Happy New Year 2013

Hey Family!

So we are just sitting here at the Horne's home again finishing up our laundry and and eating dinner with them waiting for the new year to arrive!  It was so good to talk to you again! Only one more phone call... Crazy.

Anyways, to answer some questions, i received the Christmas package a couple days ago! That package was a pretty big deal and had some amazing things in it! Thank you! We have yet to locate Elder Yovanno's... but i'm sure it will get here, if not it'll be okay, he received 9 packages this Christmas from several sources so he is well taken care of now :) haha. I love those shorts and shirt! They are awesome! Just curious though, hypothetically speaking, if those clothes are a size or two big would there be any way to exchange them for a smaller size? Those are by far the coolest shorts though! North Carolina AND Michael Jordan! You guys know me way too well!

Anyways, it's a weird feeling that Christmas has past and today is New Years Eve... You don't really feel the holidays as a missionary haha, which is fine because we'll have plenty to celebrate after!

Elder Yovanno and I are still doing really good, still trying to improve here and there but it's slowly changing around here for the better  .He is such a fun companion, you always have to be on your toes with him because you never know what your going to get and there's never a dull moment! We are slowly regaining the members trust around here too, i can feel it, they are warming up to us, talking to us, and helping us. We are now teaching the gospel principles class in the YSA ward and yesterday we were the speakers in sacrament meeting as well. The YSA ward is hilarious and the Family ward has some super legit families. We picked up some more new investigators this past week and we had 3 at church! Hopefully things will keep going well and our investigators will keep progressing! Transfer calls are this weekend and if i had to guess i would bet we are staying together since we have only been together for like 4 weeks, but who really knows anymore. I am still learning a lot everyday. Pres Hall e-mailed me this week and gave me some advice and strategies of what i can do to help us be more obedient and i am very grateful for that so we'll see how that goes this week. I know that our loyalty is first to the Lord, but it is just super hard when it angers your companion... (my biggest struggle right now) Relationships with others is EVERYTHING to me and i don't want to have to be picking between the lord and my comp so i have been trying to figure out how to have both...

Anyways though, Dad, I just finished the Book of Mormon a couple weeks ago and was about to start it again but didn't have a time frame for finishing it. So i am going to join you in your challenge Dad and try to read it all another time before i come home too!

Well happy New Year! Stay safe! Be good! Make good choices! And return with honor! :) Love you all!

Love, Elder Brady

*no regrets*

Northridge Emergency Transfer

Hey Family do i have an intense e-mail for you today!

This past week has probably been the most eventful week of my mission. First off, with all of this drama that has been happening for the past month in the Granada Hills zone, hopefully is coming to a stop now! To start off, the missionary that i have been worried about for the past couple weeks pretty much was packing his stuff to go home last week. He had one of his final interviews with President Hall when Pres. Hall received some revelation for this missionary... Long story short, Pres. Hall got permission from the Missionary department in Salt Lake for this missionary to stay out on his mission under one condition, Pres Hall keeps a close eye on him and he gets one of his best missionaries for his companion. So after much prayer and talking to Elder Yovanno they came to the conclusion that i am the missionary for this scenario. I have been talking with Pres alot lately and he told me that some missionaries have mission problems, but this case is different, Elder Yovanno has a life problem right now and is struggling with a testimony of the church. So another long short, i accepted, and got emergency transferred last Thursday to be with Elder Yovanno in Northridge covering the 1st ward and the YSA ward for the entire valley. So we did a little permanent companion exchange and they moved the ZL area to the Encino Elders because Pres doesn't want us to worry about all the leadership responsibilities and to just focus totally on our companions right now. Even though we still worry about everything because the new ZL's have been calling us about how to do everything. I also was called to be the district Leader here in Northridge and Jhonson is the District Leader for the other side of the zone still in Van Nuys. Crazy crazy stuff. I have now finally gotten settled and have come to realize these past couple days that no missionary work has been done in either of these wards for quite some time. So we are going to be basically starting from scratch now. I feel so bad for Elder Yovanno right now, he has had such a hard mission, with tough companions, and has been through a lot. On top of wanting to go home, the only reason he was out here was to make his grandma proud, who passed away last week as well. I feel like Heavenly Father has increased my Charity/Love/patience for Elder Yovanno right now because i love him sooooo much and want to do EVERYTHING i can to help him through this life struggle and so he doesn't go home. Secretly we were super excited to have this opportunity to be companions and we have been having a lot of fun this past week and because we were already great friends to begin with. We have already has so many great talks and crazy spiritual experiences together. I have known Elder Yovanno for a long time now and have been his ZL for 6 months of his mission. He has been out for about 14 months. This Christmas is definitely going to be a different one that's for sure. If i could ask one favor of you guys for Christmas this year it would be that you would please not worry about me, i am fine. Could you please though maybe make a package for Elder Yovanno this Christmas since i don't think he'll be getting anything. I am trying to come up with a couple ideas that i could do for him and I have cleaned  up their entire apartment since it was a dump and have brought all the lights/christmas tree to bring a little christmas spirit in there.

 I have so much i want to say right now, i just don't have the time. Here is some more word vomit for this week haha

Talk to you again soon! Merry Christmas!

P.s. my new apartment address is...

9801 Zelzah Ave. Apt# 101

Northridge, CA 91325

Love, Elder Brady

((((((((((((((((((NO REGRETS)))))))))))))))))))))))

Rhenz's Confirmation

Good Morning!

Thank you for your words of wisdom mom!

