"This is a natural body that I am having" - Henry

Dear Friends & Family,

This past week we went over the Word of Wisdom with Henery, an investigator who moved to Kumasi but has now come back to Kasoa. after the lesson we were walking home and he followed us a little ways from his house and we were just talking about stuff and he said, "I didn't realize that I need to gym to obey God" (on the front of the word of wisdom pamphlet it has two people jogging so in the lesson we usually say something like: it’s important to keep our bodies healthy not only by avoiding things that are bad, but being sure to give them the exercise that they need.) We said something to the effect of, "Ya, but you don't have a problem with that, you gym right?" He is a rather built guy, like most people that you run into here. Elder Herrod and I were kinda teasing him, "No, you've gotta gym, your huge man!" in response to our teasing Henery waved his hand in front of his chest in a small circle and said, "Nope! I don't gym. As for me this is a natural body that I am having." I'm running out of movie and song quotes...

On the subject of natural bodies, I am sorry for the passing of Grandma Satchwell. President Snow informed me of what had happened on Thursday afternoon. I will miss her. I know that she is happy and I am so grateful for the Plan of Salvation. I wrote a portion of my journal to my mom to be shared in her funeral from the night after I got the news. I am happy that she is with grandpa again! 

(here is a little bit of what he wrote: Today at 3:48 pm I  got a call from President Snow informing me that Grandma Satchwell had passed away. I was walking to an appointment on the road by Kwabenas house and he called me and I sat down on a palm tree log and kept the telephone call rather short. it was difficult to be very focused on the work for the next few hours as my thoughts turned to "How is my mom doing?" "What can I do to help them?" But I realized that the thing that grandma would want me doing more than anything would be serving the people of Ghana. As my thoughts are now (at 10 PM) directed towards grandma I think of the last time I saw her, that Monday after my farewell, I thought back to skipping class to drive down the day after I got my call to tell her I would be going to Africa. I remember her questions: "Do you get to wear cut-offs?, You'll teach them how to farm, then they will have something to eat? Do they have....anything?" I drew a goofy picture of a missionary in cut-offs with a machete and sugarcane strapped to his bag and wrote underneath it: Grandma Satchwell's Dream Missionary (Ghana version) I thought about how she invited the Moody's over to share about their mission in Cameroon and Gabon. I thought about all the times I mowed her lawn and going inside afterward to say "hi" and ask how she was doing, if only I could get one more chance to do that...I thought about this one time when she called our house, I had just arrived home from school (i think it was my junior year of high school) and she asked for my mom (of course) but I was home alone so I said, "no, she wasn't around" and then she paused and said, "I don't call to talk to you very much, how are you doing today?" and we had a grand conversation for a good half and hour about each others day. I told her about my schoolwork, how cross country went that day, what workout we did, goofy stuff that I did with my friends that past weekend. I will forever remember that phone call. I remember Josh and I going to her house when I was really young and we would bring our big box of Legos and dump it out on the floor and play in her living room. I remember her telling me several times throughout my life never to put a large mason jar in your mouth, that her brothers coaxed her into doing it and it was really difficult to get off. I thought about her sewing room (that became grandpas bedroom later) and all the cool stuff she had in there, I remember her backing her jazzy chair into stuff and joking with Josh that she needed that sound that tractors make when they are backing up on her jazzy chair. I thought about a soccer game that I had over by the Sportsplex when I was probably about James's age and I remember the sprinklers were on by the sidewalk because I remember getting wet helping grandma with her jazzy chair so she could watch my soccer game. I thought about how at the end of every classic Satchwell Christmas Party Nativity Grandma and Grandpa would always bear their testimony. I also remember how sincere and grateful her testimony always was. She truly did have an incredible testimony and was always an example to me.The more I think about her the more I can remember.
I hope you know that I really admire grandma a lot, and I want you to know that she truly was an awesome example of love and care to me and I will sincerely miss her..)

The name of the little boy that runs out to shake my hand every day is Daniel. I will try to send the video of him home this week. 

Two girls pretending to ride bikes like the missionaries.

