Happy Halloween 10/31/16

This week was really great, we had the visit with Elder Dallin H Oaks, and it was soo great.  It was super spiritual, but then every now and then he would crack some jokes.  

"Don't worry about home, focus on the work,  Forget about your girlfriend...she will marry someone else.    And forget about the elections in the United States....I wish I could forget..."

He taught us about Moroni 10:4 which asks us to question God with faith in Christ, with a sincere heart, and with real intent.  He taught us that real intent is the most important part of those three because it means that we will ACT upon the answer that we receive from God.  We can have faith and a sincere heart, but if we don't act upon the impressions we receive from the spirit, the first two don't help us too much.

He also taught us that we need to make goals that depend on OUR agency, too often we make the mistake of making goals that depend on the agency of other people.  

We are here to convert the people to the GOSPEL of Jesus Christ and not here to convert people just to be members of the church.  

On Sunday we spoke in Sacrament meeting.  I got called to speak about the plan of salvation, but focused my talk on our responsibility as members of the church to teach the gospel to others so they will know how to put in practice the plan of salvation.  

So they don't celebrate Halloween in Honduras, but I hope that everyone else had a spooky time!

- Elder Burnham

another apostle visit/ 10/24/16

Hello people!  Sorry, I have not been able to write much these last few P Days.  But everything is going great.  So I kind of forgot to mention last week that Elder Dallin H Oaks is coming to Honduras and will be speaking to us on Wednesday!  One more apostle visit before I finish! haha  

This week was really good, We were able to have interchanges with the zone leaders on Tuesday.  It is always a cool experience to work with a different elder for a day.  But now that we are covering the two areas, we have to walk a lot! haha  We also had interviews with President on Saturday, getting me really pumped to work hard these last few weeks.  

Today for P Day we went and played paintball!  I went last year in October, so it was cool to go again a year later.  Next P Day we will have to do something fun for Halloween, even though it is not really celebrated here.  

This Sunday we should have an activity where we take investigators and less active members to the temple to go on a tour on the temple grounds.  That should be really fun, hopefully we will be able to bring a lot of people.  

That's all I have time to write for now, see you all soon!

- Elder Burnham

10/10/16 - been really fun to be district leader of our tiny little district

Wow what a week!  I feel like I had transfers to another area now that we are covering two areas.  We basically work in one of the two areas every other day, switching off so we don't end up walking a ton!  This week we were able to find all the positive investigators the elders left in their area.  We are getting to know the people and the area little by little.  It has been really fun.  

My companion is super awesome as well.  We actually have really similar personalities.  He is from Quito, Ecuador.  It has been really awesome to teach with him because he has a really strong testimony of the Atonement and shares it with everyone.  Even if the lesson is about a different topic, he will always relate it back to the atonement.  It's so true because any gospel topic can be and should be related back to the atonement of Jesus Christ.

It has also been really fun to be district leader of our tiny little district.  Just another companionship.  The elder in the other companionship is training a new elder from Utah.  It has been really interesting to reflect back when I was in that position-  I have come a long way since then and I hope that I can make a positive impact on the new elder as he is transitioning into being in the mission field.  

We had stake conference this weekend, and it was really good (Even though we couldn't hear very well) haha  Elder Maravilla, an area 70 and also President and Sister Ferman spoke.  I really liked Sister Ferman´s talk.  She talked about Charlie and the chocolate factory explaining that the gospel is like the golden ticket.  We need to do everything we can to find the gospel and put it into practice in our lives.  

Have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

Unexpected Changes!

My last transfer is going to be a busy one!  So let me explain the changes that are going to happen in the district.  I am staying for a fourth transfer and my companion is leaving.  I am now the district leader, and the other area in our ward has been closed.  So now my area is twice the size and we need to meet all these new investigators that once belonged to the other companionship.  My new companion will be Elder Gallegos from Ecuador.  This will be exciting!  

