Good Week!!!!

Dear Family,

Im glad to hear that grandma is doing okay and i hope and pray that her surgery goes well today. im praying for her! im glad to here that everyone is doing well and that you are all happy. like i said before, it does a missionary some good to know that even if it seems everything is challneging out here at least at home things are going well. im excited that all of you guys got to see sharlee!! needless to say i was excited to read all the emails today about everything that is happening with her. thanks for helping me out;)

Things out here are great and crazy as ever! this week we were traveling a lot for meetings and we were just kinda all over the place. Elder Curtis of the Seventy and our Area President came and did a mission tour this week and it was great! on Wednesday we had Missionary leadership Council and on thursday we did a zone Conference and in both cases we were instructed by him and it was great. In his main message he instructed us on Alma Chapter 5 which was right on the money and i loved it! the scriptures are all so full of amazing advice but we need to make sure that we read it and learn it!! if we dont and we dont have the knowledge then its our own fault for not reading it!

This week i want to talk about the importance of being happy!!!! its essential!!! in missionary work and in life in general. Happiness is a choice. In any situation you can choose to be happy or to not be. trust me, its better to choose to be happy!! it makes missionary work so much easier. And when we are happy, other people see it and they want it so it gives them a desire to ask us why?? then we get the chance to share the message of the restoration and invite them to learn more! but i feel like as we choose to be happy we also allow ourselves to look and focus more on the blessings we are recieving then wallow in sorrow for the things we dont have. I dont know if that makes sense but i know its important to be happy and i like it!! haha

Fred is doing great and on saturday he went and did baptisms for the dead at the temple and he absolutely loved it!!! he says he wants to prepare for a mission and he is setting things in order so that when next august rolls around he can submit his mission forms. That is so awesome that grandmas bday is coming up!!!! she is so amazing!!! i hope she is continuing to do okay along with all of you!!! i want you all to know how much i love you and how much i pray for you and care about you!!! i couldnt do this without you and i want you to know how grateful i am for all of the suppport that you give me! you make my life complete!!!! i hope you all have a great week!!!! i love you so much!!!

love,
Elder James Bradley McGuire

Another Great Week in Africa!!!!!

Dear Family,

This week has been Great!!! im sorry my time is really short so i will try and get the  highlights in!!!

This week we had transfers, lessons, walking, talking, confirmations, sweating, struggling, enduring, laughing, crying, miracles, mistakes,learning, and about a million other things.

We had a big transfer this week and about half of the zone got transfered out so you can imagine how fun it was to put people on tro tros and coordinate it all luckily everyone did their job and we have a lot of new faces now. transfers are hard  for a little while because elders have to get to know new companions  and new areas but once things get going they are great! they  boost the zone and things get looked at and done in new ways! everyone has their own thing to offer and it makes something amazing!

there is a brand new missionary in our apartment and his name is elder Brown. he is from Rigby and went to mud lake highschool, mom i figured you might know it since its in idaho falls. he is great and full of energy. culture shock is taking its toll though and i forgot what it was all like! hahaha this place has grown to be my home right now and its all normal to me. i love ghana!

We had a member in our ward pass away last week so his funeral was this weekend. it was....welll....a ghanaian funeral! hahaha it was so funny because there were all these tents and chairs set up in this big place and it was set to start at 8. at 8:40 all the chairs were empty except for where the members were. tons of people always come to funerals, members and nonmembers alike and non of them were there. you thought mormon standard time was bad....hahaha ghana man time is worse!!! but it was great because it was and opportunity to share the gospel with those not of our faith and some things are coming out of it.

This Sunday Fred was confirmed and and recieved the gift of the holy ghost. he was also given the Aaronic priesthood. he is great and he is going to be a big strength to the ward. he says he wants to serve a mission too and  that is pretty exciting.

Guess what! i love being in a companionship. working by yourself is horrible but the two man team is the most effective! right dad??? hahaha i love being here and i love this work!!!!

i love you all and i hope you have a great week!!!!

love,
Elder McGuire

Another week as Zone Leader!! And a Little Sidestory

Dear Family!!!

well.....that was a lot to read.....hahahah you guys are having so much fun!!!!! i absolutely love hearing from all of you and all that is happening. It sounds like Heavenly Father is taking care of our family and then some! its so nice! things can be stressfull on all fronts but my family sends a peace over my mind that is incredible! did you guys know that i love you!!!!!

We had quite a few things happen here this week to so i will try to get it all in!
Tuesday we left for our first appointment and it fell through, and on our way to the next it started raining.....and it rained....and rained....and rained some more....and kept on raining!!! and this wasnt just a sprinkle, this was torrential rain!!!!! it finally stopped about 4 hours later and we said "where did the day go???" so yeah that second lesson was great! hahaha we had all the time in the world.

