Joyeux Noel

 December 23, 2019

Are y'all ready for the most wonderful time of the year??  Christmas countdown at 2 days!! So, wherever each one of you are, whether it's in Africa, or Europe, or South America, the MTC, or nice and cozy at home surrounded by friends and family, I want to wish each one of you a Merry Christmas and hope that you will MAKE IT a merry Christmas as well. And how you might ask do we make it merry? I don't doubt that each one of you don't know already the "reason for the season" or you haven't been blasted with hashtag lighttheworld billboards and posters, and I'm sure that you already know that Christmas starts with the word CHRIST. And if you're in Utah I hope you and your neighbors still brought around goodies with cute little messages about Christ on them. 😉 All those things are exactly how we make it merry! In forgetting ourselves, remembering what Christ did for us, and then acting as he would if he were here in serving others and keeping his commandments! Wait a sec, doesn't that sound a lot like our baptismal covenant that we made? Yes, it does my friends. That is exactly our baptismal covenant! So then if focusing on these things brings us warm, tingly feelings and love all around then how do we keep that feeling all year round? Not by making new promises or new commitments but simply by honoring the one we've already made. A mission has taught me that. Christmas here just feels like any other day (your right also because its 95 degrees and they celebrate with fireworks) but also a large part is because a mission is the best thing someone can do to start to forget themselves, turn towards Christ, then help others do the same. How grateful I am that I have that opportunity to be in the army of thousands of missionaries around the world all doing the same thing! And on top of that, all the millions of member missionaries around the world doing the same thing!! The Son of God truly was born for us, died for us, was resurrected for us, and has restored his church on the earth again FOR US. 

Our Christmas activity

We had a great week this week and had baptisms this Saturday (they were walk in baptisms cause I just got here). Here it is a branch, but its bumping and they have way more people at church than there was in my ward in Benin! Today was kind of crazy cause we moved apartments across town. I forgot my card at home so no pics but it was hilarious, they didn't think about how to get stuff in the apartment before they bought it so with a tiny stairwell nothing would fit up the stairs, so they rigged it and went on the 3rd story balcony and had one person hold the power lines back while the other guys pulled everything (couches, tables, wardrobes, etc) up by ropes! I laughed at first, but I ended in deep respect. 

Love y'all! Joyeux Noel!!

Amis I miss back in Benin

Goodbye Voodoo Gods, I'm Going Back to Togo

 December 16, 2019

Wow this week may have been the longest and packed full week so far on the mission. No joke. So, let's start in chronological order: 

Tuesday we had our Christmas activity for all the missionaries which ended going super smoothly and was a blast. Leading the choir went very well (but still not better than Mr. Thorpe) and we had a dance and a couple skits intertwined with bible reading and the cool navitvity video the church made! Me and 3 other elders made this sweet acapella song starting with "Silent Night" and transitioning into "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas" which challenged the legendary Bing Crosby himself. I also accompanied Elder Harman in the "Oh come, oh come, Emmanuel" piano guys arrangement. 

Once again, shout out to the world's best mission president who gave us washing machines for Christmas!!!! No more bloody knuckles and hours of dripping sweat scrubbing clothes together!! After 1 1/2 years of hand washing that makes it the number one best Christmas present ever!! They look like garbage cans but they wash super well!

Went on 2 consecutive splits, one Wednesday and one Thursday, which were a blast and I saw tons of miracles of God helping us find new amis to start teaching.

Now, Friday. I know for y'all black Friday was last week, but it was this week for me. There was a voodoo festival coming up and idk if that had something to do with this. We were walking down the street towards our next rendezvous, and we see a large crowd of people up ahead moving towards us. That of itself didn't seem too weird at first. Then we see all these guys up ahead with these reed whips coming towards us and suddenly out of nowhere I realize there's this guy right in front of me walking down the middle of the street clutching this 8-inch-long hunting knife. This guy looked like he was hunting too and when we locked eyes I almost peed my pants. Luckily, he decided not to hunt me and as the guys with the whips got closer, we could see these voodoo Gods in the street coming towards us. They are in these super scary colorful costumes and let me tell ya, this ain't no culture festival. To try to explain the feeling of darkness and evil that came over me would be impossible to describe, anyways luckily right as we got to the Gods, we happened to have an ami who lived on the left of the street and was selling stuff! He called us over and we watched a second, then suddenly he and his friend yelled at us to get inside. They shoved us through their gate and he slammed the door behind him and was locking it as the dudes with whips were pushing up against it. Ah, it was so freaky, we peeked over the wall and watched as a ton of people went by and about 9 more Gods. So apparently, what they do is if you don't give them money they will whip you. I didn't dare try to take a pic because if they see your camera, they will take it and smash it. Haha, kinda messed up right? It's like forced tithing but not from the members 😂 That or legalized burglary. 

