Elder Burch π: Keith

Hello everyone!

This week was full of good things mingled with disappointment. Even the disappointment has its up side, though, so no worries there. Allow us to venture deeper into the world of this week...

First, an appreciation: Elder Ferrara is a beast at the work, and we've been having awesome times together, and I just felt like now was a good time to tell everyone how grateful I am to have him as my companion. Could one ask for anything better? I don't think so. You rock, dood. Thank you for all the hard work, the laughs, and the unity. (This is not a goodbye; we still have a minimum of a week left together. He's just a stud. That is all.)

Okay, disappointment first. Keith, the guy who was going to be baptized, was not able to be. We got a call from a member who works at the Vets Home. He was super apologetic, and explained that Keith's sister, who is his legal guardian, was not super on board when Keith told her about the baptism. As his legal guardian, we have to respect that. We talked to Keith for a while, and he expressed frustration that she doesn't see that this is the path he wants to take. We're going to keep visiting with Keith and all, and hopefully something in the future will happen to soften the heart of his sister so that Keith can take this step that he desires. Pray for that!

Onward and upward! The new family that we've been teaching is super rad! Things are going splendidly - we've been able to teach the first three lessons so far (The Restoration, The Plan of Salvation, and The Gospel of Jesus Christ), and they showed up to church this last week! This family is so fun to visit and to teach, and they recognize the Spirit like no one I've ever taught before. We've got some things to work through before we put them on date, but we'll take it at the pace we need to, and we know that God will bless them for their diligence and eagerness to learn more.

The snow is melting. It was 34 and sunny yesterday.

Spiritual thought: After the children of Israel wander in the wilderness for forty years, the finally get to the place and are at the time where the Lord desires them to settle. Moses gets up and speaks to the people, recounting their trails, travels, and the miracles that God has shown to them. As part of that, Moses tells the people, "And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord they God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him, and to serve the Lord thy God with all they heart and with all thy soul?" (Deuteronomy 10:12) This sounds funny after chapter upon chapter of rules and statutes that the children of Israel have been commanded to follow, but it brings it all back to the simple truth: "Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." (Matthew 22:37-40) Think about that.

I think that's all I have for now. Thank you for reading my emails, and keep being excellent out there. Rock and roll ~

-Elder Burch π

"... Some day you'll walk tall with pride. Son of man, a man in time you'll be."

Snow shoveling to the max.

The District!

Action shots

At the care center

Men shall not live by bread alone.

Nighthawk

Snow

Good morning (maybe), everyone!

Oh, man, this week. Oh, man, this week. Here we go.

On Tuesday, we went on exchanges with the Zone Leaders. Elder
Christensen came up to Buffalo with me while Elder Ferrara took the
van down to Gillette to spend some time with Elder Hendricks. They had
a blast, but Elder Christensen and I had some experiences that were a
little crazy. So crazy, in fact, that I think for the sake of
information sensitivity, I'm going to have to gloss over some of the
craziest parts. Ah, well.

Alright, first off, on Wednesday morning, Elder Christensen and I went
running. Yes, running. We put on some clothes, threw on a jacket, and
proceeded to run almost a mile in the freezing temperatures of the
early morning. Was it miserable? Yes. Did my lungs hurt from
breathing? Yes. Will I ever do it again? No, but it was worth it for
the story! I can now tell people that I went jogging in the morning in
the middle of winter in Wyoming when the temperature was somewhere
like -15 outside. (Sister Wadsworth heard about it and scolded us.
Still worth it for the story!)

Hey, remember how it was -16 outside two days ago? It's 46 and cloudy
today. Nuts. Okay, back to the story.

