October 14,
2014 (week 7 in Argentina)
Hola!
So the past two
weeks have been awesome, especially with Conference the last Sunday! My favorite talk that touched me the most and
reminded me what being a missionary was all about was the talk by Elder
Holland. He spoke with so much power and spirit and he said some things that I
loved. He talked about the life of Christ.
He, who is our brother and exemplar for us to follow and be better people, He
who is King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Son of the most high God, and he was
homeless. I felt that for someone so
powerful and inspirational for all of us, was born of a humble birth. He was born in a stable, to parents who barely
had anything. And as He taught and
helped people through his whole life, He did it without having a home. When I thought of Him being so great and
powerful, I saw that He gave up a lot for us. He suffered for all of our sins and died for
us so that we may be forgiven and live with our Heavenly Father. Elder Holland asked the question "Aren’t
we all beggars? Don’t we all beg for forgiveness?" It really helped me realize that Jesus is the Christ,
and everything we have that is of this world isn’t as important as our
families. I read in Alma about Aaron
teaching the king about the gospel. The
king said "I would abandon all the things I possess to know such
joy." It really helped me feel just
how important family and people are and not my phone, Facebook, car, or
anything else of little importance.
We have
now changed to the summer schedule because it gets so hot and so many people
sleep during the period called the siesta. It’s literally 12ish to 430 every day and we
study during this time. So that is nice
because it gets super, super hot. So hot
that I am drenched in sweat every day.
Last
week was probably the hardest week so far.
We have been seeing so many investigators that we believe are finding
what they are looking for in life, which is the gospel and teachings of Jesus Christ,
and then all of a sudden they all stopped progressing! We were crushed, but we still worked hard
trying to find new people to teach and to hopefully pass by and see how our
investigators were doing. Whenever we
would contact and clap (that’s how we knock on doors) houses trying to find new
people to teach, we would only find one person who wanted to talk to us
out of the hundreds of people we talked to and clapped to share this
gospel. But, not to worry! I’ve learned that even if people don’t want to
listen to you or treat you with a lot of disrespect, you can still be happy. Elder Allen and I are so happy when we are
walking the streets and when we talk to people and are even happier when we can
share and invite people to come to know if our words and message are
true.
Yesterday was
a miracle because we were able to have all of our good investigators start
progressing again! They are so much
happier and are following the simple things we invite them to do. Read the Book of Mormon, pray, and come to
church. Truly a blessing for us and we
are just happy, simply happy.
The Spanish
is so much easier now. I can express
myself better and even understand the majority of what they are talking about. I am studying hard and praying harder so that I
can bring happiness into the lives of people.
I love all of
you and hope you all take advantage of the www.lds.org website and watch and study the topics on how to
only better your life.
Nos Vemos!
Elder Burke
 |
| Elder Allen reading scriptures with the kids |
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