I messed up last weeks blog by posting twice and leaving one out, this has a great story at the end. "We are the Lord's hands"

Family,
Well another week has come and passed. The days feel like weeks, but the weeks feel like days. And they just keep flying bye. I'm actually starting to sense already that I am not going to be able to study everything that I want to on my mission. I am not going to be able to do all that I want to do on my mission. I have plans to read all kinds of things (like the standard works), but with how fast time is going bye I’m not even going to be able to cover half of what I wanted. But that’s okay. I have the rest of eternity. I can become what I want to become, and ill just focus on that. Well things are back to the way they were a few weeks ago. Elder Keller has a new companion, Elder Wiah. He is a way cool guy from Liberia. He is like 6 foot 4 and like the most kind soft spoken giant person I’ve ever met. He is a very good missionary so I am excited to be living with him. I am teaching him "our language". Every morning he says to me "good morning bro" in his deep African voice. Its funny. So he is fitting in nicely.

This week was a really good week for teaching. We have 4 people right now with baptismal dates and maybe 4 or 5 that could be having one very soon. We are planning to have a baptism in like 5 weeks and hope to have about 8 candidates. Our teaching pool is really sweet right now. The reason why it takes a long time to be able to baptize people in Moree and just have a good teaching pool is because about 50% of the people we teach can’t read. And that makes it really hard for them to gain a very strong testimony. We have to base our judgment more off of them coming to church for a long time and then how well they are keeping the commandments and commitments we give them. Oh and that little thing called the spirit. It helps. That is probably one of the things I have noticed is the most difficult to deal with in a village. It takes so much longer for someone to gain a testimony when they can’t read. Teaching people that can read and speak good English is the sweetest thing I have ever experienced. But I would take humble people willing to listen any day, even if it takes a little longer to teach. So glad to be in Ghana.

However, our prayers have been answered. This week we taught a man who spoke amazing English, in fact he is a teacher. He is very intelligent, and he doesn’t like to mess around. Which is sweet for a missionary. We taught him all of lesson one in depth and covered a lot of small detail that we aren’t able to teach are other investigators. Like how the number 7 is symbolic. Throughout the lesson he was watching every movement we made, every comment we said, and everything we taught very carefully. I even noticed a few times where he was trying to trick us. He would ask questions like how tolerant are you of other faiths? Just a lot of stuff like that that we never get in any of are other lessons. It was the most fun enjoyable lesson I’ve ever taught. It is just so sweet to be able to teach people that can have a huge impact on a ward the day they get baptized. And use the church vocabulary I am used to. It was a sweet lesson. By the end he said that he actually loved what we had taught him and that he was very impressed with how well we presented ourselves and the message we carry. He opened up at the end of the lesson and straight up told us that he was trying to stump us, but that now we have his trust. We are going to teach him tomorrow, and he has a DVD player so we are going to watch the Joseph Smith film. I don’t know if I am more excited to teach him, or to just watch a movie for the first time in months! Anyway I am very optimistic about Francis Mensah (hint: that's his name). And boy am I glad that I didn’t slip up in the lesson, because that would have been the end.

We taught another man this week that is a member referral named Ishmael Nkumah. He is also a very smart person who would be a future leader. It is actually really funny why he wants to be a member. He told us that he wants to be a member so that he can be like us and serve a mission. That’s the only thing he saw that interested him in the church right away. He also came to church two weeks ago. We are going to take him proselyting with us this week and have him be are ward missionary and translate for us. So he will be getting taught the lessons while he is teaching other people also, which will be freakin awesome. We will definitely be teaching him on his own, but this will be cool for him to actually get a taste of what it is he wants to do for two years of his life. I guess it’s not a guarantee we haven’t asked him to proselyte yet, but I’m sure he will accept. So anyway the Lord is really blessing us with people who gain a strong testimony fast and will hopefully help out the Moree ward in the future. Our area is doing well.

So one last story I want to throw in before I wrap things up happened yesterday while we were proselyting. We were walking along a dirt road on our way to our next appointment after church, and then it started to rain really hard. So we stopped and waited for sometime underneath the overhang of the nearest building. While we were waiting for the rain to stop a little 5 year old girl was running down the road, on her way home I presume. While she was running she slipped on some mud and took a hard fall right on her face. She laid in the middle of the street crying. There were a lot of people nearby but nobody would stop to help her. It was as if they didn’t see her. I couldn’t just stand there and watch this little girl laying in the street scratched up and crying, so I ran over to where she was and picked her up in my arms and carried her over to the building we were sitting under. I washed her face off with my tie (the one Cody gave me) and then wiped off the rest of her body the best I could. She was still bawlling. I talked to her small in Fante and after a while I was able to cheer her up. I got her to smile and talk a little. When she was smiling again and happy we sent her on her way and continued on. Afterward my tie was covered in thick muddy clay and my shirt was completely covered in mud from top to bottom from carrying her in my arms. The was no white to be found. But I couldn’t have been happier. The only reason I am telling you this is because of the feeling that came to me afterward. I had never felt more in my entire life what it really meant when they say; "We are the Lord’s hands" "We are his servants" "We represent the Savior and do what he would do". I have never felt closer to the Savior. It was a simple and small act of kindness. But I was the Lord’s hands and I was doing what he would have done. I tell you this because we need to always be on the look out for those that are struggling, not only physically, but this because it will bless your life for helping more than it will bless the one in need. I have never been happier in my entire life and felt more joy than what I experienced after helping this little girl.

I have really been getting to know Elder Brown the past few weeks, and the more that I get to know him the more I like him and respect him. He is really really really smart. Which is good for me because I somehow lack in that area haha. He knows a lot about a lot of things, and he is teaching me a lot about like world governments, countries, and just random crap. Don’t worry the gospel too. But it’s really sweet. He already speaks Fante 5 times better than I do, which actually makes me really, really bitter. But I guess that’s what happens when I don’t study it at all haha. Well I guess to sum things up for the week everything is going as good as I could ask for, and the Lord continues to bless us more and more. I have noticed that my emails aren’t very interesting anymore and that I keep writing about the same thing from week to week, so I am trying to add a few new things and spice up these emails a bit.

So it sounds like you are pretty busy Miles? You have grasped the concept of real work it sounds like. What a blessing that will be cuz it’s never going to get easier, but it does get better. And that’s a promise. Whit and Cody sounds to me like you are doing well. I hope that work is doing well. Mom and Dad and Miles it sucks for you that school is starting again hahah. But not for me. Tristin and Derek and Raegan I hope you’re doing well? Sounds like everyone is loving golf and enjoying life. I swear you guys play to much golf now! I’m jealous. I took a few pictures with the jerkey and stuff. I don’t know if they will be good enough, but we still have a few pieces left so we’ll try and get some more sweet pics.

I am grateful for such a great family. I can’t tell you how many times a have thought about why I was so blessed to be a part of this family. I have pondered more about that than anything else on my mission. I don’t know why, but I sure am grateful. I love you all so much and thank God everyday for how merciful he has been to me and to our family. I know that the church is true and that it is the reason why our family is so amazing. We truly are blessed to have the gospel in our lives. Continue to stand strong in all that you do, and remember always, “ remember who you are!!” It will carry you a long way. Much love. Talk to you next week.

Love Elder Adams