Monday, September 21, 2015

Transferred to Akim Oda

Okay sorry for the no email last week. Its always hard to get them
sent to you guys but last time it just wouldnt work.

I have been transferred to Akim Oda. Its a city in the bush.
My new companion is Elder Dini from Zimbabwe. Im finishing his
training and we are getting along very well.
We had a baptism last saturday. Baptized two kids to complete the
family. They are such a sweet family.

It has been a great week. This week I have learned how to really rely
on the spirit. Because im in a new area and my companion is fresh to
mission and to me, ive had to make sure that im completely in tune
with the spirit. Ive been able to help people progress towards baptism
and its so crazy how the spirit works. If you guys want the spirit in
your lives, then Pray, Read Scriptures, Serve, and Seek for it!

Im doing good and am sorry about not much detail this time!

Have a nice week all my friends, family, girlfriends, acquaintances,
enemies, and other random people.

Love you all,
Elder Green

September 6 2015

Week of August 31-September 6

What is better, Zombie fish or crab. (both have to be eaten with all the guts and skin and scales and shell)

Tuesday- The highlight of the day was teaching Dyna. I can totally see and feel that she is prepared and so ready to accept this gospel. She would be baptized this week but she is traveling so right when she gets home, we are dippin her in the water. She is a sweet humble lady that knows the truth now.
Bishops wife fed us dinner. Fried rice and some smoothie drink.
We contacted this guy from Lebanon and he seemed pretty interested. We will try to follow up on him.

Wednesday- Zone Training was today. The whole zone met together and we talked about how we can improve our missionary work. I learned lots of stuff and it was cool.
We took a newly ordained priest to come out with us all day. I loved it because he was so excited to proselyte with us. We taught this guy who's name is smiling. I can't tell if he is crazy or what but something seems a little different about him. But we gave him a chance to receive this gospel anyway. We talked about the Book of Mormon and then gave him one to read because he said he likes to read.
Then we taught maryiam and Ishmael. They are two of the older children in this sweet family. We are learning about plan of salvation with them. The get everything and I think they really like this message. We will try to involve the whole family.
We taught Dyna again because she called us and told us she wants to learn more. We made her cry because she felt the spirit. It was powerful.
Choir practice was fun. The bass section is the best.

Thursday- Two main people we saw today were Peggy and Samuel. They are progressing at the same speed. They know these things are good but they won't pray to know for some reason. I know if they pray with real intent, they'll know. It's simple!!!
We took Dyna to midweek. Someone from the Philippines cam to speak about financial things for marriage. I was bored because I can't get married for 14 more months. It was good for everyone else though.
This man from Liberia met us a couple days ago and he told us we should meet him today. So we met him at the hotel that he is staying at. He is very educated. I thought it would just be a big argument. But we just answered his questions and he told us his view and stuff. I can't tell if he's a pastor or what but I know he didn't call us to change his ways.
We are trying to find out Magdalenes thought about baptism. After seeing her today, we decided it is best to back off for a while and let her make that decision on her own. We have taught her about everything.
We met Ishmael and maryiam again. They are doi good and are still solid.
We taught Joe about the law of chastity. We committed him to obey this commandment. He's getting baptized on the 10th. After that lesson, we had FHE with the whole family and played don't eat pete.

Saturday- We were so motivated today that we decided to sing a hymn before we went out today. We went out and contacted new people and had great success. We taught five people that we contacted today a lesson. So five lessons that we didn't plan for plus all the other lessons we did plan for. It was so great!
I made Elder Paddon have to sing by himself at church tomorrow for choir.

Sunday- We had church and we met with families after church and we strengthened them and are building the kingdom of God. A lot of our apointments failed and i was bummed out about that but then we went to this family that is kind of struggling because the mother doesnt have a lot of support from her husband and her mom died a couple months ago. We made some banana bread and gave it to her. She really appreciated it and we answered some of her questions about different things. I felt like the appointments were meant to fail because she needed us most. Then she gave us a referral and that person is really seeking the truth. I know we were there for a reason. 
Joe is all good to go for his baptism on the 10th. We ate fufu at his house. I probably ate 99% of the fufu while my companion helped me eat the other 1%. Luckily i love fufu :) and its good because now we are consistantly eating fufu every sunday. 

