Letter to his little brother Miles Jan. 22, 2012

Miles,

Bro that is so tight that you got your call to freakin Paris, France!!!! Are you nervous to have to speak and learn French? But when you get home man you will be able to get any girl you want after you talk to her with your sexyF rench accent haha. Man so you didn't even tell me when you have to report to the MTC??? (May 30th) And you better be coming back for my homecoming man, I don't care of you have school or not son. Man I am so pumped to see you bro. Your gunna have to teach me how to get the ladie,s man I totally forgot everything and I am pretty sure I wouldn't be able to get a date with anyone. Keep working hard man and read your scripts and say your prayers everyday nothing is more important than that, not even all those cute girls running around. Alright bro waiting to hear back from you man. Take it easy.

Love Elder Adams

January 22, 2012

Hey mom,

Yeah so I am sorry that I am late with my email this week but you can't be mad at me we have been working really hard. We left early on Monday to go to Kumasi for Zone Meetings with BANTAMA SUNYANI AND DICHEMSO, and also to go on splits. We just got back from Sunyani about 15 minutes ago and it's been a long week with way to much driving, but a great one nonetheless. I even tried to find some time to email you in Kumasi but we just couldn't do it sorry. I also had what a would say was the most powerful lesson of my entire mission hands down!!!!! I will tell you about it, but let me answer some of your questions first.

First off I don't really care where we go to eat if that is the plan, all I know is that I don't want any rice, chicken, fish, bread, or eggs!!!!!!!!! I have been eating that everyday for two years. Maybe a steak and a fresh salad would be nice haha, but really anywhere is cool with me. Yeah about the invisalign retainers... me, Brown. Speech and Hair went on splits yesterday and were on the way to an appointment when we passed a nice basketball court. So we played a game to 5 points, me and Speech vs Brown and Hair. Meanwhile, my retainers which I had put in my front shirt pocket behind my tag fell out during the intense game, because they were no longer there when we got back to the apartment and that was the last time I remember having them. So now I have no retainers and my teeth will probably be crooked by the time I get home. Hey come on, I did pretty well, I almost made it 2 years. Yes, Speechly is very much like Kent and I think that is why we are so tight. Speech is flippin funny man. Yeah I totally talked to Elder Alba about that two days ago and he said that they were cousins somehow and that he knew them. It is a small world.

Okay as for garments they don't sell the drylux ones here in Ghana and those are the only ones that I personally like. So you are going to have to get me like 10 pairs of the drulux garments before i get home please. They are all mediums the ones that I have right now so you should order the same bottoms, but maybe some large tops. The medium tops are kinda small now but at the same time they still fit. Maybe just a few large ones so that I can try them. And don't get me the celestial smile ones, I want the crew neck ones. I am pretty sure I will leave all of my clothes behind because most of them are pretty worn and some other missionaries have already asked for them. Really the only ones I will bring home are the ones that I am wearing. I will just figure out what I need when I get home. I have no clue. Do I have a topic or am I free to share whatever I feel like and just tell powerful stories or what??? That would be sweet, but if I have a topic let me know. That would be sweet if Miles went through the temple right when I get back, I totally want to go to the temple that first week anyway. And he better be flying or diving back to see me and be at my homecoming!!!!! You hear me! I already picked some stuff up for the girls, I didn't forget. I already have most of the things that I want to take home, but maybe I will buy a painting or something like that and a few other things. As for the African print material give me some idea of what you want there is a whole lot to choose from. And how much do you want me to bring home?? Okay I think I have answered all of your questions so now let me tell you about our week and share with you what went down in the lesson that me and Speechly taught yesterday.

