Birthday Week

Baptism day for Brother Kwabena, Sister Dorkis, and Brother Sarkodie

Dear family and friends,

 Thank you for all of the birthday emails!

This week was absolutely sweet! It was an absolute blast celebrating my birthday out here in Africa. What's a better birthday gift than teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ and having people accept baptismal dates and read the Book of Mormon? It was one of the sweetest birthdays that I have had yet.

On Friday I was soaked the whole day. Here in Ghana, it is a tradition to spray people with water on their birthdays. I completely forgot about it until my companion told one of our investigators that bakes cakes that it was my birthday. I was so grateful that he told her because I got a free cake from her as a present but included was a seriously wet shirt. After that, everywhere we went my companion told the people that we were meeting with that it was my birthday just because he wanted to see me get wet. At first I was a little annoyed about it, but in the end, I was completely fine with it because it cooled me off so much! 

This week we focused on contacting because many of our investigators in our teaching pool are about to be baptized. Majority of the people that we met this past week were super stubborn and hard-hearted. I have noticed that the people here in Techiman are a lot different than Kumasi. Don't get me wrong they love Jesus Christ and listening to people share the gospel, but they are a lot more stubborn about even thinking about changing churches and very prideful about the church that they do go, this makes the work super difficult. We met one man that flat out told us "Quite frankly I won't have any time to read your book. I am a chief elder in my church." We were like ok no problem and then left the Book of Mormon on one of his speakers. Despite not having much success contacting this week one of our investigators told us that he has two friends that are super interested in the church and we gave them a Book of Mormon and will hopefully accept baptism soon.

Vatican City Branch Members at the Baptism

Vatican City Branch Chapel

Yesterday we had an amazing day at church. Eight of our investigators came to church, and we had three baptisms. Brother Kwabena, Sister Dorkis, and Brother Sarkodie. Kwabena and Dorkis came to church three times, and then we baptized them. Sarkodie, on the other hand, was completely different. His journey to baptism was a lot longer. He met with missionaries for six months before I came to the area. His one main concern was the fact that he was hesitant to join another organized religion because of all of the things that have happened to him in the past. He has had pastors rob money from him and a bunch of other stuff that would make me scared to join another church as well. He just said that he needed time to investigate the church and see how it was. He told him to pray and read the Book of Mormon. Even we have been praying for him every day the past couple of weeks and one day he surprised us by saying "Elders I hope I can baptize this week." We were both super shocked and said absolutely; you can be baptized this week!
The baptism service was great, and the spirit was so strong.   The branch president was the one performing the baptisms. He did all three of them with his left hand to the square instead of his right. And we didn't realize it until he got changed as well as the three candidates. We had to go tell them to get dressed again and had to do the three baptisms over again. All of us felt so good after the baptism knowing that it was done right. After the baptism, all three of the candidates were so happy and had huge smiles on their faces. 

I hope everyone has a great next week. I know I will because Harmattan is ending and the start of the much loved RAINY SEASON is this week!!!!

Love,
Elder Ordyna

Pics of Techiman. Looking forward to the rainy season! 

An Investigator's Pet Monkey

Member's Farm where we went Farming

View of Techiman from the top of the Chapel

Being in The World but Not of the World

Dear family and friends,
Being on the mission and this past week I have definitely experienced this quote. "As missionaries, we live according to a set of standards that are higher than back home. That is so we can have the spirit to be with us all of the time." It has also been an amazing experience to live the mission standards and feel the impact of doing so. On the mission, you experience everything, like everything. We see the most awesome things but also the weirdest and craziest things. 

We had a multi-zone activity this past week in Sunyani. After the activity, we were assigned to sleep in the Fiapre apartment. The apartment is right above Joker's Pub, and they play loud music all night long. All night for hours you have to listen to some crazy African songs half of which are in Twi. It was seriously annoying and obnoxious, but it was classic. On almost every corner Ghana has a pub or "spot" as they are officially called here. And at night they are an absolute party. People are dancing, talking, drinking and playing music super, super loud. If I could pick any of the missionary lessons to go and teach it on TV so that everyone in the county could hear it would definitely be The Word of Wisdom. We meet like two drunk people a day. 

