Rice, rice and more rice

Im proud to announce that the destroying angel has passed over me once again this week and I have not suffered any sickness or deadly illness. Too easy. Eblola seems to be striking people right and left. Even in my proselyting area a few suspected cases have emerged. Sure, it is a little bit concerning, but whenever I have felt concerned, the Lord's words run through my head, "when ye are prepared, ye shall not fear!". I feel somehow like the Israelites when they followed their priesthood leader's instruction to avoid death from the destrying angel. As I follow the inspired preventative measures, I too feel the Lord's protective hand over me. I was marveling the other day at the miracle I have witnessed in my own health. One year and 2 months in probably the least hygenic country in the world and I have only been sick and out of commission for two days, only for a few hours each day with enough strength to go out and proselyte. I do know that Our Heavely Father is watching over those that are obedient in his service. I try to improve each day, for I have much to improve in!

We had an eventful service project this friday. It was raining all night and into the morning, through personal and companion study and it was still raining heavily at 10:30 as we were preparing to head out to work on a less active woman's garden. With our machettes and Cutless' we marched out into the pouring rain and had a lot of fun clearing some dense foliage in order for our sister to plant cassavva in the future. Not going to lie, we were pretty cool hacking down tall bushes and plants in the pouring rain. In my mind, as we walked down the path home covered in greenage holding 2 foot machettes in a large group of missionaries, I felt somehow like men coming back from battle, blood stained and covered in carnage. Yeah, the cover from 300 flashed through my mind, we were just the spiritual version of Spartans. No big deal.

We also celebrated the Liberian Independence day on Saturday by visiting Less Actives, Recent Converts and a few members homes and shoveling down food. I believe thats how they celebrate. Eat and then sleep. Then invite the missionaries because there is NO WAY any one else thought to feed them. And for us to refuse their food is insulting. oh well. My companion is a good eater and took care of me. We manage to carry a few meals home and finally, this morning, we finished the last of the rice. I was sick of rice... I cant wait for someone to whip out a nice fresh casserole one of these days. HA...

I had the privilage of baptising one of my great humble friends on saturday. He is roughly 40 years old. I was a little concerned when he came up out of the water with eyes bigger than pumpkins, not saying a word just staring off into space. not going to lie, I was a bit scared when he looked right at me. I felt like a bit of horror music played in the back of my mind. It seemed that he was having some out of body experience or maybe he was going to faint and be in a coma for 3 days like Alma the younger, I didnt know! Anyways, that passed and he safely walked out of the font and everything went well. He was silent until after the service when he kindly and warmly told us how wonderful he now felt, just that he was deathly scared of the water and didnt want to admit it. wow, i felt better after that! It was a privalege to baptized such a great man.

This week we should be having fun joining our Elders Quorum in a football activity on thursday. My companoin is a pretty good baller, and I seem to have lost my touch but will still have fun :)

shout out to those wonderful peeps that got mission calls this few weeks! wow, thats so exciting! times out but i have more to say about these peole next week! love you all!! do some good damage in the world!

-Elder Fairwell