Faith in Every Footstep

Each week here in Ghana brings different adventures and new opportunities to serve and grow. Many of these experiences are brand new to us, so relying on the Lord to guide us as we go has been a wonderful learning experience. Here are a few of the things that have kept us busy these past few weeks:

We've been helping many of the youth get ready for school. Here we're shopping in the outdoor market for food and other provisions, since most of the students board at the school and won't come home until Christmas.

I'll never be part Ghanaian if I can't learn to balance anything on my head!

This is Faith's dorm room at school that she shares with 25 other girls from here school. She's
wearing the uniform of her school in the color that indicates that she's
 in form 3 or the final year at senior high school.

Each student has to bring their own tank of gas to use for cooking at the school. It took almost an hour to get through the line and, at 95+ degrees and almost 100% humidity, our sweat could have probably filled up the tank.

Meeting up with the missionaries usually entails finding something to eat. The elders know that Sarah is a little more hesitant when it comes to trying the local foods, but they always seem to get Elder Bodine to try something new.

Sarah has been meeting with all the young women in our area to take them through their Personal Progress booklet. This is Veronica from Kpando who was baptized 4 months ago. She's already completed most of her value experiences and she will be receiving her medallion in the next few months.

We do a lot of teaching at mid-week activities where the local branch members get together to study the scriptures and learn more about the gospel. Here are some members from Kpando "holding fast to the iron rod."

A big part of what we do each day is spending time with the families from the 5 branches where we serve. They always welcome us with open arms and bright smiles and we love the friendships we've made with these loving people. 

Here are the elders from the Ho Zone after zone training. These are 18 of the finest young men and we feel blessed and privileged to work with them on a daily basis. What amazing examples of faith, obedience and sacrifice.

A few weeks ago, the Hohoe Group was made into a Branch. The church is growing quickly here in
Western Africa and we were humbled to be present on this historic day. 

12,000 Kilometers and Just Getting Started

Thanks to our handy truck (a 4-wheel drive Nissan) we've been able to criss-cross a larger part of the Volta region as we get to know the amazing people of Ghana. It seems like each day brings a new cultural experience and a new opportunity to serve, and we're grateful to see the Lord's hand in the miracles that happen each day.

Our truck has been a huge blessing and has gotten us up, over and through every obstacle we've put in its way.
The streets here are very narrow with more taxis, tro-tro buses and potholes than you can count,
but everyone seems to give us a wide berth and we've yet to end up in one of the drainage ditches that line every street.
We keep praying for safe drivers (us included)!

We travel to Accra a few times a month for meetings, transfers, departures and the temple. The trip can take anywhere from 3 hours (on a good day) to 5 hours if the wait is long at the ferry or traffic is bad in Accra, which it always is. While we're there, we always stop at the "American" stores to stock up and resupply on some of the brands we miss from back home.

Froot Loops, Lucky Charms and Cocoa Puffs - oh my! The options are limited and expensive
but nothing says home like a stale box of Frosted Flakes. Sarah even found some Bath & Body lotion
in a scent called Ghanaian Geisha, but we left that on the shelf.

Transfers occur every six weeks and bring a measure of happiness and sadness as strong missionaries head
home after serving valiantly for two years. These are 4 elders from our Ho zone. The second from the left
is Elder Ravia from Fiji who's headed to serve the remaining 3-months of his mission in the Liberia, Monrovia
mission. They haven't had any full-time missionaries there since the Ebola breakout over a year ago and he's
going to train all the new missionaries that arrive there soon. Elder Ravia started his mission in Sierra Leon and was transferred to Ghana when his first area was closed due to Ebola. Three countries in two years - what an example!

We continue to see miracles happen all around us and love the experiences and perspectives we're learning as we go. 

On Saturday we were able to attend the baptisms of seven new members of the Ho 1st Branch. What a wonderful spirit as two husbands from the branch baptized their wives into the church and 5 other youth and young adults from the area.

We attended the local Kente Festival this week which celebrates the rich tradition and culture of the Ewe tribe in Togo and Ghana. This area is know for it's fine artistry, colorful Kente weavings and fierce warriors. These are the Queen Mothers from each of the local tribes who have come to celebrate and be honored at the festival.

