Hot as Heck!

July 24, 2016

Dear Family,

The human body is not meant to work in this much heat. The heat index was regularly over 110 every day this week. I think one of them was even 115. We lost our car, too. It got towed away in the middle of the week. However the insurance company declared it totaled on Monday, meaning we couldn't drive it anymore. That means every day was spent biking around in 100 degree heat and 100,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000%
humidity. It goes without saying, but I got some pretty good heat exhaustion this week.

-> Large Plates <-

-Monday-
We played tennis with some members instead of the usual frolfing or bowling. It was a lot of fun. My arm got a decent workout. Later on we got blizzards at DQ. It's always a bad idea eating ice cream at DQ because it's always freezing in there. Good ice cream though.

The GKLM's car guy called and said our car was officially totaled by the insurance company. But he didn't tell me that until the end of the day, so I drove it all day with no insurance without even knowing it :).

We finished the night at the Quints. They fed us Mexican BBQ chicken. It was really good. Again, actual Hispanic food prepared by actual Hispanics is really, really good.

-Tuesday-
This was one of the most productive days we've had in a long time. We biked around all day because we couldn't drive the car. It was miserably hot, but we did it anyway. At the beginning of the day, Elder Salazar felt impressed to knock on a certain door. An older lady named Angela answered and actually let us in to talk with her. We taught her most of the first lesson. It was a little difficult to teach her because she liked to talk a lot. A common problem with missionaries teaching Kentuckians. It was still a good visit though. She accepted a return appointment.

As we biked around we naturally came across many people on the streets. All but probably 2 of them were super nice people. Most of them let us talk with them for more than 5 seconds. It definitely makes missionary work much easier and happier when the people are nice. Even if they say "no", if they're nice about it, we won't get discouraged at all.

Our splits session this time was fantastic. I went out with Bro Ficker and Chase to see the young Tin family. We had a great visit with them. We read the Family Proclamation with them and they loved it. Bro Tin said he wants to get his kids involved with the youth programs because he remembers going to those when he was young and having fantastic experiences. Sis Tin said she's been seriously thinking about going to church. That whole family is so close to joining the church and Bro Tin is so close to reactivation.

When we got back I found that Elder Salazar went to visit Vic & Maku, and Ms Val. So he had a very successful night too.

-Wednesday-
Okay, I need to give you some background before I go into Wednesday. Over the past few weeks, we and Bro Emmert, our ward mission leader, have been trying to figure out how to get more member-present lessons. Lessons are a lot more powerful with members there because they can testify of the truths the missionaries teach and they can be a great fellowship for the investigators being taught.

Every Tuesday night we have splits where a bunch of members come together and split off with 1 missionary. It's fantastic the Owensboro ward does this, but not all of our investigators can meet Tuesday night. Splits is not enough. So we've come up with a sign-up sheet we pass around every week in the Elder's Quorum and the High Priest's Group. On the sign-up sheet, we request that 1 Elder and 1 High Priest go out with each set of missionaries on a day and time during the week that they are free. That way we can schedule appointments at times the members are available to come with us.

This is the first week we implemented this and it turned out very well. We had a lot of members sign up but unfortunately, our appointments fell through. Wednesday was a prime example of this.

On Wednesday morning we had Bro Lott, come out with us. We had an appointment with Ms H, but she wasn't able to meet so we went and saw the old Tins. Later on in the day, Bro Pursley came out with us. We had 2 set appointments set up for him and both of them fell through. We tried a total of 6 people today with members but no lessons. 

Towards the end of the day we found out this week was supposed to be the hottest week ever. That's just what I wanted to hear because we were on bikes this week.

-Thursday-
Thursday was miserable. I think the heat index got to 110 or something like that. We started off helping with the Pitino shelter again. On the ride home Elder Salazar wrecked his bike. I thought he broke his arm too, but he just cut it up a bit. Some lady saw what happened and came over with band-aids, neosporin, napkins, and medical alcohol. He was fine after a few minutes of rest.

I won't go into detail on who we biked to because no one answered. I'll just say that we biked from the middle of town, to the southern side of town, then to the northern side of town, then to the eastern side of town, then back to our apartment in the middle of town. It was not fun. I got some pretty good heat exhaustion from all that. We returned to our apartment a little early so we could shower and prepare for the Swopes.

Bro Ficker came and picked us up for the Swopes. Dinner at the Swopes was absolutely heavenly after the day we just went through. They had Fettuccini Alfredo and It tasted so good. After dinner we had a great lesson on repentance. It went super well. Someday Ms S will get baptized.

