Monday, April 27, 2015 - Liberia

This week I also taught the most interesting lesson yet on my mission. We knocked into Marlin. He's probably about 50, has a beard of course and about 4 teeth, and invited us right in. He says he was a musician and that all of his songs were gospel related so he took us into his back room to show us all of his equipment.

We asked him what kind of music he liked to listen to and he said "Well. Def Leopard. And all these artists you see here on the walls". Me and Elder Lords looked around the room at blank walls with absolutely zero things that represented any band or artist, so I guess just Def Leopard.

Then we started teaching him the Restoration. When we taught him about baptism he got super excited and said "Hey that reminds me of one of my songs! It's called... Splash!"

He had a song, or at least a song title, for just about everything we talked about. The First Vision reminded him of his song "Angels" etc.

Word of the week this week: Liberia.

We have been doing a lot of finding in some apartments right on the corner of our area again lately. Just about every door we knock on is either Muslim or they are from Liberia. The Muslim people are usually not very interested and/or don't speak English, but the Liberians love the gospel! This week we will probably be teaching about 15 people from Liberia!

One of those families is Augustine and Patience, the miracle family from my email last week. And to be honest I can't remember all the other people's names right now I don't have my book with them in it. There's Prince, Precious, Dede, Meemee, Helen, Marshall. Most of them know Mabel and Mary, the 2 members from Liberia that we met last week so they are all super excited to learn!

We saw so many tender mercies again this week as so many people we talked to as we walked down the sidewalk had either a connection to the gospel, or to someone we were teaching.

"God is anxiously waiting for the chance to answer prayers and fulfill your dreams, just as He always has. But He can't if you don't pray, and He can't if you don't dream. In short, He can't if you don't believe."

-Elder Jeffery R. Holland

Love Elder Cox

Dear Davis,

      This week on Friday I went to the Family History Museum!!! We went for activity days as a combined group: 8, 9, 10, and 11 year old's.  It was very fun. First, we watched a video about a book that went through a lot of generations and how each relative wrote stories along their life line and then they pass it on to the next person.  Then at the end the girl that had ended up with the book was reading all the stories, how they came to be, and all the names of her ancestors.  Then, we wrote some memories of when we were little to our life now.   Next, we went on a scavenger hunt to find out about different people.  Our person was Bob Hope.  We had to go on a bunch of different floors to find where he lived, when he was born, and we had to look up his family tree.  After the research about Bob Hope we had to find books on Ohio.   Then we turned our papers in at the front desk and they said we got everything right.   Last, we drove home in Dixie Mills' car and went to get fat boys at Harmon's.  Then she took us all home.  That same day I went to Hannah Goodfellow's Birthday Party.  We watched a movie, had pizza, and had another fat boy.  It was a fun day and a very good experience.

         Today, Sunday I read an article  in the April 2015 friend.  The title is, " Obeying Mom and Dad." It is about Russel M. Nelson.   TO wake up in the morning his dad would sing to him.  He obeyed his father and got out of bed, even though he was tired. For Christmas one year he got a shiny black bike.  When Russel was ten his dad asked him to come work as his errand boy. During the time he met lots of different people.  Later he used the money to buy his mom a present on his birthday to tell her thank you for all she did for him to come onto the Earth.

          I love you soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And I miss you a lot too.  You are the best brother ever.  Again I love you sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much!!!!!

                                                                                                          Love,

                                                                                                                    Emmi

Emmi,

I love you Sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much too! I loved to hear your story about going to the Family History Museum! And I love how you always have a thought or a story from the Friend. Keep up your good work in obeying mom and dad. It is something that is very important and can bless us a lot and help us learn a lot in our lives!

Did you know it's even one of the 10 commandments to "honor thy father and mother" ? Mom and Dad have taught me so much and they do so much for you and me and our family.

Love you Emmi sorry you're home sick. Get feeling better.

Love Elder Cox

Monday April 20, 2015 - I Believe in Miracles!

Going to start out with our miracle of the week.

Last night we were knocking on some door and we knocked on the door of Augustine and Patience, a couple from Liberia who have like 6 kids. They let us in and we started talking to them and had a super good lesson about the Restoration. Then near the end of the lesson, right as we were talking about the Book of Mormon, there was a knock on the door. This always happens. Knock on the door or phone rings right as we're explaining the Book of Mormon.

But in walks 2 ladies, and say "Hi Elders! We've been looking for you! We haven't been able to find the church since we moved here."

So turns out these 2 ladies, Mary and Mabel, are really good friends with Augustine and Patience and have known them since they all lived in Africa like 15 years ago, just moved to Des Moines from Salt Lake City 3 months ago,  AND ARE MEMBERS! 

So Mabel just sits right down and starts testifying about how the Book of Mormon is true, how this is the true church, and how loving and caring everyone in the church is! Then her and Patience started talking Liberian super fast and we had no idea what was going on for a second, but then Patience sounded really excited about the church.

It was awesome and definitely a testimony builder to me that God puts us where we need to be at specific times and he brings people to those who need to hear the gospel.

Miracles happen as we:

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding.

In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.

