Monday, November 24, 2014

Happy Thanksgiving


Kirsten celebrating her 20th Birthday with Sister Lane
and the Sanchez Family
Hey all you wonderful fantastic family and friends!

We have just seen so many miracles this week. We have had so much fun serving here in Cincinnati. It is truly quite the experience. So lately i have been praying to have charity. Especially for the people that we teach. I want to really see them through the eyes of our Heavenly Father. I had a neat but heartbreaking experience yesterday. We went back to one of our investigators and he told us that he just doesnt believe. He said that too much has happened in life that there could just not be a God. He said that he used to be super religious. He said that when he was going through those hard times that he prayed and asked God to just push him in the right direction. He said that he felt like he got no answer and things just got worse. But as we were standing there hearing him the thoughts that kept coming to my mind is that this is a son of God and he doesnt even know it. I didnt know what to say to him. I kept praying and asking my Heavenly Father. But for a moment i got a small feeling of sorrow because this man doesnt know his father. He doesnt know that there is someone out there that knows everything about him that knows the pain he has gone through and the heartache he has felt. I wanted so badly to just help him see how much our Heavenly Father loves him but he wouldnt listen to it. I want you all to know that you have a Heavenly Father and he loves you beyond comprehension. He knows you and will always be there for you!

So saturday we had a real funny experience. We were going to see our investigator that we had an appointment with. It was about 7:30 in the evening and all the lights in the house were off. We decided to still try and see him. Well on the way up to the door we hear this loud snoring from coming inside. We didnt end up knocking. Well we went back the next day and told him that we missed seeing him yesterday. He told us that he got called into work about 7:30... so either his dog has a really manly snore or he was pretty late for work... haha it may have been a had to be there moment but we thought it was pretty funny.

I hope you all have a wonderful thanksgiving! i am so grateful for my opportunity to serve. I am so blessed to have such wonderful friends and family. Please all of you be safe and remember who you are. I love you so so much!!!

Monday, November 17, 2014

Kirsten's 20th Birthday, Kirsten didn't title this one so I did it for her :)

My best buddy on my mission :)

Hey all you wonderful beautiful handsome friends and family :)

This week has been a wonderful week. First off I want to thank you for the birthday cards and gifts :) it was such a treat to open them today. I love you all so much!  


look at all the leaves here
I have just learned a whole bunch this week! One of my "visions" for myself by the end of my mission is to more fully recognize the promptings of the spirit. This week we had the opportunity to have a general authority come and tour our mission and he talked a lot about the spirit and the different roles of it. After that I really tried to really focus on the spirit as I prayed and as I went through my day. It is amazing the closeness you feel to your Heavenly Father as you do that. I love my Heavenly Father so much! I know we are all sons and daughters of him. In a very literal sense. I know this with all the fiber of my being I could never deny it. I hope you all know that too. He loves you! He wants to see you succeed. He will do all he can to help you fulfill your dreams as you work hard and turn to him :)


This week I am having a hard time thinking of a big funny thing that happened. Lots of funny things  happen throughout the week. But just little joys in doing the work that we can laugh about. I have found that is one of the best cures for those hard times we all experience. Prayer and laughter! It is so much easier to smile than to frown. Just do your best to be happy and remember everything happens for a reason! Keep stayin strong and know that i love you all so so much! You are in my prayers :) Love you!

i was just hangin at a
members house last night ;)
Love your sister Davis :)

Less actives dog reading the scriptures.








Monday, November 10, 2014

Miracles always follow after the trial of your faith!

Sister Lane & Sister Davis
Holy cow! I just love this gospel so much! Heavenly Father knows exactly what he is doin! That is one of the greatest lessons to learn i think to just rely fully on our Father in Heaven.