General Conference was really great!  I really liked Uchtdorf´s and Holland´s talks.  Uchtdorf basically explained the entire plan of salvation, that will be cool to share in lessons.

On Friday we had a talent show/culture night in the ward.  I sang a hymn, whoo! haha  It was fun, there was a lot of singing and dancing and skits.  It was really funny, because by the end, it turned into a karaoke party, a ton of members all of the sudden had the desire to sing and dedicate the songs to their wives and stuff. haha  

I almost forgot to mention that we moved apartments! We had problems with the plumbing in the old apartment and we ended up with no water at all.  We would have to go downstairs and fill up a bucket of water to bathe.  So we were really tired of living without water, so we moved.  Our new apartment is behind the house of a family of members.  We are the first people to live in the apartment, so it is new!  We have water constantly!  There is also a rooftop terrace that has probably one of the best views in the city overlooking everything!  

I am really excited to work really hard this transfer, hope that everything goes well!

- Elder Burnham

Whoo! Next week is General Conference (09/26/16)

Whoo! Next week is General Conference!

On Tuesday we went to the office,  It was kind of weird not being a secretary this time.  I left the office almost four months ago.  I was able to renew my temple recommend, whoo! It was going to expire at the end of this month.  When we were on the bus back to our area, there was this crazy guy outside that was running alongside our bus trying to keep up.  He was running really fast and was following our bus for a long time!  Basically from one side of the city to the other.  Why take the bus if you can run faster? haha  

On Saturday we had the baptism for Josue, Brenda´s son.  His sister didn't gt baptized because she was sick.  Part of the reason she got sick was because she was reading the Book of Mormon too much! haha.  I think that this is some kind of record.  She would read at night until her eyes hurt and got a really bad headache.  We also had two ward baptisms for two 8 year old cousins.  The parents asked me to do the ordinance, so that was a cool experience.  

Sunday was really cool because we went to go visit less active members with three other members.  So we were five in total.  Missionary work is so much more fun and effective when you visit with members.  They were young adults our age, so it felt like doing visits with friends. 

Everybody needs to go watch General Conference!  I am super excited.  Have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

 

 

My tomatoes in my little balcony garden are ripening (09/19/16)

Hello!

Yesterday we had ward conference, so we were inviting everybody this week.  We had an activity on Saturday to go out with the members and invite all the less actives to the conference.  A ton of missionaries from the stake came to help. But we ended up going on divisions with a member from the other ward inviting people from another area to the other ward's conference.  Haha But I am glad we could help.

The ward conference was really good.  The topic was on tithing and the blessings we can receive when we obey this commandment and when we show faith, obedience, and sacrifice.  It was really neat.  We were able to bring five people to church.  Two of them have a baptism date for this Saturday!

Thursday was 15 of September, which is the Honduran Independence Day.  Which means that it is really hard to get work done, everyone is either not home, or if they are home, they don't want anything from the missionaries. haha  

My comp has been sick this week, so we weren't able to get everything we wanted done this week, but he is getting better.  My tomatoes in my little balcony garden are ripening . I also replanted some of the little sprouting plants in separate little cups.  Yes, I garden with the very little free time I have. haha

Have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

The first picture is this weird fruit called liche and it looks like a sea urchin, but the inside tastes like a grape

Another good week in Laureles (09/12/16)

Another good week in Laureles.

We have this really awesome investigator Brenda.  She absolutely loves reading the Book of Mormon, she is reading every night.  She comes to our church building even though she lives really far, on the complete other side of the city.  But she has her friendships in our ward, so she is insistent on attending church here even though there are other churches closer to her house.  She and her two kids have been coming to church and they all accepted a baptismal date. Whoo!

On Saturday we went to lunch with the assistants at Wendys! Whoo! haha.  I was excited because I hadn't had a frosty in a while.  