So we went to Kumasi On Monday, and on Tuesday we had a zone meeting with the Bantama zone along with their interviews with Pres, and then splits with the zone leaders in the evening. Then the same thing again with the Dichemso zone on Wednesday. Thursday morning we went up to Sunyani and had the same meeting with the Sunyani zone and then we went on splits with the Sunyani Zone Leaders from about 2 in the afternoon to the end of the day. For most of the day I went on splits with Elder Brown (my son) which was way sweet, just like old times. Those guys are doing really well up in Sunyani and have a lot of really cool powerful converts and investigators. Brown can speak the twi pretty well too, like he is way good. Kinda embarrassing cuz I suck at it but whatever, I never would get to use it as much anyway even if i could speak it because we don't proselyte as much. But I am totally jealous cuz its way cool, and Speechly is like fluent, man he is way good. For each of the zone meetings we had to instruct and we talked about becoming Christlike missionaries and how the success of a missionary and his mission is directly related to how Christlike he becomes on his mission, because a Christlike missionary will always be a successful missionary. Then we talked about how charity and love is the one Christlike attribute that encompasses on the other Christlike attributes, and how if we can possess that attribute while in the field it will help others not of our faith recognize us as reps of Jesus Christ more than anything else. Then we talked about how we can acquire the attribute of charity and love as missionaries and apply the same to our missionary efforts. It was pretty good I think and I pray it will have an affect on the Elders and give more of a drive to perfect themselves while in the field, because there is no better time and place to do it.

Okay so that is that. Now after the meeting in Sunyani I went on splits with Elder Brown for the day and it went way good and we had some good lessons and talked a little bit about mission and life. It was fun. We met back up with Elder Hair and Elder Speechly in the evening to go and teach (with all 4 of us) a very important lessons to their most powerful investigator who is really rich and also really smart (she drives a BMW). On the way to teach that women (Sis Ivey) that is when we stopped and ended up playing a small game of basketball in the dark which was a lot of fun. I totally drilled a 3 in Brown's face to win the game haha. So when we got to Sister Ivey's house we realized that it would probably be best if only two of us taught her and the other 2 Elders went to teach another man who they had set an appointment with at the same time. So I ended up staying with Elder Speechly to teach Sister Ivey about the restoration. It was hands down the most powerful lesson of my mission. But I am sorry I am going to leave you hanging because I will most likey tell the story at my homecoming. That way it will be more exciting for you to listen to it. It was a great week and I still love missionary work so much. Days like yesterday make it so worth every sacrifice and all the hard work we put in. I love you guys and hope to hear from you again in a few days. I will write my essays tomorrow morning for BYU, I promise. Okay love you

Love Elder Adams

January 16, 2012 Bakaano is my Favorite Area

Sorry I thought I had already answered your questions that you asked me. So I did receive the 2nd package with he cereal and the computer storage. It's perfect and I will be able to bring home a lot of really cool things on it. I just haven't figured out how to take Sister Shulz pictures off of her computer yet because she has a mac book and those things are crazy confusing.

So this week was a pretty good week. We were in Cape Coast the whole of the week and we were able to teach a lot of people in our area. We also went on splits one day with the Elders in Elmina which is the biggest fishing village in the entire mission. It's a pretty cool place. Splits are always fun if the Elders are working hard and have some good people to teach. As for us, we have 2 other Elders in our area now and so anyone that we start teaching that is serious we end up giving to them to teach because they only have a few investigators right now, and they are in the area everyday and can teach them on a regular basis. So we have been more of the finders these past few weeks, and we have found a few really good people. However we did have 2 really good progressing investigators that we were sure to be baptized but one of them moved to Accra on Saturday and won't be back for 2 months, but the other one came to church on Sunday it's just hard to meet him because he is a taxi driver. Like I have said before we spend almost all of our time working with the less-actives and part member families. I think I have taught 6 or 7 different part-member families in the last few months, but so far no luck in getting any of them into the waters of baptism. Some of them know a lot about the church and their biggest concern is they say the members don't really live the gospel that they proclaim to be true, so they find it hard to follow. So it seems that it has been more of my job to just plant the seeds and help them see the goodness of the church, and pray for more success in the future. But since I have been here there have been a lot of less-actives that have started to come more often. There was one girl in her early twenties who we have been visiting this week that finally came to church on Sunday and she even gave the closing prayer in sacrament meeting. I guess you could say that we are the home teachers for Bakaano Branch because the home teaching program is completely unused in our branch. But I think I can say that Bakaano has been my favorite area. I have such a close relationship with so many of the members because of how much we work with them and their family members. A lot of them found out that I am leaving soon and are planning to feed us a treat or do something special, so I have a feeling that my last week I am going to really suffer trying to eat so much food. It does have its pluses going home with the less-actives because I make them all promise me that they will come to church before I leave, and they always agree to it so we will have to see what happens haha. Yesterday was President Shulz birthday and they are out of town so we have to rush right now to get him his B-day present before he gets home from Kumasi. So I think that is about all for this week. I will try to finish typing all of those essays for BYU today if I can get time. We are going to have a super busy week this week and next week because we are having zone meetings and interviews throughout the mission so I have to go and prepare my instruction which is "go about doing good". Have a great week and I will talk to you later. Love you guys

