The water is back on! Yahoo! Now the only problem with getting people to church on Sunday was that the power went off... drats. Don't worry, some people came ;) Thanks tons for your thoughts. They will come in handy this week for someone i'm sure.
So I'm loading you up with pictures today!
The stories might not be in order with the pictures but you can sort it out right?
So to start out the week we worked on getting some new investigators and progressing others because on the 27th we should baptize 4 people, so we need to quickly progress some towards baptism. You see they have all this missionary work stuff systamitzed and all figured out.
Missionary 101.
You start by contacting around 20 people each day, some of those will let you teach them, then they become "investigators." Then you gotta have them be your friends and trust you but they cant be too much friends you see. If missionary work was a recipe then you would add a 'dash' of friendship. Then if they come to church and pray about the message of the restoration, book of mormon etc. then they become "progressing investigators." So after they come to church for a bit then you try and navigate that lesson where the Holy Ghost will smack them in the face and when you see and feel that they have been smacked (smack-en) across the face by the Holy Ghost, you can give them a baptismal date. Then you baptize them and pray that the bishop and ward members will give them a calling, home teachers etc. Then rinse lather and repeat.
President Smith calls this the 'bucket 2 bucket' system. You gotta keep filling your buckets to keep the work constantly progressing. Man all mission presidents all have to be business people, they know how to work the numbers and know how to have a constant increase. President Smith quote for yall, "I don't want to take a rocket-ship to the moon, I just want a small constant incline."
Class dismissed.
President Smith, he is a great man. He always is focusing on the work and the people and carries a big spirit, even though he is smaller than dad haha. I like him and his wife. You guys would like him. He is small, smart, always has a diet coke handy in the car. Sister Smith saw your Christmas tree calendar of cuteness you made and made me give it to her so she could keep it safe at the mission home. I said, "oh thanks. My mom sneezes out adorable stuff like this."
Anywho we were working on progressing some of our "investigators." One of our investigators, Henrita from Nigeria, came to church out of the blue. We handed her a pamphlet one day and SHE CAME! That never happens. Anywho, we taught her some more and she said that she had a dream about the end of the world with fire and stuff everywhere and chaos and she was running to this mountain and at the top of the mountain there was this very beautiful building and she started trying to get everyone to run to the building for safety, picking up crying children around her etc. She said that everyone was wearing white and it felt safe to be there. We then showed her a picture of the Salt Lake Temple and she said that that was it except there was only one pillar...kinda like the one in Accra. She is loving the message and is reading the Book of Mormon and is doing well. She was somehow upset about relief society because she is from Nigeria and speaks english and some other Nigerian language, but they were speaking Twi during relief society (smacks self in head!) The church has given the wards strict instruction to only have church in English (the official language of Ghana) for reasons like this. We called the bishop so hopefully that'll be resolved. So now we had to help her feel better about church and befriend her more. She is a college student by the church and is taking a course on beauty school stuff. We taught her once when there was a lady leaving her room from getting her nails done. She then asked if she could do our nails and practice that manicure stuff, Elder Holt quickly rejected but volunteered me. Getting my nails done is nothing new to me cause of the guitar stuff. I frequent the pro nails next to cold stone in the mall becuase of breaks or I need an emergency spare acrylic etc. So she did my nails and took photos of my hands for her class etc. She likes us and is committed to come to church again. We will hopefully give her a baptismal date soon.
Here are some photos of my lovely cuticles. Nice.
We also picked and got this cool guy, Neizer Cornelius, to come to church and read the Book of Mormon. He is a nice guy and is learning well. We contacted him when we saw him teaching some little kids how to play this complicated version of checkers called 'draft.' Elder Holt knows how to play so we asked if we could play and then we made friends with him and taught him and now he is coming to church, hopefully with his whole family soon. I learned how to play the game but it is complicated, you have to kinda predict the future. It is like chess meets checkers. Man Neizer is stinking good and likes to talk smack while playing. He handed it to me so I challenged him again, then he again beat me. Elder Holt is putting up some photos where you can see me losing hardcore.
