September 26, 2011

Bummer. Friday night we were teaching... The phone starts vibrating in my pocket and without looking my first thought was "Its president.... transfers". I look down at the phone, and I was correct I saw "Pres Shulz" on the caller id. So we call him back at the end of the lesson, and... It he tells Elder Nathan that he is going to be training a new missionary next transfer (a week from this coming Wednesday). So... it looks like my days in Kwamo are few. Bummer. How can I leave this place? In all honestly... this was why I came on a mission. So, I will do my best getting psyched up to go to a new place, with a new comp, doing a new thing. Just don't know where I am going yet. The reason we found out so early is because they are going to be having a special training meeting for all the trainers in Cape Coast on Wednesday. So Elder Nathan gets to shoot down to Cape Coast tomorrow morning, I will be with Elder Thompson, from Orem. He is going home next week, so it will be cool to spend a couple of days with a seasoned vet, learn some stuff from him. Heck I haven't been with a guy older than me on mission for like 10 months. Crazy. So this week will be pretty tough. Hopefully I can just go to work, make sure Elder Nathan has plenty of people to teach, and teach him a few more things so he can be prepared to train this early in his mission. Training after 3 months? Wowzers. He is in for something else :) So anyway.... The work in Kwamo is going on well. We have a lot of investigators right now. They love what we teach... we’re just working on commitment. So I decided to study ch. 11 in Preach My Gospel (Help people make and keep commitments) and I can already see a difference in our investigators' progress. Henry kept both of his commitments the rest of the week (still didn't come to church... but next fo sho :). A lot of our new investigators realized we were serious in teaching from the get go because we were doing little things like asking them to write down their commitment so they don't forget, and informing them that we would like to come to see them daily to make sure they are keeping their commitments. Which... is what Preach My Gospel was trying to tell me to do for the past... well you know how long. So anyway, Preach My Gospel is pretty incredible and every missionary needs to actually read it. And read it before they come on a mission (Hayden). Sweetest thing from the week: We were able to teach the family we’re working with on Tuesday - we are finally really really preparing for her baptism - and had a good lesson. We scheduled another appointment for Thursday, but that fell through. But it actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We knew that because we had not been able to teach her the night before church, it would be a true test to see if she would come to church with no one's encouragement, completely on her own accord (Her husband was out of town, and her phone was off, so we couldn't even call to make another appointment or remind her about church or anything). After Elder Nathan and I went through our plans for the day before church started, we prayed that she would be able to come to church with the kids, on her own, without any encouragement from anyone. She was a little late... but she came, all by herself, with her kids along with her. It was a perfect day at church too, investigators class was perfect. She had Lizzy, our recent convert, sitting next to her, then another sister also in the class helping out, and the class was taught by Daniel (just baptized 22 Aug). The father will be out of town this week, so we are going to move the baptism to 8 October - who knows where I will be :( So anyway, everything works out the way it should, and it shows that she will be able to stay active and progress in the gospel. Welp, sorry it’s a bit shorter today, time is short. We played dodgeball and touch football - as in REAL football :) - today. It was way fun. Everything is awesome! You can make a guess about where I might be going next week... You guys are the best, I love you so much! Good luck in everything you are doing and thanks for everything you are doing!!!!!! Love ya, Elder Brown