-Friday-
This was a good day. Bro Smith took us to Dee's Diner for breakfast. Then he took us to see Bro Fuqua in the hospital. He hurt himself recently. He's doing fine but he'll be recovering for a while. Next we had our last district meeting of the transfer. Elder Blake trained on effective finding. 

When we got out to work we saw Ms H, taught her the first half of L3 and finally got her a baptismal date. We made sure she understood what baptism was for. She easily accepted the date.

Next we saw the Goms. Bro Gom came out with us to try someone but they weren't there. So we went back to the Goms and they fed us fresh pineapple and tamales. They were fantastic.

At the end of the day the "Tellders" came to pick me up for an exchange. I went to Tell City with Elder Weyland for Saturday.

-Saturday-
Spent the day in Tell City. This was a much better exchange than I thought it was going to be. At the beginning of the day, Elder Weyland and I had a great study session. He shared with me his "Epistle". Basically it's a letter Elder Weyland wrote about all the natural problems that occur in leadership.

Elder Weyland has actually had a rather profound effect on the mission lately. I've noticed that mission leaders (zone leaders, district leaders, etc.) have been behaving a little differently lately. That's because of Elder Weyland. He's also the one responsible for bringing "The Brother of Jared Challenge" to the mission. He was the last missionary over the space of 2 years to finalize the Challenge and make it what it is now.

I could talk forever about this. Elder Weyland and I had a great time together. I learned a lot from him. Later on we got our transfer news. I found out I'm going to Hurstbourne, KY with Elder Williams. Hurstbourne is on the eastern side of Louisville so I'm basically going to Louisville. It's one of 3 areas in the mission that have Panda Express and it's the only area that has Carrabbas. I'm so excited :D.

Later on in Tell City we visited a LA family. They took us out to ice cream. By the time we finished with them, it was time to exchange back. We drove to Owensboro, exchanged back, and I finished the day by packing.

-Sunday-
This was a good church day full of good-byes. Unfortunately we didn't have the Fuquas or the Fedors after church so we had to feed ourselves. The whole day was spent saying "bye" to as many people as I could get to on a bike. I only got to a few but it was still good.

-> Small Plates <-

I don't have any long profound thoughts for you all this week.

Here's something I learned. I read this super short article in the newest Ensign about this lady who committed herself to more fully live the Word of Wisdom. She mentioned how she was 300 lbs and decided to try to live the Word of Wisdom more. As she tried to eat more fruits, vegetables, and grains, her cravings for junk foods vanished. And over the space of 23 months she lost half her weight. In 2 years she went from 300 lbs to 150 lbs. she didn't mentioned anything about exercising, though I sure she did some. After I read that i felt like I need to more fully live the Word of Wisdom. I am going to eat healthier. More fruits, veggies and things like that.

So, everyone, live the Word of Wisdom.

-> Closing Remarks <-
Even though this week was challenging, it was equally rewarding. We got a ton of member support even if we didn't teach many lessons. We were still provided with ways to see people who lived far out. A lot of members gave us rides this week.

You're awesome!

-Elder Benjamin Kohkonen Cox (GKLM)

Our District - Elder Salazar, Elder Gardanier, Elder Hicks, Elder Stanley,
Hermana Parra, Hermana Fluckiger, Sister Reed, Elder Reed,
Elder Weyland, Elder Murdoch, and Elder Cox. Elder Blake is on the ground.

We biked for days...!

Inspired Learning

July 18, 2016

Dear Family,

This was a week of inspired learning. You'll see why in a sec.

-> Large Plates <-

-Monday-
This was an interesting P-Day. A member came down from English IN to visit Elder Murdoch. Elder Murdoch was in English while I was in Corydon. That's where I met him the first time. So while the "Belders" were with this member, we were just on our own.

During our emailing a preacher came up to us and wanted to "pick our brains apart about what we believe". We actually had a good discussion with him. Most preachers that want to talk with us try to prove us wrong, but this guy just wanted to understand our beliefs. He didn't fight us on anything. He wants to talk with us more so we'll see where that goes.

Later we went to Books A Million. We had never been there before but we've heard it's a good place, so we decided to check it our. Found out there's an 8th Harry Potter book. Yay. Books A Million is a total nerd/geek store. It felt like Comic Con but much cleaner and much quieter. 