We traveled all day Wednesday with the ivies. we went to the other side of the zone for district meeting again and also had a couple interviews to do. traveling is fun but it makes me miss my area too hahaha. but i love getting out to see the elders and their areas and talking about the work with all of them. The Ivies are also so helpful and they make being in this zone amazing!!!!

On Friday i got my package with the dresses and on sunday my bishop came home so i am a happy boy!!! thankyou so much for those things they are all incredible and they were much needed/appreciated by myself and the rest of the elders in my apartment. the mcguire family is famous out here!!! the girls loved the dresses so much! im sure you saw in the video. we stayed and played with them for a few minutes and they took the dresses off just as fast as they put them on. they wanted to keep them clean and nice so they all went and put them away to wear on a special occasion. thankyou all so much! you make my mission so amazing!!!!

Saturday we got the transfer news for the zone and there are a lot of changes happening. my companion and i are staying the same as expected but a lot of other things are moving around. we are also having a new area open in the zone so we are growing! mission transfers are always fun and exciting. its also hilarious how much the elders like to talk about them and try to guess what will happen.

Sunday was a sweet day. Church was great and after church we had 3 baptisms for the ward. there are 4 missionaries here so it makes the baptisms so great because a bunch of people come and the converts feel so much support! Fred was so happy and he was truly ready for it! next week he will be confirmed and the following saturday he is gonna go to the temple to do baptisms for the dead for his family! so exciting!!!! Also that evening our bishop came home and he called us over to see him. He gave me the package you sent with him! thankyou so much!!!! the scriptures are amazing and i am so excited to have the new edition! ive been using the ones i got for seminary from when i was 14 hahaha. thank you!!!!!!

 i hope and pray that all of you continue to be safe, have fun, and enjoy! i love you!!!!

love,
Bradley


So about a Month ago, My family got together and made some cute dresses for girls in an orphanage by me and sent them in a package! I got them this week and we delivered them to the girls!!! Here is a picture after we handed them out!

School Starts!!!

Dear Family,

What a week! hahaha things are just moving right along at home huh? its the same out here and it is all wonderful, hard, crazy, and amazing! Fall sounds so nice!!! the temperatures have been cooler here but oh what i would give to feel 50 degrees again!  Thats too bad about Pat! i hope the doctors will be able to adress it and help her out! she'll definitely be in my prayers and fast this coming week. i cant believe school is starting for the second time on my mission!!! hahaha and kate is going to homecoming??? thats awesome!! Kate said the trip was pretty incredible! i bet the boys enjoyed the museum. hahah honestly all i can remember from going there on the family reunion was that if we did something nice grandma great would give us a bag of gummy bears and i got mine while we were at the museum hahaha!

For me this week a lot of things have changed/happened and it is a whirlwind!
We had transfers on Wednesday and that was fun to handle. luckily only 2 missionaries moved but we will be having another transfer in 2 weeks and i have a feeling it will be a lot bigger! we have a lot of missionaries in this zone that have been here for a long time.

My new Companion is Elder Tembedza. He is great and i am excited to work with him. He goes home in 2 transfers and is a stud. We are gonna have fun together and im excited to learn from him.

Elder Judy also was transferred out this week to go and be a zone leader so for the next two weeks we are in a trio with his companion. trios are always interesting but we are working hard and we are doing good with it.

One sweet thing that happened in the Ward this week was that we had a contacting activity with all of the members. We split up with Melchezidek priesthood holders and they all took us to referrals or we went contacting and it was great! we got a lot of contacts and referrals and we are excited to follow up on them.

Fred is still doing amazing and his baptism will be this coming sunday! we are so pumped!!! Also the family we have been working with just wasnt progressing the way we had hoped so we wanted to move their baptismal date back a bit. when we told the father he said no and that he wanted to be baptized on the 31st he promised to meet with us every day till then to be prepared...we accepted with some hesitation.....the next day the mother came to church but he and some of the children didnt so obviously we need to do some more explaining to him. the language barrier can be so hard sometimes. but we are using members and things will be okay. The work is incredible and we are starting to find more people to teach along with these ones so we are busy and happy.

For me this week ive noticed things i want to improve on. Improvement and progression are eternal principles. We need to make sure that we understand that so we dont try and change and become perfect all at once! step by step, here a little and there a little. Heavenly Father has given us all Talents and we need to be those who develop them so they remain with us. We shouldnt be the one who buries our talent only to have it taken away. Im trying my best to develop my talents out here and to become more like the Savior.

So thats my week guys! i hope it was okay! i hope you all enjoy the fall! football, the weather, the leaves...all of it!!!! i love you!!!!

love,
Bradley

Another Exciting week in the Zone!