Me and Elder Smith making pineapple stew. The absolute best recipe that I ever made on mission so far!!

We are planning to baptism three people this week. Sister Dorkis and Brother Kwabena are two super powerful investigators that have come to church every Sunday for the past three weeks. The other man, his conversion, and baptism is an absolute miracle. He is what I guess missionaries call The Golden Investigator. From the second he started meeting with missionaries, he knew the church was true and that The Book of Mormon is true. The only thing holding him back was his deep anti-religious feelings because he had bad experiences with churches before. Like I have shared before in previous emails many of the churches in Ghana are super Apostate. There is the gift of tongues stuff, and the pastors take all of the members tithes for themselves. Missionaries have been meeting with Sarkodie for the past year. We had a short lesson with him this morning. We were expecting to walk in there and help resolve some of his concerns, but out of nowhere, he said Elders I think it is about time that I baptize. I was so shocked that I didn't even know what to say. We basically just told him that we were super happy for him and that we knew he was making the right choice. We have been praying for him every day since I have come to Techiman. Sunday will be one of my happiest days on the mission with the three baptisms. I have loved Techiman so much and have had such a great experience on my mission so far.
Hope everyone has a great week and I will talk to you next week!!!

Love,
Elder Ordyna

Taking Accountability as District Leader

Walk, Walk, Walk,

Dust, Dust, Dust

IT'S TECHIMAN!!!!

-Quote by Elder Ayeque (new missionary from Ivory Coast)

The Dust of Techiman

Chillin

  

Dust Town

 Dear family and friends,

I officially made it to my third area. Techiman has been a really sweet place already. It is way smaller than Kumasi but super similar. The buildings and the way the city is set up reminds me a lot of Kumasi. There is a main downtown area with banks, office buildings and then a huge food market and then the city goes out from there. It is so much hotter, sunnier, drier, and dustier than Kumasi. We are farther up north and Harmattan is twice as bad up here. The dust is so bad! You walk five minutes and you look down and your shoes arent black anymore they are straight red. I have given up on trying to polish them because as soon as I step out the door my shoes are dirty again. Polishing shoes out here in Techiman is just a waste of time and polish so I just take my brush and clean my shoes off and call it good. 

The Kumasi mission is so big that we have 11 zones and take up three quarters of Ghana. There are 6 zones in Kumasi and then the other five zones are in Obuasi, Konongo, Sunyani, Techiman and Tamale. And all of these places are spread out and far apart from everywhere. So, here in Techiman I am one of 16 missionaries for miles. We get super close to everyother missionary in the zone because they are the only other missionaries that we see. In Kumasi I would see over half the mission every week. Kumasi was a lot of fun and I missed it for my first couple of days. But, now that I have been out here in Techiman for a while I have really come to enjoy it so much!!

Another powerful thing about Techiman is the fact that the Mente Brafo problem isn't bad at all. In Kumasi they love speaking Twi way too much. If you walk up to someone and start speaking with them in English, they won't even talk to you unless you mix some Twi words in. Others only understand How are you and then when you go farther than that they competely shut down and say Mente Brafo!! Which means basically "I don't speak English." It was a super serious problem for us missionaries. It was very rare to find someone that spoke good English and understood it well enough for us to teach them. Most of the time we had to coordinate with members to come out and translate for us which was a complete hassle because many members had no time or didn't care to do missionary work. But, here in Techiman many, many people love speaking English and when you start speaking with someone they will speak it back to you which was a shock when I first came here. Even little kids can speak super powerful English which was completely new to me. The farther north you go in Ghana the more English they speak. 

We have a lot of progressing investigators that we are meeting with right now that we are preparing to baptize. We are planning for two at the end of the month and two more at the beginning of March. Many of our investigators have some minor concerns that we are addressing right now and hoping to help them overcome so that they will feel ready for baptism. From what I have seen already up here in Techiman the work is a lot slower than in Kumasi. There are many, many Muslims and the people aren't as religious here as in Kumasi. But, compared to other parts of the world the work is going very well!!!