Ah missionary work. Studying, waking up early, knocking on doors, sharing the message, changing lives, getting your nails done, eating goat testicles, playing complicated checkers and getting it handed to you by your investigator. Ya know.
Well today we visited this place called 'shoprite.' It is like a normal grocery store. Elder Holt hadn't gone for over a year and it has been around 5 months or so since I have been inside. We walked inside and it was mega weird. We both kinda freaked out.
It was somehow uncomfortable but nice at the same time. It was really cold because of the air conditioning and nobody was harassing us to come and buy and not one person yelled 'hey obroni' at us. I liked the whole being left to yourself while you shop part. Anywho the stuff is stinkin' expensive so we didn't buy too much but here is a list of what I got.
Mt. Dew
Spring Rolls (chicken)
4 Steaks (beef!!!)
Coco puffs (rip off South African version)
Soy Milk (didn't feel like I could handle real milk right now, it has been awhile)
Peanut Butter
1 small bag of doritos
1 bag of frozen brocolli, carrots etc
Jam mix
and some other small stuff.
It'll be very nice!
Today we didn't have much planned to do P-day wise so we started doing our normal cleaning stuff in the morning. We then got fed up with the front yard and borrowed a shovel from a neighbor and Elder Holt went crazy. (he worked on a ranch back home) We turned a poopy front yard with no plants into a nice mormon looking house. Our recent convert Florence bought some flowers for us and we planted them then tied up our out of control branches, got rid of tons of excess dirt that would get all over when it rains, made some rock wall little things for our flowers (who taught me how to do that?...) and of course built a stonhenge. It is feeling very nice now. We even got our chairs from our living room and moved them outside, sat in them with mt dew and our doritios while going, "yup." Life feels better when things are clean.
Oh Elder Jeffery R. Holland is coming next week to visit with us! CRAZY! Elder Holt already gave me a hair cut around my ears haha. Don't worry, I will have him trim me again the night before. I have been studying a talk he gave at the Provo MTC about the 'Divine Companionship.' This talk is amazing. You should try to track it down somewhere. It talks about having a 3rd companion, the Holy Ghost. Man it rocks, too much stuff to talk about but I have been trying to live and teach so the Holy Ghost can control the lesson and it is working. It ain't our (the missionaries) lesson, it is Their (the Godhead) and of course the Investigator. The Holy Ghost has been taking the lessons to different places making each lesson unique and we have been teaching with more power and authority. We have been able to teach things boldly and say stuff we never really knew too much about before. We are somehow being taught as we are teaching. The church is true. Anywho it'll be cool to finally meet the guy. I saw him talk at conference and at BYU a buncha times. He is really really smart and I can't wait to see what he has to say to us directly the Ghana Accra missionaries.
We get to visit the temple on Friday. It has been way too long. It'll be very nice to go and refuel a bit. Problem is we dont wanna leave the temple haha. They are nice people there. Like last time (4 or 5 months ago) the seatbelt from the taxi got my shoulder on my shirt all black and dirty. The temple workers saw me scrubbing it out in the sink and they told me not to worry about it and they took my shirt, gave me a clean one and when I got done with the session they had washed, dried and ironed my shirt for me. The temple is a gret place and the workers are great people who know the importance of focusing on the right things while inside the temple. It'll be great.
So we were teaching this family and they wanted to make us fufu so Elder Holt was helping to pound and I was playing football with the kids and then another sister and her husband came in. Her husband is this white white white guy from Germany and married the sister from Ghana. They were visiting that day. The husband only speaks German. The sister spoke English, German and Twi and I told her about Kyle Kendal serving in Frankfurt Germany and what missionaries do. I then talked to the husband in my small German and told him about my buying cheesecake in Germany experience. I speak more German than I do Twi haha. Anywho they took our pamphlets and the sister read through almost the whole thing while we were eating. The husband was trying to read some as well. I told them about the websites and how they are in a billion different languages. It was cool. They had a German/Ghanian baby. It was adorable. One of the sisters and a brother in the family were the ones that we taught a freaking powerful lesson to. The sister was asking all the soul searching questions. We will see what happens with her.