We finished the night at the Quint's. They fed us hamburgers.

-Tuesday-
This was a weird day. The "Tellders" came down and blitzed us all day. That's when there's 2 sets of missionaries in an area instead of 1. They said they wanted to give us a break and kickstart our area.

At the beginning of the day we all played basketball with each other. It was us, the "Belders," and the "Tellders." Normally I hate playing basketball but I actually had a fun time. I didn't suck as bad as I normally do. I even got the game winning point.

When we started working, I went out with Elder Blake and Elder Salazar went out with Elder Weyland, Blake's companion. Blake is the District Leader so he has authority to blitz us. Normal missionaries don't. We tried a lot of people but nobody answered. We met this lady waiting for the bus, talked to her, wound up sharing the first lesson, and extended a baptismal date for Aug 20. She accepted. I'm not sure how solid she's going to be since we haven't been able to meet with her since, but she accepted the date so there's some hope.

Later on splits, I went out with Chase and Elder Blake went out with Bro Emmert. Chase and I visited the Old Tins. I shared something out of the Bible with them because I thought they would accept that easier than the BoM right now. It's not often I teach out of the Bible only. You'd think I would use it a lot here in Kentucky but surprisingly, not many people read the Bible. Everyone will say they've read it, but very, very few actually do. 90% of the time we talk to people about the BoM and simply relate it back to the Bible.

Even though I don't use the Bible a lot I've read most of it and have learned a lot about it. By this point I've been exposed to just about every piece of doctrine than anyone could possibly use against the Church and have learned the truth of it. There is nothing in the Bible that contradicts the BoM. They're in harmony with each other. There is no belief we have that cannot be defended in the Bible.

-Wednesday-
The "Tellders" left and we played basket ball with the "Belders" again. I, again, got the game winning point. When we began working not a whole lot happened. You have probably noticed that I have said "not a whole lot happened" a lot lately. That's because we're struggling to teach lessons and get new investigators. It's not just us, the "Belders" have been struggling with the same thing. For some reason, Owensboro is not receptive to the gospel right now. Everyone says "no." No one answers the door. We've been working but little has happened.

When Elder Salazar and I first got together we were teaching a lot of lessons. We had a lot of investigators that we could meet with regularly, several times a week. We also had LA's that were the same. But all at once, everyone dropped off the face of the earth. Our investigators either dropped us or disappeared and our LA's vanished as well. Since then we've struggled to get things going.

Later on we got an official storm warning. The tvs were off, the radios were off, it was kinda scary. A few minutes after the warning there were some nasty clouds over Owensboro, but nothing came out of them. Elder Salazar said they must have already dropped off all of their water. Later on we met with Ro for the first time in forever. He's a Spanish LA. Elder Salazar talked with him and shared a short message. He still has interest in the church but he still works Sundays.

-Thursday-
We had a sweet zone meeting in Evansville. Elder Blake and Elder Weyland trained on something called "The Brother of Jared Challenge." I'll share details about it later but it's a way of preparing a Book of Mormon to make the answers of life's questions more accessible. It's actually really cool. It was slowly developed by several missionaries in our mission over the space of about 2 years. The zone leaders gave a nice training on going back to the basics. In the MTC and during your 12-week training period there's 8 fundamentals of missionary work that they teach you. However, after you graduate from the 12-weeks, it's really easy to forget about them. You still study things that relate to them but you don't study them specifically. The zone leaders challenged us to go back to the fundamentals and study them.

It's interesting they trained on this because in an effort to figure out what I can do to build Owensboro up, I actually started studying these a few days before the zone leaders challenged us to do so. I think it was Monday or Tuesday when I opened my PMG to begin studies and got a very strong prompting to close it and find something else to study. I was looking around at the books and things I had on my desk and my MTC book and my 12-week book stood out to me. I was led to the 8 fundamentals that are listed in both books, so I started studying them from both.

We got a table at zone meeting because we don't have a table in our apartment. I had to take it apart to fit it in the trunk. That was fun. When we began working we visited the Gom family. They want to be sealed to each other so Bishop called Elder Salazar to be their temple-prep teacher. He introduced the temple to them.

Later we contacted a Church HQ referral who took a tour of the Kirtland temple and wanted a Bible. Her name was Ms C. We delivered the Bible but it wasn't a good time to have a discussion because her life is crazy now. One of her friend's 5 year-old kid was hit by a car speeding down a neighborhood. Somehow he's still alive but he's not doing well.