This week was a lot better! But after some reflecting, circumstances didn't really change, but my attitude did! It's all about perspective and sometimes our vision gets a little blurred... but as we know, "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he" (Proverbs 23:7)

Anyways, Rhenz's confirmation went well! He is now a member of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter day saints and has the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost so what's not to be happy about! It is such a humbling experience to exercise the Priesthood for these ordinances. Every time i am able to give a blessing like this, i know that it is all Heavenly Father taking over and i am just an instrument in his hands. When the blessings begin, I just remember thinking about how i feel like i am floating and my mind is completely blank... yet i am still saying words...? I know the Priesthood is real and i am so grateful to be apart of these spiritual experiences. Elder Johnson was able to baptize Rhenz last Sunday. Rhenz has some family attend his baptism such as his aunt that he is living with and his grandparents. His dad passed away and his mom is in the Philippines going through a divorce right now. He is such a strong kid and we have grown really close to him, he's our best friend! Right now we're trying really hard to hook him up with some other good friends that are good examples for when we get transferred to another area.

To answer some other questions, we will be getting more missionaries here in this mission. We are around 190 right now and will be up to 250 by the time June rolls around. That is awesome though that you guys are getting missionaries in your stake, maybe I'll see a missionary for the 3rd time in Utah when i return! haha

 As far as Christmas goes... I can't believe it's that time again. It feels like fall still! We attempt to listen to Christmas music but it's just so different in California without snow or any cold weather yet! I still have no need for any gifts, i am good on clothes for the most part, and don't need any shirts or anything of that nature because i still have the ones you sent me! I'm keeping those new for later :)

Lastly, we planned a Temple trip for our ward that took place last Saturday! We went down to the L.A. Temple to see the lights and walked our investigators/less active members around the visitors center! It was awesome. Always good to feel the spirit the Temple brings.

I've got to go! Love you lots! Talk to you again soon!

Love, Elder Brady

................................................no regrets................................................

Intense eye opening week

Wud up.

So sorry for forgetting to tell you that we wouldn't be able to e-mail yesterday... we had a mission conference with Don R. Clarke who is the head over missionary work. He's going to be here all week and we have Zone leader council with him tomorrow up in Santa Clarita. Anyways, so we changed our P-day to Tuesday this week.

This week has been so insane i literally don't even know where to start... its even been taking me a while to organize my thoughts at night when attempting to write in my journal. I guess the first thing to mention is the highlight! That Rhenz's baptism went perfect! I will be confirming him next week at church during sacrament meeting! He is doing amazing and his baptism was definitely a day to remember. It was probably one of the most personal baptisms i have ever witnessed. So to explain why, we play basketball with Rhenz and a bunch of Filipino kids every Wednesday night. About 30 kids show up to play with us every week. So we organize tournaments and out of all these kids that we are hanging out with, only like 6 of them are members. Rhenz has made a lot of friends by coming with us and he invited them all to participate in his baptism. It was so awesome to see all of his new friends supporting him by speaking/praying/and witnessing his baptism. We are all now teaming up to baptize everyone who comes to play basketball at the church Wednesday nights. You can tell most of these kids have rough backgrounds growing up in the valley and are involved in gangs with tattoos/piercings and stuff of that nature... but it is awesome to see how they change when they come to play ball with us. If one of them accidentally swears or says something inappropriate, they all get on their back and they feel super bad and keep apologizing to us. It's just a fun positive atmosphere that is great for these kids to be in and you know they feel the spirit.

Other things that have been on my mind this week is how wicked this valley really is... we live right by the Burbank Airport so planes are always coming in and swooping right over our apartment to land every 15 minutes. We have pretty much tuned that out and don't even really hear it anymore. But the other night we hear a helicopter that was hovering above our apartment and spot light glimmering past our windows along with cops on megaphones making announcements... pretty common noises as well, but this time it wasn't going away so we finally got up around 11:30 to see what was going on. We look our our window to find the road outside our apartment blocked off by cop cars surrounding a guy who was stealing a car right out front of our apartment and took him to jail. Then another instance, we were driving down the freeway to our appointment a couple nights ago and we were stuck in traffic. We knew something big was happening because there was 3 helicopters(or commonly known as ghetto birds around here) spaced out hovering above the freeway. As we got closer to some flares at the scene we see a lady get taken away in a stretcher and thinking it was another accident, but we were super shocked when we see the car all shot up with blown out windows... Then i got sick to my stomach when we saw that there was a car seat in the back of the car and this poor lady got shot. We did some research at our appointment and told them and turned on the news to find out that the baby was unharmed. Thank goodness. Here is the article about it that we just found about it.

 

 http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2012/11/30/woman-hurt-baby-escapes-injury-in-car-to-car-shooting-on-170-freeway/

 

Anyways, this is a super sketchy place and we still hear about tons of crazy things people have done around here. We had dinner with the Haro family and Brother Haro witnessed the "1997 North Hollywood shooting" from his little kiosk across the street that still has bullet holes in the walls that protected him as he was hiding... Here's one about that one too...

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Hollywood_shootout

 

We have life so easy in our safe little draper bubble in Utah. I definitely want to raise my family in Utah.

Sorry probably too much information, but just to share a little bit of how much my eyes have been opened on the mission and how much i appreciate growing up in a safe environment with an amazing family active in the church that raised me with good morals.

Concerning our zone, the Granada hills zone is leading the valley in baptisms! At least one of our 5 companionship's has been baptizing someone every week since Elder Johnson and I have been here! They are on fire. We have been on some baby sitting Arron's from Pres. Hall this last week and last night we were with some missionaries until 4am and one of them is probably going home this coming week due to bad decisions he made... We are so sad and worried about this missionary and have done all we can to help him out. We love him so much but now we are turning it over to Pres. Hall tomorrow and he'll probably go home this week... I feel like i am going to cry. In Valencia, a quote i heard about being a good zone leader is" no matter how many sheep you find, don't lose any of the Shepperd's!" -Brother Richard Rich. Now our powerfully strong zone of 10 missionaries (smallest in the mission) will be down to 9 and we might be in a tri-panionship covering 3 wards again... definitely hardest time of my mission. I'll have lots of details to share when i get home. But still trying to stay positive! :)

I love you all! Thank you again for the packages! The homemade salsa is amazing and a huge hit when i made nachos for the missionaries in our zone. They say thank you!