I LOVE ALL OF YOU. Be good and 

Would you rather eat snail or cow skin?

Would you rather eat snail or cow skin?

Monday-
We had a nice family home evening at night. We talked about service and why we should serve and tied it into sharing the gospel with friends. I felt the spirit. Then we played Don't Eat Pete. It was hilarious! No one here knows what it is so I had to introduce it to them and carry on the family tradition :) Next time ill try to get a video.
Tuesday-
I was in a trio today with Elder Paddon and Elder Desta. It was sweet! We went out into my area and had some great lessons. I like going out with other missionaries because I can learn new ideas and new things from them. One thing I learned from Elde Desta is that I need to talk with everyone. I've been teaching this guy named Collins about 3 times. But he has travelled and hasn't returned. His brother always tells us he isn't home so we just say okay and leave. But Desta talked to his brother and asked if we could sit down with him. He said yeah and we taught him. He is sweet just like his brother. I wish I had talked to him before. Everyone deserves to hear about the restored gospel!!!
We extended a baptismal date to Dina. Everything was perfect and she accepted. The only problem is she just informed us right after, that she doesn't actually live here. She lives in another region and will go back in 10 days. Bummer.. She is so ready for this gospel! I am not sure if the church is in that region yet.
I told Elder Paddon that if he contacted this person and got her to let us sit down with her, I'd give him a fanice. He did it. So now I owe him a fanice.
As a district, we make dinner together one day a week. Last week it was pancakes. (I finally used the pancakes you packed for me mom). This week it was taco soup. It tasted AMAZING except the chips were kind of stale. It was just like chili.

Wednesday-
We set up an activity for the young men. This morning we played ultimate frisbee and football with them for a couple hours. It was a lot of fun. These guys are crazy good. But no one knows how to throw a frisbee. I was the goalie for a bit but they kicked me out because I let the other team score three times. And then I never touched the ball again ;(
We had district council meeting after that. We as a mission are focusing on preach my gospel chapter 10 for this month. So in companionship study we will be focusing our studies on that.
We went out to see a man named nii borty first thing. He has a huge house and didn't trust us because he thought we were just acting like we share the word of god but actually wanted to steal something. But then we gained his trust and he allowed us to come back another time :) After that we visited Delaly (our rice girl). She is reading the Book of Mormon and praying about it. We gave her some passages to read from and next time we will see if that helped her. Next we met a lady named Bridget. She is the person who saw me crash last week. We went back to her and taught her. She was so happy to get to know us and our message.
We had choir practice. I struggle at playing the piano for them. My eyes can't focus long enough to play as fast as I want. Frustrating. But we are singing well. The stake president told us our ward has the best choir in the stake.

Thursday- Some big black bird was digging through the rubbish this morning. Knocked over the can and just made the whole back area of the outside of our house dirty.
The other missionaries had a baptism today so we invited Dina to see the baptism. She loved it so much and told us that the next baptism will be hers! And then joe also came and he told me he will be ready to be baptized before Sunday. It is funny how last week I thought we wouldn't get any baptisms this transfer but now we have two baptisms for sure in 2 weeks. The work is sooo sweet.
At midweek we learned about the men's Devine roles and responsibilities. Preside, provide, protect, procreate, love. God made man first so the man can take care of the woman.

Friday- The APs called me in the morning and told me that they were coming to go on an exchange with me and Elder Paddon. They came a couple hours later and I went with Elder Santo from South Africa. It was a great day for us. He really helped me a lot with the people we are teaching. I now have a better idea about how to handle people and when to drop less actives. We found a nice family that has the smartest little girls ever! We asked them what they did today (they're on vacation) and they said they went to the library! I love it when small children speak good English and only English :)

Saturday- Ephraim (a member) came out to proselyte with us. It helped sooo much. He showed us where a couple of his friends stay am we met them. It was such a blessing to receive referrals today and find people that are prepared to receive the gospel.
The struggle with my mission is I have to constantly deal with these stupid bikes! It seems like I'm spending at least one half day at the repair shop a week! My tire blew up while I was ridding it today.
Choir was fun. We are still learning I am a child of god in twi. I'm trying to memorize it. Obroni can speak twi!

