Tuesday, March 29, 2016

Temple Trip!!!!!

This week is already off to a weird start.  Yesterday, instead of having our normal preparation day, it was just a normal day haha.  It was weird not emailing home or doing any of the normal Monday activities.  We had a pretty successful day though even though it was hard to miss pday.  Today is kind of like our pday, but our day is going to be spent driving up to Hamilton to go to the temple!  It is definitely worth it to miss out on preparation day to get to go to the temple.  I love the temple and I'm really excited to get to go on Wednesday.  This week we were also supposed to have interviews with our mission president on Saturday, but he ended up rescheduling it to tonight at his house.  So even though we won’t get to play touch on the beach it still should be a great day!

I'm glad everything has worked out so far for the emails.  I'm not really sure how long I will get to write this email, so I will try my best to get as much in as I can.  I will rewind back to last week so I can give you some of the highlights of the week.  Preparation day was heaps of fun!  We went down to Howera which is about an hour away and had preparation day with the other elders in our zone.  First, we played basketball at the church, which was really intense.  We played against Elder Christensen who is 6ft 6 and has a scholarship to play football at BYU and his companion who is about 6 ft 6.  We barely lost though!  It was way fun.  I had the fun task of guarding Elder Christensen.  I think I did I pretty good job for being a little man haha.  After basketball we went and played Ultimate Frisbee on the beach.  Ultimate Frisbee was heaps of fun!  It reminded me of the intense games that we would have for mutual.  I'm sure RT remembers the mean Ultimate games for mutual.  This week I jinxed myself and finally got sick haha!  Nahh I didn’t get sick, but I have had a cold and a sore throat which wasn't heaps of fun.  It didn't keep us from working though, so that was good!  I think I would have to be practically dying to stay in the flat haha.  An update on the weather, it has still been hot!  I'm not sure if it is ever going to get cold.  I'm ready for cooler weather though so I can sleep better at night.

The spiritual highlight of the week was a lesson that we had with a man named Greg.  So I think I mentioned Greg a couple of weeks ago.  Greg is the man that we ran into after Matiu's baptism.  Greg rides around in a mobility scooter and is pretty blind.  I say pretty blind because he has some sight, but he is practically completely blind.  We had a mean lesson with him after the baptism and we could tell that he is spiritually prepared for the gospel. Unfortunately, his wife is completely against any other religion.  However, Greg said that he might be able to meet with us at the chapel.  Well we had set appointments with him two weeks in a row, and both times he didn't turn up.  Well this week when we were driving in the car and we saw Greg.  As bad as this sounds, it works out perfectly that he is blind because the past few weeks whenever we see him we just drive our car past him a little ways and get out and start walking toward him and then share a message with him.  Well this week when we ran into him he told us that he didn't think he could try and come to church or meet with us at the church.  He said that he had briefly mentioned it to his wife, but that she was against it.  However, we had a really spiritual lesson with him, and bore our testimonies how the gospel could fill the gap which he feels is missing in his life.  We shared 1 Nephi 3:7 with him which is my favorite scripture.  We shared our love for him and bore our testimonies of the truthfulness of our message.  He was really touched by the fact that we told him we loved him and cared about his salvation.  We invited him to pray and as Heavenly Father for the help to be able to talk to his wife and for her heart to be softened.  Elder Suriben and I are now anxiously awaiting the results.  We have been praying a lot for him and I really hope that Heavenly Father provides a way for us to teach him.  I don't remember everything we shared with him, but the spirit was definitely present.  I love being a missionary and getting the wonderful opportunity to feel the spirit so abundantly in my life.  Nothing can match the feeling of the spirit.  It is a feeling that comes which testifies of the reality of our Heavenly Father and his son Jesus Christ.  I have been so thankful to be a missionary at this Easter season.  My testimony and my appreciation for the Savior have increased so much since coming on my mission.  I really want to choose the right and keep the commandments so that I can return to live with them someday.  I know that it is through the covenants that we make inside the temple and through the atonement of Jesus Christ which allows us to be able to return to live with them.  I love you all and thank you all for the support you give to me.

Love,

Elder Brunson 

These are the pancakes and ice cream
Elder Fellingham and I made,  yum!!

Elder Brunson and Elder Fellingham

Weet-Bix...my favorite cereal!

It's fall!  Cold enough for a sweater.

Paritutu Mountain (hill) haha

Elder Brunson cooking Adobo (Philippine dish)

Strange animal

Elder and Sister Saunders

The Stratton Family is the best!!!!!!
Thanks!

Working out at the free gym haha

Monday, March 21, 2016

The pressure is on!

