Beloved friends and family,
What a week! I am so happy to report that life is good for me here! The sun is shining, the breeze is blowing the sweat off my face, my clothes are washed and drying in the intense heat of the sun and my new companion (Elder Bond) is awesome! as i said, Life is GOOD!!!
The new apartment is great. unfortunately, we havent had water this weekend, but we went the luxury route and ordered a truck of 700 liters of water this morning into our water storage tank. it was nice to clean the apartment and take a bath- first time in a few days. Also pretty happy to have clean clothes with the new water. Just praying that the city water turns on soon to fill our resevour all the way to the top! that water will only last till Friday!
I love the convenience of this new apartment. i cant believe im still in Africa living here. Downstairs is a laundry mat (the only one ive ever seen), across the street are small vendors selling everything i need from fruit, veggies, soap, food etc. a bike shop within sight to fix our ever breaking bikes. two internet cafe's within walking distance. a semi nice grocery store within walking distance. and the best yet? The apartment is in MY area! woot!!! :)i also sleep on the top bunk of a BUNK BED!!! yeah, life is always changing! first time since high school! only bummer is that my room is unfortunately hot and breeze free.... oh well. life is good!
My new companion, Elder Bond, is a S-T-U-D!!! shoot! im so excited for these next 6 weeks! We are going to tear it up! he is also willing to share a few of his bodybuilding tips with me to help me get back into shape before coming home... im excited about that! He is an american from Mississippi. (thats right, two white southern rednecks together.. too easy!)
The area is also doing well. We have a semi small teaching pool thus we have spent most of the week contacting new people and teaching for the first time. difficult and slow, but still quite fun! We've met some pretty interesting people... there are some strange concerns and people we run into now and again. We have some wonderful potential baptismal candidates already from introducing some BOM teachings to intrigue them. too awesome!
A wonderful experience with an investigator, brother joe, worth sharing. He is preparing for baptism on the 14th of march. during a lesson this week, he brought up some concerns he had about how to draw closer to Christ to rid himself of evil forces and spirits which sometimes surround us. He asked because of the common false practice in west africa of all night prayers and holy ghost fire, visiting and paying prophets to pray for you etc...it was so wonderful for us to be able to explain to him the power he has to individually pray with faith for himself and God would hear him personally and take care of him. We dont need to go to a pastor or prophet and pay them to pray for us, we dont need to shout and dance all night long to rid ourselves of such things. All we need to do is fill ourselves with faith and privately ask our Heavenly Father to help us in any need we are in.
I had one of those moments when i said to myself, "the gospel makes so much sense" at the close of that lesson. it was so special for me to be able to help a dear brother understand how close our Father in Heaven is willing to come to us if we only ask Him. I have found that to be true in my own life as i have faced challenges and obsticals. He is in control! Life is good!
Well, till next week, may we all strive to be a little better and kinder one to another. lets help make someone elses life a little better while we are at it. Life is so good!
love,
Elder Fairwell
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