I would like to share a story to end my letter this week. This last Saturday my companion and I were just leaving a hotel where one of our investigators works to take a taxi back to our apartment when we saw a lady walking her motobike up a hill. We asked her if she needed help starting it or walking it back to our house. She wanted us to try and start it for her. My companion hops on and tries to kickstart it but nothing. After a couple more minutes the investigator Edmond and his brother Richmond (member) come out of the hotel and start to help us. Richmond gets on and asks my companion to help push the bike to try and jumpstart it. Well... they ended up getting it going but Richmond accidentally hit the gas and the brake wasn't working so he ran it right into a concrete wall. Luckily he was completely fine but the bike wasn't. The plastic body cracked and the steering alignment was completely off. We offered to walk it home for her but she said that she didn't want to worry about it tonight and just left it at the hotel. My companion and I felt so bad afterwards. We told the lady that we were really sorry. We were trying to be helpful and found a service opportunity but the whole thing backfired and blew up in our faces.

I hope all of you have a wonderful week. I encourage everyone to find service opportunities this week. They can be big or small. Just go out and brighten someones day for them!

Love,

Elder Ordyna

We went to a members house yesterday after church to visit with her small. Her husband just passed away and she doesn't see her children a lot so we have been asked by the branch president to visit her a lot to see how she is doing. Yesterday was amazing. We were sitting and talking small to her when she said "Hold on I'm Coming!" She went behind her house and came back with a really long metal pole. My companion and I were wondering what she was going to use that for. We followed her over to a coconut tree and she started banging the pole on some coconuts to knock down a couple for us to eat and take back to our apartment. Then she goes over to a mango tree and starts knocking some down for us. Let me just say for the hour that we were at her house it was pure paradise. We were eating coconuts and mangoes! She even gave us a bunch to take with us. The picture is of the one of the coconuts. The biggest coconut I have ever seen in Ghana. I have officially been in every kind of apartment in the mission. I started in a four went to a two man and now am in a six man. The six man apartment is my favorite so far. It is absolutely a party every day in there!

The Techiman Dust from our Compound

The Techiman Six Man Apartment

The Biggest Coconut Ever (We got it from a member)

Techiman Sunset

Elder Westfall (Companion), Elder Ayequoe and Elder Ordyna

Elder Austin, Elder Smith, Elder Ordyna, Elder Carlson

Techiman and Sunyani Zone Conference

Techiman Vatican City 1

Dear family and friends,

Sorry, I don't have much time to email today. But, I officially made it to my new area in Techiman. It is about 3 hours away from Kumasi. Techiman is a very small town compared to Kumasi. It is like Thatcher or Payson compared to Phoenix. But it is a seriously nice place. It is a lot more peaceful and calm than Kumasi which has been amazing. I have certainly missed my old area Kenyasi and my companion but, I am enjoying getting to know my new companion, Elder Westfall. He is from Boise Idaho and is a great guy. We are certainly getting along very well. We have the same mindset about a lot of things and certainly relate more than a lot of my companions. The area is filled with a lot of progressing investigators that we hope to baptize here very soon. I have some stories to tell but my time won't allow it. Till next week. 

Yabeisha Wi (See you soon in Twi)

Elder Ordyna  

Shawarma Stand

Brother Sampson from Kenyasi (Recent Convert)

With Elder Buhler in Kejetia

Me with Brother Ambros (I Love You Companion, Companion I Love You)(Asuoyeboah Member)

Elder Westfall (my companion)

Last Week as Landlord of Mighty Kenyasi

 Elder Buhler and I stopped off at a gas station for some American Pizza. It was fantastic!

Dear family and friends,

Sorry, my weekly email this week will be shorter than usual, I don't have much time this week. Well, transfer news came this week, and I will be going on transfer! After 4.5 months I am leaving Kenyasi and will be shipped off to Techiman (Vatican City) which is about three hours from Kumasi. I will be serving with another American named Elder Westfall. Which I am really excited about. I will still be District Leader, but this time it is an eight missionary district instead of 4. Plus, there will be four sisters and the Zone leaders. So, it will definitely be a brand new experience for me. The branch is under the mission. There is no stake or district out there. So, the missionaries do a lot out there as well. They teach every Sunday and give talks once a month so that should be a lot of fun I guess. 

