July 31, 2017: Greetings from Itabuna!

Hello everyone!

I hope everyone is having a great week. I definitely had a great week. It was a week of transfers and I was getting to know my new area and companion here in Itabuna. It is going well though.

Eating my last big sandwich in Ilheus:)

On Monday I had to say goodbye to Ednaldo and his family. Super sad. haha I have gotten to know these people very well. I have been able to see and observe how the Gospel of Jesus Christ has transformed their lives. Once again, they thanked us and bore testimonies of how better their lives and relationships with one another are because of the Gospel. It has really strengthened my testimony of the Gospel. I will never forget them. I gave two puppets that mom made to the two kids and a shirt and tie to Ednaldo. I will also do a Christ drawing for them. Ednaldo let me choose one of the paintings that he had done to take home with me. He wanted me to take a giant boat painting, but I chose a smaller painting of boats with a yellow background. It was really cool though. 

Ednaldo's Paintings!

Ednaldo gave me the yellow painting:)

I arrived in my new area Wednesday night, ate a little bit and went to rest. The next fews days I have spent learning my new area and meeting many new people. The members here are awesome. They give a lot of food! So maybe I will gain weight! ;) haha My companion is a great guy too. He is very smart and knows a lot about the gospel. He is the oldest Zone Leader on the mission and has shown me how to be a really good Zone Leader. 

That was basically it for the week though. We haven´t had too many crazy stuff happening. I am just getting to know everyone and the area. But I really enjoy it here. It is a great area. 

Self Portrait in 40 minutes...

I love the gospel and the work that I am doing. The spirit is so strong. I love feeling the sprit and being led by it as I teach. My testimony has been solidified. I know that Jesus Christ lives. That he suffered for us. I believe that through the mission and hard situations, we come to know the Lord on a much stronger scale. I find myself wondering "Why" many times. Why did this happen? Why did they turn us down? Why did I get sick?... Etc. But I have come to the understanding that these things happen for our personal growth. A Sword cannot be reinforced with out being beaten, a pencil cannot be sharpened without being cut, so in turn, a human cannot grow spiritually, without being tried. I love this work. The Gospel is true!

Love,

Elder Davis

July 24, 2017: EDMAYFIA BAPTISMO!

Greetings, greetings unto all. 

This week was a great week to end the transfer! It was super crazy though. Let's See...

WE HAD THE BAPTISM! I was sooooooo happy to be able to be there for their baptism. I was able to baptize Edaldo and Mayana and my comp baptized Sofia (Their Daughter) The whole week we were basically preparing for this day. 

Ednaldo, Mayana, and their Family!

It was quite the experience to baptize on the beach. Some of the waves almost knocked us over! I was a little nervous going too deep in the water because I didn't want to get stung by another jellyfish!

SO the first part of the week we visited Ednaldo and his family. We talked about their doubts and they weren´t even worried about anything at that point. They said that it doesn´t matter because they knew that this is true. 

We had quite the experience on Sunday as well. We had a little bit of apostasy going on... hahahaha But everyone is learning how the church works so we just gotta be patient and laugh. 

Also this week we celebrated a member´s birthday, a boy named Charles. We had a surprise birthday party for him. I bought him a birthday cake but we first gave him just a package of like oreo cookies and he got all teary eyed because that was the only present he had got. Than we gave him the cake and he loved it.

Charles and his Birthday Cake! 

The surprise Birthday party with the youth!

I have been transferred. I am leaving the good old town of Valença and am going to stay in the same zone. I will serve in Itabuna as one of the Zone leaders. My companion´s name is Elder D. Santos. He is a cool guy. I am very excited and I am sure it will be a great experience.

Picture of my district!  The guy in the flowered shirt is my companion...Elder R Santos

The Beautiful City of Valenca!


One cool spiritual experience this week. We found a new family to teach. They loved our message and were super happy. They told us that our messages and what we believe in is so clear and just makes sense. AND IT IS TRUE. The gospel is plain and simple and it changes lives. Dont ever forget it! Doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith!

Love,

Elder Davis

July 17, 2017: Take some jelly, take some fish, put it in a sandwich deeelish.

HELLO Everyone!

This was quite the week! It was pretty crazy and went by super fast. So on Monday, I visited one of my old areas, Ilheus.  It was super awesome. I love those people there. So that was cool. Then Monday night we went to Itabuna for a Zone Conference. We bought some pizza that night and I met up with Elder Castlemain again. We all slept in the same house and just stayed up talking forever. haha It was a good time. 

On Tuesday we had the zone conference. It was really good. We received a lot of good training. It was pretty long though. It went from 8-3! haha We lost our bus and the only other bus to Valença was at 11:00 pm. SO we had to wait a while and we weren´t able to work that day which was a bummer. 

Then Wednesday and Thursday were pretty normal. We had some good lessons. We talked to Ednaldo and Mayana more about Baptism and what it is and they committed to be baptized this Saturday. We have planned it to be at 5:00 pm. So that will be awesome!

