We were in Chimbote today with Elder Hooker and his beautiful wife.
This is a pretty good photo for a drive by shooting.
No time to stop of course, so I am holding the camera out the window.
This is the plaza in Nuevo Chimbote.
We got up early and drove two hours to Chimbote this morning.
The Huaraz missionaries were catching a bus at 3:30 am.
They traveled for 4 hours... and then they sat in meetings all day.
And guess what... Not one of them fell asleep.
Elder and Hermana Hooker were fantastic.
Elder Hooker was a Mission President in Piura, Peru several years ago.
Yesterday, in the mission home
he told us this story about one of his missionaries.
He said that a couple of his missionaries got on a bus
and they sat down by different people.
One of the missionaries sat by an older gentlemen. They started to talk.
The older man told the missionary to please not talk to him about religion.
He was already very happy with his Bible and didn't need anything else.
This missionary was very sweet and said... I love that you love the Bible
because I do too. But I have another Book that goes right
along with the Bible that is another testament of Jesus Christ.
The man looked at the missionary and said again...
My Bible is all I need... I read it and I love it.
The missionary tried one more time to testify
to him of the Book of Mormon...
Finally the man said... Listen, in my Bible
in First Nephi it says...
The missionary stopped him and said...
"What did you just say?"
I said in my bible in Nephi it says
Look I have it with me...
The man pulled out an old taped up Book of Mormon
that had the cover torn off and it started in Chapter 3 of first Nephi
This man went into a second hand book store and asked for a Bible
and bought this old Book of Mormon with no name
and had been reading it and loving it for 7 years
and had no idea that is was the Book of Mormon.
The missionary told him all about what he had been reading.
He was excited to find out that the book belonged to a church.
He even knew where there was an LDS church near him.
He was going to go find the Elders in his neighborhood and get baptized.
That's a funny story.
We had a grand time today after our mission tour.
We went and ate together. We played paper, rock, scissors for
some extra chicken...
And now folks... it's a wrap.
Our third and final mission tour is over.
What a fantastic experience it was.
Thank you to Elder and Sister Hooker
and Thank you to the Best Missionaries in the
WHOLE WIDE WORLD!
WE LOVE YOU SOOOO MUCH!