It was very sad to say goodbye to all of my friends here in Kenyasi. But, it is the way missionary work goes. We have so many powerful investigators that I would love to see progress and be baptized, but Elder Bamba will have the pleasure with that. 

Till next week! Next Monday I will be emailing from Techiman!

Love,

Elder Ordyna

Eating Fried Rice at my Kenyasi Branch Farewell Party with Musah (Recent Convert) and Elder Bamba

Dichemso Zone Activity with Sister Osuji, Elder Bamba and Me

Me and Elder Bamba - Companionship study 

The Dudes in Kenyasi (gang of little boys that come to church every week)

FM at Brother Asare's House (Elder Quorum President)

Farewell Mighty Kenyasi

The Week

Mensah (Our Barber Investigator)

Dear Family and Friends,

It was great to gather with other members and missionaries here in the Dichemso Stake in Kumasi Ghana to watch the announcement of President Nelson and his counselors. I could feel the power and spirit of President Nelson and know that he has been called of God at this time to be His prophet. 

As I was watching the broadcast, I was thinking about many of the people in Ghana specifically but also in the world that do not know who God's prophet is. Here in Ghana, there are thousands of prophets. Everywhere you look there will be a billboard advertising a church and then a big picture of the founder and in big letters PROPHET and his name. And many popular prophets have their TV station, and you can watch them perform miracles and heal people. As we teach the first lesson to people here, we emphasize the fact that Jesus Christ prophesied that there would be many false prophets in the world. But, that God always calls a prophet to lead and guide us and today at this very moment God's prophet is on the Earth. I am so grateful for prophets and the guidance and direction that it gives us. I am also so grateful for the knowledge that I have of God's chosen prophet today President Russel M. Nelson.

This week was like a crazy rollercoaster ride. One super great thing would happen followed by like three bad and disappointing things. But, one thing that I have learned as a missionary is that no matter how bad things go, there will always be even better things that happen so you won't remember the bad things anymore. And that is exactly what happened this week. 

On Tuesday we were supposed to meet at Dichemso for our district council and then afterward for Zone Council. But, of course, our district council, unfortunately, didn't come on but we had a powerful Zone Council, and then we were able to watch the inspired broadcast from President Nelson. Wednesday at Mid-Week we only had two members, and at our Less-Active Fireside on Thursday not one less active member showed up. Friday and Saturday were also super crazy days.

Friday afternoon we were teaching a lady that we just contacted and was interested in our message. We got all the way through lesson one, and she told us that she would read The Book of Mormon and pray and even come to church on Sunday. As I was bearing my testimony at the very end out of nowhere a Jehovah Witness lady cuts me off and starts going off about how she heard I say that Joseph Smith saw God and Jesus Christ. She proceeded to say that it is completely false. God and Jesus Christ are one person. She kept going for like 15 minutes. She completely wanted to get into an argument with us and was even very disappointed when my companion and I just kept saying ok, ok, no problem. I would have completely argued with her, but the Zone Leaders were waiting for us to go do a baptismal interview. So, I wasn't able to talk much with her, but she completely destroyed our lesson. After she finished talking, we went back to the investigator, and at this point, she was completely scared about The Book of Mormon and wouldn't read it anymore, and she said that she doesn't want to meet with us anymore. The Jehovah Witness just walked away, and we haven't seen her since. The next day we went back to the investigator and resolved all of her concerns and is now reading the Book of Mormon, so that is great. As we were walking to meet with the Zone Leaders both my companion and I were in really bad moods because of what happened with the Jehovah Witness. And my mood just got even worse because none of our candidates were available for their baptismal interviews. So another very disappointing moment. We went from planning for three baptisms to zero for the week. 

As my companion and I were walking back to the apartment for the night, we were talking about how bad our day was and that nothing was working out for us. When all of a sudden a man comes outside his barber shop and calls us over. He said that he and his brother were just talking about the church and that they wanted to come to church on Sunday when at the very moment he saw us walking down the street. He was going to buy some water sachets down the street so as we walked my companion shared with him about Joseph Smith and I talked about the Book of Mormon. He was super happy and excited to see us. He told us that he and his brother would definitely be coming to church on Sunday. My companion and I were so happy to hear that! Joy and happiness completely overcame us, and we forgot about how bad our day was. I know that God was aware of how we were feeling and prepared the barber and his friend for us. And it was no coincidence that at the very moment they were talking about the church we happened to walk by.  Missionary work is God's work, and as a missionary, you can see the hand of the Lord in every day no matter how the day may be going. 

