Surprise at the End of The Day!

I was working on google earth mapping a stake when I heard Elder Shipley cutting cardboard. I thought, "What is he cutting?!"I turned around and he pulled this out of the box! He quietly did all this on his own. I suppose it was his turn to open a package - most of the others were for me for Mother's Day.

Scott and Melissa, Preston, David, Sam and Sarah must have had fun making this sign. It was SO MUCH FUN for us to read it and think about you making it....I remember when we used make these signs for our kids. But best of all for me were the pictures. Just darling pictures of the family. I cried...oh how I miss all of you. But I quickly recovered and starting taping them to the chair rail that surrounds my desk. I love to be surrounded by my grandchildren's pictures. THANKS Scott and Melissa, Preston and David, Sam and Sarah. It was a wonderful Surprise.

For those of you who cannot read the small print it says: Dear Mama and Papa, We think you 2 Musketeers are Extra Sweet. You have always been Mounds of fun and Big LifeSavers. Our hearts burst with Joy when we think of you! Hugs and Kisses! Scott, Melissa, Preston, David, Sam and Sarah

We Love Reading African Window Stickers!

"Christ in the Vessel; I Fear no Storm" - the most creative

This Sunday in Accra

Worth of a Soul and Christ in Red Robes by Liz Lemon Swindle

Today we visited Dansoman Ward. We were so impressed with this ward. It was fast and testimony meeting. The bishop asked everyone to give a generous fast offering and pray for the Liberian refuges in Budaburam Camp who are returning home to Liberia after several years of living in Ghana.

Next Testimonies were given of Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. One talked about watching one of his children misbehave and all it took was his mother's eye to correct his way. He spoke of how the eye can commnunicate to us. Then compared that to God watching over us with His eyes. When we do wrong things, the Lord sees us with his eyes and he reaches out and corrects us by placing people in our path that bring us back to Him. Another bore testimony of family, its blessing and responsibility. He said I am young and many of you would say of me, "Why is it that you are married?" He bore testimony of the importance of family of a wife that kindly tells him when he needs to improve his actions; of the joy of children, and of the knowledge he has that it is his responsiblity to bring his family back to God. Yet another bore testimony of the power of the scriptures and the importance of reading them and pondering on them. He testified that when we ponder on the words of God we get more revelation, more dreams, and more direction in our lives. A special testimony that Heavenly Father knows each one of us and answers our prayers was given by one of the sisters in the ward. She told of her 98 year old father getting food poisoning and ending up in the hospital in a comma. She went to the temple and poured out her heart to Heavenly Father asking him to postpone his death as the family did not have the funds for a funeral-to just give her a little more time. (Funerals in Africa are like weddings in America - very expensive) When she arrived home she was called to the hospital. She found her father awake. He said, "The strangest thing happened to me. I found myself standing next to you in your temple.(He is not a member but had been through the temple during the open house 4 years ago) You were crying. The next thing I knew a tall man dressed in white stood next to me. He said to me , "I have answered her prayers. You may now go back." He said he woke up in the hospital and asked "What am I doing here?" He was healed and was sent home. Her prayers were answered in a miraculous way.

Sunday school was on Zeezrom in the Book of Alma, chapter 12. The object was to teach us that there is more than one witness to truth. In the wards of this stake Sunday School class is taught to families: children and their parents all learn together. The teacher started by saying "How many of you would believe me if I told you I had a half eaten chicken bone in my pocket?" (Ghanaians eat the bones as well as the meat) Not many people believed him. So he had a member of the class come up and without any of us seeing he showed him whether he was telling the truth. That person testified that indeed the teacher had a chicken bone in his pocket. Then he asked "How many of you believe I indeed have a chicken bone in my pocket? Most everyone raised their hands. Principle taught: There was more than one witness.

In Timothy and in the Book or Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants we learn that there are always 2-3 witnesses to every truth. The Bible and the Book of Mormon, as well as the Doctrine and Covenants and Pearl of Great Price all are witnesses of Christ. As we have experiences with the Holy Ghost we too become witnesses of Christ.

