Brrrr it has been so cold!

Wow! You are all so amazing! I am so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends. I just want you all to know that i love you so much! We had such a great week this week. It was full of opposition but that is okay cause God is powerful and as long as we keep calling on Him we can all make it through just fine. 

Okay so this week we were trying to find this family that hasnt been to church for a long time. So we went to the apartment complex they live in and someone has to buzz to let us in. So we rang the buzzer to their apartment and in previous apartment buildings it will ring back to you. Well this one didnt ring back. So we thought it was broken and my companion ran her fingers all up and down the buzzers to see if any of them worked and none of them rang back to us.... well before we knew it we had all these people coming on the intercom saying "Hello?" and one of them even buzzed us it. So we got in which was awesome then when we got in we had all these people opening their doors to see who it was. Haha its just the mormon missionaries here ;)  But we learned a lesson that not all apartment buzzers ring back to you. Haha :) 

We had an awesome experience with the less active member that saved us from that lady a couple weeks ago. So we went back after that incident to teach his family because he has two kids and a girlfriend and girlfriends daughter that are all not members. When we went back to teach him he was telling us his story and how he met the missionaries and when he got baptized and everything like that. Then he was talking about how for a while he has felt that he has needed to come back to church. He told us he just is scared and feels uncomfortable. We talked to him about how much our Heavenly Father loves him and his family. We shared our testimonies on how the gospel and coming to church has strengthened our families and helped us so much. Then he sat and thought for a minute. Then he looked us right in the eye and said "You know what.... I am coming to church on sunday" Then he stuck out his hand to shake ours. He said "I promise i will be there and i wont let anything stop me." So we shook on it. Then we warned him that the adversary will do anything he can to stop you from coming. He said "I know but i will be there." The spirit that was in that room was so strong! Our Heavenly Father loves him and his family so much. It was an eye opener to me at how the adversary works with people in trying to make them not feel good enough or feel too uncomfortable to take those steps back to church. But i also felt a sense of love that our Heavenly Father has for all of His children. Our Heavenly Father doesnt care where you have been. All he cares about is where you are willing to go. The past is the past and all we have is the future to live for. We can definitely learn from the past to prepare for the future but we must live in the present. Anyway HE CAME TO CHURCH!!! He also brought his little boy who is not a member and it was so neat to see all the little boys his age take him and befriend him. This less active wants to totally change his life back around and knows what he needs to do it. We are so excited to be working with him and his family. There is always hope! Our Heavenly Father will never give up trying to help his children feel that sense of hope and neither should we. That is what this gospel is all about. Changing everyday and looking for that new hope so we can come closer to our Heavenly Father. I LOVE THIS GOSPEL!!!

our car buried by the elders!!

It has snowed so much here in Cincinnati. Kids were out of school this week... Chick-fil-a even shut down. People dont know what to do here when it snows haha they go crazy and buy everything in the stores and hibernate in their homes. We spent almost all Saturday shoveling peoples driveways and pushing our car out of the snow. We only got stuck three times though. Yesterday when we got stuck just sister Hatch and i were trying to push ourselves out. So we were rocking the car and putting our car mats behind the tires to try and get some traction. We were doing pretty good but it was hard! Then we see this lady walking down the street. We were thinking she was coming to help but no she gets to the bottom of the hill and just stands there with her arms folded watching us. Sister Hatch and i were laughing so hard. We eventually got out of that one but drove right into another one in the same driveway. There was no way we were going to be able to get that one by ourselves so luckily some men saw and came and helped us. But this lady just continued to stand there and eventually came down to help stop traffic. But we cracked up about that for the rest of the day. Just this random lady standing there watching us. Oh also the elders got us back for the joke we played on them with the marshmellows and their keys. They buried our car in snow in the church parking lot. Those bums but i guess we deserved it. ;)

Nothing stops a good missionary!!
They are currently digging to help someone find the keys that
they dropped to the car and then digging a car out all
while they are in their skirts -Martha Vandamere

I know this gospel is the one true gospel. I know life can be hard but i know EVERYTHING HAPPENS FOR A REASON! I will forever and always live by that moto. I know our Heavenly Father has a plan for each of us. I know He will help us make it through this life we just have to turn to Him. Never forget that He loves you. You are his son or his daughter literally. Always remember that. Keep stayin strong. I am prayin for you always. I LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH!!!