-Friday-
We weekly planned at the church. Had a good planning session. We tried Ms S, the lady Elder Blake and I gave a baptismal date to on Tuesday, but she wasn't home. We tried some peeps around her but no one answered. As we were walking, we met a lady who knew the same kid that got hit the other day. We found out his name. She asked that we would pray for him.

Later on we visited Lil. She's an older lady we met a few weeks ago and had a few light gospel conversations. Nothing serious. She said she would come to church but we weren't expecting her to actually go through with it. She actually came to church a couple weeks ago. We were finally able to meet with her again and she said she likes what she's seen and wants to learn more. We had a good conversation with her about the BoM and touched on the Restoration. She might go far in the gospel.

-Saturday-
Started off helping Des with her house. She wasn't feeling well. While we were helping, her neighbor came over and Des started talking to him about the church. She had Elder Salazar and Gardanier help her. We have an appointment with him for Tuesday when we come over and eat with Des.

Later on we were walking by the Goms and they happened to be out grilling lunch. We stopped by to say hi and wound up having lunch with them. It was pretty good. I've learned that real Mexican food is actually really good. American Mexican food isn't.

After that we saw Ms H and finally got a quality L1 in with her. I'm not sure how well she comprehended it. We were going to extend a baptismal date but her friend Jo, the "Belder's" investigator, came over towards the end of the lesson and made it impossible to extend the invitation.

We finished the night at the Emmerts as per usual for Saturday nights. We were supposed to have a lesson with Lan, but he couldn't make it because he was working.

-Sunday-
We had another good church service. Elder Salazar gave a talk on taking upon yourself the name of Christ and related it to missionary work. After church we went to Bishop Manire's house for lunch. They had sammiches and Burgoo.

After lunch we went to see the Sums. It was just Vi there. He had a lot of questions about the BoM that we answered. He has a strong testimony of the BoM but knows little about it. After that we had dinner with the Ortons. The Quints were there. We did the "Brother of Jared Challenge" with them and they all loved it. They said they're going to do it.

Later that night we had to swing by the Quints home to give them the papers for the challenge because I only brought enough for the Ortons at the time of the lesson. As usual, Elder Salazar and Bro Quint started talking and we were there longer than I would
have liked. There is no such thing as a short visit with the Quints. Bro Quint borrowed a book from Bro Fedor to study. Bro Fedor loves reading books. He's got every book the church has ever put out and has read all of them. He's also read other religious books just because he wanted to. While Elder Salazar and Bro Quint were talking I was reading through a one of the books.

-> Small Plates <-
One of the 8 fundamentals in missionary work is "The Role of the Holy Ghost in Conversion". One of the things it has you read is a paragraph in PMG on page 97. There was a sentence there that stood out to me in a different way than it has before. It says "your confidence and faith should be in Christ, not in yourself." When you think of a missionary who puts his confidence in himself you would first think of a prideful missionary who thinks he can do it because he's been out for a while.

I learned you can actually put confidence in yourself without any pride at all.

When I first came out I relied on the Lord a lot because I didn't know how to be a missionary. Since I've learned how to kind of teach, I've realized I've relied less and less on the Lord. It was a very gradual thing. As I learned more, I seemed to rely on the Lord less because my own capabilities increased. I never forgot about the Lord, but I seemed to rely on Him less.

This is what the mission leaders are trying to point out with their trainings on going back to the basics. Almost every missionary has something called "Greenie Fire" when they first begin their mission. That is, they're excited to do missionary work, they acknowledge their own weakness, quickly repent, and rely heavily on the Lord. It's impossible for them to be discouraged because they haven't experienced anything discouraging. In all honesty, "Greenies" are the closest to being perfect missionaries of any other missionaries. That's because of their weaknesses, they are made humble. They are forced to rely on the Lord more and the impressions of the Spirit. It's normal human nature to "graduate" from things that teach you how to do things. You literally graduate from school, college, and other things. Because of this mortal condition, it's easy to think that we "spiritually graduate" as we learn the gospel or learn how to do missionary work. When really, we don't. There's no such thing.

It's interesting to see how progressing in the gospel is the opposite from progressing in the world. As you learn in the world, you move away from your teachers and support yourself. You "graduate". As you learn in the gospel, you actually grow closer to the Teacher and rely on Him more.

I didn't learn this until this week and not all at once. I've learned it as I've gone back to the basics of missionary work which was prompted by a lack of success in the field. It's also interesting how zone leaders trained on the same thing a few days after I began studying it.