(Proverbs 3:5-6)

Love Elder Cox

Good morning sweet boy,

I hope this past week has been full of everything that you had hoped it to be...except for maybe any more "undead" Elvis Burgers.  DO I need to send you a Nutri-bullet to remind you that your cells most certainly do NOT need any thing fried??? nothing, zilch, nadda!!

I am determining that the "hypoglycemic" feeling that you are experiencing is most likely linked to your eating...and the "bigger than I left", Paul Blart-Mall Cop-gut is too!okay, enough of that.

We had a family dinner in Logan last night.  Everyone was together. McKay was here for Courtney's mission companions wedding. I missed you as we drove to Logan. On the way up we had a family Home Evening in the car.  Each looked up scriptures that followed an article from the December 2014 New Era "Grandpa Twede's 11 RULES for LIVING!"

I wanted to pass them along to you. 

1. Say secret prayers - Matthew 6:6

2. Keep your tongue in Check - proverbs 21:23

3. Suppress anger - proverbs 16:32

4. Consider the effect of every action before doing it. - Luke 14:28-29(Stick to a task until it sticks to you, beginners are many finishers few!) 

5. Cultivate humility and charity - 1 corinthians 15:22

6. Let love be mainstream of all your actions - John 3:16 (What if LOVE was your only MOTIVE)(There isn't any one you can't love once you know their story) ( Never Let a Problem to be solved become more important than the person to be loved.-Pres. Monson)

7. Think of Christ on upon the cross - 1 Corinthians 15:22

8. Stop work when tired - Mosiah 4 27

9. Do not sleep, eat or drink for than needed - D&C 88:124

10. Consider that others do not look on the things as you do and sometimes they are right - D&C 88 122

11. Remember that you are never alone. Therefore do nothing you wouldn't do in the presence of angels = D&C 124:9(Don't do any thing to embarrass you, your family or your team-FOREVER STRONG)

Love you, MOM

Mom, I love all those thoughts and all those quotes. You have definitely taught me well Mom, because I have used every single one of the quotes in red since I have been away :) Especially that "there isn't any one that you can't love once you know their story." Me and Elder Lords were talking about that just last night. We get to meet so many people. So many interesting people, who act differently and do things differently than us. But every single person that lets us talk to them and get to know them, I find myself loving and caring for that person so much and going out of my way to make some person, who I just met a couple minutes ago (and thought they were legit crazy when I met them), happy. I love being able to be a missionary and just give my time and service so freely. It has taught me so many things already and I'm only beginning!

Luckily I was raised by amazing parents who taught me well and gave me a head start ;)

Love you, Elder Cox

April 13, 2015 - Transfer Week

I am officially in my 2nd transfer. Which is super weird, because I feel like I have been out here for so much longer than 6 weeks, but at the same time looking back those 6 weeks have flown by! Anyway me and Elder Lords both stayed in our area obviously, but we got 2 new elders in our ward: Elders Walker and Burtenshaw.

My brain is so scattered right now this might be a short one. But this has been an awesome week with a lot of spiritually packed moments. Something that happened a lot this week was we gave a ton of blessings (Which is awesome because giving blessings has become probably my favorite thing of all time to do)

On Friday we went and gave Doug a blessing. Doug is super into natural medicine I guess you could say. He believes that doctors and healthcare are trying to poison us so that we have to pay more money to the government for healthcare. For example he told us he was diagnosed with Diabetes a few years ago, but he refused to take insulin and cured himself by drinking distilled water and doing some other things to make his pancreas work. Something like that.

Anyway so Doug broke one of his wisdom teeth in half so all the nerves were exposed and had a super bad toothache and in Vania's words was "crying like a little girl". So I gave him a blessing and afterwards this is what he said.

"When you laid your hands on my head I could feel my crown shakra light up like a light bulb. Then when you said that I would be healed and be relieved of the pain according to my faith, I could feel my pineal gland open up, which I've been praying for for months now, and I feel great."

.... Never heard anyone describe feeling the spirit like that.. but hey. It worked. We explained to him that those things he felt was the spirit. He then told us he wants to quit smoking, which was another miracle because he usually smokes a pack in an hour when we meet with him.

Also Coreana finally got confirmed today!! She's the one that got baptized 6 weeks ago but then got super sick the next day, went to Texas for 4 weeks, then it was general conference. But she is now confirmed and has the gift of the Holy Ghost!

Love you all

Elder Cox

Mosiah 4:9

Only car in Iowa without rust all over it.

Went to Zombie Burger again. This is the Undead Elvis Burger. 2 patties, bacon, a fried egg, peanut butter, and fried bananas. Sounds disgusting but best hamburger I've ever had in my life and I could feel my arteries clogging as I walked out.

Last district meeting with Sister Matley. (Elder Lords, Whiting, Ogden, Deeds, Sister Matley, Froer, Elder Hoskins and me)

Thanks Dad I loved that story in conference as well. I have definitely seen missionaries like those in the story that are more interested in having fun, and I also serve around a lot of awesome missionaries. The AP's are in our zone and spend P-day with us so I get to interact with them a lot and they are both awesome. And we are also really close with and talk with our zone leaders a lot and they are both great missionaries and very dedicated.

