Monday, June 3rd was a busy day for us. The packers were to arrive the next morning and so we needed to go through the entire house and make sure we had gathered everything that would be shipped back to the USA. Our plan was to move out of the Mission Home on Wednesday, so that the Facilities group could begin the work on painting and redoing the two bathrooms for the Boateng’s two children who would be coming with them. It took us a lot longer to get everything gathered, sorted, and organized than we had hoped. Part of that was cleaning along the way, of which LaDawn did the majority. We decided to bring everything into the living room so it would be easy for them to pack it all up. We had less than half of what was allowed and we are taking very little home with us that we did not bring.

On Monday evening, I met with the MLC over Zoom and continue to work on barriers and the challenges we have of putting people on baptismal dates that can actually be realized. Another great meeting.

On Tuesday, as mentioned above, the packers came. They were done and out by 10:30 am. I spent much of the day working on slides from our couple’s retreat on the covenants we make in the temple as I wanted to share this with the missionaries who were leaving that night. We were over at the Mission Office by 4:00 pm as the going home missionaries had arrived. Elder Baldwin was my final interview for the transfer so I made some time for that. We then brought the 8 elders leaving over to the Mission Home and ordered Aboude’s for dinner. Elder and Sister Pack who were also leaving the following morning, joined us for dinner and then left prior to the devotional. Following dinner, we spent about 90 minutes talking about temple covenants. It was too long, but the experience was excellent for preparing a crisper version for zone conference. All of the missionaries were scheduled to go to the temple the next day so this was to help in their preparation as well. The evening was enjoyable. Six of these 8 missionaries had been on the MLC and the other 2 had been district leaders. There was a lot of experience in that group! We will miss them.

Wednesday started early as we were at the Mission Office at 5:30 am. There was some confusion with our mission driver’s schedule, so we ended up driving the van with the 8 missionaries and Elder and Sister Pack drove our Fortuner. It was half way to the airport when we realized we could have put the Pack’s in the van as well. The Office Elders drove their truck to bring the luggage. We managed to get everyone onto the flight on time and then we left the van at the airport and drove our car back to the Mission Home. (Elder Loveland brought Alex Cobbina back to the airport later in the day to retrieve it). It appears that the new terminal has been commissioned and is ready to open any day, but the politicians are reportedly waiting for the optimal time to get the most votes out of the new airport. We have grown accustomed to this small, but functional terminal. Unique in this group of returning missionaries was Elder Farley from Hawaii and Elder Page from Alaska.

We went back to the Mission Home and began the task of moving over to the Pack’s newly vacated apartment. This took a good portion of the day, even though we didn’t really have that much stuff to move. We made three trips back and forth and made sure the Mission Home was clean and organized so the workers could come in and do their work on the bathrooms, painting, etc. Also included in the day was getting set up in the new apartment. There was no desk and only dining room chairs. Something we remedied over the next few days. By the end of the day we were in the new apartment, the Mission Home had been turned over to the Facilities group and in the evening I managed to get almost everything ready for the face to face MLC on Friday.

Thursday morning, we were back at the airport at 7:00 am to receive in 8 new missionaries to replace those who had left the previous day. This gentle, but certain “circle of life” is both sad and happy. Sad to see these missionaries we have worked with for so long go home and happy to see new fresh enthusiasm and vigor enter the mission. Thursday was no exception. This is a great group who will do much to further the work of gathering Israel.

On arriving at the Mission Office, we started immediately at 8:00 am and worked through the orientation, finishing around 11:15 am. The pizza arrived early from Piri Piri and so we ate lunch first and then Elder Strother (mission secretary), then came in and processed the paperwork with them. While they were doing the paperwork, we started interviews with each of them and upon completion gave them some time to rest (they had been up since 3:00 am). This allowed me a little bit of time to finish up my preparation for MLC the next day.

The Loveland’s had been helping a sister missionary all morning get back to her apartment after spending the night in the hospital due to dehydration so they had not been able to go over their instructions on health and safety that morning. Instead, we had them do that right before starting the mission devotional on obedience and integrity at 4:00 pm. We finished up at 5:30 pm and then had a delicious meal of rice with tomato stew, kelewele (spicy fried plantains and peanuts) and fried chicken. We had two sisters who had been serving in Tamale come to the office during the day (it is an 8 hour bus ride) and so the Samuelson’s were kind enough to come and take all three sisters to the bunkhouse at the Mission Home (since we are no longer staying there). They also brought them back the next morning.