A huge blessing for us this week as the mission installed a new solar-powered battery system at our house. We even had "light off" the night it was installed and were able to test the system immediately. It ran our lights, refrigerator and air conditioner for a full 10 hours! Hooray for solar power and no more generator! Special thanks to President Heid who is always looking for ways to upgrade the missionary's apartments and living conditions, even senior couples!

We had two days of District Conference last week with a zone training afterwards, so all 18 elders in our zone were in town for a couple of days. Add the AP's and the office elders as well and you know there was a lot of teaching, learning, food and fun going on. We love these missionaries! 

While major food consumption always tops the list as a favorite for missionaries, weighing each other, and subsequently teasing each other mercilessly about the gains and losses, comes in a close second.

District Training and the Ho 2 Branch. Just like herding cats in the states, they call it herding chickens here in Ghana, and we still missed getting all the elders in the pictures. There are 7 countries represented in this picture!

Busy, busy, busy...

We love being here in Ghana and are thankful that each day brings new opportunities to work alongside the wonderful people here in Western Africa. A quote from Elder Dickson, who served as the area president here, best sums up what we've learned from them; "they have little of what matters least and a lot of what matters most." We feel humbled and blessed to be amongst these great people and are grateful for their examples of love, service and a dedication to living Christ-like lives. The pictures we take and share on our blog can never fully convey the whole story or depth of what we're experiencing, but we hope you enjoy seeing a little bit of everyday life for a senior missionary couple. Here's some of what we've been up to these last two weeks:

Donne, wearing the #3 jersey, was one of the first people we met here in Ho. His mother moved away three
years ago and Donne and his sister have been working together to raise their family. We've been driving
Donne and his father out to the village where their mother lives in order to provide them with some family time.
 What a blessing to have seen them reunite all together back in Ho this week! In the picture
above, Donne is teaching a Family Home Evening lesson to his whole family outside their home. 

The church held an All-Africa Service Day where members throughout the continent spent the
day serving in their local communities.  In Ho, over 100 people from the Ho 1 and Ho 2 branches
worked together to help fix one of the worst roads in the city. What hard workers!

Working with 5 branches and 14 missionaries in our zone means we're blessed to be able to attend a number of baptisms each week. These wonderful, life-changing events are filled with the most peaceful spirit. The elders use either a portable font that can travel between locations while some of the buildings have outdoor fonts like this one.

We spent three days at the District Youth Camp with 61 amazing young women and young men from our area. We rented a facility at St. Paul's Senior High School where the kids were called on a "mini" mission. This year's theme was "Embark" which is taken from a scripture in the Doctrine & Covenants 4:2 - "Oh ye that embark in the service of your God, see that ye do so with all your heart, might, mind and strength." What a great goal for us all. Truly amazing kids.

We were also asked to speak at another youth camp, this time in front of 500 junior high students.
We talked about finding hope and happiness through the Atonement of Jesus Christ and that the
decisions they make today will determine their destinies down the road. They gave us a "Yevu" cheer at the end! 

We've been holding missionary firesides throughout our area where the members invite their family and friends to join us for an evening of fun, facts and food. We've been showing a video about the church pioneers here in Ghana, sharing a message about reaching out to those in need and feasting on local foods like banku with stew, jollof rice and malt drinks. 

One of our favorite activities is when we get to go with the missionaries on their teaching appointments. The spirit is always strong as the testify of God's plan of salvation to humble and happy families here in Ghana. We trekked through a village to meet with Anthony and Elizabeth and their young son Miracle (she was told that she'd never have children, hence the little boy's descriptive name). 

Speaking of missionaries, here's our favorite. The one on the left is our son and youngest child Elder Bodine, who is currently serving his mission in Cuernavaca, Mexico. We miss him tremendously but we wouldn't want him to be any other place. We absolutely love having this shared experience and to see his joy in serving others. 