The Three Studs (Elder Ordyna, Buhler, Bamba)

Kofi's Cafe in Kejetia Where the Missionaries Email

Brother Himas Drawing a Picture (A Less-Active we have been Working With)

On Sunday the barber and his friend came as well as eight of our other investigators. We had ten investigators at church! Even a guy that we only met for less than a minute made his way out to church! It was absolutely the best end to a crazy week!! 

Love,
Elder Ordyna

Zone Activity Lake Bosomtwe

Dichemso Zone (8 elders and 6 sisters)

Dear Family and Friends,

I am emailing again today which means another week is here and gone. Time seems like it is going much faster this year. 

I started off the week by attending a zone activity on Monday. All of us in the Dichemso Zone (8 elders and 6 sisters) took Tro-Tro two hours away straight up through bush to get to a sweet lake. It is the biggest artificial lake in Africa. Apparently, it was created by a meteor crashing into Earth. The journey to get there was a little sketchy at times though. The road was very narrow and terrible. There was a lot of winding and sheer drop-offs on the sides of us but we made it in and out with no injuries. It was the sweetest place I have been to so far on the mission. I even saw a monkey swinging in the trees so that was pretty cool. No elephants yet sadly. I heard something that the wildlife preservation societies have corralled all of them into a preservation in Northwest Ghana so now there are no more in the "wild". We had a great time at the lake playing volleyball, soccer and eating fried rice as a zone. 

We had zone conference and I met with President Cosgrave. He didn't hint at any transfer news this time so I have no idea what will happen to me in two weeks when the transfer ends. But, I am thinking that I will leave Kenyasi and my companion will stay. The mission is so big and there are so many areas, that you never really know exactly where you will go next. 

I have loved my time so far here in Kenyasi. Getting to know the members is the most fun part of missionary work. Here in Kenyasi, I have some seriously awesome members that I will really miss. 

I was reading this week in Alma about the big Nephite and Lamanite wars. One thing that stood out to me as I was reading was that at the beginning Captain Moroni fortified some of the Nephite cities and the Lamanites were unable to penetrate them because the Nephites were prepared and fortified against the attacks of their enemies. IT is the same thing with us. If we prepare ourselves against the attacks of the adversary (temptations) by keeping the commandments, studying the scriptures, praying, going to church etc. then they will have no effect on us. 

I love you all and hope you all have a great week!

Love,

Elder Ordyna

Hiking through a Plantation to the Beach

Traveling Home in the Tro-Tro

First Week of the New Year

Musah's Baptism (Brother Goodman, Musah, Elder Bamba and Me)

 Zone Conference- Dichemso

Dear Family and Friends!

Happy New Year!!! I hope the first week of the year treated everyone well! Our week didn't start so well. 

On Monday we headed into town to pull our money, email and buy our food for the next two weeks. We only go to town every other week because it is so far. We only go in the first place because everything out here in Kenyasi is $2-3 higher than in town. Well anyways we were pulling our money and the ATM took my companion's card. And of course, the bank was closed because it was on New Year's and Ghana was basically shut down. We had to go back into town the next day. We waited two hours for those guys to get my companion's card. 10 minutes in one of the workers told us that they are working on getting the card and it will be out very soon. Very soon here in Ghana means two hours. Time isn't really a thing here. You tell someone to meet you at 5 pm, they won't get there until 6:30 pm. It is the same thing for the branch members here in Kenyasi. We tell the members that we will have baptism at 4 pm and it won't start till 5:30 pm. As I look back though waiting for 2 hours at the bank wasn't even that bad. I was able to sit on a couch with A/C blowing on my face and a cookie in my mouth. Things that are very rare to find in Ghana. 