Sunday- Church was very nice today. Because it was the 5th Sunday of the month, for 3rd hour we were all together. We all worked on... Family history! It was a great experience for everyone. Everyone was doing it and filling out their pedigree charts. I was in charge of taking all of the pictures. So if you happen to see any that the church puts out, make sure you know I was the photographer. Now we are going to follow up on those people and make sure they take the names to the temple. It's a sweet work.
My Sunday proselyting went well. After church we met with a lot of families. Those families all have someone who isn't a member. So we strengthened the families and taught the investigators. We had a fhe with the ward mission leader. We were fed rice balls and groundnut soup. Then I gave a small lesson about following the example of the trees in the sacred grove. After that we played a funny game. We all pick one animal to be and we have to come up with a sound and a sign for that animal. I chose a humpback whale.
Joe is still doing well. We taught him about faith and repentance. He will be baptized on the 10th for sure and he says that day is too far away. He's a great guy and friend.
Oh and we had to walk everywhere today because my tire blew up again... In the house! Bicycles make me the most angry!

I love you all family and friends! Make sure you all dont forget me when you eat your oreos, dorritos, snickers, cake, donuts, steak, and mccdonalds. Thanks. 

Elder Green

August 24 2015

When was the first McDonald's built?

Tuesday- We decided to contact and go to a new part of our area that we haven't really gone to much. Now that we have bikes we can go farther and be more effective. We met this man named Steven. He let us talk to him and present our message. He said we could come back and that he'd read the pamphlet. Then we contacted more people but didn't have any more lessons in the morning.

Wednesday-I had an accident on my bike today. It was frustrating because I was planning on wearing the same shirt and pants all week long. Now I can't because they are all brown! Instead of going home to clean myself up, we rode to sister mensah and visited her family. She was very concerned about what happened to me so she cleaned my cuts up and gave me washing powder to wash my pants. The next person we saw was a less active. She also was concerned so she gave me a wet cloth to clean my pants. I love the reactions the people here give for the smallest things :) everyone's heart is so big here.
We also met with joe. He is doing very well and it's so awesome to see him change and accept this message. We first played a game with his family and then we taught him the plan of salvation. Perfect lesson :)

Thursday- We decided to say a prayer before every lesson today. As we were doing that right before we entered the gate to our first investigators house, a woman stopped us and just wanted us to follow her to her house. So we did and she told us she wants to join us. So we taught her and hopefully she will come on Sunday.
The Steven guy I was talking about on Tuesday let us teach him again today. Waste of our time. At the end of the lesson he said "let me tell you my true identity. I'm an apostle for a church." And then he was telling us we were wrong. So we finished him small about how he doesn't have the authority and we just left. Bummer.
Delaly is doing well. She is still praying and reading the Book of Mormon. And we shared something in the liahona to magdalene. It was about prayer. How god answers 4 year olds and all ages and no matter how simple the prayer is, they are all answered.

Friday- Godwin finally returned from traveling so we saw him and shared about the Book of Mormon. The we me an old lady named Stella. We told her to share with us her favorite scripture. It fit in perfectly to what we had to share :) the spirit is awesome! Harriet is doing well and we are trying to involve her whole family. It is just her that wants to be baptized. I feel she is too young to baptize by herself.

Saturday- I cleaned a lot and studied a lot.

Sunday- Four investigators came to church. We were almost late for sacrament meeting because we had to pick up Dina. She came for the first time and i think she really enjoyed it. The classes were absolutely perfect for her. After church we had a nice FHE and ate fufu. I ate most of it and All of the cow skin. I love fufu now. 

This was my week. It was a nice week and we got a lot of stuff done. I am doing well and i hope all of you are too. 

Love, 
Elder Green 

August 16 2015

My week of August 10-16

Monday- The outside of our apartment hasn't been cleaned in a while so we all just weeded, swept, and made everything look nice. It took a looong time. Probably about three hours. But now everything looks nice and the landlord is happy now. Thanks mom and dad for teaching me how to do yard work :)
Then all of our FHE appointments failed that night so we had nothing to do.