Saturday nights we got transfer calls and guess what!! I got transferred and I'm actually back in Togo right now!!! They did transfers super fast, and today I got here in Agoé.  I was literally so pumped to come back to Togo. I love this country so much! The best part is that I'm in the zone of one of my last areas (Kegue), so I will be able to call and see people that I thought I would never see again! Usually with 6 months left I wouldn't come back here, but somehow I'm here and so happy! I'm working with an Elder named Elder Alla, who's from Ivory Coast and super cool. 

Love y'all! Have a great week!

Elder Briggs

Good Deed Gone Wrong

 December 9, 2019

So, this week me and my companion were just walking down the street, headed to our rendezvous when suddenly around the corner comes this kid about 15 years old, booking it! As he's headed towards us, he trips and falls and dozens of CDs fly out of his bag and go all into the road. So Golden moment right! We start helping pick them up. Weird thing was, though, that as we were picking them up the kid disappears again around the corner, and we see these cops on motos go through the intersection. Looking at the CDs I saw that they all were just blank, written on with permanent marker. The Kid came back and we handed him back his CD's. He was very thankful and explained that he was running because the cops were chasing him because he was selling illegally copyrighted music. Haha, well in the heat of all that I couldn't think of anything to say to him except to wish him good luck and that he shouldn't do that and then was off again. So yup, in an effort to do a good deed, we helped a criminal instead... awkward.  😬

We did a service project today as a mission and cleaned up this little block park (I guess you could call it), it's more just like a bench area with grass. We swept it all and painted all the benches. We also cut all the grass, nope not with a lawnmower, not a weed wacker, but with machetes! And let me tell ya, it takes FOREVER!!! Shout out to my mission president who was swinging that machete like a pro and who literally cut like half of it by himself. #nomissionpresidentbeatsthat. It was so funny that people would comment while going by. Every other person came up and asked what we were doing like they had never seen a service project before. Some asked if the police knew what we were doing. The homeless guys were mad because we painted their benches they were laying on. A bunch of people were super encouraging and so many people shouted out good work or just stopped to watch us and tell us thank you. We even got 3 people who wanted to come to church just because of that! A moto taxi driver even stopped and helped us paint all the benches! It's so crazy how open people become when you serve them and show true love towards a people. When we are in the service of your fellow men we are truly in the service of our God! 

Other Highlights of the week were seeing this fight break out between this HUGE mama and this moto driver. This mama was soooo mad and she practically picked this guy up and threw him! When he got up and came back, she threw him again! He learned his lesson and stopped arguing with her, 😂 I'd be scared of her too.  

We went on splits with the assistants and got to work again with my x-comp, Elder Sorensen! While working we felt to go into this one house and turns out the guy was a pastor! Haha, that turned into a 45 min. discussion on his doorstep just trying to get through explaining our simple message of the restoration because he liked talking so much. After we backed up everything we said with scripture and got him pinned on the fact that he can't deny the oBok of Mormon if he has never read and prayed about, he stuttered over his words and quickly tried ushering us away telling us that the Holy Ghost will confirm that it's true to him, so he didn't need to read it. It was super funny.

Love y'all! have a great week!

Elder Briggs

sorry no pics.  next week!👍

I Ate the Fruit of Good and Evil

 December 2, 2019

 Hope y'all had a great week and an amazing Thanksgiving!! As I explain the week a little you will understand what I mean by Good and Evil.

Baptism of Ephraim! The son of our convert fr. Eugene

So, last week I didn't send out an email because I wasn't feeling very good and, whoops, turns out it was malaria! And also let me tell you that it is exactly as bad as it sounds 😂 I was hoping I would get through the 2 years without it, and I thought I was almost there, but I guess not. I'm really thankful that I saw the symptoms early and got the medication (6 pills!) because if not it can get super bad. Basically, it just consisted of vomiting, loss of appetite, killing headache, your whole body just hurts, and it hurts laying in any position, and a fever. It lasted about Monday till Thursday morning but the worst part of it was that we were out of water for these 3 days. Haha, Iremember one of the days I was laying there listening to a talk about afflictions and as he was talking I thought, "ya, this isn't too bad" and then boom, the power cut and I was left lying with a fever in a 90 degrees apartment with no water. Haha, I literally just laughed out loud to how funny that was and luckily the talks got me through till the power came back on.

