Lots of service washing cars

Email #41
Area: Secunda
Companion: Elder Wilombe

Hey Everyone,

This week went by fast, but not a lot happened. Not too many lessons this week either we just go to the appointment and no one is there or they just reschedule with us, but hey people have a life too I guess haha. But hopefully this week will be better. We did do some service this week. Tuesday we went to a primary school and we did some gardening and just made this little part of the school look really nice and fix it up and everything. Saturday we went to a recent converts in the other Elders area called Embalenhle or short Emba and washed four cars inside and out. The mother of the recent convert, was her birthday the next day so we made her BMW look really nice. We washed her other sons car and the husbands car and since we were washing cars we did our car as well. It was a good day and what was the worst part was later that day it rained and our car got muddy and at least the inside stayed clean somewhat! For some reason I enjoy cleaning cars and at home I was always washing our cars and it seems that people here love it too. When we tell them that we will do it for free, they don't hesitate to say yes and guess what it opens the door to be able to teach them the gospel. So it is all a win win! Service is one of the greatest ways to open doors to share the gospel with someone especially when that service is free and everybody loves free!!! We have another service project this week with the branch with the mormon helping hands with that same primary school. So yeah and this week we are going to the temple again so that will be something to look forward to! Well that is my week and I hope you have a good week! Love you all!

Elder Bryner

Confirmations, Reaching your dreams and accomplishing your goals

Email #36
Area: Cosmo City
Companion: Elder Kwabaisi

Hey Everyone,

A GOOD WEEK! We had everyone confirmed yesterday and I got to participate and do one myself, so that was a cool experience it was my first time so it was a good learning experience as well. This week is service week haha! Washing three cars, Painting a house and a wall, doing a garden and some more may come, but it will be a hectic and productive week! We had a good day at church yesterday from 17 investigators down to 2 haha some were not there and the others are now Recent Converts, but I am not complaining. When we baptized in May, Cosmo had not had a baptism since last December so the Lord is blessing us with success with our efforts. We now have baptized 11 and we hope before we leave one another we baptize 10 more haha. It is quite a goal, but with faith it can be done! We didn't expect to have this many and my goal to have 10 before I left has already been achieved so dream big and don't under estimate yourself and God especially. We are finding some more people and we should be having good amount here in a week or so with more teaching and finding! We are teaching most of Sister Dorcus's children now and one of them is a music producer and trying to help others reach their music dreams. It is in Cosmo where he is doing it and the studio is in his mom's house in a small room, he is making the most of it! That is my week in a short and exciting message and I hope all are well and you are reaching your dreams and accomplishing your goals!

Love,
Elder Bryner


Excerpts from Mom's email:

The Dunn's are so great and they are what I imagined and so much more and I am really going to enjoy the time with them seriously!!! It is funny because we live 5 min. from them in Utah! They both have that love for the missionaries for sure. We sit with our boot (trunk) open with pamphlets and all the material, outside of a shopping center called Shoprite and it is the only place that is in the area. EVERYONE comes there and we have been finding like that a little bit and it was inspired for sure haha! It is pretty cold and getting warmer a little bit, but most nights it is pretty cold I might say! Today we are going to play sports and Braii (BBQ). I really do know without a doubt this work is the work of the Lord and that we are called to the very place by inspiration and that this church is the only way we can have eternal happiness!

Excerpts from Dad's email:

The week was really good and we are just growing so much and yesterday at church we almost didn't have enough chairs to fit everyone in the chapel, but there was a baby blessing as well. I am just enjoying my mission so much and it is just a crazy experience. This week we are doing some more service for some members and the BOM challenge is starting to work so that is good. Members are bringing in referrals now and so it should start to pick up.

Email from a Senior couple:

My husband and I are serving as senior missionaries in the same branch your son is serving.  He is doing a terrific job!  We are very impressed by his hard work and focus.  He loves the people and they love him.  He and his companion work well together and are having great success.  You probably heard they baptized 7 people last week. I was trying to imagine your joy if you had been there and seen your son standing in the baptismal font with his hand to the square and saying, "Having been commissioned of Jesus Christ."  You can be very happy about your son's mission. I am an eye witness of his heartfelt efforts and wanted to let you know.

With love,
Sister Shupe

Happy Birthday Elder Bryner

Email #33
Area: Cosmo City
Companion: Elder Kwabaisi

Hey Everyone,

We had another great week and loved it and went by so fast from the beginning of the transfer! We had transfers this week and now our district leader is now training as well! We painted another house for a member on Saturday. We washed another car on Thursday and the car was an Audi, if I might add. We have a tendency to wash all the nice cars haha! We had a confirmation yesterday and that was so cool. Her mother is now being baptized the 29th of June, along with potentially 6 more people!! We are harvesting more than ever before in Cosmo City. A member told us the most that has been baptized while one set of missionaries have been there is only 5 and we have already hit 4, so we will hopefully be at 11 by June 29th! I am so happy at the blessings that Heavenly Father is letting me have and for the opportunities he is allowing me to have as well!!!