Back to Alma 12: Zeezrom was leading the people astray with great twists of doctrine. Alma, being a prophet, could read his thoughts and caught him in his lies. I realized after reading this story that each of us will have 3 witnesses to what we have become when we stand before Christ: 1. Our Words 2. Our Actions 3. Our Thoughts. Christ will look at all of them. We cannot fool Christ with words and actions that do not match our thoughts, or thoughts that do no match our words and actions. He knows everything. Our challenge in life is to get our thoughts, actions and words to be in unity with Christ and Heavenly Father: to become one with them, to become like them in humility, integrity, love for others, etc.

Zeezrom trembled when he realized Alma could read his thoughts. He knew he was caught in a lie. There are lessons to learn from Alma. For try as he might Zeezrom in trying to confound Alma with his smooth and intellectual words that twisted the doctrines of Christ, could not. Why? Because Alma knew his scriptures. He studied them. He pondered them. They had become knowledge to him.

Some great lessons for all of us. Again I love Sundays among the Saints in Africa!!!

Temple Visits

Weekly we get wards or branches visiting the temple. They come with their families, or the young men and women come. Not unlike at home. Often they come in buses. They stay for a night in the Ancilary Building or sometimes for a week. Temple workers come from far away - 5 hour drives are not uncommon and stay for a several days each week. They love the temple.
Those from Liberia are assisted by church funds (this is how some of your donations are spent) to come for their first time. This week we have a group of 36 or so saints from Liberia who are visiting the temple. It took them 5 days to get here by bus. It will take them 5 days to return home. They will be here at the temple for 1 week. For them it is a huge commitment.

Packing Up - Going Home.

"Safe Journey": The Word of God

I have come to love the word of God in my lifetime. My scripture study lately has brought me to understand in greater depth the importance of the Word of God. How powerful the Word is. I have found 15 blessings we receive from reading the Word of God. I am sure there are more.

1. Genealogy of our forefathers
2. Knowledge of the mysteries of God
3. Increases our memory
4. Convinces man of the errors of his way.
5. Brings us to a knowledge of God.
6. Teaches us of the incorrect paths others have trod.
7. Brings us to repentence.
8. Causes us to rejoice in Jesus Christ our Redeemer
9. Allows us to see examples of His Power
10. Teaches us what is True.
11. Teaches us the Commandments God gives to man.
12. Brings to light works of darkness. (that we might recognize them and avoid them)
13. Teaches us that God's words are fulfilled.
14. Teaches us what the future holds
15. Teaches us how to Come Unto Him

All of this and we are so often lax at reading every day. How can we possibly NOT pick up our scriptures to guide us each day.

Scriptures, the Word of God, are filled with Light. Without the scriptures we walk in the dark. It is by this small and simple thing that the Lord is able to guide our lives. When we are indifferent to reading our scriptures we wander off the straight and narrow path. Marvelous works in our life cease. We get off course and we experience affictions we would have avoided had we stayed on course each day. Alma gives us a type of this when describing the use of the Liahona. He said when they forgot to exercise their faith they did not progress in their journey. It is the same with us. The days we do not pick up our scriptures, we do not progress in our journey toward God.

Our journey in life is to "Come Unto Him". I am learning and trying harder each day to keep my feet on the path. I challenge our children, our grandchildren, and our friends to experiment on this idea. Read the scriptures every day without fail for one month. Pick one subject to learn more about (prayer, faith, Christ, God, repentence, commandments - whatever you want) and write down or underline everything you learn about that subject. At the end of the month ask yourself if you feel you have walked closer to God. I can promise you that you will say "Yes". If you want a good read in the Scriptures on this subject turn to Alma 32 and Alma 37 in the Book of Mormon. It is an inspiring journey! In Africa when someone is traveling it is common to say "Safe Journey". As you travel THIS path I can promise you a "Safe Journey".

Trip to Kumasi

Kumasi is a rather larage city in the mid-northern part of Ghanna. It has a population of around 4 million people. We have one Stake in Kumasi and I was asked to meet the Stake President and help him map out his wards and then to help him map out some divisions of wards he was considering...all done on Google Earth. We agreed to drive up on Sunday and stay overnight at a hotel and drive back on Monday. I woke up on Saturday morning and said to Elder Shipley, Do you realize we just agreed to drive the equivalent of a trip from Farmington to St. George and back!!!

