Letter #89

Hey guys!

Is everyone stoked for Conference?! There is nothing better than Spring General Conference. Its sad to say but this is my last conference in the mission field. I'd rather not think about it like that, cause I still have more than enough time to see miracles and make things happen out here in the field.

This week was interesting. I went on a couple exchanges. On Monday and Tuesday I was with Elder Peterson. He and I actually came out together. I specifically remember being scared out of my mind in the Salt Lake airport, just having said bye to the family and one of the first Elders I saw and talked with that was heading out also was Elder Peterson haha. Good times. We had a good time working together. We worked up here in Roma and we had some great member lessons. Because of that exchange we now have one more weekly member meal appointment! #miracles That makes 2 on the board for Roma. That's progress. On Friday and Saturday I was with Elder Madsen and we worked down in Rio Grande. Saturday morning we were heading out to do some service, so we left at around 1030 and not even half way to the lady's house, Elder Madsen's pedal busts off! So we found a sign and locked up and walked the rest of the way and the whole rest of the day. It was awesome! I've got some gnarly tan lines and sunburns but we were able to do a lot of service. I learned that it is pretty effective to pros in service clothes haha.

I cant believe another transfer has come and gone. We are on the last week of the transfer already! I'm hoping I stay. It will be interesting to see what happens. I'll let you guys in on the news next week.

A couple of days ago I was studying in John 15. Its now my favorite chapter in the New Testament. I love that chapter. Especially verse 13. I love that verse! I don't know, that verse just hit me super hard in personal study the other day and now I cant really get it out of my head. I've never really had a favorite scripture, but now I do! You guys should check it out.

Love you guys!

Elder Brian

- The wardrobe of a missionary. The good life.

Letter #88

Where do I begin? I cant even remember half of the things that happened this week.

Well, I've kinda been out of my area for the past week and a half. I went on a 4 day exchange with one of the Elders in my district, Elder Baldwin. He's doing great. he is training a little greenie. It was good to work with him and help him with his needs, and the needs of his area and comp. After that, I stayed one day up in Roma then I went back down to La Joya! Its a little city closer to McAllen. I stayed there and went on exchanges with Elders outside of my district. It was a little out of the ordinary but it was fun! Then I spent the weekend here with my comp Elder Herrin and we are splitting up again tonight and he will be going down to Alton, another little city outside of McAllen while Im here with Elder Peterson until Wednesday. Crazy couple weeks! I haven't really been with my actual comp for too long haha. But he's a trooper, he's been holding down the fort in Roma and keeping things in order, so im thankful for that.

Also this week the Relief Society had a little play and I played the role of Joseph Smith! It was fun. We just did a little skit on the organization of the Relief Society in 1842. Its cool to see the big changes that are coming about in the Rio Grande branch. One of the ladies that we reactivated got a calling to be the 2nd counselor in the Relief Society! It was awesome to see her come back and be involved in the branch again. I love less active work.

Sorry its short, its a crazy day. Love you guys!

Elder Brian

Letter #87

Very, very distracting emails guys. Thanks, really appreciated. Haha, nah just kidding. Congrats Tan and Kade on the engagement! Im stoked out of my mind for you guys! You two love birds just go so well together.  And thanks for holding out until August, I hope that was just for me ;)

This week was great! It went a little slower than usual, Im not sure why exactly but it was good. This week we went hard on finding new investigators and it really paid off! We found about 20 new people to teach! Talk about "ask and ye shall receive" right? So, that means this week is going to be packed with teaching second lessons and third and fourth hopefully. I think its been quite a while since I've taught a 3rd or 4th lesson to an investigator here in Roma, they always seem to fall off the charts before then but that doesn't mean we are giving up!

We are still working really hard with our friend Amanda. She just got back from spring break so we can get back on track with her and see what we can do to help her be baptized by the end of this month.

The mission is great, life is good! God lives and this is His work and I love it.

Elder Brian

Letter #86

Hey guys!

It was a great week here in Roma!

We had a good zone conference last week in McAllen. Brother Bott, I think that is his name, he came down from Salt Lake and he introduced something called the "Tiwi" Its a little device that is installed in each car and it pretty much monitors your driving and if you drive like a maniac it will call you out and yell at you and tell you to do better haha. Lets just say I've only had it yell at me once ;) It records how many mistakes you make and it reports them to the vehicle coordinator and at the end of the transfer you get a grade and based on your grade they then decide if you get to keep your driving privileges or not. Its basically installed and meant to keep us safe on the roads and to keep us from being stupid.

This week we painted the house of one of the members in Rio Grande! It was awesome. There were lots of holes in the walls and stuff so we patched everything and we painted it all. It looks great! Hopefully that will stop the cockroaches...

The branch is doing well. This last Sunday we reactivated another young man named Josh. He's sweet. He's from our area in Roma, I've been working with him since I've been here and it feels really good to have him back and active in the church again. There is a lot of less active work to do up here in Roma and I think that is what the Lord wants us to be doing. 

I love it here! The mission is great, life is good. There is nothing in the world i would rather do right now than serve. Have a killer week friends. Love you!

Elder Brian

Letter #85

What an awesome week to start the new transfer here in Roma!

So, to let you in on the news, you maybe already know, Im staying in Roma again but I got a new comp and his name is Elder Herrin. He's sick. He's from North Cal, probably like an hour or so above San Fransisco. Now I have 2 comps from that area haha. Elder Davis and Elder Herrin. Elder Herrin has been out for about 7 months, this is his 5th transfer in the mission and he is a good hard worker! The district switched up a bit also! We have a greenie in the district! He's sweet. Its funny to see him act the way I remember I acted when I was a greenie and was barely getting into the mission field just a couple months ago....

Church was crazy yesterday! As a district in total we had 13 people come to church and 7 new officially reactivated members to the branch. Its been really awesome to see this little branch grow. I love it and I'm really stoked that I have the chance to stay here and continue to see these miracles. It was really unexpected, but we got a new branch president! One of the senior elders just got called to be it so I'm stoked to see the new changes he has to bring to the branch.

Some elders in my district, their apartment got shot up this morning and so like 6 cops were surrounding their apartment and went through all the elders stuff looking for drugs. Just another day in the life of a Rio Grande missionary. Life is great!

Love you guys!

Elder Brian

My comp and I were committed to take selfies and wear matching ties everyday last week. Keeping commitments = blessings

Catching up with Elder Christiansen