Tuesday- we had a great day planned but not everything went the way we planned as usual! The people we thought were going to be serious just ended up arguing about the most random pointless things. But we met some new people. We met and talked to this old old lady named grace. She lives just behind our apartment. She was alone all day which was not good for her. I was glad that we met her because she just uplifted my spirits and made me happy.
Elder Paddon and I have been taking turns contacting and finding people. It's been working out pretty good. We try to talk with everyone so we don't walk passed someone who is ready for the gospel.
Then we had coordination and got some advice from our ward mission leader. It was a good day

Wednesday- Today I went on an exchange with one of my zone leaders Elder Jessee. We exchanged because he was going to help an investigator with her questions and concerns that she's had for a long time. But she was not there so our plan failed.
I learned a lot today. New ways to explain things and new scriptures. It was a nice experience.
There's this less active that has a concern about baptism for the dead and I realized that I don't have to argue about that topic to help him. He just needs to understand the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph smith is a true prophet. Then everything should clear up.

Thursday- This was a crazy day! The youth in this part of Ghana had a big efy thing going on. It was at one of the colleges close by my area. Today the youth focused on missionary work. So the whole day Elder Paddon and I lead a big group and we learned how to share the gospel with friends, family members, and strangers. It was a great experience for me. One thing we did was led that group to a busy place close by. And we had an open venue with them. So it was the youth stopping people and sharing the gospel.
 I was following a couple youth around for a while just to observe. One was very very small and young. He was with another guy who was probably at least 16. The small boy would stop a stranger and start a conversation. He'd stumble a bit, but keep trying. Then the older boy would get the conversation going again so the younger boy could teach. The small boy was so powerful but simple. And that's all the gospel is. All you have to have is a testimony! So don't be scared to share with friends :)

Friday- I led the Book of Mormon devotional. It was helaman 1-4. About standing firm in righteousness and not letting contention into our lives.
This was supposed to be a great busy day full of lessons. My companion and I were excited for this day. But it turned out to be frustrating and slow! The people we wanted to meet with weren't home. Then we took our bikes to the shop to get them fixed but that took too long and right when we left the shop, they broke! We need our bikes to work so bad so we can teach more lessons.

Saturday- Right when we left the apartment, elder paddons bike broke. So we had to walk it down to the bike shop. Again! That messed up our perfectly planned morning. But it's normal because our plan doesn't usually go the way we think its gonna go. But we were able to see Sarah and make sure she will come to church. And we saw prince who is less active. He gave us chicken and Elder Paddon shared an inspired scripture about agency. Hopefully he comes to church and uses his agency correctly! Choir practice was sweet and pec was good.

Sunday- We had magdalene at church which was good. We are still trying to help her with her concern about baptism. I feel like we are so close with her! We also had a very good lesson with Joe. He accepted to be baptized. Well actually he told us to baptize him. So it was great! The sunday was good. we taught some other great people and church was good too. 

It was a good week for us and we will continue to hasten the work 

Elder Green 

August 10 2015; week in L'Korshie

This has been a great week! Transfers were on wednesday and I met my new companion Elder Paddon. Man he is sweet! We are getting a long great and are having great success already. He really came to work hard and that is helping us a ton because now we are able to have the spirit with us which is essential. 

This week i dont have a lot of time so ill just type the highlights of the week.

We have met some surprising serious people as we were contacting. Theres this one lady who we found thats sweet. At the beginning of the lesson, we just asked her to share with us her favorite scriptures. She had her bible and all the scriptures she shared were about the apostasy and it led perfectly into the lesson. we actually had a lot of experiences like that. We shared a scripture to a less active and it was the exact same thing that he was thinking about earlier in the day. Things are just going right in place. 

We had fufu and i ate most of it ;) delicious! 

I love you guys! sorry for the short email this week!

Elder Green

weekweekweekweek

Monday- We had a couple FHEs planned for the night but we were only able to make it to one. It was a good fhe. The member talked about agency. But the cool thing is i found out that it was my friends house from the mtc. So I took some pics with his mom haha.

Tuesday- President called me in the morning and told me that he wants me to train. So in a week, ill get a greenie strait from the mtc. Either an American, South African, or Zimbabwean.

