8/6/2012

ah another week gone by. lots more to go.  elder smith is going home in one week from today exactly.  it sucks having peopl eclose to u go home. i feel like ill never have that day! ha for u to go see him though he lives in morgan so that would be a looong drive. but i guess u could go. haha hes awesome so it would be worth it. ya  our investigators are doing eh. we have really been trying to give them a fair chance lately and be patient cause we have been realizing that this is their salvation and its pretty dang important. haha our new goal is to make sure that every investigator has a sure knowledge if what we tell them is true or not. that is a HUGE goal and idk if its possible but well try our best. haha our main problem is being able to meet with all of them. everyone seems to be failing us these days or they can never meet, so its not easy at all.

our rc's are doing ok. hannah and godfred and elizabeth havent been to church for a while so thats discouraging. i have come to be more patient and understanding of the church here though. instead of complaining about the bad leadership and the tons of innactives we have been looking at it in a differnt perspective. the church is only 30 yrs old here so its like the church in 1860 in the u.s. when it first started it was the same thing. lots of bad leadership and innactives. so we just have to be patient and trust in the lord and hope for the best.

For sis... just remember what u stand for and never compromise that for anything. the story of joseph and potefers wife comes to mind. haha not to scare ya. but theyll be after ya so watch urself. let people know who u r and what u stand for. no gray area! also dont be afraid to have fun! always do the small things, scripture study, church, institute, prayers, etc.

ok so for my week. so tuesday on our way to district meeting i stopped and dropped my shirts off to get tailored. after a couple times of me having to take them back they finally got done and they r awesome now. they took something like 12 inches out. haha dont get too excited im not losing any weight. just getting a fufu gut. i still weigh the exact same as when i left as of yesterday.

Also on tuesday people were celebrating or mourning or whatever the one week since their presidents death and so they all had these red bandana things. we passed one guy that kept shooting off this homemade cannon thing. haha We then went to some members for fufu. im getting pretty dang good at pounding fufu by the way too! We then met with uncle jo who wont come to church cause he says his wife doesnt want to but we tried to tell him the story of lehis vision, but whatever. ha its so hard to explain stuff to people sometimes. u can explain it for ten min one little part and then ask them the question again and theyll say ya idk. ah!!! ha We then met with kader and met his daughter who is visiting from burkina faso. unfortunately she only speaks french. its weird not being able to communicate with someone at all. we then went and taught our promising new investigators shadirach deborah and a new friend tony. we taught the restoration and we did awesome! best restoration lesson ive ever been a part of.

when we went back on thurs though only one of them had tried praying and one of them couldnt even remember what we talked about last time! freakin heck!!! It was sweet when we went back on thurs though cause we had another powerful lesson and there was a guy sitting a little bit away that we didnt know and towards the end of the lesson he came over and bore a FREAKIN powerful testimony. hes not even a member! haha it was sweet. he said that he had really been touched. too bad he lives real far away :( Elder evbuomwam and i are doing awesome and i really hope that neither of us get transfered although not likely...

on wednesday i wasnt feeling too good so we only taught one lesson and then came back and i cooked some stew. we then went back out in the evening and all our lessons failed. Thursday we had a powerful lesson with alfred (who finally came to church!). we were totally in tune with the spirit and knew just what to say. we were both thinking the same things to say and scriptures and stuff. it was pretty sweet. the future is looking brighter for alfred. We then had a bunch of failed appointments and then in the evening we had a quick lesson with dorcas cause she was studying for   her exams, and she wasnt "there" with us in the lesson at all. haha

friday in my personal study i had a sweet experience while reading in helamen 13-15. about samuel the lamanite. the spirit was just with me the whole time and i was like wow this book is really true and we r doing exactly what samuel the lamanite was doing. it was pretty sweet. he tells the people pretty much everything that they need to do to get bsack to heaven. just like us! haha We had a good amount of eh lessons as well. we had a good lesson with bb (who also came to church on sunday!) there is nothing better than sitting in church and then one of ur investigators comes walking in!

On saturday we went to a wedding for a member in our ward. it was pretty sweet i guess. it was definitely different but it was cool. haha we also contacted a couple people and met some innactive members. We then taught 2 lessons that werent very good at all. one being with the most unserious human on the face of this earth. haha well be talking and teaching then shell just start singing or shell ask me to take her to america or marry her or something stupid like that. haha oh anyupdates on the olympics?

Sunday was absolutely crazy at church. we had a ton of visitors from the wedding and it was fast and testimony meeting so everyone got up and bore testimonies of the temple, b.o.m, etc. so in investigators class w ejust got bombarded with questions and stuff. just cauos. ha well i guess thats it. its been real! hope u r all doing well! i love u all so very very much! u havent forgotten me right? does it seem normal without me yet? love u all!                                                  

                   love, elder slade