This truly was a week of inspired learning.

I working to get my "Greenie Fire" back. The time I was a Greenie was the happiest time of my mission. If I can get back to that, then happiness will come more naturally.

-> Closing Remarks <-

What a week!

-Elder Benjamin Kohkonen Cox (GKLM)

Tiny metal drum set

So Many Thunderstorms!

July 11, 2016

Dear Family,

"This town is crazy" -Elder Salazar

-> Large Plates <-

-Monday-
This is weird because I already talked about last Monday in last week's email. This was the day we got into a 3-car accident. It happened at about 12:45 PM. That was a great way to start the 4th of July! #America. We also went to Jason's and played board games and burned suits. It was fun. :)

-Tuesday-
It was weird having P-Day on Tuesday this week. It didn't feel right. We got another estimate for the car damage and it added another $5000 on top of the existing $8000 so $13,000 total. I doubt the church will pay for that. The car itself is only worth about $8000-$9000. Somehow the car is still driveable.

Apart from that it was a pretty normal P-Day. We had lunch, shopped, and frolfed. Because it was Tuesday we went on splits. I went out with Bro Emmert and we had a really successful night. We saw the Cl's. They're LAPM (Less Active Part Member). I've seen Sis Cl at church a few times but she doesn't come often. We went over the First Presidency Message and had a great discussion. They loved it. Later that night we met Sis Tre. She's one of Bro Emmert's home teaching families. We went over the First Presidency Message with her too and had another great discussion.

We finished splits by seeing the old Tin family. Bro Emmert got to know them better. We didn't share a message because we were short on time but we left them with a prayer. I finished the night talking with Bro Pursley about music. I found out we have very similar music interests.

-Wednesday-
It rained a lot. Yahoo! said we were going to have "isolated thunderstorms". I didn't know what that meant until Wednesday. It means you work for an hour or two and then take shelter because thunderstorms here are wicked. They tear trees apart like they're nothing. If it's raining a little bit you can still work, but if it's so bad that your car wipers at full speed can't keep the water off your windshield, then you might want to consider taking shelter.

That's how Wednesday was. We worked for the first couple hours of the day, then it stormed for about an hour, then the storm left and we worked some more, then it stormed again. Thankfully it didn't storm for the last part of the day. We had Missionary Coordination at the
church in the evening. We had a great discussion with Bro Emmert and the ward missionaries about how to get more member present.

Afterwards we helped the Capeners move. They're moving to New York for Bro Capener's residency. There were a lot of people there because they turned it into a Wednesday night youth activity. We got most of it done but there were still a few things that needed to be packed so we came back on Thursday to finish. The Capeners ordered Domino's for everyone. I pigged out. :)

-Thursday-
The Tell City elders came down to do an exchange with the "Belders" and they invited us all to lunch at Chick-fil-a so, of course, we went. After lunch we went to the Capeners to help them finish moving. It was just us, the "Belders" and the Capeners this time. About 30 minutes into the move there was another severe thunderstorm that came in. Without question we had to stop for a while. While nature was tearing Owensboro apart for the 3rd time this week Bro Capener adjusted all of us for the last time. I love getting my back and neck pushed back in place.

The Capener's move and the storm wound up taking most of the day. By the time the storm finished and we finished packing everything, we didn't have much time left in the day. We tried a few peeps but that was about it. Bro Capener left us with one of his chairs.

-Friday-
During personal study we had another severe thunderstorm! Yay! This was probably the worst one this week. It left trees and power line poles ripped out of the ground and on the road. No homes were destroyed but a lot were damaged. It was almost as bad as that tornado hail storm from a couple months ago. It only lasted about an hour.

We had district meeting. Elder Blake's training was about helping our areas individual concerns. He had every companionship share a concern with their area and he spent the rest of the meeting talking about those concerns. It was pretty cool. Either he did a lot of
preparations for this or he didn't really prepare a training and made one up on the spot. Either way, it was good.

The Capeners left half way through district meeting. They had me take some final family photos before they left. Sad... 

Later on we Weekly Planned. Made some good plans as per usual. Then I went to Bro McKinnon's for some "service". He bought some new heads for his drum set and needed me to tune them. :D While I was doing that, Elder Salazar was playing basketball with some of the neighbor kids. It was fun watching him.

