2019!!!

Sveiki! Sveiki!

I hope everyone had a great week and start to the new year! I can't believe it's 2019!

This week was good with lots of learning to be done which in the end has been really really good and I'm really grateful for Jesus Christ and His love that we are able to feel all the time. 

But to start off this great year us three had a party! And at 12:00 people were being so loud everywhere that we woke up haha. But random people also decided to call us three times during the night so we were confused on what time it was the whole night haha. It's like people don't know missionaries need to sleep haha, but I guess it's nice that they thought of us at 2 in the morning haha. 

My favorite thing about the New Year is the jokes about what we have done or haven't done all year long. Well, we called one of our investigators this week who has been sick and she was like, "I've been sleeping all year!" I was literally on the floor laughing because there are other people who think it's funny!! 

On Tuesday, New Year's Day, we were talking to President Pokhilko and he told us that night in our journal's we would be able to say we talked to every single person on the street and he was right because there was literally no one haha. But we were running a little behind and didn't have time to run home to eat, but nothing was open at all except one place, my favorite burger place!! So it turned out to be a miracle!! We also went to drop by one of our less actives and we were just going to drop off a note without knocking because it was a holiday and we had dropped by recently, but we felt we needed to knock so we did and she answered and let us in her house!! She is the cutest!! My 5 transfers of dropping by her house I have only seen her twice so for her to let us in is a huge miracle! She showed us all her pictures of her missionary who taught her and when she went to Utah to visit her. It was so fun!

This week we went to Jekabs. No one has been there for awhile and he needed some help so we went over and it was a party as always haha. He is blind and hard of hearing so sometimes when we're reading the Book of Mormon to him he doesn't understand and this time he was having a real hard time with it haha. I still can't roll my R's and he always makes fun of me for it haha. But we are getting him a disc with the Book of Mormon so he can listen to it. We asked the office about it and we found out that it doesn't exist so we were sad but then that night one of the elders called us and he was going through some discs in his apartment and what did he find? A disc with one of our members reading the Book of Mormon! How cool is that?!?

Also the weather decided to turn haha. As soon as it hit January it turned really really cold and has snowed soo much. Ice is everywhere! I'm pretty sure it would be safer for us to be on ice skates. We are keeping a tally for how many times we fall and so far Masa Teilore has fallen twice hahaha which sad for her but Masa Bosvela and I have had a pretty good laugh about it.

Yesterday with the new church schedule and time we were almost late to church! We got there with four minutes to spare but we still beat half the branch so I guess we really weren't late! But it was great to have two hours of church! We only have one Sunday School class for the whole branch and it's really going to bring everyone together, I'm excited!!

One of my favorite scriptures I read this week is in 1 Corinthians 13:2

"And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing." 

I love this verse because it shows the importance of love! And who best shows love? Our Savior Jesus Christ. He has done everything for us and He is the perfect example of how we can learn to love better. I love Him and His gospel and I'm so grateful I get to be sharing it with everyone no matter how many people say no or want to fight against us. I can feel the love our Savior has for them and it helps to keep going. Always turn to Him! This week many people were telling us they didn't need more about Christ or need more happiness because they had enough and I thought a lot about how I can better reply to them. This week was dark, cold, and snowy. And I was happy. I could find happiness even without the sun. But then Sunday came and the sun was shining and there was no cloud in the sky and the joy I felt was uncontainable! I realized this is us. We can be happy with Christ for a period of time with temporal things, but we need Christ just as we all need the sun. Christ gives us lasting joy and fills a hole that some people don't even know is there!! How grateful I am for Him and is everlasting light and love!

I hope everyone has a great week! Thank you for everything!

Love,

Masa Brunere

Pics

1: All in stripes!

2: I could not cook before the mission but I have cooked every single meal this transfer :)

3: These are the best! an icecream cone full of caramel!!!