Baptism!‏

Afoyo!

Well as you can see by the subject line Jimmy, Phoebe, and Alisa were able to successfully back a covenant with our Father in Heaven! It was such a great day for them and for me. It is the first family that I have had the privilege of help get baptized. I am so excited for them. Next stop, temple! (in one year.)

Well, other than that there isn't much else to report, just living the dream. We have another family that we are starting to see progress. Yosam and his family are doing really well. They weren't able to make it to church yesterday because of an emergency, but they are understanding everything pretty well. I can't believe that it is already March tomorrow! I also can't believe that I have been here in Gulu since October! Well, not much else to report. I love you all and hope you have a great leap day!!

Mar, Elder Hawk


You know you're in Africa when you hear women doing tribal yells.

Cleaning the Baptismal font, just walking, and the baptism

Lock Down‏

Afoyo!

Well, not much to report this week because we were on lock down for the elections. Nothing crazy happened. It was just a really boring couple of days. Luckily we have the Taylor's! We got to play games, make doughnuts, and even watched 2 movies (with Presidents consent of course)! I also have been giving missionaries haircuts, I guess it runs in the blood, thanks mom! Jimmy and Pheobe's baptism will be next week for sure! Also we had another investigator at church yesterday! Yosam and three of his kids came! His wife would have been there, but their son broke his arm the day before. Well, not much else to report! I love you all!

Mar, Elder Hawk


You know you're in Africa when you are the only one who can cut white people hair..

Lock Down

These are pictures and text from Elder and Sister Taylor's blog: happiestfacesonearth.org

This week is elections here in Uganda. It is one of the most predictably violent times of the year, and almost all Ugandans and foreigners go into a kind of lockdown to avoid trouble. As missionaries, we are staying in our compound for three days. As such, we have time to be together, to play and to testify. 

God's Timing

Afoyo!

Well, this was a pretty good week. Ups, downs, and in between.

So I'm sure you are all a little curious about the title of my email today. So this week we wanted to get Jimmy and Phoebe as ready as possible for their baptism. we taught them the Word of Wisdom last Sunday and they didn't seem to have any problems with it. They have been drinking tea for most of their lives (just like everyone else here) but they weren't super attached to it. On Tuesday we saw them again and asked how it was going with the Word of Wisdom. They said they had been taking tea still. They have to live the Word of Wisdom for at least 7 days before they can be baptized so they had to be pushed to next week. Not a horribly bad thing. If anything it will help them understand how important keeping the commandments are. They felt really bad and we told them they needed to repent and to give away all the tea in their house. We gave them a call the next day and they said that it was all gone. They are so awesome and I am excited to see them finally enter the waters of Baptism. I know that they are ready.

Saturday President Chatfield came up for interviews as well to let us watch the Missionary broadcast from like 3 weeks ago.. both were super amazing. President Chatfield always knows exactly what I need to hear. It is especially awesome to get to talk to him one-on-one. The missionary broadcast was the first time in many years that they have done it. The theme was "Teach Repentance, baptize converts" They just went through many of the main points in Preach My Gospel and it was so awesome to see these General authorities teach these principles. The biggest thing I took away from it was to always have the name of Christ on my lips. As a representative of him I should bare testimony of him every time I get the chance. Our purpose as missionaries is to "Invite others to come unto Christ..." he is the center of our message. This doesn't just apply to missionaries either. Every Baptized member of the church has taken upon his name. In the sacrament prayer is says that we are "willing to take upon [us] the name of thy son, and always remember him" we need to think about him more often then we do. We need to testify of him more often than we do. I know that he lives, and is the Son of God. He died for us and became the savior not only for the world as a whole, but for each one of us personally. I love him and know him.

Well, that's about it for this week, other then that yesterday my companion and I were asked to speak in Sacrament meeting 30 minutes before it started. But then again it isn't the first time it has happened since I have been here. haha. Well I love you all and hope you always have our Redeemer's name on your lips.

Mar, Elder Hawk


You know you're in Africa when people are advertising with huge speakers in the back of their truck yelling and blasting music as loud as they can.

