Homeward Bound

HELLER!!

This is my last email as Elder Brisk...I only have a few more days as a missionary! It is extremely bitter sweet. I am going to miss this place!! Oklahoma is more than a flat land with humid heat and wind, it is where I became converted to Jesus Christ and His gospel. I will forever be thankful for the opportunity I have had to serve Christ.

A mission is not easy! It is full of ups and downs, headaches, frustrations, stress, anxiety, exhaustion, sorrow, peace, joy, love and about every other physical, mental and emotional thing you can think of! This is the Lord's work and there is no better way to come to know Christ than to serve Him.

I got to bless the sacrament and say the closing prayer in 4th ward. Then Elder Hansen and I got to speak in 2nd ward. Everyone really liked our talks too!! We gave farewell talks because I am going home and they are splitting up Edmond 24 so Elder Hansen will go be in 4th ward and 2 new missionaries will take over 2nd ward.

I just love this gospel! My testimony has been established and strengthened so much. When you truly appreciate the gospel and can see how it has blessed you then you'll want to share it!

We were riding our bikes and there was this lady getting her mail. I wasn't to confident she was going to be interested. As we talked to her she was the classic nice lady, gave us water, has a church and believes in Jesus Christ. The whole time I was thinking to myself well she isn't going to be interested, she is fine, but I told her that we not only help people gain faith in Jesus Christ but we help them strengthen their faith as well and asked if she would be interested in hearing our message. She said "You two young men can come by on Friday at 10am and I will talk with you for 30 minutes." IT WAS SO COOL! Her  name is Valerie. Lesson is don't judge people! Always invite them to hear the message of the restored gospel!!

I will be flying into St. George at 1:10pm on Thursday August 3rd.

My homecoming talk will be in the Hurricane 3rd ward on August 13th at 9am.

Thanks again for all the support and prayers. I am so grateful for the people in my life who I met before and during my mission. You have all influenced by life and I love you! Christ Lives!!!

Elder Brisk, over and out! 

That is all.

Exchanges with Elder Adams

 My wallet after walking 7 miles...definitely need a new one

 Elder Whetten, Elder Jeffs and I are all "dying"

 THE NEWS PAPER QUOTED THE PROPHET!!!

Cordier

 McCullough

 Mandy

 Riggs

Goodsell

 Larsen

Ericksen

 Matheny

 Gates

This is probably one of the best church videos I have seen on my mission. lol​

Preachers on wheels

HELLER

KELVIN CAME TO CHURCH!!! I REPEAT KELVIN CAME TO CHURCH!!

So he didn't show up to 4th ward, we were bummed. We were greeting people before 2nd ward started the lo and behold Kelvin walks through the door! He walked 5 miles to church and stayed for all 3 hours!! He also wants to be baptized in a pond he found by his house. lol!! I am going to do everything in my power to get him baptized August 1st and hopefully be the one to baptize him in a pond!!

This week has been a mission wide bike week! It was so hot too! We didn't know if there were going to be any cool miracles for us but in the past 2 days (end of bike week) We have had 2 11 years olds approach us. This one kid's name is Zaven and he is so cool!

Zaven: Who are you?

Us: We're missionaries, we teach people about Jesus

Zaven: So you're like preachers on wheels?

Us: Yeah we are!

Zaven: When are you available?

Us: Uh..when do you want us to come by??

Zaven: How about Wednesday at 5:30?

Us: ...okay...

We are going to see Zaven on Wednesday and hopefully his parents will be down with it!! lol

We had a guy sing a song about dreams to us, His name is Charles and he was karate kicking a bush before we talked to him. He also wanted to make sure we use hand sanitizer. lol

Honestly things are going so good! This is my last full week as a missionary which is way weird to think about and I already know the time is going to fly by! Thanks for all the prayers and support! See ya soon!!!

Love Elder Brisk

Selfie from bike week!!

This is a funny sign we found in the City

Exchanges in the Village

HOW ARE ALL Y'ALL!?!?

