Very Excited Siblings....

The Band Brody has been sporting around....

Miriah with all the balloons...

Waiting...

Brody and Chunk...

Hollie and Chunk so ready for him to come off the plane...

Waiting...

Braxton, Chunck and Elder Farnes in the background...

Britton and Lyla

Braxton making the time go fast for Tegan...

and Brock...

and Miriah..

and Lyla saying me too...

Grandpa is ready.

Bronson has Chunk now.

YES we are more than ready for Elder Berry to appear!

 Lots of people were getting off the plane, we waited patiently...

 and we waited, and waited...

 Still waiting...

 Todd had disappeared, only to be found on the upper level wanting to be the first one to see him.  During one of the breaks in people coming down the little kids followed a few other kids to the upper floor where they got to see Elder Berry and ride the escalator down with him.

Tears...

 What a tender moment, Love this missionary so much. 

The spirit he has brought into our home the last 20 months through his letters

has been a wonderful experience.

 Miriah just did not want to let him go, she has prayed night and morning for this day!

That he come home safe tonight.

 Oh we have missed that smile!

Oh, he is so skinny but felt good to have a hold of...

What an Experience...

Almost everyone that came to the Airport.

Who gets to pull the luggage?

Elder Berry and Elder Freeman

Elder Berry, Elder Farnes, Elder Freeman, and Elder Wing.

Brady loves these guys

Showing the Kids his money.

So Colorful!

There has been no greater opportunity for me than to be able to wear that black name tag and go into the world (Ghana) to raise my voice of warning to my brothers and sisters to come unto Christ.

Hi Everyone,

I hope that all the mothers enjoyed Mothers Day yesterday! Mom, I hope you had a good day as well. Thank you for all that you have done for me and continue to do. It was good to talk to the family yesterday and it sounds like everyone is getting so big and I am getting smaller. Ha-ha! We had an interesting conversation yesterday one that I was not expecting to have on phone call number 4, but it was good and I am so happy to have such a good understanding family. Upon your request to get an email out today, I am forcing one out! I didn’t realize so many people were reading my emails and that they are disappointed when I don’t write.  For that I am very grateful for your support it means a lot to me. I’m sorry that I’m not very good at writing and I have failed to get emails out some weeks. There have been a lot of prayers in my behalf over the past couple of weeks; which I am ever so grateful for all of you and the love that you have giving unto me.

This past week it seemed that everywhere my companion and I went there was someone who wanted to feed us food. So I have eaten a good amount of good old fashioned Ghana food this week ranging from fufu, banku, yam, face the wall, and some small rice. With a nice side of snail the size of tennis balls, welly (fresh cow skin), intestines, chicken feet and when we got lucky whole fish. Over the time that I have spent in Ghana I have eaten a wide spread of things that wouldn’t be considered eatable back home. It has been an interesting experience to say the least but for the most part I have enjoyed it. It makes me laugh to think back to the beginning of my mission where I couldn’t chop anything until now where eating these abnormal things are almost normal. Yes, that even includes eating cats and dogs. Ha-ha!

When Jesus Christ lived on the earth he taught the people a way to live that would lead them to having happiness in this life and in the life to come. The message that he taught was one of peace, love, and obedience to the commandments of God. “He went throughout every city and village, preaching and shewing the glad tiding of the kingdom of god." (luke 8:1) He taught that ordinances such as baptism and confirmation are essential for us to return to our Father in Heaven. He told his disciples that the gospel shall be preached to the entire world so He sent them throughout the land to preach unto the people.

In the 133 section of the Doctrine and Covenants the Lords says "this gospel shall be preached unto ever nation, kindred, tongue and people." The Savior set the example of how to share His gospel. He taught the gospel clearly. He took advantage of simple and unplanned moments to share the gospel and he always showed genuine love and concern for others. For us missionaries we need to DO THE SAME.

