Transfers past! THE BIG REVEAL!

I didn't get transferred. Surprisingly, Elder Peters, my companion, did! Even though I have been here longer than he has.  went to Sioux Falls, South Dakota. and I got ELDER JENSEN AGAIN. Yes, the same companion that I had about 9 months ago was returned to be and we are together as Zone Leaders. It's crazy! Like, that almost NEVER happens. #hedidntgetenoughofme 

He is also been in Sioux City before, which rarely happens (elder Peters and Elder Jensen did it so that was cool),

So yeah, this week was FULL of surprises! It was a good week tho. We met some new people that are really good people. Funny story: We met this family this week. The father's name is Miguel Angel (Michelangelo) and we knocked on his door while he was watching a documentary on Michelangelo. It was a funny coincidence. 

Otherwise, not to much happened this week, except for a SNOW STORM! "Happy Spring, have some snow!" -Iowa, Nebraska, and South Dakota.

6 Inches here in Sioux City. more in surrounding areas. It was awful. 

As of right now, there is not much to report news wise here in my mission. Soon, we will be having Mission Olympics, which are when we have a little competition on certain physical activities, like Sprints, Push-Ups, Sit-Ups, Curls, etc. It's gonna be great! 

I hope you all have a great week! I might be able to send a quick little video that we took that will make you all laugh but I might not be able to send it (the sdcard slot on this computer isn't working right now). 

Love you all!

Elder Cox

Transfer Meeting (from the NOM Facebook page) 

Superb Week! Transfers on Wednesday! AHHHH!

So, yeah. Tomorrow I find out if I am leaving Sioux City of sticking around for another 6 weeks. It's pretty exciting but I'm also a bit anxious. I do like it here, so I don't wanna leave, but at the same time I wouldn't mind some change lol. It's been good here, so I really don't wanna leave. Anyways, whatever happens happens! 

So this week had some HUGE heart break. So I talked about the MIRACLE which happened last week in the which we found a family that we drew and had a time to go see them. So, we saw them on Wednesday. Sadly, the wife was out of town on a work thing and so we just talked to the husband of the family. He started off by saying that he doesn't like the idea of us coming over after this time to talk about religion. That's a great start, right? So we taught him the first thing we usually teach people and he totally didn't want anything to do with it. It was really depressing. We had even brought over a member to be there to help us with the lesson and to give him a friend in the church. So yeah, that one didn't work out at all. But, the member we brought said that she has someone that she wants us to visit, so that's a good thing that came from that visit! 

Other news, we found another family that meets some of the same criteria of the family that my companion drew! The husband was doing his college homework, they are both from El Salvador, and she has big cheeks! Those were all things that my companion included in his drawing. And the wife is super ready to hear us! So it's a good thing that happened, just last night.

Other other news. We found a different family that are all awesome too! The mom of the family has gone to our church earlier in her life and said that when she first talked to us, she told her 3 teenaged kids, "We'll go to that church soon." It's awesome! She wasn't able to go yesterday, because she was having her baby shower (it's a huge thing for Hispanics) so we will see her during this week and she already promised to go this sunday! GOOD THINGS! And her kids are all super ready to hear us too! GOOD FAMILY THINGS!! WOO!

anyways, I hope that I don't get transferred and that you all have an Excellent week and an Excellent easter!

Elder Cox

Elder Andrew Cox
Outstanding in his field.

This week man!

So. Yeah. This. Week. Was. A. Week. Amen.

So, really awesome news! An investigator of ours named Evelio literally had a dream from God that showed him that the Book of Mormon was important. Lemme explain. So, he said that at the end of his dream (cuz the beginning part was just weird dream stuff), he said he sat down at a table and he knew that God was there, just invisible. He could feel that God was there. God set on the table in front of him the Bible, some other religious, chicken-soup-for-the-soul type of book that the investigator reads, and The Book of Mormon in a stack. He then heard the Holy Spirit say, "I'm going to explain these to you." And then his wife woke him up. AW! That's so MIRACULOUS!! Literally, Evelio had a dream that told him the Book of Mormon is as important as the Bible and it was from God!!!!! AWWWWW YEAH! That was like the best of part of my time here in Iowa!!! 