Pictures: Me and my Companion (I only look fat because he is really skinny and he only looks super black because I'm super white. Haha.), and us with one of the recent converts.

Godly Sorrow and Great Joy

Afoyo!

Well this week there was good and bad as you can tell from the subject line. Let me explain:

Godly Sorrow- Well we have been teaching this family for a couple weeks now and they understood really well. They read the Book of Mormon and love the messages we share. They always had a lot of questions and I enjoyed seeing them. I can say that I had come to love them. However, they hadn't come to church yet. If someone doesn't come to church for 3 weeks straight we have to drop them. The 3rd week was last week, but they gave a very good reason so we gave them one more week. This week we taught them 3 times. The first two were good, but the questions were getting a little defensive and I didn't like the way everything was looking. The 3rd lesson, we read the 4th chapter of the Book of Mormon with them and after they started asking some questions and he asked why we didn't use the Bible very often. We told him that he already knew about the Bible and so we wanted to emphasize the Book of Mormon because without it we can't have the fullness of the gospel. It kind of turned into an argument. The biggest problem I think was that he didn't pay attention to the Spirit when he read and listened to our messages. He took it for the knowledge not for the feeling. It just goes to show that the Spirit is the real teacher in this work. Without the Spirit people cannot come to know for themselves. After that lesson as we were walking I knew they weren't going to come to church the next day so I knew we were going to have to drop them. I was overcome with Godly sorrow for these people because I know that it is only through this gospel that we can make it back with our Heavenly Father. Enough with sad things, on with the good!

Great Joy- Yesterday Jimmy and Phoebe came again with their family! They are getting baptized this next week if everything goes right, as I have faith that it will. They are so awesome! They read the Book of Mormon everyday and Phoebe even translates it for their daughter into Luo! Every time we teach them the Spirit is so strong and I always leave so happy! I love their family so much and am so excited for the covenant they will be making with the Lord. The best part is that they are one step closer to being able to be sealed as a family for eternity. That is the end goal.

I testify that without the Spirit this work is 100% impossible. I know that this message can change lives if people allow it to. No one has ever gotten converted if they didn't first have at least the desire as it is said in Alma 32. I know that there is no satisfying work than that of missionary work and that the greatest happiness that comes in life is seeing others change theirs for the better and I am privileged to be a part of it. I know the effort I put in is nothing compared to what the Lord does. I know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints is Christ's only church on the face of the Earth. In the name of The Savior Jesus Christ, Amen.

Mar, Elder Hawk


You know you're in Africa when you hear and see tribal dances!

I wanted to send a video but it was too big..

Man of the North

Afoyo!

Transfers came this morning. They said that the transfer will be 8 weeks and that me and Elder Majawa are staying, again! This will be our 4th transfer together here in Gulu. Pretty crazy.

Well, this week was pretty good. Just a couple interesting things that happened this week: we got in a debate with a Nun and we had a family come to church!

So about the Nun... haha. We went to this lady named Rose, who always gives us water and snacks, even though she isn't really interested in the church. When we go occasionally her friend who is a Nun is there. Usually we just talk about our days and things like that, but this day was different. Elder Majawa asked her what the Catholic Church believed (even though he was a member of it for 18 years of his life). To make a long story short, we had a long discussion on some doctrine and she ended up asking for a Restoration Pamphlet.. haha.

The Family is the more important and more exciting part of the week. Here in Gulu the two biggest obstacles are marriage and people coming to church. We had three families this last week who were all married and had a great chance of coming to church. Unfortunately only one came, but that is still super awesome! Their names are Jimmy and Pheobe and they have 2 kids. This was the make it or break it week for them. If they didn't come we would have to drop them. Luckily they came and I am super excited. They seemed like they really liked the church and we have good teachers who got them involved during the lesson. We had a baptism date for them, but we are going to have to move it back since it took them so long to come to church. I am excited for what the future holds for them.

Well, not much else to report on. I love the work and Uganda. Thanks for all you guys do.

Mar, Elder Hawk

You know you're in Africa when kids are fascinated with your arm hair.