Dear Family,

Its been another crazy week here In Swedru and my time is running low today so I'm gonna try to get it all it!
SO ill start off with stake PEC this week. It went amazing! we had good reports from all of our areas in the zone so we were able to also make a good report to the stake president and he suggested some good things that will help us in the zone a lot! The Ivey's(our mission couple) were there and they offered to give us a ride home. Obviously we chose 30 minutes of Air conditioned comfort over 45 in a hot sweaty tro tro. on the way because of the darkness and weird lighting from cars we hit a pot hole really hard and it totally killed the engine. we pulled over and could find nothing wrong with it but the car just would not start! the batter was fine the ignition is great and we couldn't figure it out. We called the Fleet manager in Accra and he said he new what was wrong but couldn't explain it to us so he told us he was sending someone right now from Accra to fix it. take note it was 8:45 and its a 2 hour drive from Accra to where we were. so we waited on the side of the road for two hours talking and chilling. Eventually the guy came and fixed it and it only took him 2 seconds. the annoying thing was that he could have told us and we could have done it 2 hours ago. but whatever. so we had a late night on Tuesday haha!
The next morning we were with the Ivey's again off to the other district in the zone for District meeting and then splits that night. The splits went well and we were able to help them with a few things they were struggling with. We spent the night there too, man i love sleeping on the floor! hahaha WE came back the next day and had our own district meeting that was great. My companion gave his goodbye testimony and it was rough for him. After District meeting we went for fufu as usual except the Ivey's came with us and ate with us! it was so great because elder Ivey had never tried it and sister Ivey hated it, they were good sports though and they tried it for a minute. then us elders were kind enough to finish it off for them haha.
Fred is doing great this week. He loves reading the Book of Mormon and he is already to Alma! we've only been teaching him for 3 weeks! then he came with us and helped us to teach a couple lessons and he bore testimony that he knew that it was all true! man we are so lucky! he will be more than ready for his baptism on the 31st!
Saturday was the All Africa Helping Hands Service project and it was great! we combined our wards together and we cleaned the nasty gutters for 3 hours complete with raw sewage, dead critters, and a whole lot of other stuff that i don't want to talk about but it was great! a lot of missionary opportunities will come from it.
Sunday was amazing because Sis Mercy was Confirmed and it was our missionary Sunday. Our Ward mission leader spoke and taught classes and we helped and we are putting together a finding activity with the whole ward. we are all gonna go out and contact and meet referrals and find less actives and its gonna be great! that will be Wednesday.
Today was interesting. Elder Oluk is Gone! he was somehow scared to go! i just don't think he was quite ready for it. but i don't think anyone ever is but we said goodbye and he is on his way! I'm gonna miss that kid! My new companion is going to be Elder Tembedza, he is from Zimbabwe and we have been in the same zone before so we know each other so it should be great! Elder Jalso got called to be a Zone leader so he is leaving too. ill miss him a lot too.
I'm sorry i have so much more to write but time is out! i hope you all have a great week and never forget that i love you!

love,
Elder McGuire

Top Ten of the Week!

Dear Family,

what a week! i think its so funny that i get so excited and hyper at the beginning of every letter each week but what can i say?? i love you guys! i love the mission! i love the lord! i love life!!!!! so yes i will be energetic!!!!! That is so sweet that you got to go to Heidi's homecoming!!! Mom if you need to sharpen the knives that is fine it just means i will be going on a special fast tomorrow;) hahaha I'm just kidding (don't accidentally cut yourself!). Preston is going to be quite the Adventurous kid when he grows up. i guess we otta give him a whip, cowboy hat, and call him Indiana! the new ward sounds great! Bishop Kofford will be great!!

My week was a good one as usual, mom i think i will copy you today and do my 10 things of the week!

10. We had Mission Leadership Council this week and it was great! we talked about a ton of stuff ranging from Ebola details to the kind of music we listen too. My favorite part was when president Stevenson instructed us on an interesting way to look at the church. In the church we have 3 basic things Doctrine, Principle, & Policy. As we take time to understand the doctrines and the principles of the church it is so much easier for us to understand and accept the policy. I think understanding the policy of the mission is the biggest challenge for missionaries sometimes. I also think its the biggest challenge people have learning about the church because they see more of the policy than anything else. But being a missionary is great because we get to help them understand the Doctrine and Principles that they don't see and it makes it all good. i learned that!

9. We had a zone meeting with all of the elders in the zone to instruct on what was shared in MLC and it went really well, the elders contributed and made it a discussion and it was sweet! the elders in the zone are great and they are also close.they help each other and build each other up and it makes being a zone leader so easy!!! i love it!

8. Fred is still doing amazing! On sunday we taught him after church and we gave him a few Book of Mormon quotations to read and said if he finished those he could start from the beginning and go.....we missed a few appointments with him and didnt see him again till saturday. When we asked him if he had read he announced that he had read the entire book of first Nephi!!!!! we were so surprised! man he is so powerful and he is great! he is making friends at church and things are great with him.

