"Happy Birthday"--11/29

First things first, happy birthday to Dad and Reilly. I hope that you
both have a special day. Wish that I could be there with you. Sorry
that I cant send you any presents. I know that dad really will not
care but Its a big deal to people like Reilly. I hope that everyone
else is doing great, and that they are having a much fun with the snow
as I am in my dreams. So Elder Dixon is coming tomorrow and we have
spent the whole day cleaning and have not even finished. We woke up at
6 and started to pull the weeds out of the bricks that go around our
house, and didn't finish until about 12, and that was just weeding.
Pres. Sabey called and told us that everything had to be sparkling.
The whole idea of what we are doing in Sunyani is something he really
wants Elder Dixon to think is a good idea and so he wants everything
to be perfect for him. Needless to say, that means that this p-day is
not as fun as some of the other p-days that we have had here in
Sunyani. We also have a baptism this week. We are baptizing three
people. The first is a girl named Charity, who is a nurse at the
hospital here in Sunyani. She was converted by her fiancee and will be
baptized by him this Sat., so we haven't done much work with her, just
making sure that she knows and has a testimony of everything and is
not just being baptized for the wrong reasons. We went over the
baptism interview questions with her today and she bore a powerful
testimony of this church and I think that she will be a big strength
to the church in Ghana. The Second is a girl named Ernestina. She is
the daughter of Mary, who is the woman that we just baptized a few
weeks ago. She is the one who had the problems with her mom the other
day that we had to help out with. I'm happy to announce that she is
now happily at home and that she and her mother seem to be working
things out now. I really like her and her mom. I think that they are a
little too much alike and that that is why they have some of their
problems, but they both have a solid testimony of this church, and
they are both funny people to talk to. Yesterday she told us a story
about a man who came up to her and asked if she would buy something
from her on Sunday, and she told him no, because it was the Sabbath
day. The man asked her what church she went to and when she told him
Latter Day Saints, he started to tell her not to go to that church
because in Accra about 6 months ago there were two missionaries that
raped a girl. She asked him which church he goes to and when he told
her Methodist , she asked if no one in Methodist had ever raped a girl
before. She then asked him if anyone there had ever told lies and done
bad things. He shut right up. She then told him that maybe some of the
members have made mistakes, but that she knew that the church was true
and that that was the church she would go to. The last person that we
are baptizing is a 15 year old boy who was just adopted into one of
the families in our unit. He also has a strong testimony, and has one
of the strongest vocabularies and minds of a 15 year old that I have
ever seen in Ghana. His name is David Mills. This last Sunday he asked
why it was breaking the Sabbath day to study for school on Sunday. (I
guess that his family has that rule also) I gave him the answer that I
usually give to most adults about why we need to keep it holy,
thinking that that seems to work, and he looked at me and said, "Elder
Russell, you only answered half of the question, studding is a good
thing, why cant I do it on Sunday?" Thankfully, I was able to use
personal experience and explain to him that growing up I never studied
on Sunday either. I talked to him about how that even though it might
be a good thing, it might not be the best thing to do on Sunday. I
have never gotten that question before and I thought that I was the
only one that had ever asked that question and that was to mom and dad
when I needed to do my homework. I cant really remember what I said,
but it seemed to satisfy him. The Holy Ghost really helped me with
that one, and it helped to make his mom happy with us also. So those
are the people that we are baptizing, and I think that they will all
help the church to grow here in Sunyani. This last Sunday, we also had
another cool experience, where we had had some kids that were coming,
and we asked to meet with their parents to see if we could teach them,
but they kept saying that they were busy. Finally, it came to a point
where the children stopped coming. We were able to meet with them and
they told us that their mom and dad thought that we worshiped idols.
Here in Ghana, juju and idol worship is somehow big, and when you say
saints, that means that people are worshiping them like idols.
Needless to say, with our name its a common thing for people to think
that we do that, and that is exaclty what these people thought that we
do. They told there children that if they ever came back to church
with us again that they would beat them. We had a good sit down with
them and were able to answer all of their questions and make
everything OK again. WE were also able to turn it into an opportunity
to teach them about the church, and we have another appointment with
them this week. Other than that everything has been a normal week
here. I'm having a lot of fun and know that if I work hard It will
continue. I hope that everything goes well with all of you guys back
at home and cant wait to here from you next week. Love you all, Ty