Feliz Navidad!!!

Hahah super funny week. First off, I went to a member of the Ward to eat dinner. And everything is all good and stuff, eating some pot roast and salad, when I look at their son, who has his head down a little bit, and I realize I have seen this exact same thing before.....then I started making weird faces and weird noises cause I was getting excited, then the Dad noticed and I look at him all scared and then he nods in assurance that my thoughts are correct....and BAM I ask them, "is your son....the Rainmaker??" And he said, "yeah!" and then I freaked out for like 5 minutes. So, I watched a movie before my mission, called Looper. It had Angels in the Outfield guy, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Bruce Willis. And their son, Pierce Gagnon, was the main kid in it. It was a really funny moment.

I also contacted a guy that I used to watch on YouTube, he ran a website called college humor.. So far, my celebrity count is at 3, I still not have found Whoopi Goldberg, but the search continues.

As for the work, things are hard because finals are going on and these Chinese students are diligent. Great example to me for when I go back. It was a little sad this week though because we had a really good progressing investigator drop us, because she was really sad we couldn't become boyfriend and girlfriend....it was the first time this happened to me on the mission, it was pretty weird.... BUT anyways, Tracy is still moving along towards baptism and we found an investigator who is a pretty old lady, probably 50 or 60, her Chinese name is Fu Jie Mei, but you know, we are in America, so this just won’t do, so she renamed herself Beyoncé. So pretty much I am teaching Jay-Z's wife.

Elder Baxter came to visit it us, it was so funny, he pretty much bashed on puritans and told us to have more fun!!

BUT something awesome he said was in 3 Nephi 26. How when the Spirit fell on the people, they said great things. And then it writes that the things they said were greater than what Jesus had said just barely. He talked about how that truly expresses the character of Christ, lifting others above him, not wanting any of the glory for himself, but always looking to send praise and love outwards. Even Christ, the person that created everything, who had all the power of God the Father, who had the perfect knowledge like God the Father acknowledged that someone said something greater than he. It’s all about becoming more like him. PMG is for LIFE!

I miss you family! I sent a happy birthday package for Mom today!!! Happy Birthday Mom, I love you! Go eat some chicken feet in Hong Kong for me. (I actually like to eat that now.)

Love you guys, Happy Holiday!

Elder Burr

SunSunSun

Family,

I just hope all you know I had an awesome week! I hope all you did too. We had investigators at Church, we had investigators come to the baptism. All these blessings came from obedience to the council of the Mission Leaders. We have to listen to the council of our leaders. Some of happiest moments was when I got to see a long time less-active take the sacrament for the first time in 9 years. It’s such a simple little act, but I don't know, that snap shot in my mind was just so spiritually strong, I could just imagine all the mistakes that person made being swept up in the Grace of Christ. After we make that baptismal promise with God, he never leaves us, we leave him. And it was so cool seeing somebody come back to him, come back to the fold. Her name was Sister Cho and she was Korean, and she was the first LA I have seen come back to Church so I am going to work extra hard on keeping her here.

Remember that guy who heard about the Church in Chinese prison and flew to America with the intent of walking to SLC to find the one true Church, well yeah, his name is Frank and he got baptized this Sunday!! It was one of the funnest baptisms I have been too. In his testimony Frank said something along the lines, “when I was in darkness....prison....the guards always liked to see how tough I was, but now I am in the true Church....AND THEY ARE NOT!!" It was super sweet! Even our Mission President came.

So do you remember Eric Xiao? He got baptized in August I think? Well, he has been working on his girlfriend and now she has a goal for Jan 18th!!! yeah! She is super funny and wears big hats made out of rabbit fur to church!!

I really like the stage of my mission right now, I am just having a lot of fun teaching these people. For sure it is still stressful and tiring and taxing on the emotions, but all good things are that way, right? If everything was handed to us, we would never grow.

I gave a guy a baptismal interview the other day, well actually him and his wife. His wife passed, but he didn't want to, he was still getting hung up on Joseph Smith and his 40 wives. And I don't blame him, that's a pretty weird thing. But when I was in the interview, I realized that in this life, we need to walk by faith, and we need to rely on the things that God has already given us. God won’t give it to us all at once, but he will give us something. It is up to us to remember where these little testimonies came from and to continue to nurture what we have. This man had faith in God and Faith in Jesus Christ and Faith in the Book of Mormon. But because of a historical matter, he was throwing all these things he knew under the bus and stopping himself from joining his wife in baptism. It really was super sad. It makes me think of all the people that trade the things they do know, for something they don't. I think in a talk someone said, “they trade their spiritual birthright, for a mess of pottage." That was hard for me to see him not want to be baptized, but I will continue to pray for him and his family this week, he was such a sincere guy, I just need to trust that God will consecrate my own efforts and make up for what I mess up on.