Man it rained a lot this week. I LOVE RAIN! Especially when it is always sticky hot. I like the rain smell because we are close the ocean somehow. It smells like aunt Lindy's house. When it rains (paramore song) there is 1 problem, nobody is around to teach and all the stores that have my missionary sustaining substances (coke, coconut/pineapple juice, nilla waffer cracker things) in it close. The whole place becomes deserted. So we don't have good days when it rains or when there is a football match on.
Anywho all is well. I was bummed out because our baptismal date guys were pooping out and we couldn't find where one disappeared to. Elder Holt and I prayed our guts out for help. Our investigators with baptismal dates started improving and came back and the one we couldn't find showed up to church. Man the power of prayer rocks. If you do all that you can, the Lord will take care of the rest. He only asks for your best. The power of prayer is real. If you are having a hard time with anything, don't forget to sincerely ask your Heavenly Father for help. He will help you.
Thanks dad for your letters. Since when did you learn to write so well? I liked your testimony about blessings. I gave another one this week to a recent convert who was sick. The blessing told her to remember that she has lots of friends around who love her and she also has a bishop who loves her and will always be there to help her. Also it said to remember to get plenty of sunshine. I felt goofy saying get plenty of sunshine but the Holy Ghost told me to so I did it (story of my life). She cried and it helped her a lot. Later I remember the letter dad sent talking about Bro. Skousen and his talk in stake conference. I think he mentioned something about sunshine right? Reminds me of John 14:26. The Holy Ghost brings things to our remberance. I somehow felt to mention to her to get sunshine and didn't know why or where it came from but it was Bro. Jamie Skousen who first put that into my mind and then the Holy Ghost brought it out again to help this recent convert clear in Ghana. Tell bro Skousen that he is a good guy and must be doing something right ;) (side note, that guy is stinking good at 3 point shots in basketball) Love that Bro Skousen. Thanks dad for your thoughts. You are also helping these people in Ghana. Keep it up.
Well my family I gotta go. I love you all and I always remember you in my prayers. Thanks for yours in behalf of me (big hug)
Can't wait to hear the cd of my little craby sister and her whale of a husband. Your stories make me laugh.
Keep on crocheting or however you spell it. Keep on saving the world one baby head and baby feet at a time. I always share with people about you. Thanks for being a good mommy who taught me lovingly. Man I remember how you taught me how to distinguish between candy and dangerous medicine on the floor by scattering m&m's and pills on the floor and telling me what to do. I bring both the candy and the medicine to you and you (the adult) tells me what is right. You never yelled at me ever but you rather taught me, so did dad. You both understand that the marriage is ordained by God and that you both have the responsibility to love and nurture your children in righteousness and to teach us to love one another, the provide for our physical and spiritual needs, to teach us to obey the law and be good citizens wherever we may be and that you both are equal in this responsibility, not one in front of the other but rather side by side. I and you can think of examples for each one of these principles. You guys are doing a great job. You are an example, even here in Ghana. Keep it up. I love you. Talk to you next week!
P.S. dumb bumba dumb bumb, dumb bumba dumb bumb! (olympic theme tympani part)
nuh...nah...nah doh ray me doh (trumpet thingie)
Also (fein fein fein fein fein fein feenalee fein fein fein fein fein fee! (olympic trumpet Kurt Bestor-y theme)!
oh the picture where I am doing the metal face in the shoprite store was when they were playing 'time after time.' Ya know that 1980's one. Anywho we got excited. Talk to you later. Love you.
