Our Cote d’Ivoire Abidjan East and Bamako, Mali Mission

Our hearts were as warm as the temperature outside today!  All the new missionaries came from all over (they spent the night with local Elders and Sisters) and we met at the Stake Center in Cocody for our New Missionary Orientation. 

The new companionships were announced and each new missionary got to bear their testimony in French.  We aren’t the only ones learning this new language.  It was a sweet meeting.  Pres and Sis Binene both taught us about our missionary purpose, the Doctrine of Christ, and they had a bit to say about adjusting to missionary life.

After the meeting, we went outside for photos.  Each missionary had a picture taken with the Binenes, which would be sent home to their parents.

Our Group of New Missionaries!

We had a delicious lunch, provided by local sisters–chicken, rice and plantain.

Oh, so good!The room full of luggage!  Two years of life in each missionary’s bags!

The Cocody Stake Center:

Here are a few photos from the Mission Newsletter of the arriving group today:

Farewell Talk 15 September 2019

Look back on your life. Can you remember times when you were in the right place at the right time?  Hopefully that happens every now and again!  Our lives are like tapestries that intertwine with those around us.  We often get so caught up in the here and now that we don’t realize what the bigger picture is.

Sometimes it’s good to stop, sit still and look back to see where you’ve been in relation to where you are today. Maybe even list a few of the things –events, people, experiences–that brought you here, right where you are, right now.

I believe that as you look back on your life, you’ll notice things that led you to be in certain places, or to just BE a certain person that allowed Heavenly Father to work through you to bless others. I hope you are recording those paths in your journals!

I’ve been involved with work in Africa off and on for almost 40 years. I went there first as a young missionary in South Africa. I returned to live in Nigeria for 3 years after my mission. John and I have been involved with work in Mali for many years now. We have waited a long time for this opportunity to go serve there as missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

When we received a phone call more than a year ago, asking if we’d consider serving in Mali we said Absolutely! This mission call has been in the works for a long time now. It’s given us time to look back at our lives and see the interesting ways we’ve been prepared to go to this particular place in West Africa.

Just three days ago, the church announced our legal recognition in Mali. Things have been unfolding there for a long long time. It’s been an interesting process to watch.

This last month we’ve been meeting with a church historian who is in charge of collecting and recording the history of the Church in West Africa. I talked with him this week about his interesting job, watching history unfold as he gathers stories and histories. Often at the time things are happening, those involved have no idea what the outcome will be.

Our conversations reminded me of a talk David McCullough gave in a forum at BYU in 2005. He was talking about the Founding Fathers and how at the time they had no idea what the outcome of their actions would be. He started his masterful discourse by saying:

One of the hardest, and I think the most important, realities of history to convey to students or readers of books or viewers of television documentaries is that nothing ever had to happen the way it happened. Any great past event could have gone off in any number of different directions for any number of different reasons. We should understand that history was never on a track. It was never preordained that it would turn out as it did.

Very often we are taught history as if it were predetermined, and if that way of teaching begins early enough and is sustained through our education, we begin to think that it had to have happened as it did. We think that there had to have been a Revolutionary War, that there had to have been a Declaration of Independence, that there had to have been a Constitution, but never was that so. In history, chance plays a part again and again. Character counts over and over. Personality is often the determining factor in why things turn out the way they do. . . . And just as we don’t know how things are going to turn out, they didn’t either.

I believe there is a Grand Plan, but I also believe that Heavenly Father uses whoever shows up to help that plan unfold.

How interesting that this great historian believes that personality is often the determining factor in why things turn out the way they do.

SO, what’s in our personalities? How can we make ourselves more available? More service-minded? More aware of those around us?   More willing to help? Do we find a need and fill it? Or do we just sit and watch? How can we change our mind set from “what can I get out of this?” to “what can I give to this?” My father used to say “there are 3 kinds of people: those who make things happen, those who watch things happen and those who wonder what happened.”

Sometimes we stay put or we don’t act because we fear we might miss out on something. That’s called FOMO. Fear Of Missing Out. If we go on a mission we might miss our kids or our grandkids. We might miss a recital or soccer game. But what do we gain and what do our kids (or our missionaries) gain by our going?

When we left for Yakima 4 years ago, Pres Eyring told John and me, “Your children will be more blessed by your going than by your staying.” Now I know he was right. That makes it easier to leave again.

The things we do don’t have to be big or grand. They just have to be Something. Alma teaches by small and simple things are great things brought to pass.