7. Sunday was absolutely incredible this week for no particular reason. Everything just went well. The Sun was out too! its been cloudy for the last few weeks which has kept things cool but the sun was non existent, it was out on sunday and it was still cool! it reminded me of home! i love being able to take the sacrament! sundays rule!!!

6. We did splits for two days this week so everyone in the area thought crazy stuff was happening. on Thursday i had a new companion and then friday another one and all of our investigators were really confused. it was fun though and i love conducting splits. its fun to learn about the missionaries in the zone and to also learn new styles of teaching and doing the work.

5. Today for pday we decided we had to roast another pig but this time it was just us at the apartment. it was great and we are going to be able to have some meat all week instead of just one day now. dont worry i promise i still proselyte i dont just roast pigs all the time! hahaha but yeah its pretty great.

4. On draw back we had on sunday was that both of our converts that were baptized last sunday didnt show for their confirmations. Hayford is in the hospital with food poisoning. and Bro. Amoah had a family member die and went to a funeral.  but all is well and they will be confirmed next week.

3. This coming Saturday we are going to have the AFrica Helping Hands Service Day and its gong to be sweet! everyone in africa will do service that day and we are going to see if we cant talk to a million people that day! i thought it would be a pretty sweet way to celebrate Daniels Bday! happy Bday Bro!!!

2. Every day out here is a challenge. It is a blessing. It is amazing. It is divine! I absolutely love mission and i love the lord! i am trying my best to become the person Heavenly Father wants me to be and he is continually strengthening me out here. Especially through you!

1. I love you all with all of my heart and i have no idea what i would do without such and amazing family!!!!!!

I hope you all have a great week!!!!

love,
Elder James Bradley McGuire

August Really?? Plus Pictures!!!!!

Dear Family!!!!

Well lets just say that this week was insane!!!! so much has happened and idk where to start!!! first off im glad that you all are safe and happy and i hope that it all stays that way but with kate driving now im not sure......hahaha just kidding im sure she'll be great!!!!

All i can say is that this work truly is ordained of god and im so happy to be a part of it! we have seen leaps and bounds of improvement this week and our area. We have been able to teach a lot of lessons and they are all great. The reason being is we are finding a lot of new people to teach and they are all awesome! the lord really helped us this week by leading us to those souls that he has prepared. Ill tell you about one of them.

 Fred is a young man that i have talked to on the streets in passing a few times and finally he invited us to come and to see him. The first lesson was a really good one, the spirit was strong and he committed to pray and ask about joseph smith and the church. The second lesson was even better. he told us that he had prayed and that he knew that what we were telling him was true. obviously we had to do our best to keep from jumping out of our chairs and screaming because of joy. WE then proceeded to teach him my all time favorite lesson. The Book of Mormon. IT is so wonderful!  he asked questions and we gave answers as directed by the spirit. he promised to read and was excited to do so. To finish the lesson we read in 2 nephi 31 where it talks about how Christ Fulfilled all righteousness by being baptized and being obedient to the fathers commandments. He then told us that he had not been baptized anywhere yet and that he wanted to be baptized into our church. After scraping our jaws off the floor we gave him a date for the 31st of this month. hahaha Heavnely Father is amazing!!! so yes we are happy to say the least.

Also this weekend We had B.K. Amoah and Sis. Hayford's Baptisms and they were great! the ward helped us out so much and they made it awesome. it was by far the best baptismal service ive attended on my mission. They were both so happy and we were happy to be able to take part in it. The other elders in our Ward were also having 2 baptisms so Elder Judy did the baptizing for all of them. I love mission!!!!

In Other news there is some interesting stuff happening out here in west africa. im not sure if you guys have heard yet but here is the info. There is a Disease out here Called EBOLA it is pretty deadly and is causing a lot of trouble in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Because of this the missions in those countries have been closed. As a result our mission is recieving 20 new missionaries this week so things are going to be busy this week. As far as the disease goes it is passed by touching someone who has it. it is not airborne. and most countries have closed their borders to flights from any of those countries. it is actually making it difficult for the missionaries to get out but we are praying they make it soon. AT any rate i want to let you all know that we are all okay. WE are safe here in ghana and we will be fine! this is just and adventure and we have to take it as it comes! but much prayers are going to be needed in the next few days for the safe arrival of our new brothers coming to the mission. As a mission we all gathered in our apartments today and prayed that all would be well. We know the will of Heavenly Father will be done.

So yeah thats the fun stuff going on right now. Here are some pictures of the pig roast and our baptisms. Also my new companion. I hope you all are still doing awesome and never forget that i love you!!!!!!

love,
Elder James Bradley McGuire

Baptisms!!!

Cooking Pigs!

Eating pig! Yummy!!

Me and Elder Moleme!

Me.... In a tree!