Love Elder Adams

December 26th (Need Portable Hard Drive)

Hey good afternoon,

Sorry I forgot to ask you about something last night while we were talking. I have all of Sister Shulz pictures that she has taken since she has been in Ghana and also all of Sister Sabeys photos from her mission, which are all here on the mission computer and a lot of them are really sweet pictures that I want to take home with me, but I don’t have time to sort through thousands of pictures. I also have my own pictures that I want to take home with me that are saved onto the office computer, BUT I don’t have anything that I can store them on that has enough room to hold that many pictures. It’s like more than 20 GB I think so I was wondering if you could send me a portable hard drive or something that can hold a lot of pictures. I also have all of the original documents that the pioneers of Africa were writing to church headquarters before the church came to Ghana, they are all scanned into the computer and I want to be able to take them home. So it would be sweet if you could help me out by sending my some kind of portable hard drive with enough GB to hold all of this stuff. It was great to talk to you guys the other day. I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and enjoy the rest of the holdiays. Love you guys. OHH I also still want a lot of pictures of my converts and stuff so that I can write them a letter and send them a picture before I go home. I don’t know how but is there some way that you can send me pictures of my whole mission so that I can sort through and find the ones I want. I never really thought about needing them until now.

Love Elder Adams

Christmas Letter

Dear Family and Friends,

It’s a privilege once again to be able to share a few words with all of you this holiday season as we celebrate the birth of our Savior. It’s a wonderful time of year. I love it because it is all about Christ. It’s always refreshing to take another look at his humble birth, sinless life, and glorious resurrection, whatever form it may be. I would simply like to share today my feelings about the Savior as well as an experience that has greatly changed who I am today and made my mission all that it has turned out to be.

Just over two years ago I was sitting in my mission prep class at BYU-I listening to my teacher speak, and even though I regrettably don't remember much from that class, I will never forget these words. He said "You must start your missions now by praying that the Lord he will bless you beyond your own ability, to love the people wherever you serve. If you love the people you will love your mission." I was deeply touched by his remarks. And so that is exactly what I did. Almost every night before I went to sleep I prayed that wherever I served I would be blessed with love towards those people. At times I doubted that my prayers were even worthwhile. I remember thinking how can I even ask that when I didn’t know where I was going? But I continued to pray. A month or two later I received my call. I was called to serve in the Ghana Cape Coast Mission. I then began praying that the Lord would bless me with that same Christ like love that he has towards the Ghanaian people. And I prayed and I prayed, day after day. Well the time finally came, and my mission began. And those first few months I had the hardest time truly loving the people the way I should have. They were just so different. I was so judgmental. But I still remember to this very day night after night kneeling down at my bed side begging and pleading the Lord to bless me with charity and love for these beautiful people. I knew that without his help I could not do it, I could not truly love them as he did.