Saturday was also Dia del Niño.  Kids Day, which really isn't a thing in the states.  Basically it's like a second birthday party.  Everyone was scrambling around to buy piñatas and stuff.  

We were able to do a lot of visits with members this week.  We had lessons with the ward mission leader, the young mens president, the young womens president, and the primary president.  There was a big youth activity this week and we were able to bring a ton of youth investigators with the help of the ward leaders.  I also really liked church on Sunday because the messages were focused on families and service.  

That's all folks, have a great week!

- Elder Burnham  

So this has been a fun week. (08/29/16)

Hello!  So this has been a fun week.  I am with my new companion Elder Rodriguez.  He is from El Salvador and has the same amount of time on the mission as I do.  Which means that I will most likely leave this area the next transfer because we can't finish the mission in the same area at the same time haha.  He is a really good teacher,  he is so direct and good at asking inspired questions.  Hopefully we make this transfer really awesome.  

This week we have been working really hard and finding new people.  We found this one family that has like 11 people and they were just swarming us with questions!  Not attacking us, but just genuinely curious.  That was fun.  

We have been getting a ton of rain this week!  Yesterday it was raining almost all day and we got soaked! We were also able to take refuge in the houses of members while it was coming down like crazy.  haha.  Good thing we live on a large hill and the water runs down, because  other parts of the city have been dealing with flooding issues.  

I have become the cat whisperer because sometimes when we are outside in the streets, I will make meow sounds (I know, I am kind of strange) and other cats will meow back and come out looking for where the sound was coming from! haha  

We have also been trying to have more Family Home Evenings with the members so they can have more confidence in us and help us out with the missionary work.  And plus they will be more likely to invite us over for dinner ;)

Yep!  Have a great week!

We brought little lemonades... 08/16/16

Another week went by!  This week we went to go help the other ward that meets in our building with some visits with less actives.  But I think we were hit with some bad luck because 5 out of 5 of the families we went to go visit were not home! haha.

This Sunday was really cool.  We had the Christensens come and speak in our meetings.  They are the couple missionaries that serve in the temple.  Brother Christensen is the first counselor in the temple presidency.  They taught in the Sunday school class and spoke in sacrament meeting.  So obviously they spoke about temples.  Hermana Christensen is so funny.  She told us, "you've got to tell the youth not to use so much hair gel because it comes off and just floats on top of the water in the baptismal font"  They were both really great, just hopefully our investigators didn't get too confused.

Earlier this week we went to this big park that they built in front of our church building to go contacting.  We brought little lemonades and were giving them out and talking to the people.  The only thing was that most of the people that come to the park live in the boundaries of the other ward, so the other elders benefited more from this activity. haha  But it was really fun.  This morning we went to the park again to go have our studies outside.  The park is run by the government so they keep it really clean and well maintained. 

Next week we have changes so we will see what happens.

Adios!

- Elder Burnham

My little balcony garden in coming along pretty well... 08/08/16

We got some rain this week, but mostly in the night, the hurricane did not attack us! haha  We got more water last p day when we had a water balloon fight with the zone!

We also had a zone meeting this week.  It was really great.  I really like how my zone leaders know how to do a simple, but inspiring zone meeting.  We don´t need to be in a super complicated long meeting to be motivated to work hard.  We really focused on using time more efficiently and focusing on finding new families. 

This week in general I felt like we just kept contacting old people! haha Maybe we will end up with a teaching pool of mostly seniors! 

The elders that we living with us asked us to help them paint their new apartment.  So we all went and started painting their new house.  I think they ended up moving in too soon and the land lord wanted to paint the apartment, so we were able to help out with that.

Our old (fake) investigator decided that she wanted to progress all of the sudden and wants to get baptized soon and wants to have her baby that was born three months ago presented in the ward, so that was neat.  I say fake investigator because she really is a member, but since her record was never put into the system, she has to get baptized again to officially be considered a member.  If she doesn't have a record, she won't be able to receive ward callings or get temple recommends and such.  She had been inactive for a while, but wants to go to church again.  Yay!  