Now to contrast that with the good 😉 we got invited by the president to go eat Thanksgiving with an American family who live here working for the Embassy!! They live in this super nice, secured neighborhood behind the airport and DUDE their house is so nice!! I felt like I walked in a portal to America. Everything I saw and did was for the first time in 1 1/2 years. They had a playground in their yard, there was real carpet, nice couches, furnishing, it even smelled like America! It was hard core culture shock sitting down in what I think y'all call living rooms and eat "refreshments." The member started going off naming what they were, all these fancy cheeses and stuff- I didn't even know what it was (I did recognize the broccoli and olives, though).

Thanksgiving dinner

Bon Appetit my friends

She introduced us to two other super cool guys from the Air Force who joined us and were not members! Then came in their little girl! I realized I'd completely forgotten what white kids act and look like. They're hilarious! Haha, I tried talking to her in simple gestures then realized that she spoke English better than me! I had forgotten how white people talk to each other and I think us 4 elders just kinda stared at everything most of the time. We ate so good, no joke like probably better than I would have back in the states. I was still sick so I couldn't feast like I should have, but you bet I savored every bite. (pic below) She even let us take some pieces of pie home in a bag! Anyways I could go on and on about it but let's just say, it was good.

First white kid in 1 1/2 years! The pics looks awkward because I think either she was scared of me, or I was scared of her.

So, I'm a living testimony that 2 Nephi 2 was right. Without the bad there is no good! And when the bad gets worse, it's so that the good is even better! The amount of joy that I felt during those couple hours were only made possible by all the hard things that had happened in the week! The malaria, no water, dying heat,

Benin in general, etc. And it was 100 percent worth it!  But who knew that all those things were necessary so that I could experience the 100 percent opposite and receive a fullness of joy!? So, when things blow in life, don't worry. Just remember that because of that, life can get really good and can help you more fully feel joy, peace, and love. Another good quote I heard once was that "hard times will come, and they will either break you, or break you open. Let them break you open."

Love you all!

Elder Briggs

Mr. Thorpe, if You're out There . . .

 November 18, 2019

So, this week we started up our practice rehearsals for our Christmas program! It's gonna be good, I hope. Werre doing sketches, dances, I'm accompanying Elder Harman, who is a stud on the violin in "Oh, come oh, come Emmanuel" Piano guys version. Well, we have a choir too and while planning it we needed a conductor and "the lots fell on me" so Mr. Thorpe, if you're out there, I hope I'm making you proud 😉

Family Home Evening

Besides that, transfer calls came, but no big news. I'm staying here with Elder Kouadio at least 1 more so I'm pumped! This week we had definitely some... interesting experiences? But one of the funny highlights is that we have started teaching like half the congregation of a celeste church! The celeste church (look it up for more info) was this church started in Benin and they got some different beliefs, for example they wear theses long white robes with these white hats and when they go to church they don't wear any shoes, but usually we joke around to never teach someone who is celeste because they are almost impossible to convert and most the time they don't like us. Well one of their priests stopped us and wanted to learn more and invited us to come to his church to teach him because he is there all day, every day. We show up there and of course we don't go inside to teach him because that's a white bible no-no, so we just taught him outside. The next time there were 3 priests from his church who came out to join us! The first guy had shown them all the Book of Mormon we gave himand they too wanted to learn about it! Haha, by the third time there were about 5 guys and 3 women there and it was the best sight in the world when we showed up to see these people bring the chairs out of their church, each with a Book of Mormon, walking to us barefoot in white robes to listen to our message! Haha, of course, in my mind I was just thinking how they all looked ready to get baptized! And to top it all off the neighborhood drunk "Abel" started a fight with one of the priests during our lesson and slammed a metal door on the back of his head and he didn't want to leave so we sat him down and had him listen, too 😂 He killed me! He asked "qui est Abel?"  (Who was Abel?) I told him that he was Abel, then he smiled and was like "je ne suis pas trop belle" (I'm not THAT beautiful). It was hilarious. idk sorry it probably only makes sense in French.

Rooftop of Cotonou

The Book of Mormon is the keystone of our religion people!! I don't know if anything will happen with them, but the Book of Mormon was the key to get them all to hear about our message!! Because if someone truly wants to know more about Christ what cooler thing than another testament of him!? I know it's true and that by reading it we will get closer to God than by any other book on this earth!

Love y'all!

Elder Briggs

I Met the Prophet and an Execution Order

 November 4, 2019

I met the prophet!! Crazy, right? Actually, me and him are buddies now because for the last week he has been in my dreams almost every night 😂 Ya, my dreams have been getting really weird and when general authorities are in your dreams I think it means you've been on a mission for too long. Yup, me and Russell Nelson have done everything from deep sea fishing at a Bahamas resort to him showing me his collection of the world's deadliest snakes, to even watching David A Bednar give a conference address during conference on his TV together in his living room with Henry Eyring sitting on the couch with us too!! I'm open if anyone can interpret what these dreams mean.