As we drove home there was another severe thunderstorm. The 5th one this week. This is when Elder Salazar said "This town is crazy. I've never had so many storms." I didn't really notice it until he said this, but we have had a lot of storms in Owensboro. More than usual.

-Saturday-
We started Saturday by teaching a man named Jim. He was one of the 1000 referrals the "Belders" sent us. He's a really nice guy. We had a fantastic conversation with him. He already shares a lot of the same beliefs as us. We introduced the BoM and he wanted to read it. He wants us to come back. I haven't had a first lesson as good as this one was in a while.

Later on we visited Jo brothers. They happened to be having a Mexican backyard BBQ so we got to eat. That food was some of the best Mexican food I've had in a long time. In the middle of our visit, their dog came over and smelled my right pocket. That's where I keep my pepper spray. I think it smelled the spray because it ran from me and didn't come near me for the rest of the visit.

Later on we met a guy on the streets and got into the nicest bash ever with him. I say nice bash because most people who bash us try to prove us wrong but this guy brought up bash points because they were genuine concerns of his and he wanted to learn more about our church. He lives in the "Belder's" area so they're going to have to teach him but we gave him a BoM and he wants missionaries to come back and talk with him.

We had dinner at the Emmerts as per usual. We had Sloppy Joes. I wasn't able to eat much because we had just come from the Jo brothers. After the Emmerts, we finished the night with the young Tins. They were preparing to watch a movie outside in the dark. We shared
a quick video with them and had a great discussion about serving people. They said they've been thinking about coming to church more. We told them that would be great. They've started reading the BoM more. It shouldn't be long before they become solid investigators.
-Sunday-
We had a fantastic church service. I'll detail what I learned in the Small Plates. After church we had lunch at the Fuquas again. They're extremely nice for feeding us but sometimes it's hard to go over because they always prepare monstrous amounts of food. I'm actually
gaining weight because of that.

We had a something cool happen with Lan who is friends with the Emmert's son. They've been friends for a few years and during that time he's been to church almost every week and has taken several missionary discussions. He hasn't shown an interest in being baptized until this happened. He was sitting in Bro Emmert's Gospel Principles class and he felt the Spirit for probably the first time in his life. Bro Emmert told me about his experience and said I need to call him. So I did and told him he could feel like that forever with the Gift of the Holy Ghost and he accepted the invitation to have more lessons. I actually asked him a few weeks ago why he wasn't taking the discussions but he avoided the question and didn't give me an answer, but this time he said yes. We'll teach him this Saturday when we go to the Emmert's for dinner again. He's always there.

After lunch we studied. After studies we visited Ms Val but she wasn't available so we talked with her daughter. She's 11 and not a member. She got close to being baptized once but her father was against it so she didn't get baptized. Now that she's living with Ms Val and not the ex she might have another chance at being baptized. As we all sat on the porch we were being eaten alive by mosquitoes. The scriptures answer every question except why God created mosquitoes.;)

We finished the night by visiting P and his son C. P and C moved in right next door to the Capeners before they moved out and they got to know each other a bit. We decided to drop in on them to say hi and we wound up having a good visit. We didn't teach anything. We got our foot in the door, you could say. He's a nice guy. Single father. C is 9. He's another one of those kids who's grown up around trying circumstances (divorce) and is still somehow one of the nicest, normal, happiest kids you could meet.

I've met a countless amount of kids like this on my mission and they always amaze me when I meet one. Let me clarify the kind of kids I'm talking about. I've meet countless kids who had difficulties with one or both parents (drugs, divorce, abandonment, abuse, etc.) and somehow they stay completely normal, innocent, happy, and some of the best kids ever. You wouldn't think this would happen right? Kids usually absorb what their parents do, right? If one or both parents of a kid afflict their child with some sort of circumstance, you think that
child would tend to be negative, right? Well... I've met countless kids who are the opposite. They have affliction after affliction and they're still fine.

I've thought about this off and on for a while and I think I figured out how this happens. In all of these cases, there has always been someone who genuinely loves the child. That might be the other parent, a grandparent, an older sibling, etc. Where there is love, the Spirit is there also. The Spirit will guide and protect you even if you don't have the Gift of the Holy Ghost. The Gift of the Holy Ghost is a constant companionship but everyone can feel the influence of the Holy Ghost. Because children are closer to the veil, I'd say they're able to
tune to the Spirit easier than an adult. And because they can feel the Spirit they can receive greater protection. So much so that a kid can grow in the most trying of circumstances but if there's that element of love where the Spirit can be magnified then the circumstances really won't have much of a negative effect on the child. 