Love, Elder Brady

                                                                                                                                         `~`~ NO REGRETS ~`~`

Thanksgiving

Sup Fam!

So thank you so much for the awesome packages! Right after Elder Johnson and I finished talking at a baptism, President Jex came over to me and pulled me aside as gave me the surprise packages! So unfortunately, I didn't get to see Bill, but all the missionaries sure were jealous when Pres. Jex hooked me up haha. I feel like I have a lot of connections right now after serving around California for a year and a half. Definitely feel like these people are my extended family out here. So we got transfer calls this week and we are... staying together! Yes! Still keeping it up with being for each of my companions for 2 transfers or more! I feel like just 6 weeks wouldn't be enough time to get to know someone anyways. So we are super happy about that! We will be together for Christmas and New Years! Nice!

This week has been super chaotic... Started off with knocking around on random street doors and coming across a bunker house with "gate keepers". So of course we love mysterious/potentially awkward situations, so we knocked on and talked with the gatekeeper... long story short he let us in and a bunch of his buddies were inside camping out in tents and it looked like a giant fort house! It was so awesome! And of course they were playing PS3 and Xbox games haha. But after we finished hanging out with them we came to find out that they were a socialist group that was rebelling against the government/banks and were on "strike" camping out in their foreclosed home "for a total of 87 days now". Then on our way out they had to hurry and slide their gate closed and lock down because cops were coming down the road. The cops warned us not to go near there because they are very dangerous people... needless to mention that we were just inside hanging out with them for a while having a great conversation about God and that they were super nice... Crazy experiences as a missionary.

Then on Thanksgiving morning we were having a Mexican turkey bowl activity where we play soccer instead of football. And right after we finished we get a call from president needing assistance from us. One missionary got emergency transferred so elder Yovanno joined elder Johnson and I this past week. So we were in a Trio this past week! It has been so much fun! Definitely a week to remember. Long story short, we have been covering 3 wards with Elder Yovanno this past week. Van Nuys 1st, Northridge 1st, and the Northridge YSA ward. Talk about a crazy Sunday yesterday! haha and a Thanksgiving night to remember with 3 Thanksgiving dinners, one in each ward! This week has been super draining but Elder Yovanno will get a new companion tomorrow at the transfer meeting.

Lastly, Rhenz is still getting baptized this Sunday! He is super solid! He wants us to help him so he can serve a mission too! He asked me if I would confirm him on Sunday! I have done quite a few baptisms but this will be my first time confirming someone a member of the Church! So I am super excited about that! Well I got to get going but I'll talk to you again very soon!

Love ya!

Love, Elder Brady

---NO REGRETS---

Thanksgiving!

Aloha!

Thank you for all those great letters! Sounds like you guys are definitely staying busy at home! I can't believe Lynds and Braden are going to move here to L.A.!  That's crazy! Definitely a lot different from Utah... just look at the picture I sent dad when he receives his birthday gift this week haha. Ridiculous, and that's just a taste of your in-town "scenery" around here... Anyways, this week is going to be a short e-mail. We have transfers coming up this week and one of our sisters is getting transferred early so we have to help her out today. She is going to the grand land of Valencia! She is Korean and they need her to open a new area up in Santa Clarita!

This week, an awesome member is going to feed us on Thanksgiving Day! So we are super pumped about that.

Our investigator, Rhenz, is doing very well and is ready to get baptized on Dec. 2! Elder Johnson and I have really been having a lot of fun here in the valley. We also were helping at the mission office and we played our cards right with the office staff and we scored a new car because they love us so much! Our last car was a beat up valley car with 50,000+ miles on it! So we got a new 2013 Cruz! It's awesome and all the missionaries are super jealous of our "connections" :) . Also one more thing I will mention is that we had an "operation gratitude" this past week! Where volunteers throughout the community came together to make care packages and stuff for the National Guard! We made some parachute bands, and most importantly, sorted tons of candy! With all the candy that was donated we could have filled up my entire room with it! But we had to go through all that was donated to make sure it is legitimate. We found a couple of toys and such we had to take out as well as anything that would symbolize a body part because it could be "traumatizing". So we probably spent over 2 hours sorting hand fulls of candy and throwing it into trailers. Epic.

Sorry, I have to go! We are going to have a California snowball fight zone activity! (Aka. socks full of flower) Love you all!

Love, Elder Brady

No regrets

Granada Hills

Hiya! So this week has been super busy for Elder Johnson and I! We got the GPS and it is so helpful thank you!!! We made some trips up to Santa Clarita for ZLC, and i am really starting to like those! It was so much fun to see all the other zone leaders serving around the mission! Kunz goes home in 2 weeks! Dang!!! Same with my father, Elder Kennard! Crazy stuff... very sad. 