 

Love your sister Davis :)

What a week! :)

HAPPY VALENTINES!!! <3

Hey all you wonderful family and friends! You are all just so fantastic and i love you so much i hope you know!

My flip by the ohio sign!

It was dark so it is hard to see. 



we found a random pig in the hollars of

Kentucky on exchanges :) 

This week we had quite the experience. It truly just strengthened my testimony though. So we had this investigator that the previous sisters had been teaching for a while. They used to be Jehovah witness then they left that church. This was like years ago. They then prayed and asked God if there was a true church to have them come to their door. The next day missionaries came and knocked on the door. But they still have not joined the church and they have been meeting with missionaries for like 20 years. But anyway before i got here they apparently asked the sisters for geological evidence that the Book of Mormon was true. They told them that there was no evidence except for the Book of Mormon. That wasnt good enough for them. We hadnt seen them in a while because they had some things going on and they were out of town and such. So the other day we decided to drop back by and this was my first time meeting them and he answered the door and said that we could not talk until we got him evidence that the Book was true. So we left and decided to give him a Book of Mormon with a sticky note on it that said "We can not give you evidence only God can" We put it in an envelope and left it on their door step. Well as we were walking away we ran into this guy... come to find out he was a less active that we had never met before that we had been looking for. He lives right next door to this investigator that we took the Book of Mormon to. So we talked to him and he was like come visit with me for a minute and we were like okay so we were following him back to his house when all the sudden this investigators wife comes outside (we were teaching her too) and just starts ripping us a new one. They were yelling and getting so mad at us. We had no idea what was wrong with what we did. So this less active was like get into my house just ignore her. So we go inside his house and we can hear her outside just flippin out. Well then she started knocking on her neighbors doors and telling them what awful people we were and such. We had never seen so many people outside in that courtyard before. She was like getting these people all riled up and everything. The less active was trying to talk to us but we were so distracted with what this lady was doing outside. So he was like come back on Saturday and visit with me and my family. Then he said i will walk you out cause by this time there were a whole bunch of people out there. So he went out first and we followed closely behind him and as soon as we stepped outside it just went silent... and everyone was just staring at us. It was so sickening. Then when we got to our car this less active looked at us and i will never forget the power that came in the words he said to us next he said "You guys just keep going you know what you know and you just keep believing it." That was so powerful. Simple words but they had a power to them. The spirit at that point testified to me once again that what we are sharing with people is so true. There may not be any physical evidence that the Book of Mormon is true or that Joseph Smith truly did see our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ and restored the church but i know it because of the witness to me from the spirit. I could never deny the truthfulness of it. 

We are getting excited for these next couple weeks. We have an investigator that is preparing to be baptized on the 28th. Her son and daughter have already been baptized and have had such a great influence on her. They are just amazing! She has been smoke free for 11 days now. We call her every morning at 6:30 and say a prayer with her to help give her strength to withstand the temptation during the day. It is so awesome!! I am so excited for her! She loved the gospel and wants to take her family to the temple so bad. 

Okay for the funny thing that has been happening this week... So me and my companion decided that we are going to try and drink a gallon of water a day.  Which is all fine and dandy and it makes you feel really good except for the fact of how much we are running to the bathroom. Well last Monday poor sister Hatch had to go so bad and we were standing on someones porch. She had her legs crossed and she was like "Sister Davis i am going to pee my pants" Well people say that all the time but dont really mean it. I was just laughing at her and then that made her laugh and all the sudden she looks down and was like "uh-oh"... She was peeing right there as we were standing on this persons porch. So i pushed her off the porch into the grass. Good thing this person didnt come to the door. So we ran back to the car. Luckily it was the end of the night and we had done laundry earlier so we had a towel in the car. So she took her tights off and wrapped up in a towel. We were dying of laughter! 