While traveling up north this week we saw a sign for a local restaurant that we hadn't seen before, so we decided to give it a try. Even at under $3 a bowl, we decided to head home and snack on our crackers and cheese (we think the rabbits here are so skinny that they only come with one "B"). Let us know if you want us to order you something!

Mission Life

While we miss our family and friends immensely, we've settled into the extremely happy but tiring life as a missionary here in Ghana. There are so many people, places and opportunities here that teach us that true love comes through serving others, and we're finding joy in every journey. In a nod to one of our favorite musicals, here are a few of our favorite things...

Our children gave us the best present ever by writing 365 reasons why they love us and we open a new one each night! And if that wasn't heart-wrenching enough, they had all of our extended family and friends do the same.
Thanks for all your uplifting words - we love you too!

Cheese! Yes, of all the things we've found we love here in Africa, it's the cheese. Most nights we skip dinner and snack on a plate of cheese and crackers in our bed. It's one of the simple things we've grown to love.

Believe it or not, we're both trying some of the local foods. Yes, this is Sarah buying and eating some food from a street vendor - a Sokomie sandwich we bought on the border of Togo. It's avocado, lettuce and mayonaisse - yummy! 

Ooops - this isn't one of our favorite things. John was "arrested" last week for speeding - nothing that a few cedis couldn't fix. We were also stopped for a random drug search by machine gun-toting soldiers. Luckily, none were found.

The people - we absolutely love the people. They are all so kind and loving and so generous with what little they have. This is Bernice who runs a non-profit called Days for Girls on top of being a mom, wife and business woman. Their organization provides education, training and maturation kits for the young girls here in Ghana.

The children here radiate love and beauty and are especially fascinated by Sarah's blond hair and wonderful smile. They often run up to us to touch our skin, yelling "yevu - yevu" as they run away laughing. 

It's a simpler life when an old, rusted bike rim can provide all the fun you need.
Throw in a few goats and you've got a great game of tag.

We love our missionaries! What wonderful examples of faithful, obedient hard-working warriors for the Lord.

Meet Rebecca, a 15 year-old girl living on her own with her younger sister Happy. Mom and Dad
aren't around much so she has to support herself and her sister. She made this table decoration for
Sarah after we dropped off a loaf of bread when we went to visit her one day. 

Helping to make eternal families! Thanks to so many of you for your generosity in helping these members go to the temple for the first time. This group from the Ho 2 felt like they were visiting heaven here on earth.

Two Month Anniversary

In some ways it seems as though we've been gone for a long time and in others it feels like we left just yesterday. We miss our family and friends immensely but we know we're doing exactly what the Lord would have us do at this time in our lives. We're still adjusting to a completely different lifestyle, but we're grateful for new opportunities that help us grow and learn such valuable, eternal lessons like faith, hope and charity.

We recently spent a few days at a local hospital with one of the missionaries in our area. Unfortunately, malaria is still rampant in this area of the world and, even though the missionaries take medicine every day, most of them end up learning about this parasite the hard way. Sarah and I take our Doxy pills with every breakfast and we pray that we don't have to spend any time in the local hospitals - it was a very sobering and eye-opening experience.

Elder Marsh was admitted but then wasn't checked on for over 24-hours

The admittance and diagnostic process took so long that the blood lab and the pharmacy had closed for the night, even though we arrived mid-afternoon. Knowing what it's like to have a missionary in the field, Sarah went into mom mode and had the hospital staff doing everything they could for this poor elder. They ended up giving us the blood samples to take over to the lab and had us pick up our own medicines from the pharmacy.

Yes, it took a full box of medicine to treat Elder Marsh. After 3-days of care(?) and seven IV's, we pulled him out of Ho and drove him to one of the larger hospitals in Accra.

In between trips to the hospital, we've been able to attend a few of the quarterly zone conferences and monthly zone meetings. This is when all the missionaries in a zone get together for training, teaching, interviews and food (and there's always a whole lot of food). The missionaries love to see and catch up with old companions and roommates and we enjoy seeing how much they love and miss each other.

On top of the training, there are a lot of smiles, laughter and even some good-natured noogies!

