Dear Family,
We have had a good week this week, I won't mention numbers or Josh will die. But we are planning on having 2 baptisms this week. The first is a Sister A______. She was a member referral and is now living with Bishop Mensah and has progressed well through all of the lessons. The second we are baptizing is Brother G_____. We found him in our area book and finally had the opportunity to meet him and he has a great desire to get baptized and has a great motivation to do baptisms for the dead for his ancestors. I never realized how much baptisms for the dead means for some of these people. I have always had temples all around me and had an opportunity to go do work for the dead all of the time. Brother G's desire to do baptisms for the dead has made me realize how important and significant temple work is. He wants his ancestors to have and accept the gospel and those ordinances so much, it touches my heart. He asked if he could do anything specific so his ancestors would accept the ordinances. It is truly a blessing to have temples all over the world.
This week I had the opportunity to visit some of the really good members of the church. Christmas is around the corner so I have been thinking about how different this Christmas will be away from home. I remembered something President Crandall told me before I left. He said, "There will be times where you will miss your family. You are being called to be a part of other families now. Those are the families you will be serving." This week I have felt part of different families in the ward. It has been such a blessing to have such loving families to serve around. Bishop Mensah and his family have already had a great influence on me. I can feel that love that comes from families from them. Bishp Mensah is incredible by the way. He is about 30, has 3 kids under the age of 4, works at the MTC training the teachers, and is in college. He has an incredibly busy life but is one of those people who seems to take time with everyone to make them feel important. He is a blessing in my life.
This week I have learned many things. I have learned the importance and how to teach in unity better. I also learned the importance of not giving up on people. I was concerned that we were spending too much time on people that we would need to put too much work into, to get them to be baptized. Elder Ojaide told me of some experiences he has had of people changing their lives completely because of the gospel. My heart was softened as I realized that God doesn't give up on people, so why should I be so quick to do so? I hope I can be the means of helping even one person see the effects of the atonement in their life.
Answering mom's questions:
When you talk about marriages, what is knocking? Man does the knocking meaning he goes to the woman's parents and asks what the bride price will be. It sometimes takes years to pay the bride price so they are legally wed when knocking has been done. The Church is actually trying to do away with it.
Are you starting to adjust to the new culture? Yep, funny story: Usually people are scared at night when a black person is in a dark alley with them and such. The other day I saw a white person and I got that same kind of nervousness. It was kind of funny.
How is the power- still 24 on 12 off, or the other way around? They just take and give whenever. It usually is close to 24 on 12 off but we never know when it will be on or off which is the most frustrating part.
What were you most grateful for this week? Our trip to shoprite today so I could buy ground-beef. I wanted to buy cheese but a block was 100 cedis (about $26 American dollars). In all actuality though I was grateful for the knowledge I gained this week. I am also grateful for good members.
Again, the strangest thing you saw this week? I saw a goat get run over by a car the other week, get up, shake it off and keep going on.
I am sorry mom I am not sending pictures. We are told not to proselyte with a camera so I don't know when I would take pictures. I am starting to feel the pain of no snow. Especially for Christmas. I was telling this boy in our ward about what are Christmases are like and about playing in the snow. He was so excited it was cute. I love you all. Have a good week.
Elder Shelton
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