Elder Bronson Scott Puzey

First off I want to thank everyone who sent me an email wishing me a happy birthday! It was much appreciated.  So with the recent transfer we didn't actually have too much change. Everyone in the Hurtado House is the same which we all expected. And we only had two Elders get exchanged in our District. For the most part it is the same old song and dance which has it's pros and cons.  Over this last week I've been reminded that sometimes in the gospel we need to be friends to people, and when I say sometimes I mean 24/7 and when I say people I mean everyone. A couple of experiences that we've had will help to illustrate why I was reminded of this. Recently Elder Kunz and I decided to try and do more work in the Samoan ward, they do feed us every night after all. So we've been visiting a lot of families in the Samoan ward recently, less-actives, very-actives and everywhere in-between. We have not only been able to meet a lot more of our Samoan members that...

As I'm sure many of you know, this last weekend was conference weekend which was super awesome! It was a nice break from the normal weekend routine that we have as missionaries. Normally we're at church for nine hours because we cover two wards and also have meetings to go to so only having four hours was a good change. This year I tried to guess what the names of the Talks are going to be to help me summarize the talks in one sentence or a few words. We'll see if I was even close. Obviously everyone gets something different out of Conference because we are taught by the Spirit. For me I heard a lot about being humble, sustaining church leaders, the Book of Mormon and using the Atonement for change. Something that's different is what we all gain from Conference and from the talks but what's all the same for everyone is that the Prophet and the Apostles are called of God for everyone. As the Restored Church of Jesus Christ we have many unique messages that we ar...

The Trio Well it's been another fast week out here in the good ol desert. The weeks seem to be flying by as of late and the P-Days come and go quickly. It has been cooling down faster than my body can acclimate to so the cool 60 degrees that we get when the sun goes down is a little too cold which I never thought I would say a few weeks ago. However, the cool weather has made it infinitely easier to do missionary work. Not walking into a hair dryer feels amazing! Something else that makes the missionary work easier is some added company. This is Reilly: Reilly started walking with us while we were tracting up in North Adelanto (straight ghetto). He didn't try to bite us after a few minutes so we figured he wasn't too dangerous. Reilly would come right up to the doors with us so we used this as an easy way to start talking to people. We would ask them if they were missing a dog or knew where it belonged. Sadly we never actually found where his home is but he w...

The most exciting thing that happened this week was the baptism of our investigator, Diane. I was able to be the one to baptize her but Elder Kunz was with us in the font because she has a broken arm and wasn't able to use it and we wanted to make sure that everything went right. When she came out of the water and we confirmed everything with the witnesses her first reaction was "I did it" with a big ol' smile on her face. There is no better feeling than seeing that smile from someone who just made their first covenants with our Father in Heaven. Elder Kunz was able to confirm her yesterday and that same smile re-appeared. It's amazing to see the light that enters these people once they come to the knowledge of the goodness of God and follow the example of our brother and Savior. After emailing last P-Day, the other elders that we live with and I drove through the ghost town that's up here which was pretty cool. Sadly we couldn't get out of the ...

I'm sure many of you know that I grew up in Maple Valley, Washington which is near the foot of the mountains and consequently I have seen more rainy days than sunny. Because of the lack of Vitamin D throughout my childhood I loath the rain and bask in the sun's "life-giving light".  The Lord saw fit to humble me though and sent me to the high desert where up until this week, I could count on one hand the number of times I had seen rain hit the ground. A few days ago and today we were able to enjoy the rain sent from the heavens to cool us down and help me appreciate the rain that I had once despised.  This week has felt like a very average week as a missionary. We knock on some doors, talk to some nice people, have people flee from us and we teach anyone that will listen. But something that is exciting is the change happening within, within our investigators and within us. The change that happens within investigators is a result of an increase in faith of our Lord...

So some of you may have heard of a crazy adventure that my roommates and I went on while we were all going to school. For those of you who haven't, here is the short version.  Wednesday: We decide we want to go to Vegas. That entailed all the planning. Friday: After everyone finished with class we loaded up the truck and headed down the 15. After arriving at Vegas at 11 pm we decide that now would be a good time to start looking for a hotel #genius. We give up looking for a hotel at around 1 am and decide to enjoy walking the strip from the hours of 1-3 am at which time many drugs were offered.  Saturday: 3am, we never found a hotel so we head to the nearest LDS Church building. 8 am, we wake up to 200 people in the parking lot of the building ready to do a stake service project. Then we decide to drive to the Grand-Canyon (not a short drive), and upon arrival find out that you must pay $50 per person to go. So we buy socks and leave. We learned from our mistakes so we b...

Editor's Note: Elder Puzey did not send any pics this week so attaching one his sister took while traveling through his mission this week while going to Disneyland. No she did not stop, but as a mom it is weird to think they are so close to each other right now! So this week has been back to the normal grind. Not too much to report but we should be having a baptism coming up in a few weeks if everything continues as planned. Right now Elder Etheridge and I are down the hill in Rancho Cucamonga. Elder Etheridge is being whitewashed into the Big Bear area which is like a resort place that a lot of people visit to go hiking/skiing/ other recreational activities. I am staying put in Adelanto/Samoan and I will find out who my son is (the new missionary I'll be training) tomorrow, so that's exciting.   I'm sorry that there isn't too much to report this week, I'm sure next week will be more interesting. I just want to remind y'all how important missionary wor...