My little balcony garden in coming along pretty well too, I´ll send some pictures! 

Have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

photos

our zone!

tomatoes and green peas!  

It has begun, the sister missionaries in my mission are now wearing....PANTS! 08\01\16

It has begun, the sister missionaries in my mission are now wearing....PANTS! haha  I know this is old news, but this week was the first time that I had seen the sisters actually wear pants haha.

This week we had interchanges with the zone leaders.  I went with Elder Massey in his area in Quezada.  It was a really good time.  We were able to teach a lot of lessons.  Something that he is all about is teaching really simple short lessons,  We don't need to spend 45 minutes explaining every concept of the restoration.  We can just give really simple lessons with a couple principles to invite the spirit and teach simple truths.  And also sometimes people get bored if you try to teach a lot. haha It was a really good day, even though I got a little sunburned.  

The next day we went to immigration (I never thought I would go back there again) haha.  My companion this time had to go take out his residency.  haha.  

A family that the other elders are teaching were getting married and roasted a pig for the wedding,  But we were there when they killed the pig......  It was a little terrifying.  They tied up the pig and smacked it on the head with a hammer to knock it unconscious, then they slit its throat open so it would bleed out and die...But i bet it was delicious at the wedding!  The elders also moved out of our house this week, so now there is a little more peace. haha  And we have been able to clean up the house a lot more.  

This week has been a little rough, because we have been dropping a ton of our investigators because no one was progressing.  So this week we will have to work hard to find basically a new teaching pool.  But there are always people ready to hear our message.

This morning we also had the opportunity to do some service.  We helped these people at a tortilleria carry in their mountain of firewood. Fun stuff!

Also it is now August!  Wow time flies.  Have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

Sorry, no pictures this week..  

We got to go look at a little lake - 7/25/16

Hello!  Last P-Day we went to this little reservoir that's kind of near our area (and because there is not that much else to do).  We went as a zone and when we started out, it started POURING rain.  We all got soaked.  But it was fun.  We got to go look at a little lake.

We also had our multi-zone conference this week.  It was really long.. haha.  Sometimes I feel like president doesn't know how to do short meetings.  But we learned a lot!  We focused a lot on testifying of the Book of Mormon and developing Christlike attributes.  It was a really good meeting.

Our investigator Ilda got baptized this weekend!  She is super awesome, and has a strong testimony of the gospel.  Her children got baptized like 10 years ago, but she never had the chance to do so.  I was able to perform the ordinance and elder Garcia was able to do the confirmation.  

Also in sacrament meeting, Elder Small and I sang a musical number.  We sang Come Thou Fount in Spanish, but is was some other version, because the words were different than the normal Spanish version.  

Another short email, but I have pictures this time!

 - Elder Burnham

4 people in one apartment--with no water 07/11/16

This has been an interesting week. Another companionship of elders in our district were moving houses, but they had to move out of their old house before they could move into their new house, so they are living with us right now, and who knows how much longer it will be.  It has been kind of a challenge because we don´t get very much water in our apartment, so we have been rationing it between four people.  We had to go borrow two buckets of water from our land lady so we could bathe this morning because we pretty much don't have any more water.  But it should come again tomorrow.  

On Saturday, we had a district activity where we went and sung to our investigators.  Elder Small brought his guitar and we sung hymns to our investigators.  It was pretty fun! haha

Yesterday, we were walking back to our area and there was some water running down the sidewalk, and I completely tripped and fell! haha.  I got my pants and shirt all dirty, but we were able to go back to the house and change.  But it was kind of embarrassing because some people on the other side of the street saw me slip and fall haha.

We haven´t heard anything about the transfers yet, so I will have to let you all know next week.

Sorry, I didn´t take any pictures this week.  Hopefully I will get some to you guys next week.

