On to Dallons email
Everything sounds just the same as when I left haha. I remember doing
the diving tables, but I don't really remember much about diving,
definitely need a refresher. But I won't be doing it for another year
and a half any way haha. Wow its almost like California over there.
Figures that now that I am done playing baseball it gets really warm
at the beginning of the season haha. Well we had a pretty solid week
of missionary work.
Wednesday we met with Lubia, we installed some new locks for her
doors, and surprisingly they work the way they are suppose to! haha.
We then taught her the gospel of Jesus Christ and focused on how
reading the Book of Mormon everyday both individually and as a family
will help us to endure to the end. We downloaded the gospel library
app onto her phone, and her kids tablets so that they can listen to
the scriptures together every night.
Thursday Elder Spencer came to my area for exchanges, he was my
district leader in Hollywood, and is now my zone leader. We went and
taught our new investigator Robert, and it was interesting to say the
least. His mom actually converted from Mormonism to Jehovah's Witness,
And so he was raised as a Jehovah's Witness. He even went door to door
teaching people. But he stopped following that when he learned some
things about the how his religion started. So since then he has been
"spiritual" but hasn't been practicing in any organized religion. He
is married, so his wife sat in on the lesson with us,and that is where
it really got crazy. His wife goes by her "spiritual name" Pershia.
She is the one who is really crazy. She believes that she is a
prophetess, and that when she meditates she speaks to our "celestial
brothers." She talked all about channeling, being on the same
frequency, different dimensions, it was pretty weird. She is
completely against any kind of organized religion, because she doesn't
want to offend God and poison herself with any religion. Even though
they believe some crazy things, their beliefs are very similar to ours
otherwise. Robert believes the Joseph Smith story and accepts the Book
of Mormon as the word of God. So he is actually a somewhat solid
investigator. Our main concern with him is his wife, who was against
him reading the Book of Mormon in the first place. But there is hope
for progress there!
In Los Angeles they do something called mini missions, which I had
never heard of so I don't know if they do them elsewhere. A mini
mission is where the youth get to go with the missionaries for a
weekend. The missionaries pick them up Friday evening and bring them
home Sunday evening. I think it is a really cool idea. So this weekend
we had a mini missionary named Elder Topacio with us. After we got him
all settled in at the apartment we tried to go find some less-actives.
We had a really cool experience. While we were looking for
less-actives, we felt the distinct impression to go visit Franco. We
hadn't heard from him since he told us that he might get evicted last
Monday. He was home and let us come in, we felt impressed to read Alma
32:26-41 with him. It is the analogy of faith to a seed. When we read
it we talked about how the when you plant the seed you don't give it
all the water it will ever need right then, and then it immediately
turns into a tree. You have to water it a little bit every day, and
eventually without you realizing it turns into a strong unshakable
tree. This is the same with our faith and testimonies. We need to have
some form of activity everyday where we can feel the Holy Ghost, and
after a while we will have a much stronger testimony without even
having realized it. Then out of nowhere Franco told us that he was
ready to come to church again without us even specifically mentioning
church. And so on Sunday Franco came to church for the first time in
over 20 years!
Saturday we had a good day of service.In the morning we went and set
up an activity for the Relief Society. We then went and helped Lucas
and Ivette move some stuff around, and played some cards and then
shared a scripture with them. Then right after that we went over to
Lubia's to help her paint her apartment. The parts where we didn't let
her little kids help actually looked pretty good haha, but we are
going over again this week to put a second coat on it. We then went
and had a lesson with Rod, he hadn't been answering our calls so we
went to see if he was home. He was, and let us inside and we read 3
Nephi together. We had a good lesson about the importance of baptism,
and Elder Topacio really brought the spirit by bearing his testimony
at the end.
Sunday as i already said, Franco was at church, but otherwise most of
the people we are working with didn't come. After church we went and
had a lesson with our other new investigator named Wayne. We taught
him some of the Restoration and had a pretty good lesson. We had a
really good conversation with someone on the street named Joi. She had
her son taken form her and was really sad, I then shared the scripture
that came to my mind in Alma 7:11-13 about how Christ has felt all of
our pains so he may know how to help us. She was very touched by the
spirit that came. We then had a very powerful prayer with her, and she
gave us her information. It turns out she lives in Inglewood, but the
missionaries over there are now going to start teaching her! We then
took our awesome mini missionary home. It was really cool to have him
with us, and we actually had some great lessons with him I love you
all and hope you have a great week!
Elder Burnside
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