As I have reflected on this throughout my mission it has became clear to me that because we are begotten sons and daughters of our all loving Father in Heaven, we are born with and inherit the same ability to love as he loves. It’s in our divine nature, we inherited that ability from our Heavenly Father. I don’t know when it happened, but in a way very similar to the way that Jesus Christ loves these people, I also have come to love these people. All of those prayers, all of that pleading and begging that I would find within my soul that Christ like love for these people, all of those prayers have been answered. As I think about all of the investigators, recent-converts and members that I have grown to love my heart is full, full of love towards them and towards the people of Ghana, to an extent that I know is not possible without the help of my Heavenly Father. I now know why I love my mission so much and why it has been the greatest building block in my life. Because of love. Almost instantly my thoughts are directed to the Savior. If I love the Ghanaian people as much as I do, If I get worried when an investigator calls me in the middle of the night, , if I cry because an investigator starts crying, if I am happy because they are happy, if I dread the day that I have to leave this country knowing that maybe in this life I will never see many of them again, I can't even begin to comprehend how much Jesus Christ must love and care about me. Because of the love I have now for them, I have come to understand the love that he has for me. In a way I've never understood before, I now understand the true meaning of the atonement and why Christ did what he did. I feel so much closer to my Savior and feel like I know him so much more now than I ever have before. Now I have an idea what it is like for him, how he feels when I sin, when I do wrong, when I fail to choose the right, but at the same time I now know how happy he is when we repent. I know how happy he is when we are happy. I know now why the 2nd greatest commandment is to love all men as ourselves, because when we truly learn how to do that we know God and understand his love he has for us, and we love him with all our heart. Love conquers all things. Mom and Dad, Family and Friends, I love my mission and these people so much, I dread the day I will have to leave them. My testimony has grown so much and my desire to share the gospel has grown even more. But my love for the Ghanaian people is the true story behind my whole mission and the foundation of my joy and happiness. My prayer is that this Christmas we may all find our hearts given out in love. Just as our Father in Heaven showed his love for us by sending is only begotten son into the world, may this Christmas we also show our love for him by loving those around us. I know that Christ lives. He loves us. He is the Savior of the World. He is real. Of that I so testify, In the Name of Jesus Christ, Amen

Baptism of 30 members in Bibiani

December 12, 2011

Well another week has come to an end. It was a mighty long and exhausting week, but it was a great week nonetheless. Friday we didn't have much to do in Kumasi because president was having district meetings (the same meeting we have been to 5 times and could repeat in our heads word for word) so he gave us the day off and said that we didn’t have to go to the district meetings. So instead we spent Friday driving around doing some errands and helping Prosper the apartment man to find some new apartments for the Elders. It was pretty boring day but we still stayed productive, and then in the evening we helped Elder and Sister Zoll prepare things for Saturdays big baptism out in Bibiani.

We left the house at 7 in the morning and got to Bibiani around 9:30 or so that same morning. We gathered all of the people up who were being baptized from the neighboring villages and dresseed them at the chapel and put all of them in their whites. By the way we just got them a brand new building to worship in, their old place was terrible. 30 people in all white is a powerful sight. I helped finish doing some baptismal interviews for those people who couldn't make it out Friday for the interviews. I interviewed one lady named Grace who had been waiting for this day for more than two years. She came to know that the church was true by picking up a BOM and reading and coming to know that all the rumors and everything people were saying was false. She was by far the most prepared person I have ever interviewed for baptism. For example when I asked her if she could promise to keep the Sabbath Day holy for the rest of her life, without hesitation she said "No!" I asked, "well, why not?" She said "Because what if I get sick and can't partake of the sacrament one week, then I have broken my promise" You should have seen her face when she said that. It looked like someone had just ripped her heart out. She really felt how important that covenant was and she was scared of breaking it. Then when I asked her, "well grace, if you are not sick then can you promise to keep the Sabbath Day holy every week by partaking of the sacrament?" and then she said with a big smile "Yes of course, always, and my savior will help me." It really blew me away how serious this was to her and I could really tell that she was determined to never, ever break that promise of baptism. It meant everything to her. Half the people being baptized live in a village 40 min away and they pay to rent a bus to come in at least every 2 weeks, which for them is a huge sacrifice. After everyone was ready, we loaded them all up and drove them down to a river about 2 min away. It was a beautiful place to do the baptism. Even the Queen Mother of the village heard about the baptism and she came to see it for herself. It was great. We had a lot of people there to see the baptism too that weren't members. Probably like 75 people upwards I would guess were there. Two members gave some really great talks as well. After all of the baptisms then we did all of the confirmations and then enjoyed some time together. It was one of the neatest experiences ever. The only thing that I was a little bummed about was that because I was the camera man of the whole thing I forgot and never got a picture with me in it, so I have nothing to show for the whole thing. But oh well it was still great.