It's a two lane highway most of the way. It reminded me of our trips to the beach when I was a small child. Along the road were broken down cars, buses and trucks left for who knows how many months or years. Their sites were telling as you saw the glass all over and the windows all knocked out and in some cases you could tell they had caught on fire. We could only imagine the fate of those who were in them.




We passed through villages that sold bread in front of every home, another that sold palm oil - tables set up all along the highway with their little jugs of oil, and another that sold hand carved bowls and sticks that looked like canes that were for grinding casava root into a powder that is used to make a sort of dumpling ball called fufu that is served with a soup. We haven't yet been brave enough to try fufu. But, we have heard plenty about it - it is a staple food here in Ghana. We also passed many trucks that just seemed to be loaded to the hilt and some busses.

We stopped halfway up in Nkawkaw (pronounced EnCocoa) to attend church. The church was located at the end of a long up-hill one-lane dirt road that dead ended at the rented church. You have to realize that dirt roads are filled with ruts washed into the roads by rain, and pot holes that can swallow your entire tire. We shook hands with all the members as they arrived. These people really had to want to come to church - it was located in such a difficult place.

We were told that a few weeks earlier one older lady who had no income wanted so badly to come to church, but it costs her 2 Cedis (about 2 dollars) to take a taxi there and back, and she was much too old to work. She made it a matter of prayer. Saturday she was in the market area and as she looked down she say a Cedi on the ground. She quickly leaned over and picked it up, to discover there were 2 Cedis, just what she needed to go to church! This is a great illustration of how Heavenly Father knows each one of us and how he answers our prayers.

This story illustrates the very problem we as an Area are trying to correct. Currently and in the past the people have had to come to the church. Some walking for miles. Others using their precious cedis to take their family in a taxi to church when they can hardly afford to put food on their tables. We are trying to correct this problem by bringing The Church to the people, r This was why I was sent to Kumasi - to help them tighten up boundaries, split wards and create others and branches of the church so that the church is within walking distance of the people. Google Earth has allowed us to see where the people live, and to see where our buildings are located. Until now we have never known where one building was in relationship to another and never have we been able to locate where the members lived. It has been a great blessing to the church in Africa and only the future will tell if the direction we are pursuing is correct...but we feel the spirit telling us this is the direction we are to pursue.

We left Kumasi with Elder and Sister Burgess who had completed their mission and were on their way to Accra to board their return flight home. On our way back we stopped to visit a senior missionary couple who live in Nkawkaw, The Mathesons. They are a great couple that work with the people, the missionaries and the local leaders. This is a missionary assignment that we would enjoy, but our current assignment is to work in the office, assisting the Area Presidency. Other couples here have missionary assignments to help with welfare projects like helping schools, digging wells, helping with the medical needs of the people. Our grandchildren think only of proselyting missions - where you are teaching the gospel. I hope they can understand that there are many types of missionaries. All are needed to do the work of the Lord. Together we all work to make God's work a marvelous work and a wonder.

Elder and Sister Shipley, Sister Matheson, Sister and Elder Burgess

Gone Batiking!

One Monday a few weeks ago, I stole away and went batiking with 3 other senior missionaries.
Our task: to make a tablecloth. We choose the colors we wanted in our tablecloth. I choose brown and rose pink. The owner stirred up the die and put my cloth into it. We did the rose pink first. It was placed in a die that turned the material green, but when it was put on the lawn to dry it immediately began turning pink! (In this picture the material was died dark blue and turned emerald green.) Next we choose our stamps which were dipped in wax and then pressed on the material. I had my own clothes on then Elder Shipley's dishwashing shirt which had many bleach spots on it already. So when you look at my picture you might think I've gained a whole lot of weight. All those shirts just make me look huge. The guy offered to stamp my tablecloth - but I was there for the experience. It took me about 3 times of stamping before I got the right pressure. After the stamping it was dying time again - this time he mixed up black and dyed the pink material in the black solution. Again it was placed on the lawn and I watched the black turn brown. Where the wax stamps hit the material that area stayed pink. I had so much fun. It was a nice break from all the work.