Feb 22, 2016

1 Peter 4: 12-14

This email shouldn't be as long as last time, I don't think I have much to talk about considering this week snuck by me, but I'll see what I can find noteworthy.

The first thing is that we went on an Exchange with the Zone Leaders out in New Georgia, Elder Cichoski and Elder Degen with their companions. It was a lot of fun! They are great missionaries and it was a lot of fun being with them, they work hard. The roughest part although was the simple fact that there are no extra beds there, so Elder Wight and I came up with the obvious solution. Lay a sheet on the concrete floor and sleep on that. We did. It was not fun. I felt something crawling on me all night. I did sleep pretty well though sometime after 3am though, so we're good. The rest of that day was sweet! The best part? We taught a Ghanaian family! We even spoke twi! Well at least I did with the family, oh how I miss that. The lesson was great and they have great faith. After the lesson, they fed us Ghanaian food! Kokonte with groundnut soup. oh man oh man oh man! Loved it. I met the women in my area a couple months earlier, so when we met we recognized each other and got a long good really fast. It was incredible.

Another cool story: My Investigator, Peter, gave me permission to tell this story. He was bearing his testimony at the end of a lesson, we were talking about faith and miracles and he shared one miracle with us. I'll try to write it as best as I can remember. "during the Civil war, I had a lot of close calls with Death, being a Krahn man (the tribe that was largely hated and hunted during that time) it was a hard time for me. One day, I was caught and they took me and a group of men to the beach (that's when my heart stopped, beaches mean death). They stripped us down and lined us up facing the soldiers. They started to execute us. one by one, Pop, right to the head. They got to the man next to me, I was last, his blood came all over me. I knew in that moment I was going to die and told my God that if this was my time, I'm ready. But they didn't kill me. They asked me if I was Krahn and I replied 'no' in another tribes language. My name is also different from Krahn so I told them that too. I said I was framed. They then let me go."
He then went on to show how the Lord helped him during the war. He is an incredible man. It was a humbling experience for me, realizing how personal the war was for everyone. I love his faith and steadiness in the Gospel, he and his friend Matthew will both be baptized this Saturday.

Lighter noted story: I figure I should probably lighten the mood, so I'll do so by saying, the Branch choir performed a musical number on Sunday and is definitely the best performance I've ever heard in Africa and challenges my Ward Choir back at home. holy cow. They did a beautiful rendition of "Let us all press on" They stunned the whole branch, I was blown away! I think MoTab did it before. I almost teared up it was so beautiful. Aaron, the excon investigator? he has joined that choir, as well as a recent convert, Bouktak! haha man it's so cool to see them participate in the Branch and use their gift of Bass to help out a little.

But those are the highlites of my week, at least the ones I can remember. We're looking at another good week, we always are.
Elder Verdoni