I love you guys!! Happy Holidays! Merry Christmas Harry! Happy Hanukah Marv!

Elder Burr

Rodney King!!

So today we will be confined to our house. LA has a history of rioting so we are going to be stuck inside when the verdict comes out for the Missouri shooting case.

This week was fun because I got to teach a chinese person with a christian background. Her name was Huang Qian ( yellow money??jk different characters) but yeah, so we had our first lesson with her and we were teaching her all this cool stuff that she had already hear before "God loves, us we are his kids, " you know, just run of the mill non-denominational Christian evangelizing, BUT when we got to Joseph Smiths first vision, everything changed. Huang Qians was just so calm and so quit, and it was just so cool. I know I have been out for a long time now, but I love that I can still have these experiences with these lesson that I have taught a hundred times. Yeah, a lot of crazy stuff went down in Joseph Smiths life, but I just know that the first vision happened, and that God the Father called him to be a prophet. I am really excited to see where she goes. It has been a while since we have gotten an investigator to really progress, but the overall chinese district is doing awesome. The other set of Elders in the Ward found a guy wander into the VC. His name was Frank Xiao and he had heard about the Church in China, but he couldnt get full information because no one was willing to talk about it fully becase of the government rules, so he decided to travel to Utah to see the temple and the church with prophets that those people in China were talking about. But, he landed at LAX and googled the church and found out that we have a temple here and so he just decided to stay. He is just a super humble guy that loves christianty, hates communism, and rides motorcycles, thats my kind of guy! he will be baptized on Dec 7th. Its so cool, the modern day pioneers that we get to see. It reminds me of all those people from Scotland and England that came over to build Zion, and now all these Chinese pioneers can be baptized and return and build up the church. Our mission president always says our job is to find and baptize the future general authorities of china. We are still in the middle of the Restoration!! We carry a message that no one else has, WE ATTEND THE TRUE CHURCH OF GOD EVERY SUNDAY!! Thats just crazy to. #blessed. Oh man, when I start doing hashtags, it is time for me to get of.

I am going to be spending thanksgiving with a nice crazy portoguese family!

I love you guys!!

Elder Burr

The Long Haul

Just finished a 5-week transfer and now we are in for a 7-weeker! I am still with the big-boy, Elder Zhang and I am trying my very best to make him lose weight, we even went to Ross last P-day and bought him some skinny slacks for motivation, but alas, he goes into hunger rages and eats a ton of microwave burritos and sriacha sauce. 

Haha! So we were helping our investigator Wang Zi Yi pray for the first time, so we were having her list off the things she was thankful for, she said, " the world, my family, my friends, my school, the great communist party of China.." after she said that I just lost it and started laughing, and she got a little mad at me for laughing at China. 

AWESOME SUNDAY!! So a girl that Elder Bria and I street contacted into at USC four transfers ago got baptized on Sunday. I couldn’t go because I couldn’t find an investigator to take to it, but it was just an awesome testimony to me that I need to try me very hardest in every contact, in every person I talk to because who knows where that little experience will go. It really is true, we plant seed every single day with how we live our lives, I am just lucky enough that I wear funny white shirts and Mr. Mac pants with pleats and people instantly know I am a missionary so they can associate with the Church, it will for sure be a lot harder after the mission, but I am excited for it. I shouldn’t think about life after.....

That is so awesome Tori is heavy with child!! Ohh man, life is just moving on and on. That pictures that Dad sent a while back were crazy! Mellissa and Tina and Becki look so old! Has Rebecca been applying to school? 

ahhh, I don’t know why, but lately the rejections have been a lot more. These rich Asian teens just aren’t worried about this stuff right now. It has made me realize more and more that we are looking for the elect. I know God guides this work, and that is why I keep going. If I was out here for just me and my companion, I would have quite a long time ago. All I can do is pray for these investigators. Please also pray for them!! Thanks family for being a part of this hastening!!

I have been turning to this scripture a lot lately, Alma 37: 33-34 

“Preach unto them repentance, and faith on the Lord Jesus Christ; teach them to humble themselves and to be meek and lowly in heart; teach them to withstand every temptation of the devil, with their faith on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Teach them to never be weary of good works, but to be meek and lowly in heart; for such shall find rest to their souls.”