So, we have had this cockroach problem in our kitchen that I, apparently, didn't think was very bad. Just turning on the lights there are a few here and there that run away. Well, I've started to notice that they have been "multiplying and replenishing" our kitchen so I decided to fumigate our kitchen today. Well turns out it turned into a genocide after finding that the couple cockroaches was really hundreds! Ahh, it was so bad. I would empty boxes and drop the box on the ground and hundreds of cockroaches would fall out of all the cracks! The shelves were the worst, after pulling the cabinet out and turning it around the ENTIRE back of the cabinet was covered in cockroaches! Got to say it was pretty gross. 

The works going well, and we are in the process of seeing how we can help the stake to improve missionary work between the members and the missionaries and have been doing formations in some of the wards. I had one experience that I would like to share. We were headed to a rendezvous and I have the habit of always carrying a Book of Mormon in hand. My comp asked who I was planning on giving it to and I said I didn't know but we would find someone. Sure enough, while walking down the street a moto driver stopped and asked me if he could have the Book of Mormon! He had seen the same book at his girlfriend's house and started reading it and when he saw it in my hand he stopped! I think it's so cool that if I hadn't decided to carry that Book of Mormon , that guy would have just ridden by without knowing the blessings of the gospel! Sometimes God doesn't need us to go find people for him but to simple be an example for him so that when he sends people our way, they recognize that what we have was what they were searching for. Love y'all!

Elder Briggs 

Modern Lamoni and Snake Temple

 October 28, 2019

I'm still alive! Sorry I just haven't sent out a weekly in a while. It's been rough the last couple weeks trying to find a good place to email cause the police have shut down all the cyber cafes because they're usually filled with scammers. 😂 Well it's gonna be hard to try and sum up the last 2 weeks because so much has happened so I'll just give a couple highlights. First, we baptized the frere Eugene and his wife! (the ami who was a pastor) Coolest thing was that the day we were at the church to do his interview there were some guys here from Salt Lake getting the translation process going to translate the book of Mormon in Fon! And Eugene started talking to him and guess who now got asked to help with the translation of the Book of Mormon!? Eugene!!! So, he went straight from 0 to hero and the day after his baptism he was in meetings with them all day starting translating. (You would assume to translate the book of Mormon President Nelson just whips out the urim and thummin but apparently not 😉) Its crazy to see now how God has prepared him! Haha, and he lights up Sunday School. By the time he finishes talking he has everyone going "amen hmh amen!"

Another experience we had was when we went with the stake president to go visit bishops to see how we can get missionary work moving here. It was amazing to see how led by the spirit the stake president is and I can truly say we were on the Lord's errand! After the first bishop we went to the stake president asked if there was a member in his ward we could visit. He mentioned a member and then we all went to visit him. When we got to the member's house, he told us "I knew you guys would come". The president asked "why?" and he said that his wife had seen us go to the bishop's house and he just felt so strongly that they would come to his house. At the next bishops house, we walked in and the bishop told us his 80-year-old Muslim father was at his house and wanted to talk to us. The father walked out with his Muslim robe, cap, and long white beard. He told us that his intention of coming to our bishop's house was to convince him that his church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints) was wrong and to make him come back to Muslim. He watched him for 3 days. During these 3 days he saw the life his son was living and the spirit that glowed from him. He told his son that he didn't want to change his mind anymore, he wanted to know more about his church! He went to church on Sunday and he testified to us that this church really is the church of God and that the holy spirit is truly found here. He even told us that with time he wants to himself be baptized!! The president and us took turns testifying of the truthfulness of the gospel and I don't think the spirit has been stronger in my entire mission. He even started crying! People!!! THE CHURCH IS TRUE!! Go read Alma 22: 1-27! It's not just in Book of Mormon times, that literally happened this week!! Just like how Lamoni converted his father by his love for the gospel! If you know the gospel is true, take a look at your life and ask this question. Has the gospel had an effect on my life to the point that someone could tell a difference? 

Love y'all! Elder Briggs

Voodoo priest feeding an idol nuts.

More idols

 Here is a sacred rock that protects the village... pretty cool right 😎 Something about how every 7 years 40 young women come to dump buckets of water on it. 

 Python voodoo temple! It's in this voodoo village and they give kinda a tour and explain all their idols and Gods. Apparently touching the pythons is "good luck"..? they drink from the holy water.

 In the last 2 weeks I saw a coffin on the back of a moto, 8 sheep tied on a moto (but one fell off and painted the road) and then I saw this. Hundreds of live chickens stacked and hanging off this car! Gotta love Benin.

Sifting corn