"It" is Never Done

January 25, 2015

The spirit in church today was so great!  The people here are so wise and loving and committed to the gospel it seems.  The Stake Center here is just across the parking lot from where we are staying in patron housing so we walked a short distance to attend church this morning.  The building overall is not air conditioned.  Listening to the speakers in sacrament meeting was a bit of a challenge since all the windows were open and fans were going to circulate the air, but also the noise of the traffic and the street comes in through the open windows. Although the natives did not seem too hot, we Americans were sweating and hot fairly quickly.  They are very soft spoken so even though there is a microphone, it is difficult to hear.

Alicyn and her Nigerian Crew

Following are my thoughts and notes from attending church today.
The opening prayer was such a sermon in and of itself.  The brother asked God to “cleanse the evil from our thoughts”.  He prayed for the sick and needy with such fervency and also the country of Ghana to be at peace.  I really felt his heartfelt desire going out in the prayer and I thought a lot of whether or not I’m asking for forgiveness in the right way as he did for all of us in the beginning.
The youth speaker, wearing a full suit and tie in the heat talked about the Book of Mormon.  We are led by the spirit (in life) not knowing beforehand what we should do.  I’ve read this scripture in Nephi so many times but today it gave new meaning as I applied it to what I am doing here in Ghana in the temple with so many.  We should “go and do” and as we go forward in faith and pray for spiritual gifts, we will see them present in promptings, impressions, and the presence of angels.  As we pray, answers will come in many ways. Trust in the Lord and he will direct thy path for good.  I’ve witnessed this over and over again.

A brother spoke about strengthening marriage and relationships by emulating the Savior’s life in our words and actions and then the man from the high council spoke.  He said that Heavenly Father did not leave us helpless without direction in our lives.  We have all the tools we need, even the spirit of Christ.  He encouraged us to read the talk from the October conference of “Ponder the Path of thy Feet” from a spiritual level.  He talked about during the open house of the temple here in Ghana, villagers (non-members of the church) came from far away to visit this spiritual place and as they came out of the temple they knelt down, reached their arms toward heaven and said, “It is done!”

American's and Nigerians

He told us how “it” is never done.  Life is a journey and a learning process with progress, mistakes, repentance and more.  We don’t just do one event and we have “made it” but it is a life full of enduring to the end to get us back to heaven.  God is the only one who can tell us when it is done and say to us, “Well done thy good and faithful servant…enter into my presence.”  Then it will “be done” for a season, per se.  Christ faced all the same challenges in His life that we face so he can succor and comfort us and lift us.

The young man who taught Sunday school was an excellent teacher.  He taught without a note, walked the aisles to have eye contact with all members of the class and asked us to all “contribute” as they say.  I thought how “contribute” is such a better word than asking for comments or stories.  When we contribute to something we are making it better or building the kingdom.  I love the use of that word here in this country.

Relief Society was held downstairs in the high council room which was air conditioned.  Yeah! When Camron found that out afterwards, he said he should have come to Relief Society.  There was such a sweet spirit in that room.  These are wonderful women who love and strengthen one another.  All singing was done without accompaniment, yet it was just right.  It appears that the young women and young men just attend priesthood and relief society with the adults since there are so few of them. Hopefully in the future, they will have enough youth to form a YM/YW’s group.

Alicyn