This week we set 2 more baptismal dates with a father and a son! December is looking like a great month for multiple baptisms so we are lovin life right now! Elder Johnson and I are really kicking things off well, we are working hard and having tons of fun! We had companionship exchanges with the Elders in Northridge YSA ward this week that are covering the whole valley and we visited a referral up in Topanga/woodlin Hills area (aka the richest area in the mission) and that is such a nice area! As we were driving up through the hills this elder i was with took me to the top where you could see the whole valley and then you turn around and you could see downtown L.A. off in the distance and the Beach/Ocean! It was crazy to see how close we really are to all that stuff! Oh haha and come to think of it, on that JPS, it listed a previous search of Anaheim (Aka Disneyland!) as only 30 miles away! Our zone is awesome. We trained them last Friday and it's a whole lot easier keeping a group of 12 under control rather than 22! We have also been having a lot of fun and we have been bringing basketball games here every Monday for those who want to play, and it's becoming tradition now! Elder Johnson is... you guessed it, my best friend. Just like the past 5 companions of mine have been. We have so much in common too it's crazy! He played football as well loves Michael Jordan apparel! We even both have Mosiah 2:17 as our missionary plaque! It's hilarious how much we have in common but i will just leave it at that for now. :) 

Sorry we've been super busy today and i proposed the idea of making zone shirts and everyone is super excited so we'll probably be doing that here as well. So we got to go now! 

I love you all! Have a great day! Talk to you again in a couple minutes! (1 week in missionary time:) 

Love, Elder Brady

no regrets

The update

Hello family!

Thank you so much for those pictures! I'm glad you guys had a great Halloween! We all laughed so hard when I pulled up that Halloween jib jab card from Braden... I definitely was not expecting that. We did do the monster mash pretty well though! Our Halloween was pretty fun as well! We were not allowed to go out after six so our whole zone got together and we played games, got pizza, and just partied! Our missionaries in this zone are awesome! It's so fun hanging out with them. I'm still trying to get the hang of this ward... It's all over the place ha. They are mostly off doing their own thing and I think Elder Johnson and I need to do some work to gain their trust or something because we only have like 4 dinners this whole month! Very different from Valencia, where they were fighting over spots to feed us for even the upcoming months! Well, we'll just have to change that somehow and show them how awesome missionaries are!

This past week we had some miracles! We have been teaching a less active family trying to get them to come back to church and their extended family are not members. The less active work is golden here! So while we were teaching, a 17-year-old Filipino kid named Rhenz, came in and joined in the lesson wearing a Kevin Durrant Jersey. So we started talking about basketball and we ended up playing some pick up games with him. Long story short, after getting to know him and becoming friends with him, he now has a baptismal date for December 2nd! We were trying to figure out if he was really serious about baptism and we invited him to come to church. Then yesterday, Rhenz showed up, and the less active family we have been working with, brought him! Magical! Two birds with one stone! So the work here is starting to pick up. :)

This is the major event of this week, and mom, don't worry, something that I have come to find out is that change is a good thing! Just like how Pres. Monson changed the missionary age limit... shocking at first, different, but it's perfectly what Heavenly Father wants for us and it ALWAYS works out. Also, we can't get too comfortable, we need new experiences! If they only fixed things when they were broken, I would probably still be in Saugus 3rd with Norton where everything seemed to be going perfectly! But now I was there and now I am here and wouldn't change these choice experiences for the world. Your counselor needs that new experience and will do great at her new calling!

 So I can't believe Logan is 2... That's crazy. Mom, I’m glad you liked that card, it definitely was one of my favorites! Dad, you too have something special coming your way this month! ;) Oh and a GPS would be Super nice to have, but I don't need a new one... If I got a new one, I should have gotten it at the beginning of my mission... but it's pretty late for that! I could just give back your GPS when I come home to save money!... just thought I would throw that idea out there.

Well, this is all for now! Keep Reading, Praying, and going to church cause that's how we endure to eternal life!

Love, Elder Brady

No Regrets

Mom's Birthday/Halloween

Happy Birthday Momma Brady!

I have a surprise coming your way in the mail mom so get excited!!!

This email is going to be a little bit shorter because we are going to carve pumpkins as a zone in a half hour...

But to answer a couple of questions, Elder Johnson is from Spokane, Washington and goes home one month before me in May! Crazy! Time is flying!

Our zone is called the Granada Hills Zone which consists of Hollywood, Van Nuys, Encino, Sherman Oaks, Mission Hills, Granada Hills, and even the Northridge area... We only have 12 missionaries down here, in our zone, and all of them except for the Sherman Oak Elders have a car. So it's a lot different from good ol' Valencia with 23 missionaries! haha. We have the most diverse missionaries in the mission down here in many diverse areas. We have an Arabic Elder, a Korean Sister and Elder, and 3 Polynesian sisters; one from new Zealand with an awesome accent, one from Hawaii, and another from Tonga! The Van Nuys ward is probably 60% Filipino, 30% Latino, and 10% white haha... So we don't know how we managed to get placed here but it's definitely a fun experience!

Our ward had a "trunk or treat" Halloween Party last Saturday and so Elder Johnson and I took advantage of the situation since we have a car and joined in! We threw NBA Jerseys on over our Proselyting clothes and passed out pictures of Jesus, Pass-a-long cards along with a bag of candy! Everyone seemed to get a kick out of it and wanted pictures with us and our trunk set up. I thought the best part is when we would get the kids all excited to get a picture of Jesus in their basket and they run off and tell their friends, "Hey you guys! I got a picture of Jesus!" "NO way! I did too!" "Yes! WOW!" haha

So we are looking forward to Halloween on Wednesday and Elder Johnson's birthday tomorrow! Party week whoohoo!

I am also thinking to get a GPS... i bought a map a couple days ago but this Valley is super nuts! We have actually been getting a lot of questions that have been arising from the combination of Romney running for President and the new "Book of Mormon Play" on Broadway showing in L.A. (not sure if you have heard about that but it's super popular here with signs everywhere!) But as President Hinckley said,"Any publicity is good publicity!"

Well this is the major updates for now!

Love you all! Have a great week!