One lady has been taught by missionaries for almost a year, she works on Sundays, but the days that she is off she comes. She brings this little girl with her that lives behind her, but we were not aware of this. We tracked into that house where the little girls stays having no idea who she was or anything. Now we are teaching her and her sister. She and her sister came to church yesterday and it was just a miracle that we found her and her sister just completely inspired and directed by the spirit to go to that home!

Nothing much else has happened this week. President and Sister Omer are heading home June 30th and President and Sister Dunn are arriving!! I have enjoyed serving with President Omer, but his time has come and time for a new one to start his adventure!!

Elder Bryner

Elder Bryner and Elder Ajei

Elder from Utah and Elder Bryner

Making his own birthday cake or treat (not sure)

Looks like a cake :-)

Simple perspective on being young and doing service for others

Email #31
Area: Cosmo City
Companion: Elder Kwabaisi

Hey Everyone,

Another good week and this week went by faster than last week!! Transfers are next week and we have a zone conference this Saturday is my greeny first one on mission, so he is really excited for that!! Wow I remember my first one, haha not too long ago actually! Time really is going and it isn't waiting for me and just keeps going like that!!! It really does feel like yesterday that I was in the airport and meeting all the other Elders and traveling on the plane for miles and miles. Finally getting the MTC and just really enjoying the time that I have!! For those that wish that they were just all grown up and just on their own you better think twice about that, because becoming an adult with responsibilities and stress and all these crazy things is just something that makes you wish that you could go back and do it all over again!!!! Take time to appreciate how young you are and don't jump to the end. Enjoy the journey that takes you there!!!

We didn't get to do the service this week because the branch president canceled for some reasons, but hopefully that we will be able to do it in the near future!! We did get to clean that members car and she really appreciated it haha! It was a BMW so I enjoyed cleaning it haha!!! She came out saying that it looked brand new, so we did our job on cleaning the car!!! We have some more promising investigators and they continue to progress and make more return appointments with us so that makes us really happy!!!! Baptisms are this week so that is something that we are looking forward to and we should have 4 so that will be a great turn out if all of them make it!!!

Elder Bryner

Investigators progressing, finding others and doing the Lord's work through service

Email #30
Area: Cosmo City
Companion: Elder Kwabaisi

Hey Everyone,

Another week came and gone. It goes fast until Thursday and then it feels like an entire month the rest of the week. But now it is finally a new week. We had a good week. We did a ton of finding because a lot of our progressing investigators are being baptized and we need more new and better people!! We had stake conference yesterday and it was a huge hit. There were so many people there and we had some investigators come as well. There are two that are on date and three that are not. So that experience was definitely needed for both of them!! We had a good lesson with Amanda and her family, the lady that owns the crush. She said to us that they read the Book of Mormon together and that every time that they open the book and just read a chapter, it speaks about baptism and repentance. So they said that it may be a sign that God is answering their prayers about whether or not to be baptized. So that was something that we have been waiting for. It has been some time now that we have been teaching them and it just keeps getting better and better each time that we go and visit with them!!!

We have been finding this past week and the members are also working and will soon have some referrals for us hopefully!! It goes so much easier when we get referrals, because they actually progress and want to hear the truth. We are teaching that one guy that I talked about last week now and is on date for the 8th of June. That will be 5 being baptized on that day, so the work is going well!!!!

We painted a less actives home this past week and we are going this week to finish up! We are also painting her sisters home as well this week. We have more service to do at the crush where we did last time and that will definitely help Amanda and her family!!!! We are also washing a members car this week as well, so we are loaded and busy with service. No complaints, because it helps the time just go like that!!! My companion and I are really getting along and just laugh with each other about the dumbest things. Other than that not much else this week so have a good one and know that the Lord loves you!!

Elder Bryner

Service, Conference

Email #23
Area: Cosmo City
Companion: Elder Perez

Hey Everyone,

Another good week and it just flew by. It's crazy the time that is flying by. A lot has happened this week and we have done a lot. We did a ton of service this week and it was so nice to see that our efforts are working. We did some service for a member that was moving and they have been deciding to move for some time now, but just as we were going to go to her house she was moving everything herself as her husband was gone. But luckily we had shown up when we did. The husband did not get home until the next day, so we were able to help her get everything moved into her new house. It took about 3 hours to finish moving everything. We also did some planting with the members at a crush, which is just a day care for kids. We planted all kinds of vegetables and made the yard and everything look nice. When we were finished my companion and I talked to the lady who owned the crush and we made a return appointment to come and share with her. So just from doing service you can find many opportunities to jump in and share a message with them.

We went to a concert that was organized by the church. The group was called 4 Reasons and they were a really good group. It was just inspirational music that they sang to the stake. I hope everyone enjoyed General conference, but I won't see it until this weekend. I am looking forward to watching it. My first on mission so we will see how it goes. All is well and have a good week.

Love,
Elder Bryner

Excerpts from Dad's email

Wow that is just crazy that you met a guy that lives here and that his daughter works at Yankys. So we are going to pay a visit to Yankys and get her reactivated really quick so that is just the coolest and smallest world. My ward mission leader served with Jed Facrell's older brother in Uganda and his name is Jack Nkuna or Elder Nkuna be sure to tell grandma I forgot to mention it to her but be sure to let the Facrells know as well what a small world it is.

Elder Perez and kids at Crush