- Elder Burnham

Yay! Happy Fourth of July Everybody 07/04/16

Yay!  Happy Fourth of July Everybody.  I won´t be able to do much to celebrate, but we might go eat hot dogs and sing the patriotic songs at the end of the hymnbook! haha

This was a really exciting week for my companion.  For some reason he never called his family on Mother's Day so we went to the office on Tuesday so he could make his call home.  I also realized that I am glad I don´t have to deal with all the work and stress of the office anymore! haha.  

Elder Garcia had also not received his Patriarchal Blessing before the mission, so he was able to get that on Thursday.  We went to our chapel and the stake patriarch came and gave him his blessing while I chilled outside.  

We had a contacting activity in my area this week with my district.  We all divided up and went contacting in our area.  We all found some new people to teach so hopefully we can help them progress. 

I realized that I haven't been taking any pictures lately, I´ll try to get better at that, but in the meantime, here are some pictures of my area again! haha

Have a great week and 4th of July!

- Elder Burnham

Walter's Baptism 06/27/16

Hello!  Sorry, this email might be another short one because the computers and internet at this cyber cafe that we are at are really slow, haha.

Most importantly, we had the baptism for Walter!  Even though practically all our other plans on Saturday fell through, we had a baptism!  We also combined the service with the other elders in our district who are in the other ward that uses our same building.  Even though it started a little late, the service went really well.  (For some reason there is nothing you can do to make a baptism service start on time).  Then on Sunday I was able to confirm Walter as a member of the church, and confer the gift of the Holy Ghost.  I actually had never done that before.  It was a really an incredible experience.  

Our landlady keeps an oven stored in our apartment, and for some reason, the elders that had lived there before said it didn´t work.  But I wanted to investigate that, haha.  It turned out that the cable just didn´t reach the outlet in the wall, so we propped up the oven with some blocks.  It works perfectly fine.  In fact we used it to make a cake for an elder´s birthday last week! haha.  So that has been a fun toy to have. 

Well, that´s all I have for right now.  Hopefully I will be able to send some pictures with this crappy internet! haha

- Elder Burnham

 

 

The Garden of Elder Burnham 06/20/16

I feel like this was a pretty normal week in the mission.  (I feel like I have not had one of those in a long time haha).  On Friday we had interchanges.  My district leader, Elder Small, came to my area.  That was kind of fun because I am still pretty new to the area, but we ended up not getting lost haha.  We had Walter´s baptism interview even though we decided to postpone the baptism for the next Saturday because there was this huge multi-stake activity that caused some scheduling conflicts.  But next Saturday Walter will get baptized.

We went back with this guy we found last week, Mario.  He is super awesome.  He told us that almost 20 years ago he made a promise with God that he would stop drinking and has never done so since.  He really likes our message and wants to come to church this week.  He already accepted a baptism date and is progressing really fast.  We left him one chapter to read in the Book of Mormon and he had read the three chapters after that one!  Super cool!  

We have a balcony with some potted plants that we kind of take care of for the land lady.  We have some pots that just had some dirt in them and so she gave us some seeds to plant some more plants.  So basically we have a garden that I am investing random spare time into. haha Hopefully the tomatoes, onions, and greens peas I planted do well! 

We started church on Sunday with no investigators and ended with two!  One of them was a friend of a member that she invited, but she doesn't live in our area.  But the place that she lives does not have missionaries.  So she is going to come here on he weekends so we can teach her here!  We invited some less actives to church and they showed up!  Their mom who is not a member and didn´t seemed too interested, unexpectedly showed up to church about halfway through the sacrament meeting, so that was really cool!

When it is not raining, it's really hot, so I kind of hope for rain even if we have to walk around in it haha!