Love, Elder Brady

Van Nuys 1st Ward

Hello Family!

So I got my transfer call and it was exactly what I hoped would happen! I am now serving in the legendary Valley that I have heard so much about my entire mission! The San Fernando Valley, which is what our mission is actually named after so I am stoked! Come to find out, its even more ghetto than East Lancaster! I didn't think that was possible!

They also put me with an awesome missionary whom I am already really great friends with! Elder Scottie Johnson! He has been out one month longer than me so we have seen/hung out with each other a lot in the past year and a half. Right before the transfer meeting we were talking to each other how awesome it would be to serve together and we had our fingers crossed, and it actually happened! Elder Johnson has only been in the valley for one transfer and so we are both getting thrown into the "pit" together. They have a lot of different nicknames for places down here that we are coming to find out. They also say that Van Nuys is the Heart of the Valley, so we will get the full effect really quickly :) The first night I was here, there was a car chase where a cop slammed a car into a barrier and 12 cop cars showed up to the scene where the victim started shooting at the cops so they all unloaded back, destroying this poor car... The missionaries in the ward next to us witnessed it and they had to bear testimony of what happened and couldn't leave the area until the cops were done "cleaning up"...

It's interesting how I feel total peace and comfort with where I am at serving Heavenly Father at this time, even though it's a super sketchy place, I know nothing can harm us when we are doing the work of the lord. It'll all work out as we walk down the streets in our little spirit bubble ;)

Elder Johnson and I just got called as the new Zone leaders in the Granada Hills Stake. One of the last zone leaders down here just went home and the other one got transferred so they just changed the zone leader area from the Sherman Oaks ward to the Van Nuys ward now. We have both served as ZL's for 6+ months now so we feel that we are going to do great together. He was a ZL up in Ridgecrest area (bishop/mammoth)!

Well, I feel like I am going to get some crazy stories and experiences serving down here in the Valley... I can't wait to show you guys these areas where I'm serving... It'll blow your mind. My mind is currently in shock. I feel like I am seriously in a movie at times, being in the world but not of it!

Oh! Yesterday we had our usual 7 AM meeting with the stake presidency and this one was so much better! President Jex is the stake president that we get to work with! We had a lot to talk about its funny odds that I am actually here like we envisioned before the mission started! President Jex is such a cool guy. Also, after I bore my testimony in my new ward, people came up to me and like half of them had some kind of connection to draper! One even asked if I was related to an Andy Brady? I was like heck yes I am! I am still a learning the names of the 200 people I met yesterday, but I am sure they will become "extended family" to me as well, just like in previous areas...

Things are going really well! I love you all! Hope you have a great week!

P.s. Touchdown Jesus and First down Moses was hilarious! Thanks for that.

Love, Elder Brady

---NO REGRETS---

Transfer 12 calls

HAPPY BIRTHDAY B-HOUSE!

So this week has been super interesting to say the least. We got transfer calls and I guess it is finally my time for me to leave after spending 1/4 of my mission the Newhall 2nd ward! :( well it's kind of expected after being here for six months! Serving as a zone leader here has been a huge learning experience and a delightful treat that's for sure! Elder Kunz and I were hoping that we would stay together for his last six weeks next transfer so we're pretty bummed about that. So I have no idea what to expect this next transfer or what's in store... We'll find out this Thursday and I'll let you know where I'm at and who my new companion is! (Probably another best friend from how all my past comps have been! :) 

Last night we had some of the missionaries that are going home tomorrow stay with us down here in Newhall since we live right by the office and they had to be there early this morning. It was fun to spend some time with them and hear all their "exciting plans" for when they get home and feel the energy they have after serving for 2 years! haha so we didn't get too good of sleep last night to say the least.  

Anyways an update on this past week: first we had another zone conference and besides the trainings, I had the opportunity to conduct it for my first time! Elder Kunz and I had a good time running the show last Thursday. It was probably one of the longest meetings we have had yet! 8-5! Now there is a full day of meetings for ya! That's definitely one thing I am not going to miss about the zone leader calling...billions of meetings!

WE HAD A MIRACLE THIS WEEK!!!

When I first got to this area we were visiting less active members and we came across a lady named Jen Peterson. Over time she has been coming back to church and she is living with her boyfriend, and her boyfriend's son who are both non-members. Over time we have taught them all the lessons and their son, Bryan Tavelli, got baptized about 2 months ago. Brett has always claimed to have his own beliefs but totally believes everything we teach. So they have been coming to church as a family for the past 4-5 months every week and we teach them every week at a member’s home. Then yesterday during church, Brett came up to us and told us he needed to talk to us right away. So we went over to their house right after church and he proceeded to tell us that he got his answer and is finally ready to commit and join the Mormon Church! We were so shocked and when Jen heard his announcement she started crying and the spirit was so strong! We are so stoked and he said he knows that I am leaving but wants me to come back to baptize him! So now they are going to talk to the bishop and get married as soon as possible so he can get baptized! So Jen is coming back to church and her family is all coming together and becoming members! The less active work is true! :)

So this is the big news for this week! Very exciting!

Well I have to get going! We have an appointment we have to get going to.

Talk to you soon!

Love, Elder Brady

NO REGRETS

General Conference

Hey Fam!

