Sister Davis~Salt Lake City Temple Square Mission: Such an exciting week! (July 15th)

My companion is amazing! This week she passed off in giving tours, AND she passed of with Fleet driving cars! She is working so hard and it's wonderful how quickly she is absorbing, learning, and adjusting. It's also neat to see how much the gospel means to her in her life and how it's affected her choice to serve a mission. We are almost constantly talking about every gospel topic you can imagine. Although new missionary experiences can be scary, she's always willing to try. Sometimes we have awkward moments...but honestly we just walk away and laugh. It's also funny to see how willing she is to talk with antis. Many sisters here get scared very easily with talking to those people who come trying to argue with us, but Sister Merrill loves to give simple answers, testify, and move on. Any fear she has, she does her best to not let is show. All-in-all she's doing very well!

We have a wonderful new investigator from California. She has known members of the church before but never had a good chance to really look into it. We taught her for the first time yesterday and she is just so golden. She has so much trust in the Lord and as she explained to us her personal beliefs we were able to connect them so simply to all of the things we know to be true. It's so exciting to know that when we are diligent the Lord leads us to people who are looking for the truth, and even those who already understand truth but just need to be shown what to do with it!

On Saturday morning we woke up early and loaded the bus for Brighton Girl's Camp!!! Brighton is the oldest girls camp in the history of the church. There were several activities available including slack-lining, a zip-line, repelling, rope courses, etc. Ah it was so fun! It was so weird to go repelling as a missionary though because (it's like driving a car for the first time as a missionary) you just don't ever expect that you would ever being doing that! But it was SO fun! It was Sister Merrill's first time and she did really well! Sister Sherratt and I had a ball just jumping down the cliff-side! Many of the foreign sisters hadn't done it before so they were pretty scared, but it's like anyone else, once you get over the edge of the cliff it's pretty smooth sailing! One of the slack-lines was one that you had to have a partner to do it with, so obviously my companion and I did it. In a nutshell you just have to put all your weight on the person on the line across from you because the ropes get further and further apart. Just as Sister Merrill and I were getting ready to go, President walked up and decided to watch us. It was the ultimate test of companionship unity but we were surprised at how quickly and easily we did it! President congratulated us. :D Woo! After camp they fed us lunch and we came back to the square, changed and went back to missionary work! It was a great day!

Sunday morning was exciting because I got to be one of the English sisters announcing tours after Music and The Spoken Word! We had a good sized crowd and after announcing we were able to take a tour with some wonderful folks! In every single tour we've taken this last week we were able to teach The Restoration (about the prophet Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon). In fact, just an hour ago we met the sweetest newly-married couple in the North Visitors' Center and they had some wonderful questions! We taught them the restoration and they accepted a Book of Mormon as well. It's such a testimony building experience to watch as people from all parts of the world come to Temple Square, feel the spirit, and have an interest in learning more about the gospel. It's so clear to see that this is not an American religion. God isn't wanting to give these things to one group of people, He wants this to go to all the human race.

Well we really have to run. Zone Activity is later today and we have much to do. I love yous a lot and I pray for you daily. It's crazy to think how time is going so fast and how it's bound to only move faster. Continue to enjoy your summer!

Love,
Sister Davis

Woo!