I can't believe it is already Monday. Time is flying by so fast! AHHHHHH

You're never gonna believe what we did this week....WE SANG TO KELVIN!!! He wanted to sing a hymn and then he didn't know any English so somehow we ended up singing Nearer My God to Thee to him with a member and it was SOOO BAD!! That is the first and last time I will ever do such a thing! lol

Another funny story of the week. We are teaching this super old lady in OKC named Osa Jones. We asked her if we could say a prayer before we started reading and all she heard was "start reading" so she began reading the chapter. For some reason we just let her keep going. I looked at her freezer and realized it was not shut tight from when she was getting us ice earlier so I got up and went to shut it but it wouldn't shut!! Osa was still reading and had no idea I was in the kitchen so I tried to shut it a few times but it wouldn't work so I had to open the freezer, grab this huge bag and throw it in the back of the freezer and it was so loud!!!! OSA HAD NO IDEA!! I sat down and she was still reading away so Elder Hansen and I were laughing so hard we stopped Osa and asked "Do you understand what it is saying?" and she replies "I think so.." IT WAS SO FUNNY!!!

We were on exchanges in the Village this week. Their apartment is the smallest, nastiest apartment by the way and somehow 4 of us stayed the night there. I was with Elder Gardner and it was a lot of fun! We went and taught Tracy the man. Yes you read that right, Tracy is actually a man but chooses not to be. We talked to him about the Book of Mormon and how important it is to read it every day. We also taught this bible referral the restoration and it went so good! We had a member come see their investigator Val with us and she was awesome! She was like "What do people mean when they say God spoke to them? God doesn't talk to me, what are they talking about??" So we taught her about the Holy Ghost and she really like it! Then the member brought us Braum's afterwards :)

We tried to teach Kathy and Danielle this week but they had some events going on where we weren't able to. We briefly talked to Kathy about the Book of Mormon and she told us how her husband isn't to fond of us but she was telling him that maybe they could become mormon because she learned so much from talking with us for a few minutes. She is so cool!!!!!

Kathy

We have 2 new part member families we found this week who want to have us over to teach the husbands so we are pretty excited about that!! Edmond is the best place ever! I love being a missionary :)

Love Elder Brisk

That is all.

Exchanges in the Village with Elder Jeffs and Elder Gardner

PRESIDENT MANSELL IS THE BEST!!

2 rounds of free slurpees from 7/ll

Free Chick-fil-a for dressing up like a cow

Homecoming info.

Heller!

Well it's official, I got my flight itinerary this week and I gave my departing testimony in Zone Conference! I love and miss all you and can't wait to see you soon! Feel free to be at any of these 2 events, would love to see you there!!

St. George Airport                                                      

Thursday, August 3rd at 1:10 pm                               

4550 S Airport Pkwy, St George               

(Airport-->Cafe Rio-->Swig-->Home)

Homecoming talk
Sunday, August 13th at 9am
677 S 700 W Hurricane

Kelvin was SO close to coming to church. We had a member teach him Saturday morning with us. Kelvin never said yes or no to coming and so I said okay we will pick you up in the morning, we said a prayer and then left. Well Sunday Morning he answered the door and we told him we're going to church if you're coming we got to go and he thought for a second and said no. Keep him in your prayers.

We met a lady named Kathy and her daughter Danielle this week. They are so cool and interested in coming to church with us! Kathy grew up in a Mormon family until she was 7 and she really likes the church and it's focus on family. We are going to try and meet with them this week!

We finally taught Jeff! He is the guy we helped move into their new house when we were down in the City and he was so open to hearing our message! it was pretty cool and we are going back to teach him, his wife and their 9 year old daughter on Saturday!

This week we should be able to see quite a few of our investigators, wish us luck!!

Elder Kyler Brisk

4th of July in Downtown OKC

      We met with a less active who wouldn't let us leave without taking his food.
 I might be eating straight cereal for the next couple weeks.

Random pics from this week/saying goodbye at zone conference.

