My time here in B2 has come to an end. Today I´m boarding a six hour train to head up to my new area. A Coruña. It´s one of the bigger cities up in Galicia (the north of Spain). It´s supposed to be really rainy so good thing I bought a rain jacket a few months ago because I´m going to use it! I´ve only heard good things about the area so I´m really excited to go and kill it up there for my last two transfers, or twelve weeks for those who don´t know missionary vocab. The city´s absolutely beautiful from what I´ve heard so I´m going to fill up my memory card with cool pictures with cool people. However that starts when I get up there. So at 9 o´clock at night Spain time. I´m still Zone Leader up there so I´ll be coming back to Madrid on June 9th to pick up our iPads! Weird... I was excited but then I realized that I´m not going to be able to see Jake off. I was planning on seeing him today but I need to write, pack and get to the train station on time.
Well this week was full of planning Dina´s baptism and setting everything up for that! So it flew by! We had the service on Saturday night around 8 o´clock and it was a really special service. As you can see by the pictures she was soooo happy to get baptized. She´s almost finished the Book of Mormon and just absolutely loves everything about the church. If we come back in a year I want to go through the temple with her and also Christian and his wife Paola said that if I do come back they want to wait to get sealed until I get here soooooooo we should do that. :) It´s been such a good experience to see all of these people enter into the waters of baptism and then set goals to go to the temple and we´re going to invite Dina to talk to Bishop on Sunday and set goals to get a temple recomend and then go do baptisms. I TESTIFY OF THE POWER OF THE TEMPLE. Having the temple so close has been a huge blessing for all of the converts here. If they go and do baptisms, they stay active. Fact.
Something funny that happened this week was that we had a good contact last week and the guy called to set up an appointment. He called. I don´t think I can make that any clearer that he wanted to meet with us than that. HE CALLED US. However turns out that he was gay and it was super awkward... However we learned a valuable lesson. Treat everyone like the children of God they are. He´s been looking for the true church for a really long time but every where he´s gone they´ve kicked him out because he´s gay. So we told him that if he fought to get over it and didn´t act on any of the feelings he has then we were willing to work with him. The church does not reject sinners, it rejects sin. The guy didn´t want anything in the end but it helped Elder Brewer and I learn and grow.
Speaking of Elder Brewer he´s a rock. He´s been through some pretty tough times on his mission. Last night he got a call from President saying that his brother had passed away in a motorcycle accident and also, on top of that, that his aunt had gone through a neck surgery and didn´t quite make it. She had also passed away. He came out of the room after talking with President and quoted D&C 58:2-4. "After many trials come many blessings" So all night and most of this morning while we´re cleaning the piso I was thinking about that. He´s a strong missionary and I really look up to him. It was inspiration to put us back together.
We also talked about that recently. In Segovia we baptized a family that wasn´t really prepared to be making sacred covenants and keep them. However this time with Dina, both of us felt how potent her testimony is and how willing she is to do whatever it is that the Lord commands her to do. In her testimony after the ordinance she said that she didn´t decide to get baptized. The Lord had decided a long time ago for her.
This transfer went by too fast. I wish I could have more time in this area and especially with Elder Brewer. He´s a good missionary and we just buckled down and got to work. The mission has changed me. I looked at a little message that I wrote Elder Brewer when I left Segovia to the one that I just wrote to him and the difference is astronomical. To the effect where last time there were only inside jokes and funny things that had happened and in the latest were just all of the things he taught me. A LOT. I´m going to come home from my mission a completely different man. However these last two transfers it´s going to be very easy to get distracted so family and friends please help me stay focused so that I can keep improving and changing! Change is good, when it helps us to be more like Christ. :)
I love you all and am very grateful for the support you´ve all given me through the course of my mission.
Con mucho cariño,
Elder Hawks
1. A little mopping
2. Dina!
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