Wednesday- I went to a meeting for the people who are training this next transfer. We were instructed and we had fried rice. It was at the temple site.

Thursday- We saw Godwin and I don't know if he will ever visit the church. If he comes, he'll progress. But if he doesn't, I feel like he won't so we will hope he comes Sunday.

Friday- It was our mission temple trip. Oh I love the temple so much. It truly is for the living. I just love the feeling I have while I'm in there. I wish I could go there more often! But it was an amazing experience. Then we had a mission conference. We were instructed on lots of things and it was great for me. I really needed this day.

Saturday- We had a great lesson with a guy that knows that there is a lot of corruption in most churches. He is one of the few people here who believes that God has a body and that He and Jesus Christ are two separate beings. He stopped us on the street last week and told us he wanted a Book of Mormon. So today we brought him one and explained it. He really has a good understanding on things and I feel like if we teach the apostasy well to him, he will become converted.
Sunday- 2 investigators came i think. I starved because i was fasting but then i remembered i had no food in the apartment. So i had to scrounge around the house to find little snacks haha like a mouse. but i survived. 

Week in West Africa

Tuesday- I went on an exchange with the district leader elder schoessow. Because we needed him to do a baptism interview for a small boy named Gordon. He's nine years old and just hasn't been baptized yet so the missionaries before me already taught him. So I was with him and we had a couple good lessons about the Book of Mormon.

Wednesday- We are teaching joe. We feel like we can give him a baptism date soon. He really likes the teaching and asks great questions. When we answer him, he really understands and accepts it.
Last week someone came to us while walking on the streets and he told us he wanted to learn about the church. So we got his number. Today we finally got a hold of him and we found his house. He is actually going back to Kumasi on Friday so that's a bummer. But his grandpa is less active. So we met him as well and now we have another less active to work with.
Choir practice was today. Elder sharp came late so there was no one to play the piano. So I was able to play small and I taught everyone their parts with the piano.

Thursday- The highlight of the day was the baptism. Elder Okwu and I had Gordon (9 years) baptized and the other set had 2 people baptized. Lots of people came and it was successful. The second best part of the day was when someone we just met told me that I have mastered the Ghanaian English and I sound just like one.

Friday- We were contacting a huge compound that had 3 tall apartment buildings in it. We knocked on every single door. Out of all the people living there, we were able to teach one 22 year old. He was so happy that we were there and he told us that we are welcome any time. It was nice to find him but it took a lot of hard work to get to him.
We taught Godwin all about speaking in tongues. He had a lot of questions on that so we read from 1 Corinthians chapter 14. I feel like he can really progress IF he comes to church.
There is a Muslim man that some missionaries have been teaching but he moved to our area so now we get to teach him. The first words he said to me when I first saw him was "when is my baptism?" He said he was reading the Koran and realized that Jesus Christ is the chosen messiah and he is the way back to God. So his family disowned him and he is now hiding from them because they are looking for him. We have a lot of work to do with him but he has a great desire and great faith.

Saturday- Most of our success for the day was in the morning. Joe is continuing to progress. We will be expecting him at church again. We helped a member prepare banku. I just fanned the fire because I didn't want to mess their food up. We are also expecting a man named Isaac to come to church.
A lady called us in the ward and told us to go to her house so she can drive us over to someone who needed a blessing. I love riding in cars. Then we were late for pec and choir practice but its okay.
Sunday- The investigator that we will extend a baptism date to this week came to church. We feel that he will progress well. After church we went to see a member and he gave us 3 referrals so thats great. We have been working really hard on getting referrals. So our hard work is paying off.
It was a good week and i hope you all had a great week!
Elder Green

July 20 2015

Monday- I was recovering from a terrible night of food poisoning. I stayed in bed all day long and just slept. Then the light came back and I showered and went back to sleep.

