June 8, 2015

Hey everybody! Hope yall had a great week this week! It's so good to
hear the Payson temple dedication was a good one! I sure do wish I was
able to go to it, but I'm out here doing the lords work so I'll just
have to miss it until I get done here! I'm not gunna lie though, based
on all the pictures I've seen online there is not a single temple in
the entire world more beautiful than the Payson temple. And what a
privilege I have to be able to have grown up in the town and be able
to call it my temple. I've heard that summer finally hit and now that
it's done raining for a bit it's time to get out and cut hay! I don't
think hay fields exist in Florida... But if they do I'll be sure to
find it and do service for someone!(:

This week was transfer week, unfortunately I had to say goodbye to
Elder Heiner, he is now serving in hunters creek which will be good
for him cause he'll have the opportunity to speak Portuguese and
prepare himself for when he gets down to Brazil. My new companion is
named Elder Clark, he's from Wellington Utah. He's certainly an
interesting person. We get along pretty decently, were able to get out
and actually work hard so that's a big plus for me! (Not that Heiner
didn't, in fact he was probably the hardest working companion yet.) we
also are the best burger I've had in my entire life at a place called
juniors over on orange blossom trail.

Let's see... Highlights this week, hmm.... Honestly the beginning of
the week was pretty rough with the new companion. We were having a
hard time working together and he really doesn't like how fast paced
my style of work is... But later on in the week after a couple days
things got better off.

I guess one of my favorite things that happened was on Wednesday we
went to lunch/dinner with a recent convert named Lowell. We went to
the village inn and had some decent food! Lowell gave us a little life
story thing really summarizing everything that he has accomplished he
has had some really stinkin cool stuff that he's done! Sadly later
that day we thought that Clorisa dropped us, that was scary! But she
didn't so that's good thing!

Saturday we had the adult session of stake conference, it was amazing!
We saw so many sides of Elder Bednar, he was laughing, joking,
serious, bold, loving and comforting. I thought one of the best things
I've ever seen was during the closing prayer at the adult session the
recent convert was struggling to say the prayer cause it was such a
huge crowd. In the middle of the prayer Elder Bednar stood up and put
his arms around her to comfort her. I thought that it was amazing.
Honestly I thought I saw the savior putting his arms around her to
comfort her truly, you can feel the saviors love for us through his
apostles.

As a spiritual thought I'd like to add, a scripture in 3Nephi12:44
"But behold I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse
you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them who despitefully
use you and persecute you;"
I love this scripture and I actually used it in a lesson, a member was
dealing with a hard time with people that were using him. It's made me
really think, if we serve the people that bother us we can feel
Christlike love for them. It has helped me deal so much especially
when I'm with a hard companion, I've noticed if I serve them I'm able
to love them and it helps us get along so much better!

But everyone that was my week! Here's a picture of my visit with Elder
Chatterton at transfer meeting! I love you guys!

June 1,2015

Hello everyone! How's this last week of school been for yall?! Ready
for summer to start up for each of ya? (Except for the people that
have jobs and all that great stuff, Us adults never get summer!) hope
yall have some good plans for this summer! As far as me for summer
plans, I'll be out here in Florida, sweating, biking, and lovin it!
This week has been a pretty dang good and busy one that's for sure!
Had the opportunity to do some service, went to a party, and
socialized with a bunch of high school kids! It was definitely a
success of a week! Well, has it started to get warm back home?
Anything exciting happen? Ohh I can think of one exciting thing! The
payson pool opened for the season on Monday! This is the first time in
three years I wasn't working on opening day, kinda sad.... But oh
well, one day I might do it again just to make more cash.

Anyways, this week has been a fun and busy week! One of the biggest
highlights of the week was when I bought a cast iron skillet, holy cow
do I miss cooking in cast iron! It was the best 15 bucks I've spent in
my entire mission! All the small things are really what make things
worth happening. I had an old companion that always said "these are
small problems" well, these are small successes for me!(:

This week had a few highlights:

 Starting with Tuesday, exchanges with Elder Lefholtz, the Georgia
peach himself! We had a stinkin rocking day! To start it off we got to
go do service at the Salazars house, we had rob Whittaker with us from
the cocoa ward. He owns a lawn business, and he brought out all his
awesome toys to work with! In that hour and a half we got so much work
done on their yard, mowing, edging, trimming trees, and...taking the
forest back! Holy cow it was awesome too! Then like always the
Salazars went and got us pizza to "pay" us, I'm not sure why but I'm
pretty sure the Peruvian culture thinks that if you enter their house
they must be feeding you! Not that I'm complaining though, I mean look
at me I'm gaining tons of weight!

