January 19, 2015

Dear Family,
Well this week was actually a pretty good week. I guess it started off
crazy though,Tuesday was Tolars last day  and I was able to talk with
him before he left, just blows my mind that he is done. Also on
Tuesday we had Zone meeting at the Kaneshie stake center. IF I am
being completely honest with you Zone meetings  are just so different
from Liberia. Elder Fairwell is my zone leader so it was good to hear his
instruction, good old fashion Liberian instruction but other than that It just
makes me miss my old mission more. I was pumped though, I got 2
packages that day, one from Gpa and Gma Lovell and one from the
Asburys. Thank you guys so much, you guys are making sure you are
taking good care of me out here. Gpa, that jerky is slammin, everyone
in the apartment is enjoying and its almost finished haha.  The rest
of the week was a blur, we honestly just worked our butts off this
week, I think we ended up having 37 lessons or something like that.
The highlight of the week was Definilty Sunday.  Sunday we had baptisms
for our branch. Our companionship had one and One of the sisters had 6
(a family) and then we had some children of record baptized as well.
The family that the sitsters baptized was pretty sweet, it was a
mother and her 2 grown up children and then the grandchild. I was able
to perform the baptism and it was really sweet. The Mother is 70 years
old and the day before her leg started to give her problems. She
couldn’t bend her knee and was just hobbling along. She said that she
stayed up all night long the night before because she just didn’t know
how she was going to be able to be baptized.  She is a little bigger
to so she wanted to make sure that somebody could do it, and she
looked at me and I don’t think she had the full confidence in my
smallness haha. But I told her that it would be ok that that god would
help. WE got down into the water and she was still very nervous but as
I was telling her that god would help us, I just got an over whelming
feeling that it was going to be good and that things would work. I
finished the prayer and went to put her down and she didn’t want to go
but I told her to just straiten her leg and I would take care of the
rest. Well it happened pretty fast but I got her down and up and
looked to the witnesses to make sure it was good, and they said that
everything went perfect. For sure a miracle that we were able to
baptize her. I was standing out side the changing room when she came
out and I went to shake her hand and she said no and just came up and
gave me such a big hug and thanked me.  It was a pretty awesome moment
, one that I wont forget. God definitely helps us when we need his help
and when we are doing his work. Our baptism went well as well. Her
name is Patricia and she is going to be a strong member. Another high
light that we had on Sunday is we had 2 other investigators there, one
Bro George (he came last week) and after he told us that he made up
his mind to be baptized, which is a miracle. This guy has been
searching for the truth for so long. When I first met him he called
him self a church prostitute because he has been to so many churches
haha. So hopefully in a few weeks that will go down and then our other
was bro Ayuba (Muslim name ) We met with him after church and he told
us he was going to baptize next week haha but we told him we have to
go over a few other things with him before so we will do it in two
weeks. The work is picking up here and I am definitely seeing the
blessings of Dilligence and relying on the lord. Also another sweet
miracle that happened yesterday was that I was sitting in sacrament
meeting and I looked out the window and I got a faint glimpse at
somebody walking in. I thought to my self he looks a lot like my BML
Richard Yansey from Paynesville in Liberia. Well he came in after
sacrament and sure enough, it was Richard Yansey. It was so sweet to
see him, like a sweet reunion. I can only imagine what it will be like
on the other side when I meet all the people I have met on my mission,
especially the ones in Liberia. Overall it was a good week and I am
anxious to see how things go this week, hopefully they will be even
better. I love you all and I hope you have an awesome week. Love
Elder Bowring