The baptism finished by 4 then we drove to Sunyani. We got there late and then I wasn't feeling to good so I just went straight to sleep after dinner. We got up in the morning and worshipped and then sat in meetings for the rest of the day with the Branch leaders in Sunyani and with the Elders. Closed from that and then we recorded the weekly numbers for the whole mission late into the night. Got up this morning and played some basketball with the boys and we just got back to cape coast and right now it is about 9:45 in the evening. I am so excited to sleep on my own bed :) YES!

It was a really good week and we were able to do a lot of really cool great things. The baptism was the highlight of it all. Now I am just exhausted so I am going to bed. I love you guys and hope that you have a wonderful Christmas this year. Enjoy the Holidays. Love you.

Elder Adams

December 4, 2011

Hello,

I am in Kumasi right now and we have a big weekend ahead of us up here. We are going to have a baptism in Bibiani tomorrow where we are baptizing 30 people who have been meeting together in a group for more than 8 years or something, but because of how far away they live the church hasn't allowed them to be baptized or really be established. They have been paying more tithing than any of the mission branches and they even double the highest paying branch in amount of tithes payed. They have been begging the church to send missionaries to them for years. They are among the most faithful people this church has ever seen. So tomorrow is going to be a really special day. I get to do a few interviews and be one of the witnesses for the baptism and I also have been given the assignment to be the camera man and do interviews of the people being baptized and all that. It will be a once in a lifetime experience and I am really excited.

On Sunday we will then head up to Sunyani and have a meeting with the elders up there and go on splits. We are also making the preparations for the Christmas zone conferences and it is going to be really sweet, we have a lot of really fun things that we are going to do and the instruction will be powerful as always. When it comes to Christmas I really don't want anything I would rather just have at least one Christmas where everything is focused on Christ and on its true meaning. It would make it one to always remember. I have been thinking about what to put in my letter but I haven’t really come up with anything because I put everything in last years letter, and we all know that somehow I have to make it way better than lasts years, so I am still trying to come up with something good, plus I am the only missionary out so that is also added pressure.

Now to answer some of your questions, when it comes to the police I have been stopped more times than I can count. They have on numerous occasions taken my license and filled out a court date and a ticket and all kinds of other things, but always all they want is money and so a lot of the people associated with the church they just pay them off and then nothing happens. But as for me I am very stubborn and I was taught that you never pay them, but that you can always find a way out. So sometimes I spend 30 to 40 minutes talking and negotiating my way out before they will let me go, but they usually get tired of me and know that I won't pay them so they just let me go. You do have to be very respectful and beg and beg and beg but in the end I ALWAYS get away free (knock on wood) But I have had to go to some extremes and at times practically get on my knees and beg for forgiveness and give them the big spill about how we are representatives of Christ trying to help their country and then that always gets them and they just turn their head, give up their pride, and let us go haha. It's a great experience. As for the retainers I have been wearing them pretty regular, but not every day but usually I never go more than a day without wearing them.

Well I am staying more busy than ever and the mission is so big that we are always going. I think it may be one of the biggest missions in the world. So it is really making me grow and making me stretch, a lot. But at the same time I love it. I talked to Pres the other day about staying in the office and he wanted to know if I wanted to be released for my last transfer. But as I thought about it I just said "I don't know what the Lord wants me to do, but you are entitled to that revelation so when you find out, that is exactly what I would love to do." So that's how it is going to be, up to him and the Lord but I really love what I am doing and would also love to be with the people more, but thank goodness I don't have to make the decision!!

Well I love you guys and hope that you are having a great Christmas season. I pray for you everyday and I am always thinking about you guys. So I was late in emailing this week but truly I haven't had much time, not even to sleep haha jk. but not really.

Love Elder Adams