Monday, October 6, 2014

El que no sirve, no sirve‏

Hola,

The title of this email was my favorite quote in conference. It doesn`t really translate as well in English, but it basically means that if someone doesn`t serve others they aren`t worth anything. But not that harshly. It is hard to explain. haha

Conference was probably the best of my life. My questions were very thoroughly answered. We set up a room for all of the gringos to listen to it in English which was really good. The message is more powerful in your own language and by the voice of the person really giving the talk. So we were all listening in there and every time a Latin guy would talk we would run into the other room to listen in Spanish and then run back to the English room when he finished. haha. I especially enjoyed the MTC priesthood quire and an awesome priesthood session, but it did make me miss Dad, Parker, Tanner, and Grandpa thinking of how we would always watch priesthood session together. My favorite talk was by Eyring in priesthood session. One of my questions was "How can I help others to achieve their potential?" and he hit it on the head. I was thinking of all of the amazing men who have helped me to improve and strive to reach my potential. I am grateful that the Bishop was inspired to make me home teaching companions first with Dad and then with the high priest group leaders. Three amazing men right there. I think now in the mission, and as a leader especially, it is my turn to help others to reach their potential. I have been trying to do it the whole mission, but I really want it to be my focus now.

This week I was in a division for two days with a brand new missionary and it was way good to be able to try and help him and the people at the same time. The new generation of missionaries coming into our mission is awesome. It is cool to be able to work with them and try to help them learn from some of my experiences. But I learn more from the new missionaries than they learn from me.

This week we had a crazy experience when I was in divisions and we finished our lesson early and there is this other neighborhood that is farther from our tiny area, but there are some recent converts that live there and we hadn`t planned to go and it is a bit dangerous and creepy to go there at night cause they don`t have power and so there is no light, but I felt like we should go and so we went. Right as we turned the corner we see a young couple. We had taught the woman but the man wasn`t home so we went to talk to him and I was sure that was why I felt we should go, but then our recent convert comes around the corner at the same time and is way angry and yelling and his son is trying to stop him. So we go over to him and he is saying something about how he is going to fight with his neighbor because he lied and said he stole something. So we calm him down and take him back to his house and sing a song and pray and read the scriptures and he totally calmed down and even prayed at the end that he could forgive his neighbor and that they could settle their differences. I was grateful we got there just in time cause it would have been big trouble if they had started fighting. I am grateful I followed the Spirit to prevent anything bad from happening and also that it helped to calm down our recent convert.

Also, in conference they talked a lot about receiving revelation and on Sunday after conference we took our zone`s numbers for the week and they are all just having a lot of difficulties and we haven`t been able to totally help them yet. So we started talking and then said a fervent prayer together asking for guidance, and right after we realized that the problem wasn`t asking for references or working with members or inviting people to be baptized. Those are only symptoms of the deeper problems that we have which is really just a lack of faith. A lot of missionaries, myself included sometimes, loose faith that they can have success. But we need to have faith that we can work miracles even when all the odds and problems and even the history of the area are against us. We are making good plans for this month and the leadership council is tomorrow so we are really excited for that. I am very grateful that I can receive personal revelation to help myself and others because I definitely would have no idea what to do without it and things would never turn out very well. All that has gone well in my mission is because I sought revelation and received it and followed it. All that has gone bad is because I have not done that. The Lord is so willing to give us the revelation we need. We just have to ask.

Con amor, Elder Hawk

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