ON Friday we had to go up to Guaibim (the beach place) to clean everything up and get things ready for the baptism of two little girls. (They are from the other area) So we were up there all day. When we came back we took a shower and visited Ednaldo and Mayana. We taught them about Prophets and Thomas S Monson. We invited them to check out the church site and watch the videos that they have on it. 

THEN on Saturday, we went up to Guaibim again. haha Because it was the baptism. It was pretty cool. It was very different having the baptism in the ocean. It was pretty crazy and wasn´t as spiritual. But it was still fun. Then we ate lunch their and played around a little on the beach. Unfortunately, after lunch when we went out there, it was really hot and I didn´t want to stay out there. But I put my feet in the water to cool them...AND RIGHT WHEN I TOUCHED THE WATER, my foot started to sting really bad. I thought that I had been cut by something and the salt water was just stinging me. SO I jumped out of the water and saw a Jellyfish wrapped around my foot!!! I got my foot out and it was hurting sooooo bad. SO I walked back to the member´s house. I told one of the guys there about the jellyfish and he told me to hurry into the bathroom to pee on my foot and scrub it with my hand! 

My foot after being stung by a Jellyfish:)

I DIDN'T HAVE ANY OTHER OPTIONS GUYS.... So yeah. I peed on my foot. It was a blast. It still hurt though. SO I just layed down and slept for a little bit. When I woke up it was much better. I sent I picture of it when I woke up. But, before peeing on it, it was a lot more swollen. hahaha It was quite the experience. 

Did a quick drawing for Pday!

Sunday was also good. Ednaldo and Mayana came again. After the meeting, I went to chat with them. They told me they had to tell me something... So it turns out that Mayana went to look on the church site and a bunch of anti mormon stuff popped up. So they read quite a bit of stuff and have a lot of questions. But it is good that they came to us first. So we will go there tomorrow to talk to them about it all. She said that she won´t give up though. She just is a little confused. So pray for them that everything may go according to the Lord´s plan. I know the Lord is guiding this work and I think it is so incredible that He uses such imperfect servants to perform this Work. I am so thankful that He has Perfect Patience for each one of us and is always there to help us out. I love you all! Don´t forget to Remember him in your day-to-day lives! 

Love,

Elder Davis

July 10, 2017: Greetings from Ilheus

HEY EVERYBODY,

Unfortunately I don't have much time today. We got permission from President Bangerter and got to visit Ilheus again. SO that is awesome. I´m able to see a lot of good old friends that I made here. Then tomorrow we have a zone conference and that should be great. 

We had a big activity/party at the church. It was fun! We did the decorations. It was basically all the ideas of my companion. He is a party planner.... hehe So yeah we spent basically the whole week doing that stuff. But luckily it is over. Thank heavens.  The  party was fun but I like teaching people much more.  

Let´s see,  Ednaldo and Mayana went to church again. This time we didn´t go to their house to search for them. So it was stressful. I didn´t know if they were gonna show up. They showed up like 25 minutes late, but they made it!! So awesome. I love their family so much. They asked for more time so they aren´t getting baptized this Saturday so we are gonna move the date for the next week! haha 

But I have had a great week here! I have learned a lot of really important life lessons. So I am growing as a person and everything. SO that is fun. I love the mission, I love the work. It is so great here. I love you all! Have an amazing week!!

Love,

Elder Davis

July 3, 2017: Week of Crazies!

Greetings unto all,

My beloved brothers and sister, and friends and family.... and parents... collegues... fellow ward members,

This was a great week here in Valença. I am loving it here. We have done a lot of good work. We have gone on splits with the young men in the group to be able to visit more people and get to know their friends. SO the work is going really well!

So this week I have learned of my new talent that I have.... For some reason all the crazy people like me in this city. Crazy in terms of literally mad.... like they can´t function as a normal citizen. hahaha They don´t really have places for those people. So they generally wander around on the road. haha So they all stopped me and kissed my hand and conversed with me about different things. Really strange. But it was funny. It is some good entertainment throughout the week. 

Got the Elders to make French Toast. They thought it was too much sugar!

So we had some good progress with Ednaldo and Mayana. They are loving our visits and they visited the church on sunday!!! Everything went well and they were really impressed with how different our church is than all other churches. They said they really felt different. The funny thing is that a mess up happened while the other elders were preparing the sacrament and they FORGOT to put the water in the little cups in the tray. hahahah So when they went to bless the sacrament they had to grab a cup of water to fill it up quickly. It was a little embarrassing. haha But it´s all good. Everything worked out. 

We have talked more about baptism with Ednaldo and Mayana and they committed to be baptized on the 15th of July. They are a little worried though. Ednaldo humbly told us that he loves our visit but Mayana and him were talking about tithing. He said that he has a lot of debts and things to pay off and at the moment they are barely making it. So he said they wouldn´t be able to pay tithing. I wasn´t sure what to say. But I bore my testimony that God will pour down blessings upon us as we faithfully keep the commandments and I invited them to pray for guidance and help. SO pray for them! Hopefully all will work out and they will be baptized on the 15th. 

Anyways that pretty much sums up the week for me! I love you all!! Have an amazing peaceful week.

Love,

Elder Davis