One other awesome thing that happened was we got to go greet a new
member to our ward, sister Doty. Her husband is working in Louisiana,
he works for space-x (not sure what the heck that is) but they moved
here from Idaho because he was stationed to work at Kennedy space
center. They have, 5? Kids, all younger than the age of 6, her oldest,
Rocky being six has autism, I'm not sure what kind. Honestly I
wouldn't have ever guessed! Then she's got a 5 year old girl, 3 year
old boy, and seven month old twins! So she has her hands full! But she
is so stinkin cool! She's gunna be doing a ton of member missionary
work for us! She was already talking about having us over to eat with
one of her neighbors! She's a golden member that's for sure! Now with
all that good news we found out some downer news, Clorisa and her
family had to postpone their baptism until June 13.... It was a sad
moment but hey at least they are going to be baptized on the 13th!
Better late than never!

But that was honestly the highlights of my entire week! We really were
just busy teaching half a million people all week! We had a lot of
opportunities to bond with members, like I said we went to a party on
Saturday night. Another party by the Salazars, a graduation part for
Andrew, we really got to hang out with him and his friends, talk a
little and play some frisby and other stuff with them. So that was
fun, we spent a ton of time with Clorisas family this week and made a
ton of great memories. We put Tyler on Elder Heiners shoulders and
took pictures, Clorisa posted them on Facebook and all that! We got
her and her family to church this week to, so that was a huge success!
We also had a ton of less active members were working with come back
to church this week! Last night Elder Heiner had to say goodbye to
some of the members and investigators, yep you heard right! I'm
getting another new companion tomorrow! It's crazy, next month I'll
have been in Titusville for 6 months! I'm assuming that I'll be
leaving at that point as well... Sadly, but hey I've got six more
weeks before I gotta even worry about that so I'll enjoy my time here!

I love yall, hope ya have a good week!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BROCK!!


-Elder Brett Davis.

I went to Prison!

Hey everybody back home! I hope all is well for you guys and you're
seeing amazing miracles in each of your lives! I'm really hoping that
yall are enjoying the weather you've been having too! Based on the
weather when I get a chance and look at it, it seems Utah's really
cold for this time of year! I think the highest temperature that I've
seen over this entire week was like 65? Is it really that cold over
there? Over here it's unseasonably warm for Florida, the highest temp
we saw this week was 98. Smoking hot right?! And the humidity didn't
help with that temp at all!(: oh well, I'm enjoying it while i can!

This week we had a bunch of normal teaching and that kinda stuff,
nothing too interesting for the first couple days! Our investigators
all passed their baptismal interviews this week! So that's super
amazing, one step closer to being baptized! We're really excited to
have these guys get baptized this week! It's been a real privilege to
be able to teach them and see the gospel turning wheels in their heads
and helping them to really feel the spirit. What a marvelous work to
get to be a part of! And just the opportunity to meet all these
wonderful people down here in Florida makes it worth it! I've gotten
to make friends with members, less actives, non members, and pretty
much everyone out here, crazy to think, Ida never had this opportunity
to meet these people and have them become part of my life if I hadn't
made the decision to serve. Crazy how much a small decision can really
have such an impact on your life right?!

So just a few of the highlights of the week:

Wednesday we helped the cocoa elders move their apartment to down in
Port St John, that was a heck of a good time! Got to ride in a super
nice tricked out f-150! It was soooo nice, and brand spanking new!
That night we got caught in a HUGE thunder storm! It was so stinkin
cool, especially while we were biking, the sky would just light up
every few seconds.