I have definitely decided that I want to be a very consecrated missionary. To consecrate ALL my time, thoughts, and actions towards the work of bringing others to Christ.

I love you and thank you for the post cards! I have the one with the Southern Utah mountains hanging up above my desk. I'll have to send you one from Iowa sometime with a picture of a cornfield and fried chicken on it or something.

Elder Cox

Hi there, So we didn't get to coordinate on labs last week.  I am hoping that you have now taken them for it has been long enough from day of tapering.  

1. have you taken labs. 1. oops

2. If not then when THIS week are you taking labs? Don't go any longer on the taper please without taking labs! 2. I will take them on Wednesday probably

3. are you still feeling like hypoglycemic? 3. I don't really know what hypoglycemic feels like. I am basing all of my knowledge off Paul Blart: Mall Cop.

4. What symptoms are you having? details please.  Do you think there is any relation between tapering and your symptoms? 4. Just tired if I'm not eating like constantly :) no I don't think there's any relation. I've been thinking that even before I came out here on my mission actually

5. Are you eating well? 5. Very well! If you consider everything anyone feeds us here as being deep fried as eating well :) 

6. How is your gut? 6. Bigger than when I left

7. hows your head? 7. Going a billion miles an hour during email time. But I'm guessing you're talking about the dry and flaking. It's doing super good after about 2-3 weeks here I haven't had any dryness or itchy red patches or anything on my head. Combination of the humidity here and blessings from heaven!

Monday April 6, 2015 - Mormon Super Bowl Sunday

Conference was AWESOME!!

It was so much different watching it out here than back home. It went by so much faster. All the sudden a session would be over and I'd be like wait.. There's more right?

Quick little funny thing about the tabernacle choir. So their conductor's name is like Mack Wilberg? And there is a guy in our ward who is convinced that it's Mark Wahlberg. Me and my comp just went with it when he said it and messed with him so he was probably disappointed Sunday when Mark Wahlberg wasn't up there waving his arms around in front of the tabernacle choir.

A ton of super good talks. Elder Holland brought tears to my eyes. It made my eyes blurry as I thought of my brother Jesus grabbing my hands and pulling me up.

Elder Anderson's was super funny to me. "I can teach you to dance, but you have to hear the music." It made me think of how us Mormons do some things that some people look at as super weird, like not drinking or smoking or dressing up in white shirts and ties to go to church. To them it's like they pull up to a stoplight and they're watching me dance and sing along to a Shakira song in my car. They can't hear the music. They don't realize what a party is in here!!! And how happy they would be if they joined us and head heard the music!  You all know exactly what I'm talking about.

My favorite line from conference was from the very first talk Saturday morning, Elder Eyring: "When we succor others, Christ feels it like we are succoring him." That sentence hit me hard as a missionary. Because whenever I look into someone's eyes that I'm teaching the gospel to or helping them get through an addiction, stop smoking, or talking to them about a loved one that just died, I see Christ. And it makes me so happy to be able to serve. Even when people aren't being nice to me, which never happens in Iowa.... When we succor them. Christ feels it.

I think keeping that in mind can change the way we think about everything in life and will help us to be able to love everyone as Christ would.

It sounds like you guys had an awesome conference weekend as well! I loved Elder Holland's talk! Always do! I also really loved how much of conference was about families! It definitely is something this world needs, which is why the Lord had like every other talk be about family and marriage. But it made me so grateful for my family and my amazing parents. It also made me a little homesick I'm not gonna lie. This weekend was by far the most homesick I've been my whole mission, but it was in a good way I guess. Because the reason I was homesick was because I missed sitting on the couch with all of you, having German pancake breakfast between Sunday sessions, going to priesthood session with Dad and the boys, John and Jason. But after a moment of homesickness I had a literal wave of happiness come over me as I thought of all of you and what a great and strong family we have in the gospel. And how the gospel brings us together and bonds us together.

I love you all and miss you, but there's no place I'd rather be.

Love Elder Cox.

Monday April 6, 2015 - Q and A's

1. when are you planning on labs again?

1. Good question. I think I have hypoglycemia.

2. Sister Courtney would love the hear back from you about her letters!2. On it

3. What did you do for Easter, eat, where did you watch conference and did you get the package. 3. Yes I got the package thank You I loved it!! Me and my comp probably used the eggs for golf balls in our apartment instead of dying them... but thanks!

We watched a couple sessions at the stake center with some investigators. We watched one session at the Bahams (The young family in our ward from Kaysville that is out here for Medical school) and one session at the McPherson's, a Jamaican family in our ward. Then they fed us Jamaican jerk pork and chicken and rice.  And some little pastry thing called a Festival.

4. Did the shirts work?  More like that or a different kind?

4. Ya they are working awesome so far!

6. Dad printed all the bear hunt photos, figuring that you needed that many!!!5. Thank you very much for the photos. Did you ever find my baseball glove?

7. Are you with elder Lords for the next transfer or change?  When are transfers?  
7. Transfers are this week and we got a call this morning that we are both staying so we're both here for atleast 6 more weeks.