today. so i have a new email address. the church is reorginizing theWHOLE myldsmail.net deal and doing it through google now. they basically give you your e-mail address now. it's kinda tedious right now, but it'll pay off. the new system seems to be much faster and more efficient, and i think the inbox can hold more emails now which i'm happy about. my email address, as you can probably see, is now jesse.mackay@myldsmail.net. can you tell anyone that you know that has my old one?? maybe shauna can throw the new one up on facebook or whatev. thanks.
wednesday. i got a new companion!! i've spent the first 6 months without living with one other white man, but my new companion is elder adams; an obruni from fallen, nevada!! (like an hour east of reno). and i'm happy to report that he's a normal white boy. he's way into sports (which is so nice, you have no idea) and we're always laughing about everything. i have like six months of comments about africa built up and now i have someone to tell it to. ha ha. he's a stud - he's learning really quickly and he's come in with a really good attitude. he's ready to work really hard and it's really refreshing. he's straight from the mtc, so i guess he was like the first group of missionaries that didnt have the harmon's as their mtc leaders.
so i'm expecting to be in moree for either 3 more months or 4 1/2 more months (that would be 2 or 3 transfers). so that'd make 9 or 10 1/2 months living in the biggest little fisher - village in ghana. i was REALLY surprised when president Sabey called me and told me elder ekaette would be leaving me. i thought we'd be together for one more transfer then maybe i'd go. and futhermore, i didnt think i'd betraining again for a while. i donno if president is fallin asleep at the wheel here or what haha!
when elder ekaette left, it was kinda rough for him. i was REALLY surprised to see him get pretty emotional at the station (he was sent to kumasi to be companions with an elder harris in the same apartment with elder lehr). most of these africans are not emotional at all. i've only seen three africans cry in six months of spiritual highs and lows here. (Two were when we were teaching and helping through the repentance process two different women who had had abortions in the past) and the other was elder ekaette. it made me feel loved : ). i SERIOUSLY enjoyed my three monthswith that kid, he has learned and grown (at first very slowly, and then exponentially faster and faster) to the point that i'm so proud of the kid. i donno if it is the same in other missions, but we have like our own missionary lingo here. i trained elder ekaette so he is the son, i am the father. now that i've given birth again, elder ekaette has a brother. haha!
mom, elder adams just heard from his family that they might be coming to vegas around the 23rd of february, so they might be there right now. haha! his mom is elaine adams, her email is ________ . check em out!! (they're all way into cafe rio wink wink)
well, i donno how a visit from four general auhorities, including Jeffery R Holland, in one long meeting gets pushed to the back of an email, but it just happened. it was legit. basically picture a general conference session specifically directed towards me as a missionary. there was power in that room. i both recorded it with my voice recorder and took studious notes
of my thoughts and feelings as the meeting was going. we heard from sister and president sabey for 5 minutes each, president dixon for 10 minutes, president cardon for 20 minutes, president snow for 25 minutes, and then president sabey again for 5 more minutes. Elder Holland then spoke for the next 1 hour plus!! it was like he KNEW exactly what it would be like te be a missionary in this mission. he spoke as if he also was having the day to day experiences that i was having. it would only be by direct revelation and guidance by the spirit that he'd be able to speak from that perspecive as a seventy year old man. it was amazing.he said something that is SOO true. he said something like ''it would be ironic to say that this mission has the possibility to become amost too easy, but it's true.'' he went on to expound upon the idea and said that this mission is crazy hard physically, but that the people are so prepared to change that it would be easy to do the work in a way that isnt from the Lord. of course, there wouldnt be any lasting success doing it that way, but it'd be easy to loose sight of the level of relience on the spirit and obedience to the commandments and mission rules in order to see our success.
i will remember that day for a long, long time. i was able to look into his eyes, shake his hand, and listen to him say ''Elder, it's good to see ya.'' what a g.
well, once again, you've got nothing to worry about here, the Lord's taken care of us. you're in my prayers every day, i love you!!!
love, elder mackay