Thursday we were on exchanges and I went with Elder Coon down to the
cocoa area. Spent the first night in their new house! Holy cow do I
miss living in a HOUSE instead of an apartment. Like honestly you
wouldn't think there's much difference but ohhh boy the difference is
HUGE! We went down to see some people down on Camp rd. One of the
addresses we were given was to a halfway house for the prison system.
We were like "hmmm okay cool well let's go see it!" So we went down
and the entire prison, halfway houses, and everything down there was
abandoned! It was as if everyone just up and left in the middle of the
night. I looked through the broken window of one of the houses and
there was still clothes hanging up in the room and everything! It was
so crazy! I wondered why they were just abandoned, never really did
figure it out. But I took plenty of pictures of my visit to the
prison!

Saturday was one of the biggest highlights of the week. We got special
permission to go down to the cocoa beach area with a ward family to
celebrate for their sons graduation. We went to their beach house and
had a total blast! We got to meet their son whom is a less active
named Randy. Super cool guy! We talked with him forever and had the
most amazing Peruvian food I've ever had in my entire life! Our
"appetizers" were this awesome lime cooked fish, squid, and clam dish.
And when I say lime cooked I mean they literally cooked the food with
the acid in the limes! IT WAS TO DIE FOR! Our actual dinner was what I
call Peruvian chili, a bowl of hot pork, chicken, some root stuff, and
a little bit of bean. It was also TO DIE FOR! Haha no wonder I'm
getting fat! I'm getting fed to much stinkin Peruvian food!

That was pretty much my week! Everyone, I hope you all have a good
week and a happy Memorial Day!

This week is a picture from my visit to prison!

Love y'all!


-Elder Brett Davis.

11 Months out!

Hey everyone! Hope y'all had a good and busy week! Things out here
have been insanely busy this entire week! I've loved every ,minute of
it! Not gunna lie for a second though, the week started off rough with
an awful district Pday. We tried having a bbq but honestly it was the
most terribly planned event I've ever seen, we didn't even have
anywhere to grill anything. I tried to jimmy rig somethin up for us
but it didn't work so we ended up cooking everything in the kitchen of
the church.... Disaster right there! After Pday was thankfully over we
drove home from Rockledge and went out to dinner with a ward member.
Brother Jensen, he's a really cool guy normally very quiet and kinda
by himself. But holy cow he's starting to talk more and more each time
we go out to eat with him! I really like it! After that we had an
appointment with the Jenkins family which was very good very fun as
always.

Tuesday was by far the busiest day of the entire week! On our way to
see Logan I saw Belle riding her bike pulling Mary in a little cart
down the sidewalk. We flipped around he car for a minute and went to
talk to her. Turns out she was back in town for a couple of days so we
set up to come back by in the afternoon and see her. After that it was
off to Logan's to help him. We helped him move and shared a little
lesson about service, while we were there him and Matthew got into a
fight. That was weird... We left after that and went to see Bro Ray,
we had a good lesson with him. We have to kinda reteach him all the
lessons because the sisters that baptized him a few years ago didn't
teach him anything.. Kinda sad really he's been sinning and not
knowing it. But we're helping him! After Brother Ray we went to the
Castillos house and had a great little lesson with them, then we spent
like a half an hour teaching Sukie how to skate. That was very very
very interesting! But it was loads of fun to do! After that we dashed
off to see Clorisa and her family and had a great visit with them.
They're now all working towards being baptized on the 30th, hopefully
their able to keep that date and all get baptized together. After that
we went and saw Belle, kinda just saw how she was doing if there was
anything we could do to help her. After her we took Matthew over to
see Patrick cardone, a less active were working with. We had a great
lesson there and I think Matthew even enjoyed himself. So that was a
great and busy day for sure!

Wednesday was crazy too! Haha we got a call from the vehicle
coordinator saying that we needed to take in Elder Heiners bike
because someone needed it and he could get a new one from the mission
office. So after all of our studies we loaded up the car and headed
out to Orlando. It took us 2 1/2 hours to drive there because of all
the stinkin traffic. And the worst part is when we got there Elder
Spencer (the vehicle coordinator) took one look at the bike and it was
the wrong one! We still got Heiner a new bike though because that one
was a piece of junk. Then it took us an additional 2 1/2 hours to get
back home because the traffic was still awful! Luckily on our way in
we had called our dinner appointment and pushed it back to 6pm. And we
barely skidded into town by that time! Our dinner was with the Jenkins
family, we had a great dinner and after dinner all the girls left the
house and went to young women's and relief society and activity girls
or whatever in the world that was! So we got to have a good lesson
with Brother Jenkins. I enjoyed it, and I think he really enjoyed
having some time with guys in his house for once! Haha he's such a
good guy though, I love that family. After we got out of Jenkins we
went and had a quick 20 minute lesson with Donna, then it was off to
the sisters house to drop the car off. On the way there I hit a snake,
I didn't take the time to figure out what it was but hey it's now a
good one. It's dead. So that was one more busy day down.