Once the meetings are over, the bank is open. We provide reimbursement for monies the elders have spent for travel, power (when it's on), water and even bicycle repairs. Every penny of these sacred missionary funds are accounted for.

We spent 4 days at the mission home in Accra working on transfers as 20 missionaries left (after completing their 2 years here in Ghana) and 23 new missionaries arrived. It's a bittersweet time when these spiritual warriors head home to resume the lives they left behind to serve the Lord, but the excitement and eagerness of their replacements warms our hearts.

Sixteen of the new missionaries arrived from the Provo MTC a bit jet lagged but eager to find their companion and head to their new areas. We also had elders/sister from Zambia, Nigeria and Australia in this MTC group.

We continue to put a lot of kilometers on our truck as we visit each of the branches and groups in our area. We've attended a number of baptisms, firesides, and leadership meetings lately in an effort to get to know these humble and wonderful people better. They live hard and burdened lives but the message of the restored gospel gives them faith and hope to carry on and endure to the end.

These great missionaries taught this gentleman the gospel in sign language. The portable font
gets a lot of use in the branches and groups.

Thanks to some wonderful friends back home (thanks Charole and Lynne) we received a shipment of young women medallions and personal progress books. The young women of the Tsito Branch felt like Christmas came in July as they've been working to qualify for their awards. The love and live the gospel!

Every Saturday we have a group of local kids over to our house. Most of them come from tough family situations and are living on their own. We have them wash the car, weed and sweep the dirt around our house in order to earn some money for food the next week. Sarah washes all their clothes and school uniforms and they iron their church shirts so they're ready for Sunday meetings.

We always have the cleanest truck in town!

While we were in Accra last week, the mission president asked us to head to the market in Jamestown (the largest and therefore the craziest market in the city) and buy 25 white shirts. We took two of the African missionaries with us so that they could bargain in the local languages. Thanks to their hard work, we were able to get 25 new white shirts for 230 Ghana Cedis - that's under $3 per shirt in US dollars.

Another Great Week in Ho!

It's been another busy week here in Ho and the heat, thunderstorms and "light off" have been our constant companions. We did a bit of traveling last week going from Accra, the southernmost point in the mission, to Hohoe, which is the farthest north, putting almost 800 kilometers on our truck. Sarah keeps our daily calendar in pencil because the schedule can change on an hourly basis and we've learned that being flexible is a necessary trait for all missionaries.

Sarah's excellent organizational skills come in handy as do lots and lots of post-it notes!

At the start of each week, we work together on a short message that we can share with the people we meet and the less-active members from each branch that we've been asked to visit. Last week we shared a thought on "being of good cheer"and read a scripture in John 16:33 that helps us put our trust in Jesus Christ.

It's not always easy finding some of the homes as there aren't street addresses or house numbers

We helped with another funeral last week and our truck was used as a hearse again. The tradition here is to hold the funeral on a weekend and sometimes it takes a few weeks before the family can all travel to where they're holding the funeral. The families wear mainly black if the deceased was older and passed on after living a fulfilled life. They'll wear mainly red if the funeral is for a younger person who left this life too soon. We've enjoyed sharing the message of God's plan of salvation with those in mourning and that we'll have the chance to be together with our loved ones once this life is over. 

We've been helping some of the youth with their English literacy and have been providing computer training to some of the adults. We love to see the joy on their faces as they learn something new and they share what they learned with others. 

This is our good friend Christian Dikro. He just finished writing a letter to his daughter who's away at school and I showed him how to add a picture of himself to the letter. He was overjoyed to send it to her!

We were busy most of the day on Saturday, but we were able to have the missionaries over for pizza and ice cream that night to celebrate the 4th of July holiday. Being away from home and living outside of the United States has deepened our love for our country and the many conveniences we are blessed to have. We pray for and are thankful for all those who have served or are currently serving to keep our country free.

Ghanaians love America and this store hung the flags together on Independence Day.

The missionaries at our house celebrating the 4th of July with pizza, ice cream and a good game of golf. Just a tip for future missionaries - the elders from the Sudan and Nigeria love to look at their cards!