Missionary worked didn’t start on September 24, 2010 nor will it end on my return. It was once said in conference that "the sun never sets on missionary work".  This applies to the full time missionaries as well as every member. We are commanded to take this message to every one!! I don’t have some of my notes in front of me, but if I remember right from reading the Doctrine and Covenants that missionary work was the first thing they did before the organization of the church (minus the translation of the Book of Mormon) and it will be the last thing we do. I have loved my mission more than anything that I have done so far in my life. I can add my testimony to all those who have gone before me that there is no better place or time to come closer to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ than while serving a mission. There has been no greater opportunity for me than to be able to wear that black name tag and go into the world (Ghana) to raise my voice of warning to my brothers and sisters to come unto Christ.

All of us feel a desire to return home to live with our Father in Heaven and He has given us wonderful gifts in order to be able to do this. First He has given us the gift of his beloved son as our Savior and redeemer who has paved the way and taught us what we need to do to follow Him. He has giving us prophets to point us in the right direction and we are fortunate to have a living prophet who has been called by God upon the earth today. He has giving us the scriptures which I have come to love.  My personal love for the Book of Mormon has increased 100 percent since the beginning of my mission.  The Book of Mormon is true! It is our sure guide to get us back home to live with Heavenly Father. Like the prophet Joseph Smith once said "it is the most correct of any book on earth."

As we abide by the precepts taught in the Book of Mormon we become more like what our Father in Heaven wants us to become.  The precepts of the Book of Mormon are the Lords set of rules of how we should live and treat one another.  Some are direct commandments from the Savoir given through his prophets as to what we are to do and what we are to BECOME. It also gives us many examples of how we can increase our faith and determination to obey his commandments’. This book is filled with the complete doctrine of Christ to guide us.

2 Nephi 31 Jesus said unto the children of men: “follow thou me” and the father said “repent ye, repent ye, and be baptized in the name of my beloved son" The book makes it plain that we must receive the Holy Ghost as a baptism of fire to help us stay on the strait and narrow path. We are taught that we must pray always in the name of Christ and if we do this we have this promise: "wherefore ye must press forward with steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of god and all men. Wherefore if ye shall press forward feasting upon the words of Christ, and shall endure to the end behold thus saith the father: “ye shall have eternal life"

I know that these things are true with all my heart! The church is true!

I love you all,

Elder Brady Todd Berry

Sometimes we are satisfied in our life with just being hot water.

Hi everyone,

Another week has flown by and it seems time is going faster than ever right now and I don’t know how to deal with it. I have been told that two years on mission goes by faster than you will know. I never dreamed it would go by this fast. I used to think two years would take forever but not anymore.  I can add my testimony to that now, in the blink of an eye it will come and go. I got a lot on my mind and things up stairs for me right now are a bit foggy today so bare with me, this letter might be jumbled.

Last Monday we had a small mission tour with Elder Callister, Elder Evans, Elder Dickson, Elder Sitati and Elder Curtis. It was a really good meeting and I enjoyed it even though it was super hot and long. Ha-ha! Elder Evans who spoke in general conference this last time is actually Elder Orchards uncle. It sounded like he told the story of Elder Orchards dad coming in to the church at conference. He is a really good guy and he talked to us a lot about the Book of Mormon and Preach My Gospel.

The talk that I got the most out of was from Elder Dickson. He started off by asking us at what temperature does water boil. The simple answer was give that it boils at 100 c. Water boils and produce steam which creates great power at 100 c. He then asked what is water at 98 or 99c?  It was kind of a trick questions but the answer is that it is just hot water. He then compared it to missionary work and asked what kind of missionary work is a missionary doing if he is only at 100 c? He is right there and very close but he is not producing any "steam" or “power” that he could be if he just changed by one degree then the missionary or whomever would start to producing steam at 100c. The difference in temp is only 1 degree but the outcome is much different.

Sometimes we are satisfied in our life with just being hot water.  99 degrees is hot and it will probably burn you but it is still just hot water. Sometimes when I am cooking my oats in the morning I lose my patience and pour in my oats before the water reaches the boiling point of 100 c.  It seems to get the job done but is it good enough.