It has been quite the week. Lots of memories made and fun times to look back on. I am so thankful for my mission and wouldnt trade it for anything in the world. Thank you for all the prayers and love and support. I sure am grateful for you all. Keep staying strong! I love you so much!

Love your sister Davis :)

Miracles at church!!



Sometimes we shoot the elders with marshmellows ;) 

You all are just so wonderful and fantastic and i just love you so much! My goodness i feel like it was not that long ago since i was emailing you all last Monday. The days and the weeks are just flying by! It is insane!

So this week my companion and i wanted to hit a triple double so bad. Which is 10 people at church 10 new investigators and 10 member presents. We had a ton of meetings this week and were relying a lot on God to be able to make it happen. So by Friday night we had 10 committed to come to church on Sunday. Then Saturday morning two of them cancelled. So we spent the whole day trying to commit two more people to come to church with us. Around 8 o clock we still had not been able to find anyone. We had one more appointment for the night and we were just praying that we could get two more. So we went into this appointment and the lady that we were teaching her daughter was there. The previous sisters had been teaching her but she hadnt been there any other time we had come by to teach her mom. So we sat down to teach her mom and her mom was like you are coming to church with me tomorrow. So there was one person out of the two that we needed to find. We had an awesome lesson with them. Then when we were headin out we ran into this guy that we had talked to before and so we went over to talk to him again. Before we could get anything out of our mouths the member that was with us was like "Hey do you want to come to church with us?" and he was like "Yes" Number two right there. It was a miracle! So we go to church the next day and the mom and her daughter show up to church and another investigator that we hadnt seen that week showed up. So we had three at church. Then we get a text from the member that was supposed to pick the other guy up saying that he cant find him. So we are sittin in sacrament meeting and all the sudden our phone starts vibrating and it is the guy so we didnt know what to do and our mission president has asked us not to leave the meetings so we whisper to the member sitting next to us if they could run answer our phone. Luckily it was the member that was with us that invited him to church. So she was out talking to him in the hall then the member that was supposed to bring him to church shows up and comes and sits by us and says that he couldnt find him. Then we get our phone brought back to us by a little girl we didnt know where the member went. So we wait a little bit then all the sudden the member shows up with the guy. So we got four people at church. Which  was a lot better than last week and it was truly by the grace of God that it all happened. Everyone else had their excuses but this next week we are gonna try again. We can resolve the concerns that the other people had and work really hard to get all ten there. It is amazing what happens when you are working with God. 

Okay so we got our car all cleaned up. Haha that took forever to get all the mud off of it. Luckily the car wash people let us go through the car wash twice. But we went back to this house on Wednesday to teach the guy whose yard we tore up. HE IS SO AWESOME!!! He has such a sincere desire to learn. He wants so badly to know how to keep his family safe and strong in this world. He has one little girl who is five and she is going into Kindergarten next year and he said he is scared for her. He said that previous to our visit he had been pondering on the things we shared with him when we first met him. We are going back this Wednesday again to teach him. We are so excited. And we are trying to figure out how to fix the yard still but it will all work out. :) 

Man i wish i could explain to you all the feelings that i have about how much i know this work and this church is truly ran by God. But there are seriously no words that can describe it. I know with all my heart that Joseph Smith is truly a prophet of God. I know that we have a prophet on the earth today. I know the priesthood has been restored and with that comes the power to seal and bind our families together and to God. I am so grateful for this church and i pray that each of you will know and feel of the truthfulness as well. Keep being the fantastic people you are. I love you all so so much!!! 

Love your sister Davis :)

We went muddin ;)

These are our rescuers. 

this is our muddin experience :) 

Wow! What a week we have had :) You are all just so fantastic and i hope you know that! I feel so blessed to have such wonderful friends and family!