Thursday we had a meeting in Viera (which is why we had to take the
car to the sisters) and we car pooled with the cocoa elders. We had a
great meeting, they gave us some of the best news in the entire world!
They told us that we would now be able to go to the temple with
members that were reactivating to do baptisms for the dead! Wooooooo!
More temple trips! I'm so excited, we already have a few people that
were going to focus on in getting them back to being active so that we
can take them to the temple! After the meeting we took Matthew and
went to see a couple of people. We went and saw Sam Woodard, that was
awesome especially for Matthew, he was able to hear SAMs testimony and
see his example of truly enduring to the. End. I feel like that was
something that really helped Matthew. After Sam we took Matthew to see
Clorisa with us, we had a great lesson there. Then we went off to
dinner at the Salazars house, they had some family in from Aruba and
we actually taught them. One of the names was Roderick and holy cow he
was so cool! He was constantly asking us questions about the church
and the things we believed and things that we did especially as
missionaries. We gave him a Book of Mormon and talked to him about it
and committed him to make contact with the elders when he got home. He
gladly accepted it and said that he would for sure be getting in touch
with the elders!

Friday rained like none other! We still went and did service for the
Salazars, that was awesome! It was raining so stinkin hard and thunder
and lightening and it was so hot too! I honestly couldn't tell if it
was rain or sweat running down my face! But I wouldn't have traded it
for the world! It was a heck of a good time!  When we got home from
that I put on sweats and we did weekly planning while we sat and
watched the rain trickle, or more rather dump in buckets from the sky!
Then in the evening we went up and taught Matthew, he was having a
really hard time with lots of things so we were and are doing our best
to help him.

Saturday was another pathetically busy day! We were getting run
ragged! Our first appointment of the day was going over to see
Clarissa. Which ended up failing but we went through our list of less
actives and we went and visited with a bunch of people we ended up
teaching this one guy on the side of the road which is a really really
cool guy. He seems like he has a lot of potential and we will be
following up with him in the next couple of weeks because he is having
a surgery. After that we went over and saw a couple more or less
activesand we were able to catch Clarissa at home. So we taught her
and her family and then we had to bike it all the way back across your
area to the church for a baptism. The baptism is really good not many
were member showed up but that's typical here in Florida. While we
were at the baptism our dinner appointment fell through and we ended
up just grabbing a snack and eating on the way. We went out that night
to see some less actives and we ended up bribing the girls from the
Vargas family to come to church the next day!

Sunday another extremely busy day. The Vargas girls came to church and
like 10 other less actives that we are working with it was awesome to
see unfortunately Clorisa and her family didn't make it but that's
okay. One member offered to feed us that night so we scheduled an
appointment to go up with him. After church we went over and we taught
well we took the sacrament to Sam Woodard and we went over and talk
Clarissa about tithing and fast offerings and they excepted it very
well so that's really good we're excited they're progressing very much
and they should be able to be baptized at the end of the month still.
Our dinner was with brother Pickelzimer, yes Pickekzimer, quite the
mouthful right? He is such a stinking cool guy. He lives up at the
very very very north end of our ward which happens to also be in the
north end of our county he fed us really good meal called Cowboys
delight. Which consisted of ground brisket and pork and beans and some
red pepper all make stand one pan to gather and all my goodness it was
so stinking good. We talk to him for a while and we Learned a lot
about him and his past and is just life in general. It was really cool
to get to talk to them because I feel like he really needed someone to
talk to because his wife passed away three weeks ago and it's just
good to always look for ways we can help people especially in times
like that. And I was pretty much her entire week I got an awesome
Stihl hat from brother P. So. I'm really happy we have had a great
week it's been crazy it's been busy it's been every thing you want it
to be.