If a child has no one to love them then yes, they'll probably go down a rough path. But if there's someone who genuinely loves the child, their love will radiate with the Spirit which a little child will be more receptive to. It will protect them.

-> Small Plates <-

Well, since I already talked about some Small Plates stuff with the whole children thing I'll keep this section shorter. As I mentioned we had a high councilor in church and he gave a great talk about being a valiant servant vs. an honorable servant. He asked "Why are we members of the church? Is it because we're here for our friends or are we here for the Lord because He wants us to be here?" He then went on to say if we're here for friends or any other reason, then we are honorable servants. Honorable because we're at least doing what the Lord wants but not for the entirely right reasons. But, if we're valiant servants, then we'll do everything we can for the Lord because we have a genuine relationship with Him and want to please Him. There were several other things he talked about and there were several things in the other 2 hours of church I liked. All 3 hours were good this week. But I'm going to stop here. My hands are tired and this letter is long.

-> Closing Remarks <-

This was a fun week. Go out and have a great week yourselves!

-Elder Benjamin Kohkonen Cox (GKLM)

Elder Salazar

We were helping the Capeners move and it started raining. Hard.

This is the pedal of the bike that slashed my leg.

Dark, scary clouds

Pretty sunset after a storm.

Owensboro is Trying to Kill Me

July 5, 2016

Dear Family,

It has been officially decided by myself and many others that Owensboro is trying to kill me. You'll see why by the end of the email. Besides that, this was actually a really good week. We did a lot and we got fed by members every day this week. I think this was the first week of my mission that members fed us every day. It was awesome! Here's the week in review...

-> Large Plates <-
-Monday-
We bowled another 5 games with Jason. I did better this time and my hand didn't hurt as much. Then Jason took us to Olive Garden for a late lunch which was ultimately a bad idea because we had a dinner appointment right after with the Wagner family. At the Wagners, we had burgers, hot dogs, watermelon, and other things. Towards the end of the day we biked around and tried a few people. Not much happened.

-Tuesday-
I started Tuesday with getting my stitches out at the same Urgent Care that put them in. It didn't hurt at all. I barely felt it. My leg is holding up great now. It's healed a lot. Later, we got to the apartment and found that Elder Salazar's front bike tube was destroyed. We weren't able to drive because we were severely low on miles. And we were severely low on miles because we had to take several extra long drives this month that left us with hardly any miles for the end of the month. So that left us with walking.

We walked to Ms H's which took about an hour and read out of the BoM with her. I'm not so sure how well she's progressing. She likes having us over but she isn't reading herself. After Ms H, we walked back to the apartment, and had Bro Emmert drive us to splits.

For splits, I went out with Bro Pursley and visited Des, and Vic and Maku. Des fed us. This was easily the best meal I've ever had from her. She had great meatloaf, real mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, biscuits, and orange cake with cream cheese frosting for dessert. Her food was so good.

We were only able to spend a few minutes with Vic and Maku. They were preparing for 2 festivals in New Orleans and one in San Antonio. They're doing good. As we were there, the pizza guy came and Vic offered pizza so I got fed a second time. :)

-Wednesday-
We walked to Walmart, got a new tube for Salazar's bike, fixed his bike, and went on our merry way. That whole process took over 3 hours. When we finally got out, we visited Ms Val, a LA we haven't been able to teach for a long time. We had a simple lesson about the BoM. She said she was going to come to church.
 
We tried several more peeps but nothing happened. Later we were supposed to go to the Hoopes for dinner but they weren't able to so they sent us pizza and bread sticks. Yay food! We finished the night with English class. After a day completely full of walking and biking, I was exhausted!

-Thursday-
Not a whole lot to report on Thursday. We spent the whole day biking around and trying people but nothing happened. I had fun biking around though. My bike is awesome so I don't regret any time I spend on it. :)

We had dinner with the Childress family. Sis Childress prepared this amazing healthy meal that tasted wonderful after a day of biking around. She made potatoes, corn on the cob, biscuits (I love biscuits), and several other things I can't remember. We finished the night biking around, talking to peeps and trying more peeps.

-Friday-
We had district meeting. Elder Blake gave a cool training with shoes. I'll detail that in the small plates. Afterwards we went to Moonlite. Any day we go to Moonlite is automatically a great day. After lunch we drove around and tried some peeps. We finally have miles now because Friday was the first of a new month. I missed having a car.