I have one hour to finish a really eventful week haha!  I don't think I will even be able to say half of the things that I want to, but I will give it a go.  This week was pretty crazy!  I think I say that almost every week, but it really was crazy haha.  I have lots of things I could talk about and I'm not really sure what would be the most exciting for you all to hear about.  I think I will start with the best part of the week though.  I will tell you a little bit about one of the cool spiritual experiences that we had this week.  So it was Friday night, and we were supposed to have a sports night.  Every Friday we have a sports night down on the beach and play touch (rugby) and basketball.  We used to be able to play as well, but unfortunately that got banned a couple of months ago.  Now we can only play sport on Mondays.  Anyway, even though we can’t play we still go and run sports night and talk with lots of nonmembers.  Not very many people turned up this Friday though so we had to cancel it.  We decided to go to our backup plan for sports night, so off we went.  On the way to our backup plan we felt like we should go try one of the former investigator’s houses that we had been trying to contact since it was close by.  We went to the house and gave the door a good ole knock.  Hohepa, a Maori fella in his 20's answered the door.  When he answered the door he responded as a typical 20 year old would.  He was like, “nahh man, I aint into church, that's not me bro.”  Well me being the punk that I am, I kept trying to talk to him.  Really we could have just left because he told us that he wasn't really interested, but we decided to just try and get to know his background a little and then see if we could share the gospel with him.  We started talking and he started to open up.  We asked him about his religious background and if he believed in God.  As we kept asking him questions he really started opening up to us.  We taught him about prayer and how through prayer we can have peace brought to our hearts through the Holy Ghost.  He said that he has been really trying to find peace in his life.  It's hard to explain how the entire lesson went, but the spirit was really strong.  It was so cool to see the way he opened up.  At first he didn't want to know about our message, but by the end he had committed to praying about the truthfulness of our message, and if God really loved him.  We invited him to church and he said that he would come.  There must be opposition in all things though and unfortunately he didn't come to church.  We have a return appointment with him tonight though, and we are hoping that it goes well!  Sunday at church we were pretty bummed though because we didn't have any investigators at church.  We felt like we had done a good job inviting people, but none of them turned up.  Then, about 20 minutes into sacrament meeting we heard the door open up behind us.  I was expecting to see another member, but to my surprise a less active and investigator showed up.  Their names are Trayc and Cyrus, they are partners and are 20 years old.  We worked with them ages ago, but then they went out of town for a month.  They just got back last week, so we went around and invited them to church.  I was so surprised when they walked through the door, and it just put a huge smile on my face.  It was definitely a tender mercy from the Lord!

Monday we had a mean preparation day.  We went and hiked a massive hill haha.  It’s called Paritutu. Look it up! It’s a pretty intense hike up to the top.  At the top was a mean view!!!!  Funny story though, it might be hard to explain so bear with me.  So we were at the top of the hill and there are railings that go around the top to keep you safe.  So I decided to jump up to sit on top of the railing so we could take a picture.  As I jumped up my foot got caught on the railing and I rocketed face first toward the ground.  Unfortunately, my hands were holding on to the rail so I had nothing to catch my fall.  I smashed my dome into the ground and scraped up my arm and bruised my leg.  It was probably the most embarrassing thing I have done in my entire life haha.  It was something that would for sure make it on to New Zealand's funniest home videos haha.  I don't have heaps of time to explain about the other things that happened this week, because I still need to send pictures home.  Elder Suriben and I found a strange animal on our way home for the night. It was like a small porcupine thing.  Elder Suriben decided to pick it up, he didn't realize that it was spiky though and it poked his hand haha.  It is a funny little creature, and I took pictures so I will send them home.  I might try and explain some more things that happened this week in my next email, sorry I couldn't get you all of the details.  I hope you all have a great week this week!

Love,

Elder Brunson          

Dear Brother and Sister Brunson,

We are the senior missionaries (Elder and Sister Sterzer) in New Plymouth but we also work with the Waitara Branch a lot. Elder Brunson is the District Leader of our district and we wanted you to know what a good and faithful missionary he is. If he were our son, we would be very proud of him! He is a hard worker, diligent and obedient. He is a good leader and has a wonderful, happy spirit about him. His last companion, Elder Vaea, from Tongo left a few weeks ago and he has a new companion, Elder Suriben, a brand new missionary from the Philippines. We haven’t got to know him well yet, but he seems great.

We thought you might enjoy a few pictures:

Elder Brunson, Elder Lingwall (from Utah), convert Les Parrish,
Elder Fogaloi (Samoa) Elder Vaea (Tonga) 

Zone conference
The middle two sisters are serving in Waitara
Sister Flake (Arizona) and Sister Katene (Australia) 

These boys DO love to play rugby and Elder Brunson is getting pretty good!

Dawson Falls on the south-east side of Taranaki

Mount Taranaki

Mount Taranaki

Back Beach in New Plymouth

Elder and Sister Sterzer, Senior couple in New Plymouth
with Elder Brunson and Elder Vaea

Elder Brunson and greenie Elder Suriben
Elder Brunson is taking good care of him!