More awesome news! Elder Peters recently drew a little family on a sticky note and we prayed to God to help us find this family. It was incredibly specific. Father: College education, bushy eyebrows. Mother: From El Salvador, big cheeks. Kids: 2 twins of a boy and a girl, 2 other kids, all above the age of 8. WE FOUND THEM! It wasn't exactly as Elder Peters drew but we found the following: Father: Bushy eyebrows (college education not verified yet, we will find out lol). Sister of Father: Big Cheeks. Mother: Really kind. Kids 6 kids all above the age of 8! We were given by God more than what we expected! It's awesome! And it's ok that not everything was done specifically how Elder Peters' drew it, it was still another MIRACLE!!!! YAY!!!! 

Also, on Friday, we went to Orange City, Iowa to give a 3 classes to high school students! It was pretty terrifying. It is a private Christian High School and they had some HARD questions. They are realllllllyyyy intelligent kids, so they really wanted to understand what we were saying or they wanted to find out the beliefs we have on some hard topics. It was a good experience though. I learned that I would be just fine having a job as a teacher and I might actually look into going into that field. 

So yeah, that's the week! It was good. I'm doing great out here! I'm nervous, cuz this might be the last week I spend here. Transfers are next Wednesday, so I'm gonna be taking some pictures just in case I get moved. It's been really good here, so I'm happy with the time that I have spent here.

Love you all!

Elder Cox

P.S. I want to invite you all to go to followhim.mormon.org because there is a REALLY SWEET video about Jesus Christ and Easter on that website. It's a great way to begin to remember the special Easter time!

The week where I have like no time left to send this e-mail

So, this week has been pretty good. It's been good weather, we have found some new families, the people we have found in the last few weeks are doing really good and are really liking what we teach, and only a few people have told us not to come by anymore. Nothing much to complain about. 

This week, I also had an awesome opportunity to hear directly from the Mission President about some things! (it's a sweet perk about being a Zone Leader). But, he specifically trained us on the importance of the family, so I'mma talk about the importance of the family to God.

So, when God made everything, he made a family. He first made literally everyone who ever existed or ever will exist in the form of a spiritual family. He made a place for that family to live on: Earth. Then, he started that family physically by making Adam and Eve, a husband and a wife, and designing them in a way that they can increase that family. He gave them the commandment to have children (in other words, increase the family). They, however, sinned, making all of God's family fallen from his presence, unable to return to him without help. God likes his family (us) and wants all of his family to come back to live with him. So, God send his Beloved Son, Jesus Christ, (our older and awesome brother) to the world to die for our sins and resurrect for us, giving us the way to come back to him. Not only that, God also gave us the ability to keep our earthly families together through the power of his Son. In holy temples, we can seal (or bind together) our families. By God's power, we can make it so death doesn't seperate us permanently. Marriage isn't just "'til death" but for Time and All Eternity (aka forever)! How wonderful!!!! That sealing power is found in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the church that I am currently serving. I want to bring the Good news of Eternal Families to everyone! and I know that what I just said is all true.

Have a great week!

Elder Cox

Editor's Note: The Nebraska Omaha Mission on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/220374167987612/

Heating up in the Mission Field!

Man, it was getting hot this week. Saturday was about 71 Degrees, which was great! Almost all the snow is gone from that big storm 3 weeks ago. I'm surprised that there is still some left but it's mainly the stuff that was frozen solid at the bottom of a big snow pile of in a place that is always in shadow. 

Anyways, This last week was a pretty big deal! There was Spanish Conference! That's where all the missionaries in the mission that speak Spanish get together and have special training from the Zone Leaders and Sister Missionary Leaders that speak Spanish. That's me, my companion and the sister missionaries in Sioux City. So yeah, I TRAINED ALL THE OTHER SPANISH MISSIONARIES. It was stressful. And Normally, we have someone named Brother Miranda help us out and train but he called AT 6:30 AM AND CANCELLED. He was really sick. So we were STRESSING OUT TO THE MAXIMUM. Luckily, we were able to get another member, Brother Dallon, to help out and that worked out perfectly. But it was so stressful!!!!!!!!!! The most stressful event of my life up to this point. Like I felt sick it was so stressful. But it all worked out in the end and it was a great conference. 