Lately the "Belders" have been sending us potentials they meet that live in our area so a majority of our time working has been spent trying these people. We haven't had any major success with them. We've cleared several out because they no longer live at the given address but we still have a lot more to go through.

We finished the night at the Swopes. We ate pizza and threw a stuffed dolphin around.

-Saturday-
The Capeners are moving to New York next Friday so we helped them move a few things. We'll be helping them with the main move next week. Bro Capener is going to medical school for something and he found a place to do his residency a lot faster than he thought he would. He thought he was going to stay another year in Owensboro but it turned out he can actually leave now and progress with his education.

We spent a lot of the day trying peeps and referrals from the "Belders". Still no significant success.

We finished the night at the Emmerts. We ate dinner and shot fireworks off. A firework war broke out between everyone there. Everyone was trying to place small fireworks like those spinning things as close as possible to someone without them noticing. Everyone was also shooting little bottle rockets at each other. At one point I was standing by a truck, hiding from the action when someone lit a bottle rocket and threw it about 30 feet away from me. They weren't trying to aim for me, but when that thing landed it happened to be perfectly angled towards me, and when it went off, it went straight towards me. Everyone was rolling on the ground and laughing. But it didn't hurt much. Bottle rockets weight almost nothing. It felt like a big, angry, flaming bumblebee decided to headbutt me. That's how the war ended.

-Sunday-
Church. It was fast and testimony meeting and everyone wanted to talk about how much they're going to miss the Capeners. We went to the Fuquas for lunch and the Fedors for dinner. In between the two, we saw the Gom family and helped them understand the gospel. At the end of the night we received 1000 more referrals from the "Belders". Yay!

-Monday-
4th of July! Bro McKinnon called and asked me if I'd tune his drum set. Of course I accepted that opportunity. On the way to his house however, we were severely rear-ended and pushed into a car in front of us. We and the car in front of us were stopped at a red light when another lady slammed into our back bumper and pushed us forward. It was pouring rain so it was fun dealing with the police and the car stuff.

After everything was cleared, we went to Bro Mckinnon's and I tuned his drums. It's been 15 months since I've tuned drums so I may not completely remember how to do it. Speaking of 15 months, I hit 15 months in the mission! Woo!! 9 months left.

After I tuned the drums, I went to the Fedor's house and did all the church damage reports for the car. This was the 4th time I've done those. We had to use the Fedor's phone for a couple calls because our phone got wet in the rain while I was making a trillion calls at the scene scene of the accident. Our phone's working now thankfully, because we put it in a bag of rice overnight.

After the Fedors, we went to Jason's house with the "Belders" to celebrate the 4th of July and Elder Murdoch's suit burn. We had hot dogs, played Quelf, and had Elder Murdoch burn his suit with gasoline and the Sword of Laban. It was a fun night of which I severely needed after a day like this.

-> Small Plates <-
As I mentioned before Elder Blake gave a cool training about shoes. He had Elder Salazar put on a pair of old, worn out missionary shoes and had Elder Gardanier put on new, nice cleats and had them run around a tree. Neither of them were able to do it well. The old shoes were unusable and the cleats were the wrong size.

He then compared this to missionary work by asking if we still had our "cleats from home on" or if we were trying to "fill another missionaries worn out shoes". He pointed out how missions are extremely personal. They're between you and the Lord. The most important shoes you'll wear are your own shoes. Be yourself and give the Lord your all. Don't be distracted in the work by keeping your cleats from home on and don't be distracted from your own personal relationship with the Lord by trying to fill another missionaries shoes.

He also talked about how throughout his own mission he's thought "Either I suck, or there's no one prepared to receive the gospel." He learned that both statements are false. Missions are personal. They're between you and the Lord. Not anyone else.

-> Closing Remarks <-
This was a fun week. I ate a lot, worked a lot, had fun, and survived. So far in Owensboro alone, I've been attacked by a dog, cut my leg, got hit by a firework, and got severely rear-ended. In Corydon, I only got rear-ended. And in Campbellsville, I got attacked by a dog. Owensboro really wants me to leave. Oh well... Thanks for all the support you all have given me! Your prayers really help. I don't have much longer on the mission left. I'm going to keep going until I finish.

Loves!

-Elder Benjamin Kohkonen Cox (GKLM)

Munched bumper on back of our car

Not much damage on front of our car

Car we were pushed into

Car that hit us!