New Plymouth Elders
Elder Fillingham (New Zealand) and Elder Lingwall (Utah)

New Plymouth Sisters
Sister Watson (Australia) and Sister Johnson (Nevada)

Monday, March 14, 2016

It's Monday again?!!!!!

Man this week sure flew by, I don’t really know where all of the time went.  Nothing overly exciting happened this week. I really wish my Mom would have asked me some questions so that I knew what to write about haha.  She probably thinks I get annoyed by the questions, but sometimes my brain is just sleeping and her questions wake up my brain so I can type.  I guess I can give a weather report for the week.  This week it got cold out of nowhere!!!  Actually during the day it is still really warm, but at night and in the morning it is freezing cold!!!  Which is a bonus for me, because I love sleeping in the cold.  If you remember, my first couple of weeks in Waitara were miserable because it was so hot!!!!!  I could hardly sleep at night.  This week things have turned my way though and it has been freezing cold.  First thing I do when we get back each night is go in and open the windows in our room and shut the door.  Pretty much I turn our room into a freezer.  I almost killed my son on the first night that I did this though.  Because he is from the Philippines he is not used to cold weather at all.  Luckily we have heaps of extra blankets, so I'm not killing him anymore.  You probably all think that I'm really strange, but it’s something that I love doing.  When I was back home, even in the winter I would open my bedroom window and make the room as cold as possible.  The best part is getting in your warm blankets and it just feels so nice.  This week I even had to put a sweater on one night.  I went from having a short sleeved shirt on during the day, to having a sweater on at night.

This week I had another mean exchange with Elder Fellingham.  I have been on heaps of exchanges with Elder Fellingham!  Elder Fellingham can’t drive and I can so when I was in Gisborne, I would always be with him on exchanges.  We have heaps of fun together, and he is a really good missionary so he straightens me out.  We had a solid exchange and talked with some really nice people.  We were thinking how strange it was because usually nobody is really nice to us haha.  For lunch we had a mean feed.  Guess what it was?!!!!  Pancakes with ice cream!!!!!!!  Elder Fellingham made the pancakes and I bought the ice cream haha.  Plus we didn't have sugar so we had to use brown sugar instead haha.  It was probably one of the most unhealthy meals ever haha, but it was way good!  Speaking of brown sugar, I could tell you a little about my breakfasts each morning.  Every morning I have weet-bix with brown sugar on top.  It's nice!!!  You should look up weet-bix on the internet because they are mean.  That is definitely something I will really miss when I get home.  Another thing I will really miss is Kumara.  Kumara is like a sweet potato, but way nicer I reckon.  I literally could eat Kumara for every meal, it is really nice.  Also I really love lamb roasts, those are nice.  Lamb has a really nice flavor to it haha.  Sorry for only talking about food haha.  Maybe because it is 1:00 and I'm pretty hungry.  I'm not sure what we will do for preparation day today because Elder Suriben is not feeling very well.  We might just chill out and let him rest.  Elder Suriben loves p-day though, so he might tough it out.  He has kind of had an upset stomach this week, but we have kept working, he is the man!  I'm doing good though, I haven't been sick at all on my mission.  Hopefully I don't jinx myself haha.

This week we went and did some service at a Marae.  I Mara is where Maori funerals are held.  We got to do some painting so that was lots of fun.  One of our investigators told us that they would be doing some cleaning up and we asked if we could help out.  It was a really good opportunity to get our faces in the community and let other people see that we are normal haha.  I guess I might not be normal though haha.  The work is going good here and we are trying to find more people to teach.  Sounds like being a missionary.  I'm so excited for general conference!!!!!!!  I know it isn't for a couple of weeks, but conference is the best thing ever!  I love listening to the prophets and apostles.  It is something that I definitely took for granted back home, the fact that we have living prophets and apostles.  It is so amazing that we have an opportunity to listen to men who are special witnesses of Jesus Christ.  I know that they are inspired men and that there messages can truly help guide us home to our Heavenly Father.  I love this gospel so much and love getting the opportunity to bear my testimony every day.  I have so much to work on and so little time to do it in.  I can't believe how fast it’s going.  Before I know it the new mission president will be here and I will be halfway done with my mission.  Thanks for all of the support and encouragement.  I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Love,

Elder Brunson         

My flat

Elder Suriben!!!

Mean sandwich

Service at Brother Busky's

Elder Suriben, Matiu, Elder Brunson

Baptism!

Elder Suriben, Matiu, Elder Brunson

Fish head, yum!!

