Week 41 How Strong??? Too Strong!

I think we will all agree that General Conference was the best!!! To be 100% honest though the 70's came in strong this year... almost showing up the 12 at times...

General Conference is pretty much our vacation... Saturday in the morning we all went to the grocery store and used all of our money for the week on a ton of snacks, sodas, and other foods. Then all of us gringos found ourselves a room with a fan, obtained a tv and set up the ultimate general conference watching room! It was way awesome! I learned tons, got some killer notes, and have some new specific goals I'm going to work on. 

The talk on the sabbath day was god-sent... such a problem here and it helped a few members see the true importance of the commandment! 

A recent convert went to the priesthood session with his mom and they both cried during Thomas S. Monson's talk!!! He talked to the bishop about getting enrolled in a mission prep class and said the conference answered his prayer about whether or not he wanted to serve a mission!!!

Other than conference we had a good week. We had a mission wide temple trip for investigators and less actives which was a huge success! We loaded a huge bus full of people and went to the temple... such a great experience!! Now people have a bigger mind set... the goal isn't just to get to church each week, it is to prepare to go to the temple... we are teaching all our recent converts and less actives about family history and they are starting to prepare names!!

Getting in lessons this week was tough though. The Catholic church had a billion things going on for semana santa, and it was tough to find anyone in the house... but they (the Catholics) made some really cool salt creations all over town... just in the middle of the street they make these awesome art things out of colored salt, then they destroy them in their funeral walk for the death of Christ.

Also we bought a bunch of little chicks Tuesday from an investigator and just dumped them all in my ward mission leaders house because he hates animals and it was hilarious!  Just 15 chicks chirping and running around his house and him freaking out. hahaha 

Overall it was a super fun week and I learned a ton. Hope you all had a great general conference weekend! 

Love Elder Davis

Week 40 Semena Santa

Happy Semana santa!! I hope that you enjoy watching all the Catholics doing "secret combination" like ceremonies.... I know I do. haha

This week was tough but good... Holy cow I am just really breaking into the scriptures... I am learning so Much!! 

I finally was able to finish the Miracle of Forgiveness and it is hands down one of the best books I  have read... well recommended for anyone who hasn't yet read it. 

We were walking in the street Wednesday when we had a huge power outage... the entire city lost power and it was super cloudy which made it pitch black. We were able to make it back to our house and find a flashlight... Then we went to the church to see if members/ investigators were there for the ward family night we have. We helped people get moto taxis to get them home safe (the streets get really dangerous and full of crime when the power goes out) and then we weren't able to visit everyone so us four missionaries went to the mexican restaurant in front of our house and had a nice romantic, candle lit dinner. hahaha It was lots of fun. 

I have been trying to activate this member (in the pic) for a long time... we are good friends, but he works every Sunday. He finally had one Sunday off and promised me he would come to church, but Sunday in the morning he decided he would rather watch the soccer games... To tell me sorry that he didn't go he bought me this super sweet Barcelona jersey though so I can't complain to much. 

This scorpion was on my bed a couple nights ago... good thing I saw it before I laid down haha

Overall I'm doing good. Hope you guys are all having a great week.

If you aren't pumped for general conference you should get pumped.. I know I am!!!!!!

Love Elder Davis

Week 39

We had another good week... Just the usual, tiring but good. 

I started out the week by buzzing my hair really short because I'm in El Salvador and it is 1 billion degrees and why not....

Then we visited people and looked for people and just did the same old stuff. 

Oh yeah, our chapel got new white boards!! But the bishop bought permanent markers to use with them and they all got destroyed Sunday:( 

A 10 year old girl with down syndrome fell in love with a recent convert... she just follows him around all day in church and in elders quorum sat down in front of him and just stared at him for 45 minutes... it was pretty funny!

We brought 3 new people to church who had never come with us before and the subject was temples... I have never prayed so hard in my life haha.  They were all so confused afterwards and asking questions about ceremonial clothing and such and oh gosh it was a tough sacrament meeting haha

But we finished up the week with a really cool spiritual experience. A recent convert bore his testimony about the atonement of Jesus Christ and how it changed his life... It was awesome and pretty much the entire class left in tears. 

Cant really think of anything else... Just trying to always push forward. Everything is going good,

Love Elder Davis

Week 38 Rain, rain let it pour

The glorious season of rain has started again... walking from lesson to lesson completely soaked is so much better (at least for right now... I'm sure i'll get over it) then walking from lesson to lesson in the miserable heat and humidity!!

Today we had a great day... I talked to almost every single person I saw in the street. The majority didn't listen, but we found some really good people and have got our area flying again. 

Sunday I gave a talk in sacrament meeting about gaining a personal testimony of the gospel. I talked about how we need to know the gospel is true, not important what the bishop or the leaders do wrong,  if we really have personal testimonies. 

Part of the missionary purpose is inviting people to repent... I took that pretty seriously this week and invited pretty much all of Quezaltepeque to repent. At first it felt really direct and rude, but it ended up helping us a ton because these people have very little education and just telling them directly works out a lot better. 