Early in my mission we would work really hard during the day to reach all of our numbers so we could go back to our apartment early and rest. We would still teach as many lessons as we needed to and see all the people that we needed to in order to get baptisms so we were still working hard and doing all the right things and we were baptizing we were just not staying out until nine.  Sometimes we would come home at 8 or maybe even 7 but the work was still getting done. At this point I was just a pot of hot water not at the boiling point not producing that great power that comes from steam.

Thankfully for the atonement, I repented and change my ways. I have tried taking things up another degree in temperature and even going the extra mile staying out later even when I have seen all the people I need to see, knocking on those gates at 8 30 trying to find the elect. The difference that I feel in my life and in my mission from my early months from simply coming home early to now going an extra mile and raising the bar is hard to describe. The principle of obedience can never be justified.

Out of all that I hope that you got the point, Elder Dickson kind of used his own things and I used mine. The main thing that he tried to point out that there is not much difference between 99 and 100 but the out come is greater. He wants us to go the extra mile as missionaries and not just get the job done and go home, but to do it the Lords way, out of love for him and the people that we serve and doing those little extra things when people are not watching.  

We also had a zone conference on Friday but I am out of room to talk about that. Maybe next week!

This Sunday we had more white people in sacrament meeting than black. Ha-ha! It was kind of weird. We had a whole crew of people from BYU here doing something. We also had a few from the area office.  In the third hour I sat behind the Powell’s that Grandma and Grandpa Berry know.

Love Bbear

For which we will praise his name Forever

Hi Everyone,

This has been another crazy week. I can’t remember what day it was but one of the days this week I was looking at some of my companions pictures of his family and stuff from back home in Zimbabwe. He served as the ward mission leader and as a full time ward missionary before coming on his mission. He had several pictures of this one missionary that looked really familiar. I told my companion that it looked like one of my friends that I played soccer with a while back named Taylor Madsen. My companion looked at me in shock and said yes that is Elder Madsen. Ha-ha! Come to find out it was Taylor’s older brother. Small, small world. Who would have thought that I would see a picture in Ghana, taken in Zimbabwe of someone I knew in Utah.  Elder Madsen served in Elder Wichos home area for some time.

Yesterday at our multi stake conference we had the chance to witness history in the church in this area. The four stakes that we had are now six in the Accra area. President Badoo from the Ordorkor ward is now the new stake president over that stake. A lot of other cool things took place yesterday as well.  A few of my recent converts from around Accra were presented to be ordained Elders and receive the Melchizedek Priesthood. That was a sweet feeling to see that something was done right in there lives. Today we will be going in to have a small mission tour with Elder Callister who was assigned to come and oversee the splitting of the stakes along with Elder Sitati and Elder Curtis.

This week I also got to go on splits with Elder Wollenzien again. We had a good time doing the work together. Elder Wollenzien was my third companion who will be going home July 4th. He has some small time left and he is trying to go out on top with the work. He is a good kid and plans to go to UVU after he gets home this fall.

Life is not all that easy and some of the trials that we face and the challenges that come our way can be pretty harsh. One of my favorite Book of Mormon prophets and hero, Ammon, explains how much two people can accomplish together when one of them is the Lord. In Alma 26:12 it reads:

12 Yea, I know that I am nothing; as to my strength I am weak; therefore I will not boast of myself, but I will boast of my God, for in his strength I can do all things; yea, behold, many mighty miracles we have wrought in this land, for which we will praise his name forever.