Spiritual thought for the week on enduring to the end. I've noticed a
lot of people down here they struggle with enduring to the end. So
what does it mean to truly endure to the end? As we are baptized we
take on ourselves the name of Christ and we say that we are willing to
mourn with those that mourn and help close the stand in need of
comfort at all times and there's a lot of other things that we commit
to do in our baptismal covenant covenant. And it's very important to
understand that as well, we also commit that we will endure to the
end. That doesn't mean we won't have trials we will have struggles or
we will be immune to anything that goes on in the world. But as we
continue to read pray and attend church we will have our faith grill
and is her faith continues to grow we will be able to endure to the
end and we will station strong in the Gospel. And not only in the
Gospel but in our faith and we will be able to help those around us.
What a blessing we all have received by excepting the gospel so how
can we live up to those covenants that we've made what can we strive
to do better? Let us all evaluate how we do things and let's see in
what ways we can improve and apply them.

 I love you guys all of you have a great week.!


-Elder Brett Davis.

Elder & Sister Clark

This week, what a stellar week! Monday was our preparation day, which
was pretty fun. The most excitement of the day was having pizza
ordered in by my wonderful mother! Then the night we biked all the
long way up to the hospital, about a ten or more mile ride. We gave
Sukie a blessing, she's still pretty dang sick but getting better! She
was doing a hole lot better on Monday. She requested another blessing
because she found out about some more health issues that's going on.
We headed out from there and decided to head home cause it was a long
ride back from there. It was interesting, we took a way home that we'd
never have taken before and had a feeling to stop in on a member that
has t been to church for a few weeks and just check in on him. We got
there and his wife opened the door and talked to us on the porch for a
few minutes and then Brother Delorenzo got home and invited us in.
Turns out he has been really sick the last few weeks and was in need
of a blessing. So we did that, gave him his blessing and just kinda
talked to see how life was for them. It's pretty cool to see how we
can be guided by the spirit to go see people that we never woulda
thought to stop by before.

Tuesday was a feast of a day! We had a zone conference with Elder Don
R. Clark! He came and talked to us about so much stuff and it was
really just a feast of knowledge! My favorite thing he said the entire
time was "I'm not smart, but I know how to work" and then he went on
and talked about how if we don't know how to do something but we're
willing to work and to learn then we'll be able to be more productive
missionaries and even beyond the mission if we can and will apply
those principals then we can become more successful. I think it's so
true too, I've seen it in my life I didn't necessarily know how to do
something, take fixing my truck for example. I didn't know how to do a
water pump back then but I was willing to learn and work at it, with
the help of Tyler S. I was able to accomplish it, and he taught me how
to do a bunch more repairs on that old dodge and even on my rodeo.
Because I had the desire to learn and work so I would be more
knowledgable. It was just amazing to hear Elder Clark talk, he didn't
just talk about things that'd help us as missionaries but he talked
about things that will help us throughout our entire lives! Another
one of my favorite things that he talked about was our scripture
study. He said that when he was made a seventy he was told to buy new
scriptures and study and mark them as a seventy. He went on to tell us
that at each phase of our lives we need to study and mark a fresh set
of scriptures according to our needs at that point. For instance right
now we're missionaries. Well all go home shortly and become students,
while we're students we need to study scriptures as students. Shortly
after that we'll become a husband and we need to study them as a
husband, then a father, and so on and so forth. I was thinking about
that and thought that it was such a good idea and it made complete
sense because when I'm home and married (hopefully) and (hopefully)
become a father the things I'm highlighting and making notes on in my
scriptures won't be applicable to me as much at that point. Especially
because right now my main focus is things that will help me in sharing
the gospel, that won't be my main priority or reasoning for studying
the gospel at that point in life. Needless to say, Elder Clark is the
man. He gave me a ton of good info, news, and just a cool guy!