But yeah, we are working really hard and finding success. Happy and exhausted as usual. 

Love, 

Elder Davis

Week 37 Go Big or Go Home

So we didn't have changes... Everyone in my ward thinks I'm going to start and end my mission in Quezaltepeque .... I'm not going to lie- I was pretty disappointed, this area is one of the smaller ones in the mission and I feel like I know everyone. I stopped a guy in the street to try and contact him and he told me I had talked to him 4 times already. hahaha

So yeah I was pretty down, then I flipped open my scriptures Wednesday morning and saw a quote that dad had sent me a few weeks ago, that I had written in a margin, "Good is not good when better is expected"- The great Vin Scully

Holy cow it got me thinking... I think I've been a pretty good missionary... I work hard and am obedient and have had a little success, but is that good enough?? I don't want to be a good missionary, I want to be the best missionary (still haven't lost my competitiveness  I guess) 

Then Wednesday I got a package with books in it from mom... I flipped open the first one that night and it was the Miracle of Forgiveness by Spencer W. Kimball.... In the first few chapters I read, "Many people die with their music still in them. Why is that so? Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live. Before they know it time runs out." Oliver Vendell Holmes

and then a little later in the book, "Waste is unjustifiable, and especially the waste of time--Limited as that commodity is in our days of probation, one must LIVE, not only EXIST, he must DO, not merely BE, he must grow, not just vegetate" Spencer W. Kimball

and then I received the ultimate machete (not sure if we say that in English or not) "The real tragedy is the tragedy of the man who never in his life braces himself for his one supreme effort, who never stretches to his full capacity, never stands up to his full stature" Arnold Bennet

Holy cow I was into some pretty deep self reflection this week... I had been telling myself I had done all I could here, I just needed to wait to get to a new area and then I would start going at it with everything I had again. I was so wrong. The Lord left me in this area because My work here is not yet finished. When (if ever) I have changes I want to leave this area knowing I did everything within my power to bring these people to the truth.

So yeah, basically I am  more motivated than ever, have the goal of being the best missionary in the world (still got a long ways to go) and in love with anything and everything written by Spencer W Kimball. 

Hope you all have a great week. I love you! Thanks for all the support you send me every week. 

Love Elder Davis

Week 36 Another Great Week

This week was tough... Running in every direction, trying to re-build our investigator pool that has been sinking fast... but in the end it was AWESOME. 

Our zone led the mission in baptisms again and so president gave us permission to go to the temple!!  So our Zl,s called the temple to set an appointment, but we learned tomorrow it is going to close. So at 10:45 Thursday night we called all over the place trying to rent a bus to get us there and then had to wake up super early to make the trip but it was so worth it!! Holy cow I learned so much, and felt the spirit strong... If you ever need a testimony boost just go to the temple... I'm  convinced that nobody could sit there and not realize the church is true!

Then Saturday was crazy, running all over the place but awesome, and Sunday was elections day!!! There has been a ton of political stuff the last 3 weeks. The entire city is decked out with flags from the political parties and it all went crazy on election day!! Getting people to church was tough... they have always only had sacrament meeting on election day, but this year the president of area said he wanted us to have all 3 meetings... but in the end we had a pretty good attendance:)

Changes are Wednesday... the word on the street is I'm going to have a new area, but my friend in the office went home last change and I don't have many reliable sources to get an early glimpse this change:( Guess I'll just have to wait and see what happens. 

Everything is going good, except our gringo soccer team finally lost.. .the Latinos put together the best all star team they could and won:( but we had a good run at least. 

I'm doing good, happy and working hard (its funny how the two things are dependent on each other)

Love Elder Davis

Week 35

I have no idea what pictures I've sent home and what I haven't so I'm just sending a few random ones...

I really have no idea what to write... the work is going really well, we are being blessed with quite a bit of success. 

Yesterday I had a long talk with the bishop to try and settle our differences... it didn't really work and in the end he pretty much just told me he is going to wait until me and my companion have changes to help with the missionary work. But you know it happens, I guess I've never really been the easiest to agree with... but I don't think I'll be here much longer and maybe its for the best. 

I had an interview with President Vasquez last Monday that was just awesome... Holy cow I learned so much and we just talked for well over an hour and he showed me all the statistics for the mission, what areas and companionships were doing the best, my success training compared to the other trainers... goals he has for me... Planned an activity for my ward that he is going to come out one day and help with... A bunch of stuff I don't know, but it was just really awesome. I love President and Hermana Vasquez, and know that they are inspired people. 

I got 2 super awesome goals when we played soccer today... The latinos are really mad that our gingo team keeps winning and keep trying to form "all star teams" to try and beat us and it is really funny because they have played their entire lives and we have no idea what we are doing. haha

I'm happy working hard. I've been reading a lot in the Book of Mormon the last few days... Just want to say that the strippling warriors are so awesome. haha

Love you guys, 

Elder Davis

(I am assuming these are the "sack lunches" they made last week....)