What an awesome General Conference weekend eh!?! We got to watch the Saturday sessions at the Sirias's home, and then went to Priesthood at the stake center with the Whitmore/Dunn family! All the missionaries in our zone were there, of course, but it just made me realize how much different these Priesthood sessions are here then they were at home. I don't even remember ever seeing missionaries more than 3 times in my LIFE! So it was just different to see 22 missionaries they’re having a good time together... This is something that I have definitely grown attached to, having missionaries everywhere! Anyways, we then watched the Sunday sessions at the Ramirez's home! This ward is so awesome, we had multiple families invite us over to watch it with them, but like I said before, we can only be so many places at once! So we just ended up hanging out with the Ramirez family. I have been thinking that each General Conference has been getting better and better! This one seemed to talk A LOT about missionary work. It's also interesting to see (depending on what stage of life you're in) what message the spirit brings to you, and what overall theme sticks out to you personally from listening to the same talks as everyone else! The theme that stuck out to me this time was: becoming a more FULLY CONVERTED disciple of Jesus Christ, and once you are, to strengthen those around you.

My mission has definitely converted me. I have come to find out that I was kind of wishy washy before the mission... I would follow Jesus Christ because I was supposed to... Now I follow Jesus Christ because I WANT to! Just doing "missionary things" can get you only so far... Like President Uchtdorf has said," The what informs while the WHY transforms." That has been my focus lately. Not just doing missionary things, but also actually BEING a missionary. Not just knowing what to do, but WHY you're doing it in your heart. Overall thesis: BECAUSE WE LOVE HIM! Not because we "have to" or are obligated to. Because WE LOVE HIM! Taking his words to heart, not just memorizing/reciting them all day long, but taking them to heart. We can talk about things until we are blue in the face but that still won't get us anywhere. We need to understand them and apply them with REAL INTENT or it profiteth us nothing! (Moroni 7)

Sorry, I just realized that I am sounding kind of preachy... this mission stuff is really getting to me :)

So a couple of updates before I run out of time. First off, it's kind of hard to write about our investigators right now because they are taking us on one heck of a roller coaster!  We have approximately 5 investigators who are progressing towards baptism right now so the work in our area is still doing really good! All of which we have found by knocking on doors/contacting on the street. And all of which have a problem with the word of wisdom commandment and have the desire to get baptized but can't because of these addictions that Satan has them bound with. It truly is the most frustrating thing to witness, and I bet, Super annoying to actually deal with! So we have been exercising some faith that some miracles will happen with these people as they take action and attend addiction recovery classes through the church. Because of my mission, I now fully know why they say, "Say No to drugs"! Because seeing that once they start, their life goes basically goes straight down the drain with limited/no happiness along the way.

Oh before I forget! Last Tuesday when we had one of the missionary department visitors from Salt Lake come out with us for the day, we got the coolest evaluator you could ask for! And we basically knew each other from the pre-existence (aka. before the mission)! He knows Braden Hansen and come to find out he was his young men's leader or something! His name is Mark Pendleton and he was the stake president that named the Hidden Valley Stake in Draper! And raised his family there! So we had a great time with him and clicked right off the bat so it was actually an enjoyable day instead of stressful! We were just ourselves and had a really good time with him. Then last Thursday we had Leadership Training where like half the mission attended and he trained us all by the mistakes that he noticed while being out with us ha-ha. He said, "none of it was our fault, it's just how our mission's culture is". The AP's got a real stickler evaluator that tore them up, they said it was a rough day... and come to find out the other ZL's with the evaluator had "a huge learning experience as well" ;) ha-ha I guess all the missionaries here are just training each other wrong! Nah jk. There were only a couple things that needed to be fixed such as how our mission sets goals and plans for the day. So that was an awesome learning experience! He did tell us how enjoyable we were to be out with and that we were definitely not "Robot missionaries" (which is always good to hear ha-ha). He also told us that he can tell that we are honest, truly love the people that we work with, have great relationships with the missionaries in our zone, and are doing really well to help meet each of their needs.

Well this e-mail is really long! We didn't have time to e-mail yesterday (as you probably know) because we had too many activities! Basketball, volleyball, then even football this time too! We're crazy!

Well love you all!

Love, Elder Brady

Meetings/Trainings

Thanks for all the amazing letters and that good thoughts letter with some extra "support"! :) I definitely was not expecting that one! Thanks again!

So to answer some questions real quick, transfers are on the week of the October 15th. Elder Kunz goes home after next transfer (8weeks) (59 days) "but who's counting really?" haha he's hilarious. And Elder Otis goes home in 2 weeks! Crazy. Everyone is starting to leave me! Jackson goes home in 2 weeks as well... and even Kennard goes home with Kunz! Kennard is a ZL in the valley right next to me now! Father like son! So we see each other more often now.

Anyways, I can't believe Ty Robinson is home now! That is insane! I'm sad i missed his homecoming. I got a e-mail from zach petersen too and it has been good to catch up with him as well.

So we had another Marshmallow war today out in Castaic! Everyone is getting really good and it's becoming very intense like a real war!! haha people sniping from roof tops, buried in leaves, building turtle shells for cover and moving them into their base to steal the enemies flag... etc. It's so dang fun. We are doing one more for the last P-day of this transfer.

This past week has been insane again and this week is looking like it will be just the same as last week. Last week we had all our meetings ZLC, Stake Presidency MTG, and even our "Member MTC Training" to the relief society/priesthood combined for the 3rd hour at church! This week we have a leadership training from 8-4 again on Thursday, ZTM (Zone Training Meeting) from 10-1 where we train the our zones on Friday, Oh and Tomorrow 3 Missionary department evaluators are coming from Salt Lake to evaluate our mission and see how it is doing... so they have selected 3 areas through prayer to tag along for a day and what do you know, they selected the AP's, Santa Clarita ZL's, and last but not least, VALENCIA ZL's! Yup that's us... bummer. Tomorrow is going to be interesting. We have just been calling up everyone and setting up appointments for every hour so it will go by fast. So stressful! haha jk, it'll be good.

Oh we can't forget the main event of the week though! GENERAL CONFERENCE! A missionaries living water! We are so excited, we are not sure where we will be watching it this time, all i know is that we definitely are not going to miss it that's for sure!

