Happy New Year!

Christmas this year was pretty good. I wish I could have sacrificed more of my time to the Lord's service, but we didn't have any investigators to visit, and so we just went to sing to our members and a veteran's hospital. We didn't actually get to help prepare anything for dinner because Sister C and her family were on top of it. We had turkey, ham, green bean casserole, funeral potatoes, and the classic stuffing/pie/cranberry sauce stuff. All 8 of the missionaries in the ward were there, and I think Elder T and I got the fewest, yet the best gifts. The gifts I got were awesome. And I can actually use the headphones for mormon.org time, and I'm allowed to use them with my companion. So all I have to avoid, is using the headphones to isolate myself. I would say that my favorite part about Christmas was knowing that you all had gotten my gifts, and that I was celebrating the birth of the One that I had come to represent; and as His representative, I loved this Christmas. And the calendar just made me guffaw for around 5 minutes after I'd opened it. I LOVE IT! And on the days following Christmas, we tried to contact several people that we hoped had returned from Mexico. To no avail. They're still partying it up over there.

But oh well. We were able to have dinner with a lot of people in the days following Christmas, because they have left-over tamales, and so we got to finish those off for them. I've had so many tamales. It's disgusting. Other than that, we've got someone with a baptismal date. His name's D, and his mother is a less-active member, (for reasons that I don't quite understand), but he really wants to do the right thing and join the right church. The thing is, is that he's humongous. He's absolutely ripped. Muscles. EUGH.

Anywho. This Sunday was the 5th Sunday, and as we all know, that's when everyone combines for a joint lesson. We missionaries were assigned an hour to teach about member-missionary work, and our goal was to address the points that apply most to the members, which were "The purpose of missionary work", "How to do missionary work", "Who I should talk to", and "Promised blessings." Elder T and I had the last point, and so we assumed that because of unplanned interruptions, that we would only have time to bear testimony. I sincerely wanted us to be able to inspire the members, and invigorate their senses through the Spirit. So Elder T and I fasted that day, and prayed all day to have the Spirit there to bear testimony of the things that we said. When the time came, Elder T talked about how his mother met the missionaries some 40 years before she was baptized, and that because a friend invited them to church one day, he was here serving a mission. He then bore testimony of how no effort is ever wasted. I then took the time to bear testimony about how there is no faliure with the Lord. I told them about how Isaiah became one of two best friends in my junior year of high school, and told them about how I had wanted him to join the church. I told them about how for two years I had hoped and prayed that he would have a desire to come to church. And I told them about how inadequate I felt during those two years. "But," I said," it was worth every moment. On the day I entered the MTC, my friend came to my house, and said to me that he desired to be taught by the missionaries, and eventually be baptized." When I mentioned that, the Spirit went rushing through the congregation. I saw peoples' faces change from indifference to immediate surprise and marvel. I saw the Spirit working on them. I then bore testimony of the divinity of this work, and that with the Lord, we will never fail. After the meeting, around 6 or 7 members came up to me and profoundly thanked me for my testimony. The Lord truly answered my prayers, and I hope that the members will now have a stronger disposition to help their friends to find the truth.

And yesterday, I went on exchanges with Elder B in his area, which is the Eastlake area. The majority race of their area is caucasian, and very rich. The houses up there range from 600,000 up to 1.2 million. They have investigators in mostly apartments, and we were able to have several lessons, and we found some people that were quite happy that we stopped by. On top of that, I carried a christmas tree like a He-man. HEHE.

Apparently we're having a picnic today out on Coronado Island, which I just found out means "Crowned Island". BUT, I don't really have much else to say about what's happened this week, because most of our lessons have been eating tamales with members. So hopefully we'll see some more miracles this next week. Until next week, and Transfer day.

-Love, Elder Crook