Given my current state I know what Ammon is saying to be true. For I am nothing, and my strength is weak! The things that I have been able to do has not been because of me but it was because of the Lord who has provide the way for me to be his instrument, even in bring forth many miracles among the people of Ghana. The joy that I felt as I sat in the conference and watch 6 of the men that I was able to teach and baptize stand to be presented as worthy to be ordained to the Melchizedek priesthood brought to me indescribable joy. I owe it all to the Lord for in his strength I can do all things, and do mighty miracles in this land. Forever and ever I will praise his might name. I thought about a scripture in Mosiah chapter 2, in this chapter King Benjamin is teaching his people the way back to the lord, he closes chapter two with verse 41    

 41 And moreover, I would desire that ye should consider on the blessed and happy state of those that keep the commandments of God. For behold, they are blessed in all things, both temporal and spiritual; and if they hold out faithful to the end they are received into heaven, that thereby they may dwell with God in a state of never-ending happiness. O remember, remember that these things are true; for the Lord God hath spoken it.

For me I desire that every one should consider the blessed and happy state of my six brothers that are keeping the commandments of God, for they are blessed in all things, temporal and spiritual as they continue to keep the commandments. As they are faithful to the covenants that they have made they will be received into heaven in a state of never ending happiness. I desire all to come unto Christ and to repent keeping the commandments of god that they to maybe able to feel the joy and happy state that comes from Gods love. I feel blessed to have been among them yesterday! For my six brothers and many others that are in this blessed and happy state they have come to understand and know that these two things are true. The first is in Mosiah 3 17

17 And moreover, I say unto you, that there shall be no other name given nor any other way nor means whereby salvation can come unto the children of men, only in and through the name of Christ, the Lord Omnipotent.

They understand and know that the only way to revive salvation is through Christ, the lord omnipotent and there is NO other name given nor any other way nor means where by we can gain salvation. Must be why we read so much in the scriptures "come unto Christ and be saved" The second thing that they understand and follow is in verse 19 of chapter 3

19 For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.

They know that the natural man is an enemy to God. They understand that they must yield to the enticings of the hold spirit, and become a saint through the atonement of Chirst, being as a child. Submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to ALL THINGS (even skin infections ha-ha) which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him. I personally know that as we put off the natural man, and keep the commandments of God that we will become a saint, because Christ has done everything to make that possible if we put forth our effort become what God wants us to be.

Love everyone,   Bbear

The preaching of the "word" had a "greater" tendency to lead people to do that which is just.

Hello again,
I find that its getting harder and harder to write since I feel like I
have already written about everything and that I am just repeating
myself so I guess I better force myself to write this letter before
something happens and I don't do it. Well I got transferred again to a
ward called Cantoments. We worship at the stake center that is next to
the Ghana temple, so my area is pretty much the center of Accra. Our
area is huge so it is going to take me some time to be able to figure
things out here. My companion is way tight his name is Elder Wicho, he
is from the same stake in Zimbabwe as Elder Mudenga my last companion.
Elder Wicho came in August with Elder Rich. The biggest problem with
this area is the airport is right in the middle and so we will be
teaching some one and a huge plane will fly over and make a lot of
noise and causes a big distraction for both me and Wicho and the
people we are teaching.
The Stakes here is Accra will be split this Sunday so this past
transfer they changed the zones. The zone that I’m in now is the
Christian Borg zone, and we have my old area Teshie, LA and Christian
Borg districts in the zone. A lot of change is happening here in Ghana
and it is truly a blessed land for the gospel.
Part of our study in the Book of Mormon has been focused on Alma 31:5
“And now, as the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead
the people to do that which was just--yea, it had had more powerful
effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else,
which had happened unto them--therefore Alma thought it was expedient
that they should try the virtue of the word of God."
In this chapter Alma goes on a mission to reclaim the apostate
Zoramites. The Zoramites are Nephites that have fallen away from the
church and are persecuting church members. Alma said in this scripture
that the preaching of the "word" had a "greater" tendency to lead
people to do that which is just.
In John 1:1 Christ refers to himself as the “word” so Alma found that
is was more powerful and effective on the minds of the people to teach
and preach unto them about Jesus Christ than by the sword. We have
been using this example in all of our missionary work. When our
companions are not doing what they’re suppose to are we to pull out
the sword and force them to do what is right or are we to pull out the
word and preach unto them the about Christ because he has a more
powerful effect upon the mind to do that which is just. With our
investigators when they don’t keep commitments to come to church or
whatever, we are quick to tell them they are wrong but we need to
continue to preach unto them the word, so that their minds and hearts
will be softened to come to church the next time.
President Boyd K Packer taught "True doctrine, understood, changes
attitudes and behavior. The study of the doctrines of the gospel will
improve behavior quicker than a study of behavior will improve
behavior" as we teach people the word or teach them about Christ, and
they begin to accept his gospel you can immediately see in them a
desire to change. I have seen an old man by the name of Richard who
went to Denmark and drank and smoked for 30 years until one day the
doctrine of Christ and the teachings of Joseph Smith pierced his soul
and he accepted the word of wisdom to be from God which changed his
attitude and behavior towards drinking and smoking.
I have seen missionaries who have not liked mission life but who have
changed their attitudes as we studied the scriptures together and as
they have felt the spirit. The “word” had a more powerful effect on
them to change their attitudes and behavior than any other method of
persuasion could have.  I have seen them repent and change their life
so they were living more in accord with god.
It is Hollie’s birthday next Tuesday! I wrote her a letter but I lost
my stamps so I didn't send it yet! Ha-ha! Don’t worry I still love
you. I will try to borrow a stamp to send it to you so don’t send me
any stamps. I hope that you have a good birthday next week!
I love you so much!
Brady
P.S.  What Brady is not saying in his letter is that he is still
suffering each day with his skin problem and nothing seems to be
working to help him.  He is meeting with his mission President later
this week to discuss what should be done which may include coming
home.  This is something that Brady does not want to do.  He loves
Ghana and he loves the people and being a missionary.  Please remember
him in your prayers this week he wants to be healthy enough to finish
his mission.