I gotta tell you this funny story. Our zone leaders came over for our district meeting which is held under our mango tree in our compound. These two lizards were fighting and they change color from orange and blue to speckled white and one of them chased the other right into our front door. Elder Brown grabbed a broom and ran into our front door yelling YAAAAA! So we have a lizard living in our house somewhere. Occasionally I will hear him scampering around on our ceiling. Also we have these really big bats that live in the trees in our compound, I saw a snake in our front hall the other day while we were studying. Every time I see a cool animal, I totally think of my little bro. James! 

This past week we contacted a lady named Josephine. She had met with missionaries in Kaneshie before but sort of lost contact with them over time. During that period of time that she lost contact with them, her young husband passed away. She now lives with her two boys Jaden and Fitzgerald and they are really cool. She sits on her sister’s front porch (they kinda took her in after her husband died) and she weaves bead necklace's all day. (They are actually really cool btw I would never buy one because they are really girly but she has some talent) so we sat out on her porch and started with a prayer. The lesson was going really well until her neighbor (a pastor for another church) came over and started listening. He started to ask questions, starting with saying, "in Revelations it says that we shouldn't add or subtract anything from the bible... so why do you have the book of Mormon? That’s going against the Bible." side note- (it’s kinda funny, Ghanaians will follow what some pastor says the Bible teaches before they will follow their own constitution I’ve noticed, all you've gotta say is "it says in the Bible..." and the argument is over.) I turned to Deuteronomy 4:2 "" so what your if what your telling me is true, and looking at this scripture, Nobody should have written anything more than the 5 books of Moses, therefore entire New Testament and the rest of the Old Testament you are holding in your hands is false. What these scriptures teach us about can be explained using two other scripture passages Isaiah 24:5 and 1 Nephi 13. After reading the scriptures I told him that adding and subtracting from the word of God means that you are making interpretations and taking things away from the bible without the priesthood authority. I’ve found that everything hinges on whether or not someone accepts and understands that you NEED priesthood authority. I bore my testimony that the Book of Mormon was translated by the authority and power of God, and that the only way for someone to really know if something is from Him or not, is to ask Him. There is no other way, you can quote bible verses all you want, until you ask god in faith with a desire to act on the answer you receive no matter of human evangelical philosophy can give you a correct answer.

It rained again this week and we discovered that water has been leaking into our room behind our desk, the way we figured this out is we set the area book under the desk by the wall after planning one night and the next morning (after the rainstorm) and everything was soaked. All of our records have become one as the ink is now on every page. (Which is sorta convenient cuz then you don't have to thumb through the teaching records, you can just look at the first one really close and see ah ha! we taught john chastity, so let’s teach him tithing tomorrow) we moved our desk. The leak is really gradual and it doesn't leave a puddle it just slowly moves down the wall. 

We went to teach Abell a Recent convert lesson to help him prepare to go and do baptisms for the dead. As we were talking about it and sharing some scriptures and points from the plan of salvation that we had covered in previous lessons we discovered that he had heard about baptisms for the dead at church already. he was glad that we came and clarified some things but he said, "I was trying to figure out how I was going to get my grandfather’s dead body and take it to Accra..." we had a good laugh at that one, but as I was leaving that lesson I thought about how faith filled that statement was noticing that he was trying to come up with a plan to get his grandfather’s dead body. I learned that faith is all about action. It’s kinda weird but I thought it was cool how devoted he would be to anything he was asked to do. He has strong faith. 

I took Mary (an 11 year old girl in our area) to church. She would occasionally hang around while we were teaching this guy named Denis. she isn't really mature enough to be a serious investigator, or to be baptized and she also doesn't have very good support from her family so right now wouldn't be the best time for her to be baptized but she has been begging me to take her to church every time I see her. So this week we had ward conference and elder herrod and I were both at kasoa (usually one of us has to go to bawjiase) so we went to pick her. She told me as we were walking to church "my dream has come true. every night I pray to god that the two white men will pick me to church, and my dream has come true!" Her simple testimony helped me keep perspective on things. 

I hope everyone is doing well. I love you all so much! 

Love, Elder Peters