December 8, 2014

Dear Family ,
Well this week was a pretty normal week I wouldh have to say , nothing
to much out of the oridanary. It was really good though. I am really
getting along with my new companion Elder Peterson and we are doing
hard work together. This week we got our bikes going again, its been
about 3 weeks since I have ridden my bike because my companinos bike
was busted but we finally got a new one so that was nice to get riding
bikes again. This week I would have to say our biggest focus was to
just teach so that is basically all we did all week and that is just
how I like it. I sit here and think , I am just greatful to be on a
mission where I am at , where I can just teach all day long. If I
wasn’t teaching I am not sure what I would do.  This week we have
focused a lot on seeing Felix and Celistina , our son and mother who
we are teaching. They loved church this past week, especially the
mother. We have one small problem though,and that is anytime we go
there for a lesson, we have to fight for time to talk haha, Celestina
can straight talk. We will start off talking about Word of Wisdom and
she will want to make a contribution and about 20 min later she has
moved from the word of wisdom to how everyone in her community calls
her a witch because she teaches her son to follow christ haha she is
all over the place but I do the women, she is funny.  We are really
working on seperating them from there chruch though and that might
take time.  These past two Sundays what they have been diong is waking
up at 4:30 and going to there church which is all the way in Accra and
then they will leave and ride in a Tro-tro for about an hour to come
attend church down in Nsawam. They love the church a lot but are
having a hard time leaving there church completely , although
Celistina did turn in a letter of Transfer to her bishop so that they
can stop going. We will defintly be praying for something there, we
are trying to baptize them on christmas but that wont be possible
unless they stop going to there church. WE will see what happens, but
I know that they will come, its just a matter of time. We are also
really focusing on  our deaf guy now to. We are pusing him to also be
Baptized on Christmas day. We found out that one of the Elders near by
can speak sign languange so we are going to have him come up and teach
him everything and then we are going to baptize him christmas . What
is cool to is that we are going to have him start teaching sign
languange as a class on Sunday after his baptism so that the branch
members will also know sign languange and then it will just open up
the door for a bunch of deaf people here in Ghana. There is actually
quite a bit in our area so this could just open up the door for all of
them getting the gospel. I am really excited to see how it all goes.
Only thing that is making a little nervous is that we have transfers
news coming this Saturday and I don’t want to leave, if I left I would
have to miss all these peoples baptisms. I am hoping for atleast one
transfer here, and it would also just be nice to spend christmas here,
we have an apartment full of all americans and I just love the branch
here so we will see what god has planned for me. Sunday this week was
pretty good, Darius Celistina and Felix (the big 3 ) All showed up for
us this week and it was also fast and Testimony Sunday. Everyone one
in Ghana had  Specail fast for Liberia and Serria Leon so that was
really cool. My new ZL is from Liberia to and the odds, his home
branch back home was Paynesville 2 (hint,that was the last branch I
served in) and he knows just a bunch of the same people I do so it was
cool to talk  to him about that. This week will be a pretty good week
though, we have a christmas conference tomorrow in Accra that will be
really sweet, I am mostly pumped because Tolar is going to be there
and I will get to see him again. Dude strait goes home in 5 weeks, I
cant believe it. Anyways, I am trying to think of anything extra
ordinary that happened this week. I was riding my bike one day on the
side of the road and I got hit by an orange that somebody chucked from
there car, that was cool haha. Anyways, i hope that you all have a
great week, love ya tons.
Elder Bowring