Elder Kunz and i have been having a blast together. It's at that point where you are with someone for a solid 3 months and start to think the same again. We are known as the "fun" zone leaders because there are some out there that are super strict and party poopers. So we have a great time with the many relationships that we have and we have come to find out that the better the friend you are, the more likely they are to trust you anyways. So it's a win win situation IF you make obedience fun! For our last ZLC, Elder Kunz and i totally rocked the perfect missionary come-over look. We got up there all serious-like to represent our zone and give a report and everyone laughed because they know that that's just not how we are. It's great. We are definitely making the most of these boring missionary meetings. haha.

Sorry if this letter is all over the place, but i have so many thoughts and so little time! Hopefully it makes sense!

Well there's the update for this week! Love ya all! PeAcE!

Love, Elder Brady

N O  R E G R E T S

Birthday Celebrations

This week was definitely full of activities! To start off, Elder Kunz's birthday was last Tuesday and I have been making under the radar plans for the whole week prior! It turned out to be "the best birthday ever" with approximately 6 surprise parties!!! ha-ha. To start off the day, we did some service and then I took him to the park where our whole zone was waiting and surprised him and we blind folded him and had a piñata for him to smash and ate pizza. Then we went to a members where they were waiting with some other missionaries and surprised him again! Then we "stopped by some other missionaries apartment" where they got him again. Then for dinner, the whole office staff came together that night and threw him a little party as well! That was even all! We had another later set appointment after dinner with Brett, Jen, and Bryan (recent convert/PM family) and we had the lesson at another members house where they were prepared with more surprises!!! It was such a crazy day! He made like 5 wishes by blowing out 5 different sets of candles! We don't even have enough room in our kitchen for all our cakes/cupcakes we received! It was straight up madness! The best part was that he NEVER even suspected ONE of these several surprise parties! He couldn't believe how everyone found out and how they just kept coming!

So besides this awesome day I also had the opportunity to go on exchanges with the APs on Wednesday. They sure do have a busy life and have very little time to do missionary work. I thought zone leader was bad, assistant to the president is definitely a hand full! We helped a couple missionaries pack up their stuff and get ET'd (emergency transferred)  to another area because of certain issues... We also had a set of elders sleep with us that night as well because something was wrong with their apartment... It was a great learning experience but I don't ever wish to do that full time. ha-ha.

Anyways, Elder Kunz and I spoke in Sacrament meeting again because some "high councilman" bailed.., but this time was a big land mark for me! I gave a 15 minute talk without writing anything down! I never thought I would be able to get to that point. ha-ha. So I'm pretty stoked about that :) And I guess we did a pretty good job because we got quiet a few compliments from some individuals saying that was exactly what they needed to hear. We keep telling them it's 100% the spirit and we are just spoiled to be his instrument. Man, It's tough having him get all the credit as the 3rd member of our companionship I tell you ;)

Besides all this fun stuff we have a crazy ton of meeting this week and the first of the month is approaching which means CHAOS! So brace yourselves...

We have also been getting a ton of requests to do the marshmallow war activity again so Elder Kunz and I are getting ready to do that again one of these P-day's before the transfer ends. This is our first "normal" p-day where we actually have time to e-mail this month!;) 

Well I got to get going! I'll talk to you again extremely soon!

Love, Elder Brady

---NO REGRETS---

Marshmallow War

Hello family!

We just got done with all our p-day activities and now we are waiting for our laundry to finish at the Sirias's. It's been a crazy day today! We had our zone activity earlier today out in Castaic and did our paintball style marshmallow war! It was sooo Epic! By far the best zone activity we have participated in! It was definitely a hit! We are probably going to do it again at the end of this transfer and let people make their upgrades and prepare for better for our next war! It was amazing to see how much fun everyone was having! They all got so into it, all decked out in their war outfits, snipers, and other guns running from one cover to the next trying to capture the enemies flag. I could talk about how ridiculously fun it was for this whole e-mail, but I shall move on because it's getting late. 

Tomorrow is Elder Kunz's birthday and I have set up a couple surprise parties for him that he has no idea about. So this is going to be good! It's going to be a special day! 

I have heard about the BYU game a couple times now and that is a serious bummer... we are actually taking some investigators  to our elders quorum party this Thursday night so we will have to be there with them of course, and they might be watching the game :) so we'll see how that goes! 

This past week we had interviews with President Hall and all the missionaries and it has been incredibly busy! Our zone is tons of fun with a lot of hilarious personalities to contribute.

We also attended a baptism last Sunday and took one of our investigators (who should be getting baptized on the 30th of this month) to the baptism and he brought his son with him to show him what he will be doing at the end of the month. His 10 year old son then asks, "Dad, can I get baptized with you?" Music to a missionary’s ear I tell you. :)

So we are witnessing some miracles with some souls coming closer to Christ in the Newhall 2nd area!

Things are going really well and time is flying here as well... We are just trying to make the most of every day!  Well, speaking of time we have to get back home before it gets any later, so here's this weeks update and I’ll talk to you again soon!

Love, Elder Brady

-no regrets-

Octavio Sirias's baptism!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KRISTIN !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey Mom! Sorry about yesterday again, with our one free hour to e-mail yesterday, right as we sat down and started reading the letters, we got a call from the Sarmiento family. Sister Sarmiento said she just got home from work and when she walked into her house, it was flooded! The water heater burst. So we rushed over there and helped her move all her furniture out of her water filled rooms. It's all good now though and they fixed the problem and insurance is helping them out. I am so glad you got to meet her though! They are such an awesome family. I think the reason I like them so much is because they are so much like my family! It's interesting to see how different missionaries mesh with other families. They weren't very close to too many previous missionaries but they sure are now! That is also the case with a lot of other families out here that tell us how they used to have the missionaries over everyday but don't see them too much anymore. So we try to keep the ties with everyone and be everywhere at once. Also, on top of that, we try to strengthen our relationships with the missionaries in our zone and hang out with them every once in a while. It's so hard to please everyone though!

