The Baptism of Moses 9 May 2017

Dear America,

Congratulations on Porter's mission call!!! I'm so proud.

The internet cafes in our area were having problems yesterday, so we got special permission to email today instead.

This week an investigator named Moses was baptized with his family by the other companionship in our branch. He has a pretty neat conversion story, so I'll share it. Moses works in a bank and his coworker is a member of the Church. They were friendly with each other, and eventually she invited him to a Relief Society activity that the Church was having. Now in the first place, who invites a grown man to a Relief Society activity? But she did and it turned out that they were the first people there. They started cleaning the chapel and arranging the chairs for the activity when he noticed a copy of the Liahona on a table. He had the strongest urge to pick it up and read it (although he had the newspaper with him because he had been planning to sneakily read the newspaper instead of paying attention in the activity). He read a little bit before the activity and was very impressed by the quality and diversity of the articles. He put it down until the activity finished and then resumed his reading while the others were cleaning up. When it was time to go, he wanted to take the magazine home with him. He put it in his bag and was on his way home when he felt guilty for stealing from a church. He returned to the chapel but was overjoyed when the members informed him that he could keep the Liahona. When he finished reading it, he knew that the church that published it must be special in a good way. He contacted his coworker--who had since moved--and got the location of our chapel. He showed up on Sunday morning ready for church.

Of course, the missionaries jumped on him and started teaching. His big problem, however, concerned the topic of baptism. Moses was a deeply rooted Catholic and refused to be baptized again. He believed that his previous baptism was effective. The missionaries tried and tried but could not find a way to resolve his concerns. So they told him to pray about it. A few days later, we met him on the road. He greeted us with his huge, characteristic smile, and asked us if we were ready to here the good news. We asked him what news and he responded that he was going to be baptized. When he had prayed, he had a dream in which he was working on a large plantation. The side of the plantation that he was on was barren and had no work for him to do. The other side was fruitful and needed much labor. To get to the other side, however, he needed to cross through a deep stream that separated the two. Moses told us that he believed that God has a lot of work for him to do, but he evidently needed to get baptized before he could begin. We were so happy. Since that time, he has read a ton of Church materials and really prepared himself to be a member.

Dreams don't always solve problems, but apparently inspired dreams are much more common here than what I'm used to back home. Ghana....

This week we had a sweet zone activity that I was pretty worried about but everything clicked together nicely. I got so sunburned. Collars are killing me right now.

Love, Elder Nelson the elder