So i told you all about the lady we were teaching who said her parents werent gonna let her be baptized... well we told her to keep prayin and we would keep prayin as well. Well this week we went to another lesson with her and she came down and told us that her parents are gonna let her be baptized and come to church. She said they finally realize how important this is to her. That was a miracle everyone! God truly hears and answers prayers. I have seen that so much on my mission. He doesnt always answer them exactly how you think he will but sometimes he does and those are the most noticable times but the real challenge is to see how he answers your prayers when it is not exactly what you ask for. Isnt that intersesting? Maybe that can be a challenge for all of us to try and see how God answers your prayers each day when it is not exactly what you ask for, cause i know no matter what he does answer prayers :)

Okay so my funny story for the week. Well we went to help this lady clean her house.... it was.... interesting. So she has been known to have bugs in her home like an uncontrollable amount of bugs. So we took precautions and sprayed oursleves with rubbing alcohol before and after we helped but when we got home something we had been told to do is undress and put our clothes in a bag and throw them directly in the dryer. Luckily we live with a member so she had a garage so we were able to undress in there. But unfortunately the members cleaning lady was there so we yelled inside and told her not to look as we ran downstairs in our underwear... she was a good sport about it and totally understood. But it was kinda funny. Maybe it was a had to be there moment but so far we have been good and havent gotten any bed bugs... knock on wood :)

Also another funny moment is we have been trying to see this one member ever since we got here and we seemed to always go when she wasnt home... well that is what we thought. So we were talking to this other member and she told us to try and go see this lady again. Well we told that member that we can never catch her home she was like you know that she lives in an apartment. And we were like no the door we have been knocking on is a house door... so we doubled checked the address and it was the right address. Then we realized that we had been knocking on the front door to the apartment complex... no wonder no one was answering the door.... it was kinda embarrassing but funny too. So now we know we have to go inside that door. Even though i am on a mission i guess i am still entitled to my little blonde moments.

Well i hope all is going well with you all. Know that you are in my thoughts and prayers. Keep staying strong. Know that your Heavenly Father loves you so much and is watching over you. I love you all so much!
 
Love your sister Davis :)

Monday, November 3, 2014

Faith!! :)

Hey all you wonderful family and friends!!

I just want you all to know that i love you so much! You are all in my prayers! This week was quite a week.

First off we have met this amazing women. Our bishop told us all about her and asked us to go and see her. So we have started teaching her. She has studied the LDS faith for a long time and wants to raise her family in the church and go out to BYU. She has done a lot of studies on strong healthy families and she told us that the LDS familys have the highest rate of stability out of all the other faiths. We come in at 98% and the next closest one is 68%. Holy cow! But i cant totally understand why that is! But anyway she is just like a sponge with everything we share with her.  So she was going to come to church on sunday but we got a text from her that told us her parents are completely against her joining the church. She told us that she is going to have to wait until she goes out to Utah to get baptized. But we keep prayin for her. We know that God will take care of her. Miracles are always happening!!!  

This week I was studying a lot about faith. I am sure you all have read the chapter in the Matthew about Jesus Christ and Peter walking on water. It was so fantastic! I think i have talked about his before but when i was little i always thought it would be so cool to walk on water and told myself that one day i wanted to have enough faith to walk on water. So i really love this part of the bible. But anyway as Jesus comes to his diciples in the ship Peter Calls out to him and tells him that if it is him then to tell him to come out to him on the water. So the Lord tell Peter to come to him so Peter looks at Jesus and steps out of the boat and walks on the water. Then he turns his head towards the winds and the waves that are coming and starts to sink. But he quickly cried out to the Lord and the Lord immediately reaches out to him and pulls him back up. I thought we could relate that to our lives cause there is no doubt that winds and waves will come our way in life but as we stay focused on the Savior we will have the faith to get through them. But those times when we do start to doubt as we cry out to the Lord he will immediately reach out and pull us back up. But it all starts with the courage to take that first step out of the boat to increase our faith. I know that Jesus Christ is our Savior i know he wants us to be successful in the things that we are doing in life. I know that he has a plan for each of us to grow our faith to one day be able to walk on water.

So that is a little bit of what is going on here in the greater cincinnati. I sure love hearing from you all. Have a fantastic safe week. Know that i love you all so so much!!! :)
 
Love your sister Davis :)