Wherefore, let us be faithful to him.

Dear family,

I think the hardest part of my week is trying to think of a way to start these letters and than what to write.

This week on Tuesday I got to go on splits with Elder Wollenzien again! I really love that kid he is so funny. Funny thing is we were both together for both of his birthdays in the mission field. Last year we were companions in Ordorkor and we both were suffering with pink eye, now this year we were in Osu having a good time teaching together on splits. While we were on our slits in his area we saw a lot of people and started teaching a lot of new people for him and his companion Elder Nielson. Ha-ha! Yes, Elder Nielson was my companion too; they both can’t get rid of me.

On Saturday night we had 4 failed appointments in a row, kind of a frustrating thing. Then we got this call from this member around 7 pm and he was like “I got this friend that I want you to teach” we ask if we could come right then and he said that would be  fine; so we went on this wild hunt to try to find this place that we had never been before. We finally found the place around 8 and the member was there with his friend. We started doing a little teaching and the member was right there just a testifying to everything we had to say, it was a picture perfect lesson. After we got done introducing what we do we ask him if he had any questions. He said yes. What is this Book of Mormon? My companion and I looked at each other with a little smile on our face. We have been really focusing on using the Book of Mormon and it’s just that much better when the person that we are teaching wants to know more about it. We explained what the book is and how it can help him answer questions about life. Our member friends bore a solid testimony and pretty much wrapped it up for us. We invited him to church and he said that he would be traveling to Kasoa. We told him that we had a branch there. Yesterday we found out that he went to church. MONEY! Ha-ha

We had another interesting experience this week. We got this other referral from these members that work at the area office here. They told us that they wanted us to teach this man and baptize him as soon as possible. We were thinking great we teach him give him a Book of Mormon, give him a date to baptize, and then commit him to church. It will be as simple as a 1 2 3 baptism.  Well when we got to meet with him it was everything but that. This man is a doctor and he lived in England for 15 years. He is very smart and knows way too much about the bible. He has read the bible so many times that he pretty much in his mind has proven it to be false. We tried to introduce him to the Book of Mormon, and he just shut us down. Then he started telling us that he doesn't believe that Jesus is the Christ. I have only met maybe 5 Ghanaian that don’t believe in Christ and the sad thing is they have all had influences out side of Ghana mainly they have lived in Europe somewhere. Ghana is a blessed land and the church is exploding here. At stake conference we will come together as 4 stakes and leave as 6.  It will be exciting to be a part of that in a couple of here in Accra.