Otherwise, we were able to find a lot of new people to teach this week. like 11 people, and most of them are just the family of those we have already taught for a little while. It's awesome. In fact, one that we found was an awesome miracle. So, we found this name in our records a few weeks ago of someone who really like having missionaries visit but went on vacation to Mexico and there wasn't anymore records of anything happening. We tried her like 2 times before but both times, she was about to leave for work and there was not a man in the house (we can't be in a house with out an adult of our same gender). So skip forward to Thursday. We had a lunch with a member at Taco Bell and he said he wanted us to visit one of his friends, Marthita (Martha-ita or Little Martha: It's like an affectionate way to call your friends to show that you care about them), but he didn't tell us where she lived. He was going to tell us on Sunday. So we finished the lunch, he went to buy some tacos for a friend, and we went to go see  Martha, the person we found the name of before. Turns out that when we got there, the member had just got there with the tacos he just bought; they were for her! She was the person he wanted us to see, and we didn't even know it! And then we had a great lesson with him, Martha and her 2 kids! It was awesome! So yeah, there can be miracles, even if it as simple as getting to teach someone that you normally wouldn't be able to. 

Yeah, this week was great. I hope you are all having a great week!!!!

Peace.

Elder Cox

A good week man.

Apparently, not everyone got an e-mail from me last week. I don't know what happened, since I did in fact send an e-mail. I'll attach a screen shot of it to this e-mail. 

but yeah this week was great! It was my birthday week! As a hispanic tradition, my face was shoved into a cake (la mordida or the bite. It's where you are supposed to take a bit of the cake but while doing that someone pushes your face into the cake). There is a picture of it attached. I want to send the video but it's much to big to send sadly. But it was awesome! I got a sweater from one of the sisters in the congregation and my brother sent me a tie and a watch!  They are both awesome! 

So yeah. This week was good for the work too. We found some awesome new families to teach. We found them because we have been asking more often "Who do you know that we can teach?" Well, not exactly that question but basically that question. It's been really successful. People are telling us to visit their family, friends. neighbors, and anyone they know that needs an uplifting message about Jesus Christ. And we really enjoy being able to talk to them about it! so yeah, good stuff is happening. 

This week, Rodolfo (the one I mentioned last week) has started going through a really rough time in his life and we are really working on trying to help him. We can't do much but we are involving his friends from the congregation to do things that we can't a lot of times. It was really sad to see him in a bad situation but we hope that the congregation can help him where we can't. We are praying for him!

so yeah. That's my week. Hope you all have a good one!

Elder Cox

The week in which there was no snow

So yesterday, we were supposed to have like 1-5 inches of snow. We didn't have any inches. It was great! 

Otherwise, this week was pretty great. Rodolfo, who we have been teaching a lot, is doing really good! He is reading from the Book of Mormon and praying to see if it is true! He has been to church the past 2 weeks and that means that he is well on his way to being baptized on the 27th of February! It's awesome! 

We also found a really awesome new person to teach this week! Her name is Joanna. She is the grand niece of a family who is in the congregation. The family is really old and has health problems so they don't come to church but we visit with them and Joanna was there this week! She said that she really wants to go to a church and to help her children grow up in a church with good values and knowing God. It's awesome! She is striving to be baptized next month already, even though we've only taught her this week! She is going to feel God's love as she begins to pray to him more often (daily) and as she reads his word. She has already prayed with us and she asked God for help as she prepares to be baptized next month. It was awesome! 

So yeah, we are seeing some great work go on here! And the missionaries in our zone are doing amazing! There is success happening everywhere! It's amazing!

I hope you are all having success in your daily lives!

Elder Cox