Anyways, this last week has been awesomely busy for us. I got your package!! Thank you it's perfect! Sister Sarmiento is hilarious and it sounds like you talked about A LOT! Considering that she said you better not marry that non-member girl! ha-ha I just laughed and she made me promise I would marry in the temple... Thank you Mom #2 :) That's mother Sarmiento for ya!

Then Octavio Sirias got baptized last Saturday and probably 100+ people showed up! It was definitely a spiritual feast in there! It was awesome. We have also become really close to the Sirias family and spend a lot of time with them as well.  He then got confirmed on Sunday and Kunz and I were supposed to talk in Sacrament meeting but they ran out of time and they Bishop said to save our talks for another time. ha-ha interesting.

Then lastly, the new transfer meeting went extremely well and is something that will be an awesome tradition! We have two brand new missionaries in our zone now and we have been having fun with them helping them feel comfortable out here in "big this scary mission field". It has helped me to remember my first couple days and the roller coaster that was! They are doing awesome though and they are going to be epic missionaries. It's been fun helping them out this past week. 

 We trained the zone last Friday and a lot of the missionaries in our zone changed this past transfer and we now have 22 missionaries! Elder Kunz and I have some pretty awesome zone activities we are currently working on! This next Monday we are doing a marshmallow war. Yesterday we got with the zone and taught them how to make Marshmallow guns out of PVC pipe. ha-ha. So everyone is preparing and customizing their guns this week. Kunz and I are setting up an arena out in Castaic and we're going to do it paintball style with some Free for all/ capture the flag/ 2v2v2 games. It's going to be awesome and it is currently the talk and hot topic of the mission right now.

Thanks again for the package! It's awesome!

Have a great week! Love you all. Talk to you again before you know it

Love, Elder Brady

Transfer 11 calls/new transfer program

Hello again! 

Sorry this Tuesday e-mail thing is becoming so routine! Our P-day's are so dang crazy and on top of that, the Sirias's Internet was down and it was a holiday so the library was closed! But yesterday we threw a surprise party for a sisters birthday in the zone! We got the whole zone to come and we went and set up at Fosters Freeze (a place similar to ice-berg, where everyone goes to hang out)! She was totally shocked to see us all there already with birthday hats and cupcakes and streamers etc. We got the workers in on it too, it was awesome. I got pictures of it all and I'll have to get them together and send them home soon, I'm slackin on that. 

Anyways, now it's time to tell you the news of what happened with transfers! Crazy things have been happening and President Hall is revamping a ton of things! He is changing how we do transfers. He told us all how it's going to be done at Zone Leader Council last week and we were all confused yet excited, then we took the message back to our zones and told all our missionaries last Friday and they too were all confused/excited. So what's going on for now is that we are not transferring on Mondays anymore. We are now transferring later in the week on Thursday... We will still find out on Saturday if we are leaving or staying so we can say our goodbye's on Sunday at church if we need to, but we will not know where we are going or who our companion will be. We will continue working through the week, then when Thursday comes, all the missionaries getting transferred in the mission will pack their stuff and meet at our Stake center in a spirit of prayer. We will then sing called to serve as a whole (which brings such a strong spirit, and super powerful to hear, with that many missionaries singing together) and as this is being done, the new missionaries, fresh off the plane, will enter the room and Pres Hall will then start to announce who is companions with who and where they will be serving! As these announcements go, each individual missionary stands up and then sits with his new comp. So everyone will find out together in an awesome atmosphere instead of a phone call from your zone leader...  I'm not sure if this makes any sense, because we sure had a lot of questions about it as well. But we'll see how it goes. This is the first time trying this, so it's basically a test run. I'll let you know how it goes next week. 

So back to the punch line, when Kunz and I answered the phone and Pres. Hall told us who was getting transferred in the zone, our names were not mentioned!!! We are staying here together! Ohhh Yeeah! We are very happy about that. We will still go to the transfer meeting on Thursday to meet/welcome the new/old missionaries to our zone! Kunz and I were joking about how cool it would be if we knew who was coming to our zone and made them zone shirts as well before hand with their name/number and presented them as their names were announced and stood up to join our zone (like the NFL/NBA draft) haha 

Anyways, this e-mail is getting super long and i fill like i haven't covered much ground. This week should be really good for us! Octavio Sirias is getting baptized this Saturday and we are thinking the whole ward and even some from the stake will be there! He knows a lot of people with coming to church for 5 years and everyone has been waiting for this day. We love the Sirias family and spend a lot of time with them. They are already making plans for going to the temple and getting sealed! So cool! 

Yesterday we had four baptisms that we attended that happened in our zone! Our missionaries are awesome! 

This last Sunday our lesson to the Relief Society went extremely well! We have a main thought but mostly just wing it by the spirit off of their comments :) The spirit definitely carries these trainings! It was also fast Sunday which means we bore our testimonies. We got the whole place roaring with laughter this last session. I got up and talked about how blessed Elder Kunz and I have felt lately, and during the Blue Moon last week (the night of transfer calls) Elder Kunz and I saw our shadows... so we get six more weeks to serve in the newhall 2nd ward!!! They definitely got a kick out of that one. 

So this is all the big news for this week that i can think of right now. So I'll talk to you again soon with more! 

Love, Elder Brady

___NO REGRETS____