Monday, March 7, 2016

This week was so crazy!!!!!!!  My companion and I ran all over the place trying to get Matiu's baptism ready.  It was pretty stressful because Matiu is a big fella and so we didn't have a baptismal suit that would fit him.  Lots of random things kept coming up that were not helping us get things prepared for Saturday.  I'm pretty certain Satan works his absolute hardest to keep us from having people enter the waters of baptism, but jokes on Satan because Matiu got baptized!!!!!  It's really hard to explain all of the trials we faced this week in preparation, but I will just say it was crazy!!!  I'm so thankful to Heavenly Father for allowing everything to work out though.  Saturday truly was a special day.  One of the highlights of the whole process came on Friday nighth.  Friday night we went to Matiu's to see how he was doing and to follow up with the Word of Wisdom.  Matiu had been trying really hard to stop smoking.  He had been cutting back the number of cigarettes, but still was struggling with stopping completely.  However, Sunday Matiu had a break through and was able to not smoke at all.  One of the things he told us that was really hard for him was to say no when people offered him cigarettes.  He said that no matter how hard he tried he couldn't say no.  Well Friday night when we went to check up on Matiu he told us that he had been offered 3 cigarettes that day and turned them all down.  I felt the spirit so strong as a smile came across Matiu's face.  I have really come to appreciate a simple smile since being on my mission.  When I first got to this area Matiu never smiled.  He is a really quiet fella and has been through a lot in his life.  Whenever he came to church he would just sleep and not really seem very happy.  These past two weeks have been different though, he is always smiling and it makes me so happy to see him happy. Sunday night we went back around to check on him.  He was over at brother Tapuke's house that lives across the street from him.  Brother Tapuke is in his 60's and is a single fella in our branch.  When went over there Matiu was grinning ear to ear.  He said he has had a great last two days and that he feels clean.  Matiu is the man!  I wish I could explain better in words the whole experience, but someday I can tell you more about Matiu haha.  The hardest part is that Matiu doesn't really have support from his family.  Matiu is divorced and has three girls.  We invited them all to come to the baptism and confirmation, but they wouldn't come.  It was really sad because you could tell that Matiu really wanted them to be there.  We had a really good turn out from the branch at his baptism and that was great.  I got the opportunity to baptize Matiu which was pretty interesting.  Matiu is way bigger than me so I had no idea how I was going to baptize him.  I was really worried that I was going to be baptized at the same time as him.  Thankfully I ate my wheet-bix (not my Wheaties) and had lots of help from Heavenly Father and we got him baptized haha.  That was also a miracle haha.  A big fella in a tiny font haha.

After the baptism we had a mean lesson with a blind fella.  Unfortunately his wife is really anti-religion and so it might be really hard to meet with him.  We taught him the plan of salvation and it all made sense to him.  We asked him how he felt as we taught him and he just explained how happy it made him feel and how much peace it brought to him.  He said that he had never felt the feeling before and couldn't really explain it.  The spirit was so strong and I'm really glad that we had the courage to open our mouth.

After the lesson on Saturday night we went out to Brother Patu's (branch mission leader) house and had a mean feed.  I ate a fish head!!!!!!!!  I love trying things that I have never had before!!  This week has been full of trying new food.  This week I had a fish head, raw fish salad, and ate an entire apple... stem and all haha.  Sunday night we had a mean feed at the Mauga's.  They are the coolest family ever.   They are Samoan and are the best.  It was fast Sunday and so we had a massive feed.  That is where I tried the raw fish salad with coconut milk.  It was mean!!!!  Brother Mauga makes us eat heaps or else he gets really disappointed.  I ate so much food it wasn’t even funny.  I probably gained 25 pounds in one meal.  I knew I had to eat a lot so I just tried to eat fast as so the food didn't have time to digest haha.  Plus my Filipino companion hardly eats anything, so I knew I needed to eat a lot.  I was so full, but we had a really good feed.  We had a lamb roast, raw fish salad, bread, potato salad, crab meat, and some other dishes that I can’t really explain haha.  Everything was so good though!

This morning we got haircuts from brother Mauga. He said it was a $60 haircut.  He is the man though, we go and do service for his family in return.  I love my companion, Elder Suriben, he is the man!  We are having lots of fun together, and getting to know each other better.  He learns really fast, and I think he is probably going to end up training me.  He works really hard, so I'm always excited about that.  I have heaps to improve on as a missionary, but I love it!  It is hard work, but so rewarding.

I want to give a shout out to my Young Men’s president, Brother Mellor.  This week in our leadership training the zone leaders asked us to think of a leader who has influenced us in our lives.  Of course my thoughts turned right to him.  Brother Mellor has an amazing testimony, and always made us young men feel loved.  He had a special way of connecting with each young man and I thank him for that.  He always was spiritually prepared for our lessons at church.  I can definitely credit a lot of my testimony to him.  He truly helped me to have the desire to strengthen my own testimony.  I always felt the spirit so strong whenever he taught and I'm so thankful for his great example.  Thank you so much for all of the prayers that I get on my behalf, and thanks for all of the support.  I love you all and hope you have a great week.

Love,

Elder Brunson