Frustration! It's part of being a missionary.

Heller!

We were in a trio on Tuesday for a little bit. Elder Gardner came with us while Elder Jeffs was at MLC so we saw Kelvin and Mona with him. Elder Gardner has only been out for 2 weeks and he is awesome!

This week we have been working with Kelvin and he is starting to frustrate me!! He wants to be baptized, is reading the Book of Mormon like a saint..but HE WON'T COME TO CHURCH. He has issues with vehicles, won't walk there, thinks there is to many people and thinks our visits should be church. Even Bishop visited him with us and he still didn't budge!! He has been praying about coming so keep him in your prayers specifically that he will attend church before I lose my mind!!

Mona told us some of her friends that are always at the apartment complex felt like we were trying to convert them so they aren't going to sit in anymore. Mona asked about it and we told her that we convert people to the gospel of Jesus Christ. Her friend Tiana came over and listened to us teach the restoration. Tiana wasn't interested but said she would pray about it!

We visited an investigator Elder Shira and I found a few months ago named Thomas. We haven't really had a real lesson with him so we talked with him and his wife Dena. They go to life church which is basically a rock concert so we are going to do a church swap with them in 2 weeks where we go to life church (to get free donuts) and they come to our church! While we were talking we got on the subject of temples. Dena is very familiar with our church, has attended before and was teaching her husband about the temple via old testament. She knew about the Holy of Hollies, Levitical Priesthood/law, etc. I don't know how she knows all of that and still goes to life church??

On Saturday there was a hot air balloon festival at Mitch Park so we had 20 missionaries there volunteering! It was so fun! I was inside a bounce house for 5 hours straight! We also had a booth setup and got free food for helping! The hot air balloons were really cool but they didn't fly them.

That was basically the highlights of this week. Happy 4th of July!! The scriptures teach against the phrase "Eat, drink and be merry!" don't do that.

Remember who you are, make good choices!

Love Elder Brisk 

Emergency stop for FREE Cherry Limeades!

 I taught Elder Hansen how to get gas!!! He did so good.

 Mitch Park!

Hard Transfer...goodbye Elder Shira.

Heller!

I literally have like 5 weeks left? Where has the time gone? This will be a bittersweet transfer.

Transfers were so hard! I had to say goodbye to a lot of my friends because I probably won't see them for a long time. It was hard saying goodbye to Elder Shira. We worked so hard and had so much fun but he is needed in Seminole. So thankful for the opportunity to serve with him! 

Kelvin is doing great! He is also becoming more and more social as we meet with him which is a blessing! He always asks about baptism! He is at the end of 2 Nephi. We just read some throw down chapters with him and he loved it! Haha he knows what the scriptures actually say. We are having a hard time getting him to come to church but I felt impressed to not push it on him. He will come when he is ready :)

We have met with Mandy a few times and she is doing better. She knows she needs to read the Book of Mormon and come to church but she is having a hard time doing that with sick kids. We taught her about the Godhead and she believes it! We read Alma ch. 22 and she understood all of it! She was so excited/shocked about it!

We went to the OU Medical Center to give a blessing with Brother Lojka. The name sounded familiar and when we got there I recognized her! Her name is Luann Haddon. Elder Shira and I gave her a blessing a while ago. She is going through stage 4 cancer. We gave her a blessing and afterwards I asked if she was a member and she said no! She has never really heard about the church. So we told her about the Book of Mormon and how it was a history of her ancestors, she instantly fell in love with it! As we left I watched her as I closed the door and I saw how peaceful she was. She felt the spirit in that blessing and the Book of Mormon. They way she was holding it and looked at it I knew she was going to read it. It meant a lot to me to see that..

I am so thankful for the gospel of Jesus Christ. I know God lives, I know Christ lives and I know they love me too.

Also our p day next week will be July 4th instead of the 3rd.

Love Elder Brisk

That is all.

 The last pics of Elder Shira and I 

New Companion Elder Hansen

Transfers

New District

Elder Davis and I are in the same district now!!