Have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

lightning storms and earthquakes 06/13/16

This week has been crazy in terms of weather.  We have been getting rain all week, but on Tuesday, we had this crazy storm that caused the power to go out.  We were in a lesson and then we stayed in the investigator's house a little longer for some refuge from the storm.  When the rain lightened up, we went outside and two light posts had fallen down and there were a some little mud slides.  Then a couple days later we had an earthquake!  It wasn't very big, but we sure noticed that the house was wobbling back and forth.  Apparently it was centered in Nicaragua, but we felt it pretty well here in Honduras. But everyone is fine!

It has been pretty cool to work in a new area.  We have a few families that we are teaching and we found some new ones this week.  One of our investigators, Walter, should be getting baptized this Saturday.  He is such an awesome person,  He has changed so much to accept the gospel.  Before the missionaries started visiting him, he was really deep into drugs and alcohol.  But he just dropped it all just like that!  Miracles!  

This old member guy told us that he is more faithful than others at church because he doesn't have to get up during the meetings and use the bathroom during the whole three hours.  So if you truly want to keep the Sabbath day holy, you shouldn't use the bathroom at church because it is a big distraction.  haha

Sorry its a short one, have a great week!

- Elder Burnham

new mission limbo 06/06/16

I am in this weird mission limbo where I have my new area and companion, but I also have to come back to the office to train the new general secretary.  All last week I was in my old area, so I could go to the office and train.  But this weekend, I was able to actually meet my new companion and work in my new area.  My companion is Elder Garcia from Guatemala, super close to the border of Mexico.  He is newer in the mission (he has about 5 months).  He is super cool, and laid back.  We are the area, Los Laureles (Colonia San Francisco), which is basically on the top of this hill in Comayaguela. There are some pretty good views of the city up there.  I can see my two old areas in the distance.  I am going to end up spending almost a whole year straight just in the city, within three areas.  

Our house is on the second floor of a restaurant owned by a member.  The apartment is not bad, but I just have to get used to taking cold bucket showers again because we only have running water every few days.  It was kind of sad after taking hot showers for the last seven months haha.  The landlady´s cat sneaked into out apartment and pooped in an empty box, haha.  I hope the elders before me haven´t been feeding the cat because we are not supposed to have pets, haha.  

Elder Garcia has been showing me around the area, and we got to meet a lot of members and less actives, as well as some of the investigators that we have.  We are teaching some really awesome families.  We have also been getting a lot of rain this last week.  I guess we are heading into the wet season now.  It usually rains every night now.  

Today I am writing from the office. I might have to come and pop in every now and then to help out the new secretary.  But everything is pretty good and I am excited to work in a new area!

- Elder Burnham

Museums, cathedrals, zoos, immigration 05/28/16

Sorry folks, I have been pretty bad at writing letters lately.  Here is one for you all (even if it´s not all that long).  

The last two P-Days were pretty fun.  We went to the Basilica de Suyapa and we went to this armed forces museum in Centro.  Last Saturday we went to Sabana Grande and to the zoo that is pretty close by.  I am pretty sure this zoo is some person´s private collection because it´s attached to this restaurant and it is free to enter.  So basically pictures of animals and catholic cathedrals (I think I have some kind of obsession with cathedrals).  

I have also been going to immigration a whole bunch lately.  A lot of certifications have been coming out and I have to take all these missionaries to get their residency processed.  So that has been kind of fun (NOT).  I have been doing some math and realized that I have taken over 120 missionaries to immigration for their residencies.  Just casual.

We have been trying to have a lot of Family Home Evening lessons with members and investigators.  That has been really fun.  Sometimes we end up having really big groups of people.  We had to even bring extra chairs to a member's house.  We are hoping that Robelio, our investigator, gets baptized pretty soon.  We hadn´t been able to teach him for a while because he had been out of town for a couple weeks.  

Things have been getting a little crazier as we are approaching transfers.  Nothing is official until Monday, but I am about 99.99% sure that I am leaving the office, haha.  Seven months is a long time, haha.  May is almost over!? I hope you all have a great week.  

- Elder Burnham