Monday, May 16, 2016

I love my family!!!

It was great to see the family this week, everyone looks so different and grown up.  I guess when you get on your mission you just expect time to stop back home, but apparently it does not stop.  Emma looks tall and skinny, Kevin looks like a man now, Amanda looks a lot more mature and very pretty, Katie still looks like Katie, and mom and dad you don't look like you have aged a day.  It was way good to get to see Katie even though she was on a little screen.  It was weird to see her. I feel like it has been ages since the last time I saw her.  My mom told me in her letter this week that she was a little grumpy after the Skype.  Don't worry mom, I know exactly how you feel.  Saying goodbye is definitely the worst part.  Skyping is pretty much teasing missionaries…here is your family…in 10 minutes they will be gone haha.  The call goes by way too fast and that is the worse part.  It was still awesome to see the family though even if I did get smashed for my terrible letters.  Apparently I say "haha" too much haha.  If I sound depressed in this email you will know why.  I'm no longer allowed to say haha, so I might sound a bit grumpy, but I promise I'm not.  Back to the family though, I think Emma gets the award for the most changed.  I still can't get over how tall and skinny she is. I hope you are feeding her mom.  I think my Mom and Dad are probably excited that they didn't win the award for the most changed, because that would mean they look older.

This week was an awesome week though, and it went by way too fast.  This week we went on an exchange and I got to be with Elder Fellingham again.  Elder Fellingham and I have been on so many exchanges it’s not even funny (I just put a haha right here because I forgot I wasn't supposed to say haha, good thing I remembered).  We had a really successful exchange.  We met a super nice lady.  We talked to her for a little bit and introduced the plan of salvation, which was exactly what she needed.  The spirit was super strong as we met with her and testified of the truthfulness of our message.  Unfortunately, this is a story with an unhappy ending.  We tried our very best but in the end she said that she wasn’t interested in us coming back right now, but that when she was ready she would find us.  It was so sad, we were so excited because the lesson was going so well.  She was interested in our message, but in the end she wouldn't commit.  It is definitely a tough aspect of missionary work, you do everything you can and in the end they turn us away.  It is so sad because we know how much our message could bring peace to her and her family.  However, the exchange was mean and we met heaps of people from all around the world which was mean.  We met a lady from Bolivia and her brother joined the church not too long ago.  We got a return appointment with her and we told her that she should skype her brother and talk to him about the church.  So who knows what will happen with the wonderful people we met.  That is something that is cool about the mission.  You never truly know the impact that your visit can leave on someone, and we don't really know who will end up joining the church.  Our message that we share with them can make them more willing to meet with missionaries later on in their life.

This Sunday I had the wonderful opportunity to speak in church. My topic was being worthy of the Holy Ghost.  I based my talk off of a talk by Elder David A Bednar, "That They May Always Have His Spirit to be with Them."  It was a wonderful talk, Elder Bednar's not mine, and if you have some extra time I would recommend reading it.  I shared the experience of when I got lost on my last young men back packing trip, when I got super dehydrated.  I don't know if any of the young men remember the story.  I was running along as usual on the last day of the hike.  It was a very hot day and I didn’t have much water.  I always run back to the cars on the last day of any hike because it makes no sense to take your time hiking when you are going home, so you might as well get home as fast as you can get home.  Well I was doing my usual routine of running and I thought I had to be getting close to the cars.  To make a long story short, I ended up getting lost. I prayed and was able to make it back to the right track and made it back to the cars but added several extra miles onto my route.  In my talk I shared how there will be times in our lives when we will desperately need the companionship of the Holy Ghost, it is so important that we are worthy of that companionship so we don't become lost.  However, there is more to the story that I didn't share in my talk.  So after about 30 to 60 minutes everyone else started arriving to where I was waiting by the cars.  What I didn’t realize was that by that point I had become extremely dehydrated and wasn't really sure what was going on.  I knew I needed to go to the bathroom really bad but I couldn’t explain my situation to my Dad.  I kept asking him over and over again if I could go to the bathroom right there because I didn't feel good at all.  My Dad realized I was dehydrated and eventually convinced me to drink some water and cool down in the river and my senses finally came back to me haha.  Thank you for taking care of me Dad.

I hope you all have a great week, and stay safe.  

Love,

Elder Brunson