Wednesday.. Not nearly as eventful as Tuesday but still a really
really good day! We had lunch with Brother Moon (ward mission leader)
and Brother Barker (recent convert) up at the village inn. It was
great food and I really dig the strawberry rhubarb pie that they have
down here! It's just amazing! After that we went directly to work on
teaching people. We went over and met with Mathew, a less active
returning active. We had a great meeting with him, were helping him
quit smoking and we accomplished that. Now we just have to wean him
off of his ecig but that will come with time! He's a great kid I
really enjoy working with him! Then we biked on home for dinner and
instead of dinner I worked on my bike while Elder Heiner was eating..
No nothing's wrong with my bike, I'm just doing maintenance on it.
It's just wearing out from all the miles that I've been putting on it.
Then for the evening we went and tried stopping by a bunch of
potentials and less actives and ended up getting in the door of a less
active guy named Jawon. We had a great lesson with him and got to know
him and all that stuff so that's good.

Thursday was another great day. We spent a couple hours trying to stop
by less actives, former investigators, and potential investigators. It
was a good time too! We made contact with a couple of really neat less
actives. I saw a super nice truck, and we met this really cool lady
that makes stain glass windows for a hobby. We saw some of the things
she made and it was just so stinkin cool to see! I had no idea the
process of making stain glass designs. After that we went over to
teach Clorisa, when we got there no males were present so we weren't
able to go in. Luckily we knew of a less active near by that we could
go knock on and see if he could come with us to teach Clorisa. So we
went over to Logan's place and knocked on his door, turns out he had
his girlfriend over so he couldn't go with us. But on the bright side
she started asking us questions about the church and things like that.
So we taught her right there and did kinda a huge over view of all the
lessons that we share. She was awesome and wanted us to come back and
teach her more so that's what we're gunna do! By the time we were done
with that lesson we went back to Clorisa to see if her son was home.
Turns out he was and we had a quick lesson with them. Quick, and
powerful lesson. It was awesome! Then we dashed off to dinner with
brother Mason. He took us down to the Cracker Barrel. It was pretty
good food, the grits weren't that great but oh well. I've seen worse
things happen. Then we began the insanely long journey biking up to
the hospital to see Sukie, and Sam. We went to Sam first and had a
great lesson with him! He's a great guy I love going over there and
meeting with him, to me he's a true example of faith and what true
faith is. His testimony is such a strong one and he continues to share
it with everyone around him. After Sam we went and saw Sukie and had a
great lesson there too. Then we took to the insanely long bike ride
back to our apartment.

Friday was a day filled with meetings, that was pretty good I guess.
When we weren't in meetings we were doing weekly planning so that was
pretty well our day! Saturday was a super busy day! We went less
active hunting in the afternoon and ended up running into a really
cool guy that's a free mason. He was about to go on a motorcycle ride
so he asked if we could come back next week and teach him more. When
we went away we shook hands and he shook in a very different style
than I'm used to.. But it was cool I guess. The rest of her Clarissa
and her family. We had a great lesson. After that we went to our
dinner appointment at a less active's house and it was pretty good and
I was pretty much our entire day.

Sunday was pretty productive I guess you could say. We went to church,
had a pretty good time there. After church we called our families had
a good conversation and then we were off to our dinner appointment
where we had a fish fry. The fish fry was pretty dang good we had
catfish trout couple other types of fish and is just awesome the food
that we had there and the families that we were with was really fun.
It was out in the country area so it was awesome. We heard a couple
flocks of geese flying by never were able to see them but still is
pretty cool. And that was pretty much her entire week this week very
busy dealing with people is good I guess and lot of fun.

The picture that I am sending home this week is a picture of me and
Elder Clark and his wife. We were able to sneak a picture in between
some of the let the sessions that we had and it was an awesome day.

My spiritual thought for the week is Mosiah chapter 2 verse 17 and it
talks about when you were in the service of your fellow beings you're
only in the service of your god. I know that is we reach out and we
serve those around us we will be able to lose ourselves in the service
and learn  The ways the Lord works through us. It is a great
opportunity to serve others and to be able to forget about myself at
times when I feel down or tired or whatever and I know is you guys go
look for ways to serve those around you you'll find more of the Lord's
love in your life. Have a great week guys I love you all be safe don't
do stupid things.

Love Elder Davis

P.S. HAPPY BIRTHDAY ON SATURDAY MOM!!!!
-Elder Brett Davis.