On Friday morning, all but two of the trainers joined the new missionaries in the Mission Office (the other two were on Zoom since they were in Tamale and Bolgatanga). I spent a few minutes asking the question of the trainers, “In this mission, we _________________”. The trainers were invited to fill in the blank. This was a way to help the new missionaries get a feel for the culture directly from other missionaries without any prompting from me or the Assistants. Elder Togba Jr and Elder Reynolds then went over the 12 week training program and what it means to become Finders of the Elect.

We were finished by 10:15 am and then loaded everyone into trucks, the van, and our vehicle, and headed to the Bantama Stake Center where those going on transfer met to get in vans and taxis to return to their areas. The Loveland’s had gone over early at 9:00 am to get things moving. The Samuelson’s were kind enough to take 3 missionaries on the route out through Ejisu, Effiduase, and Agona as this is a difficult and expensive journey on tros tros and taxis. The Kirk’s had come in with the luggage of the Bibiani missionaries going on transfer and returned then with the luggage of the transferred missionaries headed back to the Bibiani zone. They took three with them and the other two took a tro tro. The Bibiani route is a second difficult and expensive route for our missionaries to get to their areas. We are so grateful for our senior couples and would struggle significantly without them. All in all, we were finished at the transfer grounds by noon. It was exceptionally smooth (for which we were grateful!)

Just before noon, we were able to drive back to our apartment and get a quick bite to eat before returning to the Mission Office for MLC. I have said it many times before and I will say it again. This is my favorite meeting that we hold each transfer. Rather than do a Vision refresh this time, I talked about the transition with the Boateng’s. The missionaries identified many transitions in the scriptures, and then we did a deep dive on four of them: John the Baptist to Christ; the Law of Moses to the Gospel of Christ; Elijah to Elisha; Moses to Joshua. It was an amazing discussion! At the end, I invited them to write down these two invitations:

• What will you do to make this transition to President & Sister Boateng revelatory and empowering
• What will you do help President & Sister Boateng succeed beginning on June 26^th?

The Assistant’s instruction was on how to baptize those we put on date. For the role play, we practiced filling out the Baptismal calendar. This form allows us to plan with those we are teaching in the selection of a baptismal date. By knowing the principles that need to be taught prior to baptism, the investigator becomes much more motivated to give the missionaries the needed time to teach them. The 40 principles are on the back of the planner and can be checked off as they progress. The size is one half of an A4 sheet of paper. We think this can be another game changer. We will go over this our upcoming zone conferences as well.

Here are pictures from the meeting:

On Saturday, I worked on the weekly letter to the missionaries and LaDawn worked on a transition document for Sister Boateng. She also spent time on phone checks. At 1:30 pm, we left the apartment and met Thomas and Rebecca Tabi for “Linner” at Noble House. They brought their four beautiful children as well: Ryanne, Hyrum, Mitchell, JahReal. We had a delightful meal together and then enjoyed a scoop of Pinocchio’s ice cream afterwards. This is a great family and we will miss our associated with them. President Tabi served as my counselor for the first year after our arrival. He then became the president of the Obuasi District where he continues to make a difference.

On Sunday, June 9th, we traveled to Akrofuom in the Obuasi District and there created the Akrofuom Branch from the Obuasi 4th Branch. Ebenezer Ntim is the new branch president. Unfortunately we had to pull him from another branch to serve as the branch president. He has been serving as a District Councilor. Samuel Amoah, is the man behind the success of this new branch. He is the man to the furtherest left of this picture. He is now serving as the branch president of the Obuasi 4th branch, but it has been his desire, passion, and efforts that have made this historic day possible. All in all we had over 50 people in the sacrament meeting that day from Akrofuom and another 11 from the mission and the District. We are currently in the process of renting a building next to the chapel so we can move missionaries to the town. Truly it was an historic day. Here are some additional photos of the events of the day.

Sunday evening, we met with the Assistants and reviewed their instruction for the upcoming zone conferences from what we learned from MLC. We also prepared for the Monday night virtual MLC meeting.

And thus, transfer week number 26 was over. Right now we are experiencing a lot of “for the last time” events. This next week we will begin our final round of zone conferences and then our three year journey of gathering Israel, Together in Ghana, will be over. We will forever call the name of our God blessed, for allowing us the privilege of serving these missionaries and the people of Ghana in such a significant way. Hurrah for Israel!