Elder Maxwell (April 2000) said:
Yearning for expanded opportunities while failing to use those at hand is bad form spiritually.

Sometimes it’s just a matter of showing up! Be a warm body. Be present.  Sometimes just being there for someone else is enough.  We are all little cogs in a great big wheel. Be a helpful, useful cog!

If someone you need doesn’t show up, perhaps they’re a cog in someone else’s wheel. Be patient. Focus on where you need to be, not where others need to be.

Oprah Winfrey said, speaking to this year’s Graduating class at Colorado College:

“The truth is, you cannot fix everything. But what you can do, here and now, is make a decision, because life is about decisions. And the decision is that you will use your life in service; you will be in service to life. You will speak up. You will show up. You will stand up. You will sit in. You will volunteer. You will vote. You will shout out. You will help. You will lend a hand. You will offer your talent and your kindness however you can, and you will radically transform whatever moment you’re in . . . . — which leads to bigger moments.”

Be that person who tries, who shows up, who steps out of a comfort zone. Be an answer to the prayer someone else offers. Be available. Let your personality take you places.

Sister Bonnie D. Parkin, former General Relief Society President said:
“We are all required to make journeys of faith. That is the gospel plan. [Y]our path may not be crossing an ocean or walking alone from an empty train station. But whatever it is, it will demand faith in every footstep. Years from now your grandchildren will tell with amazement stories of your choices which changed their lives. You will be called their pioneers. Have you ever thought that as you step into the unknown you are showing others the way?”

I pray we will all be brave enough to embark, to show up, to serve.
In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

by Newsroom.ChurchofJesusChrist.org | Sep. 13, 2019
From the ChurchMormon Life

“It was a historic and memorable day for the people of Mali, and for the Latter-day Saints in general, but [especially] for the Saints in Mali,” said Malian resident Yeah Samake, a Latter-day Saint and former 2013 and 2018 Mali presidential candidate.

At a ceremony held in this West African nation in the capital city of Bamako, religious and community leaders joined with government dignitaries and national journalists to mark the official recognition of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints as a religious association in Mali.

Elder Marcus B. Nash of the Seventy, President of the Africa West Area, spoke of the contribution Latter-day Saints in Mali will provide. “At the very core, [members of] The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints seek to live according to the following words, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, might, mind and strength.’ That is the first and great commandment. The second is like unto it, ‘Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself.’ We truly believe those words.”

Elder Nash first met with the office of the Ministry of Religion in Bamako on January 22, 2019, where he received word of the official recognition of the Church and had the opportunity to express thanks to the Malian government on behalf of the First Presidency.

At the ceremony, Minister of Religious Activities, Daniel Thera said, “We are not closed. Mali is an open country for all religions.”

Mr. Samake, who has also served as the Malian Ambassador to India, added, “We are loving, caring people. Muslims are very tolerant, but our constitution is secular. All religions are welcome in Mali, and all Muslims are welcome to worship any god they see fit.”

“I was blessed to start coming to Mali before the Church was organized here,” shared Elder Nash. “And I have some people that I’ve grown to love very deeply.”

In a country of 18 million people, there are about 50 Latter-day Saint families in Mali. This formal recognition allows the Church to better minister to its members and allows for missionaries to be called to serve. There are currently four full-time missionaries of the Church serving in Bamako.

The recognition also allows for the gospel of Jesus Christ to be taught to all Malian citizens regardless of their religious affiliation.

Elder David A. Bednar of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles dedicated Mali for the blessings of the gospel of the restored Church of Jesus Christ in 2017. That year, the first congregation was organized in Bamako. Today, 68 members claim membership in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There are two congregations and meetinghouses.

In recent years, the Church has provided US$4.3 million in humanitarian aid to residents in Mali, including assistance with improving health; aiding the homeless, including refugees; and disaster response. Elder Nash said, “And in a quiet but significant way, we will continue to help.”

Mali joins Senegal and Guinea as the most recent African countries to welcome the Church. The Church is also officially recognized in the following countries in the Africa West Area: Benin, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Togo.

The Church has seen dramatic growth in Africa in recent decades, where Church membership has grown from a few Latter-day Saints in the 1970s to just over 650,000 members today in nearly 2,300 congregations.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a worldwide organization with more than 16 million members meeting in more than 30,000 congregations, with materials published in 188 languages.

“More and more people will come, ask and wonder what this Church is all about,” Elder Nash said. “It all begins with the love they have for God and then the love we have for each other. We are honored to be here with you.”