This week was pretty disappointing in the fact that only one of the people we were planning was baptized. We visited the other two on Wednesday. They have been seriously powerful and have been coming to church every Sunday for the past 2 months. It is just very hard to teach them because they don't speak any English. So, we need the members to come help but they aren't really motivated to do that kind of stuff. But, at the end of the lesson, they told us that they want to wait for small for baptism. I was shocked because just last Sunday they both came up to us after church and said that they want to be baptized. We will continue to meet with them and hopefully, they will be baptized here very soon. 

On the bright side, we were able to baptize Musah. One of our investigators that we have been working with to be baptized for a seriously long time. We scheduled a baptismal interview but he couldn't make it so the baptism was canceled. The next week he had the interview but couldn't make the baptism. The baptism was canceled once again. Finally, this past Saturday he was baptized! He is such a faithful young man and it makes me so happy to see how happy and glad he is to finally be a member of the church! He is very serious about everything and comes to Midweek, Chapel Cleaning, Church and is already almost halfway done with the Book of Mormon.

On Wednesday we headed to the chapel for the Branch's End of Year Party! There was music, fun, and of course food. Parties here in Ghana are taken very seriously. Let me just say that the branch used their whole budget of 2017 for this one activity. We even received 3 referrals from the members. So in my book as a missionary, the party was an absolute success!!!

We went contacting many times this week for new investigators. Contacting here in Ghana is basically just walking up and down the streets and just talking to whoever you see. You don't really go door to door because most people are outside already. But, whenever I go contacting the craziest stuff happens. We were walking down a street and out of nowhere a drunk man comes out and yells OBRONI!! And tells me that his name is Alexander the Great Opoku and that he wants to join our church. He told us this crazy story about him being lost at sea and then he had a dream that if he promised God that he would devote the rest of his life to living the Gospel then God would save them. So, now that he is alive and saved he wants to join the church. He ended by saying that his brother lives in the US. I asked him which state and he said that he wasn't sure but his brother's name was Barack Obama. I had a good laugh afterward. 

Things continue to go super well here in Kenyasi. I can testify that missionary work is God's work and I have seen the hand of the Lord in my life as a missionary as well as those I teach. I love each of you and hope you have a great week!

Love,
Elder Ordyna

Happy New Year! 2018

Recent Convert Musah

Dear family and friends,

Happy New Year!!! Hope everyone had an amazing Christmas and a wonderful New Year! It was amazing to talk to my family last week and glad to know that all is well back home! This week definitely has been a crazy one here in Ghana!

New Year is the biggest holiday ever. The Ghanaians celebrate much more than we do back home! For a straight week, there have been fireworks going off every night. And these things are nothing like the little ones we have back home. These people are setting off the huge ones that they do at stadiums and concerts. Except, it isn't at a stadium it is in their backyard next to houses and buildings! The past week it has sounded like they were fighting a war outside. 

And then New Year's Eve was nothing like I have ever seen before. Everywhere you look in Ghana you will see a church. And they aren't like any of the churches back home. They dance, sing, and pray for hours and the top of their lungs and with huge speakers. They even have something that they call the gift of tongues. Which is just them blabbing out random stuff into a microphone nonstop for hours at a time. They believe that when they should pray no one should know what they are saying except for God. And on New Year's Eve all of this stuff completely escalated like three levels. All of the churches had something called Watch Night. Where they stayed up all night singing, dancing, screaming, and yelling random stuff into microphones. Every single church in Ghana has watch night. So, basically, I had absolutely no sleep last night or even the past week for that matter.

We even had some investigators call us and said that they were at the chapel and no one was there. They asked us if we had Watch Night. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the only church without Watch Night. The people here love it so much that they didn't even show up for Sacrament Meeting they just wanted to know if we would have Watch Night. 

Plus, with all of the holidays, people have been very busy and it has been hard for to meet with our investigators and the new people that we find each day because they are never at home or available for us to teach them. I am ready for this week when things will get back to normal and we will be back on our normal proselyting time. Hope everyone has had a joyful holiday season and had a great break from school and work! I love and miss all of you and will see you next year. ;)

Love,

Elder Ordyna

School in Kenyasi (On Sundays it's a Church)

Happy New Year from Me, Elder Bamba, Elder Buhler and Elder Lephoyo