During lunch, we get a call from an unknown number. "Hello, it's the
missionaries for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints."
"Hey, it's Les!"
"Wh- wait, Les Babin?" Les is a very less active member who I hadn't
met yet, so this was exciting.
"Yeah, that's me! Hey, I need a Book of Mormon. A hard back one. With
the thick pages; none of the thin page stuff."
"Um, alright. Sounds good. We can do that for you. Where do you live?"
"You know where I live! Just down the street in those apartments; you
know the drill."
"Um, alright, rad. I guess we'll see you in an hour or so?"
"Good plan. See you then!" *click*

Turns out that Les has desires to return to church, and wanted a new
Book of Mormon because he just gave his last one to Keith, who will be
mentioned later in this email. How rad is that? Les was talking about
how he has just felt the Spirit recently in his life, and he says that
he knows it is time for him to come back. Rad, Les! More power to you.
He has to be out of town this coming Sunday, but he says to expect him
on the 22nd.

After that, as we're about to pull out onto the main road, I get a
prompting to take a short detour and give Alex* a visit. Alex is an
investigator that we had taught the first lesson, but had not been
able to set a return appointment yet. Alex answers the door and looks
disheartened and disheveled. After some initial hesitation, he opened
up to us and told us about some really rough stuff that had been
happening in his life, and how he felt alone, and had turned to
drinking. The drinking was putting stress on his family and he felt
like a failure. We testified that God had a plan for him and that he
can get through this with His help. He looked us straight in the face
and asked us to tell him honestly what brought us to his door. I told
him the truth: I believe God gave me a prompting to visit you. It was
a highly spiritual experience, and it confirmed my testimony that
promptings from the Spirit are things to always be followed.
*Name changed for reasons.

That same day, the bishop referred us to a family that had come to him
for a little financial help. He asked if they'd be down for visiting
with the missionaries, and they agreed! It is a young couple, early
thirties, and they have one sixteen-month-old boy. They expressed to
us in the first lesson that we had that they are looking to get to a
better place spiritually. Holy freaking perfect. We taught them the
restoration with bishop present, and they mentioned a couple times how
they felt the Spirit during certain parts of the message. A peace and
familiarity, they described it as. We left them with a commitment to
read the Book of Mormon, pray about it, and come to church. They did
not show up to church, but only because their kid got really sick (ER
sick) Saturday night. We decided we'd make them cookies and give them
some space. After all, that sounds pretty gnarly for their kid. Around
3 Sunday, we get a call, and it is the mother asking if we were still
coming by that day! "Um, yea! Yes, of course!" So, we went over again,
with Brother Thomas this time. (He knows her from work. I swear,
Brother Thomas knows everybody in the town of Buffalo.) We learned
that they'd been reading a chapter of the Book of Mormon every night
since we taught them the first lesson, and that they were still
feeling that same spirit of peace when they do. AHHHHH, THE LORD
PREPARES PEOPLE AND IT'S THE BEST THING THAT HAS EVER BEEN EVER. We
taught them the Plan of Salvation, invited them to continue reading,
and set an appointment for Thursday. Honestly, the lessons are kind of
difficult because they just accept everything so readily and joyfully.
I just... it usually isn't that easy. Going back to how prepared they
are, the father had decided to stop drinking literally two days before
our first lesson because it had been hurting the family. (He's been
going strong since then.) How freaking rad is that?! I'm so excited
for this. Pray for them. (Emily and Branden.)

Keith passed his interview and is on his way to the waters of baptism
this Saturday! We are seeing miracles. We are seeing the Lord's hand
everywhere. Keith is awesome, excited, and I couldn't be prouder of
him. Pray for him, because Satan likes to screw things up at the last
minute. (Knock on wood.)

Real quick last funny thing: Yesterday's talks in sacrament meeting
were all by high priests, and there was one that went on a little
tangent. I can't exactly refer to it as "false," but it is definitely
speculative, and not super important to our everyday salvation. He was
talking about Kolob and its length of rotation around its star and how
that relates to the time periods involved in the creation and it was
kind of funny. Maybe it was good that the new investigators couldn't
make it that day...

That is all for now! I love you all, and I hope you're seeing God's
hand in your life, too. Keep on keeping on!

-Elder Burch π

"... So come on, Davy! Sing me something that I know!"