Sister Davis & Sister Hatch

Okay so i got to start off with the funniest story that happened to us last night. So we were having a really rough day. We had struggled getting people to come to church and we just were having a hard day. So last night it was about 8:30 and we had a member out with us contacting some people. It was a little rainy and a little snowy. But we pulled up to this house that sister Hatch felt prompted to knock on. So we pulled in and pulled up to the side of the cars. We were in the grass but it looked like cars had parked there before. We went up and knocked and talked to this guy. He was so nice and agreed to let us come back and teach his family. So it was all well and we were super excited especially after the struggle we were having earlier. So the member we were with took off to our next appointment and we were going to follow him but as i was backing out our tires started spinning in the mud. So my companion told me to drive forward a little bit and back out straighter. So i did but once again our tires started spinning in the mud. So the neighbors yard and the yard we were in connected so we were like oh lets just drive straight out... well that was not a good idea either cause when we put it in drive to try and drive forward we realized it was our front wheel that was stuck and spinnin. Those good'ol front wheel drive cars. So my companion and i decided to switch spots and she got in the drivers seat and i got out and started pushing the car. But it was no good we just kept sinking in the mud. Then to make matters worse i heard police sirens and it freaked me out and i ran and jumped in the car and yelled "The police are coming!" Then my companion started freaking out and we were just screaming and laughing in the car. While all this is going on we were on the phone with the zone leaders cause we needed help. They were laughing at us and didnt think we were serious they thought we were joking with them. So we called a member and they came and tried to help push us out. In the mean time the member we were with came back cause we never showed up to the appointment we were going to. Also the zone leaders came and found us. Well the member we had called to come and help us had parked in front of someone else's house. Well the house that she parked in front of called the cops cause there was a car parked in front of their house. So the cops came to look at the car so the member ran over there and told them how we were stuck in the mud so the cop came over and flipped on his light plus another cop came and flipped on his lights. So by this time we had the two zone leaders there, two members there and two cops there plus sister Hatch and me. So we had this big commotion going on in the front yard of these peoples house that we had just met and they had no idea cause they had been down stairs watching the super bowl. So sister Hatch and i went and told them what happened. Luckily they were nice and laughed at us too. Well we could not get the car out no matter how many of us were pushin. So one of the members called another member to come and see if they could get us out. The cops told us that we would probably have to call a tow and then they left. Then the zone leaders had to go and report some numbers so they left. Then the other member showed up with his truck so the first member we called went home to put her boys to bed. So it was us and two other members plus one of the members little boys. The member decided to hook our car up to his truck and pull us out. But we were so stuck it took the truck pulling and the other three people pushing and one person in the drivers seat steering. We did eventually get out. We have mud everywhere all over our coats all over our car... inside and out. Plus to make it even better the place we got stuck in was freshly planted grass. By the time we got home it was 9:30. We were exhausted.  We decided that will be an awesome conversion story for that family haha ;) What a night. But it was good cause we needed a good laugh ;) 

car teaching :)

Okay now for our amazing experience we had this week. So this member gave us a referral of his friend to go and contact so we did and she said we could come back. Well when we went back she said her house was a mess so we couldnt come inside and we didnt have much time anyway so we were standing out on her door step and decided to give her a quick restoration lesson. She was listening and truly taking it all in. Then we recited the first vision. She just started crying! She told us that she couldnt wait for the day to see Jesus again. She told us that she feels that the day is coming that he will return. We told her that what we share will help her prepare for that day. She told us that we could come back and that she would have the house clean so we could come in and sit down and talk. It was a miracle! The spirit was so strong and she was able to feel it and be touched by it. The church is so TRUE!!! 

I do have to say that the spirit is so amazing! Everytime we have the opportunity to share the story about Joseph Smith and testify of him i just feel this peace and happiness. I know it is so true. I know Joseph Smith restored this church. I know we have a living prophet on the earth today and i know that the priesthood is here on the earth and what a great blessing that is. I know that we have a loving Heavenly Father and Savior Jesus Christ who wants to see us succeed in life. They walk with us. I KNOW IT!!! I have felt them. I know we have angels all around us helping us and protecting us. I know our loved ones arent that far from us. Keep going everyone. Keep enduring. The blessings we all have ahead of us are worth more than any momentary happiness that we would find here on earth. FAMILIES ARE FOREVER!!! I love you all so so much!

Love your sister Davis :)