Tuesday- District council meeting: We discussed small about how to use the Book of Mormon more often and more effectively in our teachings. Sometimes I find it difficult to introduce it right away but I need to remember that the Book of Mormon is our greatest weapon. It is what separates us from all the other churches. I also feel that it brings the spirit more than anything else I can use to teach. So my goal is to use the Book of Mormon as I am contacting and finding people all this week. Because of the Ghanaian English, most people think its the book of mammon. Because mammon here is pronounced the same as Mormon. They are afraid of it so I always have to show them the way they are spelled different.
We met too many drunk people today. We tried to teach a less active family but there was a drunk man there and he was worrying us too much so we had to leave and we will go back another day.

Wednesday- In the morning we taught Godwin. He is a sweet guy that is truly trying to find the truth. He had some pretty good questions for us. One of them was about how someone he knew was saying that there is no Christ and he wanted to know our view about those people. We read the story of korihor to him and it was perfect! He understood and realized that he should never doubt that there is God and Jesus Christ. The rest of the morning we accidentally went to the middle of zongo and got rejected too many times.
After lunch we saw Dina (the less active we saw on Tuesday). This time it was just her so we were able to teach her. I am still trying to find the best way to teach less active members. Any suggestions? She will be traveling at the end of the week so she won't be able to go to church this week :/. We are teaching Harriet which is the 12 year old girl. She stays right next to some members and they bring her to church. We are trying to involve her mom but she is always super busy. We want her parents to come to church with her before we decide what we will do with Harriet. She's a sweet girl.
Then at night we had choir practice. This ward does good at having midweek and other activities. It is fun to sing with them.

Thursday- We saw magdalene and taught her about some commandments. We are pushing her baptism date back because we feel she needs more time and I don't really see a desire from her. She just has her sister and the missionaries pushing her. So we will step back a bit and see what she really wants.
We taught Sarah the less active about the restoration. She said that she really liked the way she felt during the lesson and she wants to keep learning so she can share it with others.
We are also teaching this guy named Joseph. He was being taught by the missionaries about a year or two ago so we are just giving him a second chance. We found him one day and he likes the missionaries. We taught him about the Godhead. I'm not sure what he really thinks about it yet. We will see next visit.
Sarah came to midweek which was great and then she gave us a referral. We have been making it a goal to get more referrals but its very difficult because we can't just go ask someone for one.

Friday- I felt like it was a good day. We taught some good lessons that I felt the spirit a lot. We had a long lesson with esiinam. While teaching her I was so great full that I'm in Ghana. Because I felt like I was teaching someone in the US. They are stubborn papa! Chai. But we just bore testimony to her and used some scriptures and told her to pray. Now it's all up to her to have the desire and pray with a humble heart.
A member called us around 2 and told us to come over. She was preparing banku for us. So we helped her cook it and then we ate it. It was banku and shito with egg and fish. It was nice. When I was finished, I just wanted to go back to the apartment and sleep! Banku makes me sooo tired.
But we stayed out and contacted some people and helped a lady wash her clothes and then we helped another lady prepare kanke.
We had an fhe with a family. It was a SWEET fhe! Because it was an fhe and then in the middle it turned into a member present lesson and then we blessed a child that has malaria and then we had a blast playing the game. It was a nice time and the spirit was definitely there. And then also a lady dashed us coke.

Saturday- another successful day because we were dashed come again. We were just contacting and we went to this house and he told us he is Muslim and then he rejected us but when we were leaving, he said we were doing a good work and just gave us some coke :). Then we were fed banku again. This time it was with okra soup. It was good and then we went with that member to see someone close by and teach for the first time. She really liked us a lot and I think she will progress because she is friends with the member. Then we contacted more people and we also saw Harriet. We met her dad and he was cool with us. But he doesn't want to learn from us.
Later in the evening a member (bro chris) invited us and also the other missionaries over to his house to eat dinner. His wife fed us eba. It's a Nigerian food and is one of my favorites here. The rest of the night I was feeling so sick because I ate so much but luckily the rest of the night was just choir and meetings at the church so I was able to just sit and let the food digest. In the meeting, we were trying to create a third ward out of the two wards we have in the building. I don't know when the split will happen but the wards are growing fast!

Sunday- One investigator came to church. We met him last week at a members house. Then we taught a recent convert and gave a blessing and taught an investigator and then thats it.
Have a great week family and friends! The Church is true, the book is blue, and Moroni is on the ball.