As I was studying in the Book of Mormon this week, I was reading through first chapters of Nephi again. The first few chapters are the most read chapters in the book of Mormon, probably because I get to second Nephi and forget to read and then I would start over again. Any way I was reading and I was just so impressed with Nephi as always. Nephi was a stud, I want to be just like Nephi. Every time a challenge came up in front of him he did "not forget"

When I was taking history classes in school I would always wonder why we had to learn this stuff. The teacher would always say something like “so that we don’t make the same mistakes as these people did”. I have been reading through first Nephi studying Laman and Lemuel and the things that they did wrong so I won’t make the same mistakes as they made. There are a lot of things that we can learn that they did or didn’t do. They were slow to listen to the words of God, quick to do inequality, slow to repent. They harden their hearts, and they complained. One thing that has really stood out to me this time around is that they did "forget." in chapter 7 verse 10 Nephi says "How is it that ye have forgotten that ye have seen an angel of the Lord? 11) Yea, and how is it that ye have forgotten what great things the Lord hath done for us, in delivering us out of the hands of Laban, and also that we should obtain the record? 12) Yea, and how is it that ye have forgotten that the Lord is able to do all things according to his will, for the children of men, if it so be that they exercise faith in him? Wherefore, let us be faithful to him.

Each time that Laman and Lemuel rebelled they demonstrated that they were more concerned about there own well being and had totally forgot about the eternal purpose of life, Jesus Christ, and our Heavenly Father. Sometimes in life or even on mission we can forget what’s really up and we tend to get causal about things. In Helaman 5:12 he said   And now, my sons, remember, remember. I know that as we follow Nephi's example and never forget but to always remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation. Let us not forget but to always remember.

Love you guys,
Bbear

I know that the Book of Mormon has a power of its own to bring others unto Christ

What’s up my best family?

How has everyone been this week?  I got the stuff from that guy that came so thanks so much for that mom.

I don't have much time and the lights have been giving us problems but I know I need to send a quick note to my family.  We have this investigator named Ruth. I think that I mentioned her before. She is 24 and has a little girl. We have been teaching Ruth for some time now but she hasn’t really been progressing much. She wasn’t coming to church and she wasn’t reading the Book of Mormon so my companion and I talked a lot about what we could do to help her. We decided that if she wasn’t going to read the Book of Mormon then we would just read it to her. So every time we went to see her we read one or two scriptures that went along with what we were teaching her or we would just read a whole chapter to her and then talk about it. This seemed to be working quite well because she never told us to stop coming and she liked having us round. It was about two weeks into reading the Book of Mormon to her, her whole attitude about the church and about the gospel change. She started coming to church and starting reading on her own. Well she pre-pared herself for baptism and everything went well all the way up to the day of her baptism. Then her mother heard something about the church and wouldn't let her be baptized. It kind of through me and my companion off but we believe that she has a testimony and will be able to get through this and work things out with her mother. I know that the Book of Mormon has a power of its own to bring others unto Christ and help them see the truth in all things.

This week we had our interviews with President Judd. It was really sweet! I love that man. I wish that I had more time to talk to him, but we only got to spend a short time together. We mostly talked about what we can do to work this skin problem out. We are trying a few different things right now and we are seeing improvement. I think it has more to do with all the prayers in my behalf than anything! Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers. I can feel the power of pray in my life right now. Everything is looking better so I’m happy about that! My companion and I are working hard, and we are working on changing the boys into men. We are doing all that we can to be the best that we can be!

Sorry for the short one but I just wanted you to know that I am alright and I love you guys and miss you so much!

Love Bbear