Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! 12-31-2018

 Strawberry vanilla birthday cake! :)

Sorry I know It's late for me to say Merry Christmas, ha ha. I didn't send an email last week because I wanted to put everything in one email. So I'll start with Christmas Eve!

On Christmas Eve Ally and Devin Despain came and visited me! They took me and my companion out to lunch and we had a wonderful time. We just sat and talked and it was awesome! They brought me a suitcase of presents from my family and it was just awesome! :) It was really so good to see some old friends from home! :)

Hanging out with Ally and Devin.

Then on Christmas day we went to a few members houses who fed us some good old Ghanaian food! After that, we went to our Bishops house to have a small party and then I got to call home which was by far the best part! :) Man I love all of my family so much! I hope you all know that! 

Christmas morning with presents, ha ha! :) 

(He assured me that these are extra mattresses in the study room and not his bed. :))

On December 28th there was a big ward party which was full of dancing and eating! IT was such a fun day and even better, we had some people bring some new investigators for us! Anna brought a friend of hers and she said she wants to learn more! So it was a very good day for us!

 After he got soaked. Pictures sent to me by Alixa. :)

Today we went to a fried rice restaurant and I bought a cake. Then we met up with some other missionaries in our zone and just had a good time eating and talking. :) Then I got drenched by one of the sister missionaries because here in Ghana, on your birthday, you are supposed to get soaked with water. I don't like that tradition, ha ha!

On an exchange with Elder Florence. We were visiting an old man who wouldn't stop talking so Florence took a nice little nap, ha ha! :)

Okay, let's talk about my investigator Jesly. I have talked about him in the past and I just want to share something really cool that happened with him. We weren't able to get a hold of him all week so we couldn't teach him and I was worried something might have happened. Well on Saturday night, he called and apologized because he had been so busy all week. He said he was planning on coming to church with us and I was super happy about that! During sacrament meeting there were some wonderful talks that I will talk about in a minute. But anyways, after church he wanted to have a lesson with us so we went to go teach him around four o'clock. We were finishing teaching about the plan of salvation with him and then we started to talk about the atonement of Christ. Here in Ghana, nobody knows about or teaches about Christ's suffering in the Garden of Gethsemane. Here they just think of him dying on the cross was the atonement. Well after explaining it, I could feel the spirit was there with us. I felt inspired to read the story that Elder Boyd K. Packer told about the Debtor and the Collector. I read the whole story and when I was done I looked up at Jesly and could see him wiping tears from his eyes. Just before our lesson, Jesly was telling us of so many struggles he is going through, which I will keep personal. But after the story, he just looked at me and my companion and said, "Elders, thank you. I am so happy I met you and I will never regret it." The spirit  really touched his heart and testified to him of the truthfulness of what we are teaching him. 

Gotta love rainy days before Christmas!  

(...and he didn't want to take that umbrella. ;))

Okay, now I will tell about the talks in sacrament meeting. I want to talk about the one our first counselor in the Bishopric gave. He told the story of the talents where the employer gave five to one employee, two to one employee and then one to the other employee. When the employer came back the first one had gained five more talents, the second one gained two more talents and the first gained none. He had taken his one talent and buried it. He related it to how many years we have been members of the church. Some have been members for twenty years, some fifty years, and some five months. He asked this question, "What have you done with your membership over the time you have been a member? Have you buried it like the third man or have you done something about your membership and received more rewards out of it?" I loved how he talked about this example and I want to pass the question to you. What have you done with your time as a member of the Lord's church? Have you done what you need to do? Or is there more for you to do? As the year 2019 comes, let us make our time in the Lords church profitable to us and to those around us. 

I love you all, and I hope you have a wonderful New Year!

Sincerely, 

Elder Baird

More pictures from Alixa. :) 

Mom's notes:

1. He loved the Reese's brownies we sent. He was also impressed with the fidget spinner, good work Lauren! :)