This scripture has been helping me understand what I am doing out here.

I know this is true. It is all centered on faith in Jesus Christ, our Savior. Let’s never ever forget that!

Love you, thanks for everything!

Elder Burr

Crispy

The weather is getting crispier, just a like a Carl's Jr. $1 chicken sandwich.

Thanks for the package Mom!! And also thanks for all the Hostess snacks Grandma, it was like I was back at the cabin, sneaking into the pantry while all the Uncles and Grandpa are playing Hearts and Brads all like "shoot the moon Johnny!!" (I never did quite figure out how to play)

Whenever I tell people that I have a family of 8 and we are all active, they are super impressed. Keep it up Mom and Dad!! But don’t push too hard ; )

I was teaching our English class students a lesson on money and at the end I shared a message about how grateful I am that my parents and the Gospel taught me what’s most important. That titles like CEO, CFO, etc etc, are not the most important titles, but Father, Son, Brother, Grandson, Friend, these are the most important titles. Also what things are important to obtain. Not money, cars, or possessions, but spiritual experiences, knowledge, and family relationships. Our investigator QiQi (a single mom) was listening and she was very touched! It made me realize how blessed we are to have this Gospel. The things it teaches us and our families are so important!!! I really believe that there is no substitute, no other things that can teach these eternal virtues with such strength and conviction. It is very easy to take for granted this Gospel, I know I did before my mission, but as I share the things I know to be true and I feel the Spirit testify through me, I remember just how valuable this gospel knowledge is. BUT OH MAN! It is so hard to get other people to realize this sometimes.

The RC's in my area are doing well! They should be going to the Temple soon!

I like the Fall!! It is pretty much the same weather, not that much different. It is so weird just remembering what happened a year ago. In 7 days is the 1 year anniversary of Betal Liu being baptized. Things have been hard for him and his wife, they live far away from Church and it is hard to get work off because they are illegal, but they have been checking out English wards (even though they don’t speak a lick of English...diligence!!!)

Samson and Tiffany are still in China, they could be in Hong Kong by now. I will need to email him.

Darren and Wenqi are preparing for the temple in Feb!!

Leo is still in China, he is really from any branches, but I try my best to email him.

Regina is doing good! She has almost read the whole BOM but has a hard time making it to Church.

Near and Bo Yi are awesome, they are always trying to date the female INV's at USC.

Eric is also awesome, he will go to the Temple this month!

Love you guys!!

Elder Burr   

水

YES! Memorizing the baptismal prayer in the MTC finally paid off. This weekend I got to baptize our investigator Bo Yang. It may have taken 14 months to use those white pants we got at Sea Gull Books, but they were nice and crisp when I put them on, so all is good!

It was just a super funny and happy baptism. I will be honest, I was not sure if Bo Yang was ready to be baptized, he was just a little....off at times. But in the last 2 weeks leading up to the baptism, I have just seen him so happy and just a better person that by the time Sunday rolled around, I knew it would be fine. (I am still praying it will be fine though) He is just a little bipolar, BUT his family is a SUPER powerful family back in Beijing and his mom will check out the Church. Next Stop, the Forbidden City Temple 2024!! 

Oh man, giving a baptism interview was wild. I was super happy that the guy I was interviewing was super prepared. I had taught him 1 or 2 times before, but I really didn’t get to know him until the interview. The Chinese District is slowing down a little bit, so hopefully Elder Zhang and I can pump some fire into it and get it going again so we can have some more baptisms!

MOM! I met someone from Tuen Mun but I didn’t know where your house was, where is your house?? 

So I gave a talk in Sacrament Meeting (English- no worries) and the subject was "What was your favorite conference talk" and the one that I picked was "Lord, is it I" by President Uchtdorf in the Priesthood Session. So I picked that one because it is something I have had to apply a lot on my mission and it is something that I hope to apply after and that I can help the members here apply in their own live. For those of you who don’t wear suit pants and didn’t go to Priesthood Session, it’s about humbling ourselves and giving ourselves, not our neighbors, an examination. Too many times in my life have I felt that something pertaining to the Gospel was good for other people, but I was the exception. This was just the pride of the natural man talking. I also really liked that talk because it talked about the promised blessing of humble, sincere, self-evaluation is enduring and deep conversion. I especially like that part, because that is what it is all about, our individual conversion and our personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Sometimes, it is hard to know what success is. Is it the baptisms, the number of lesson, the contacts? My mission President stated that "the success of a missionary is defined, not by numbers, but how deeply he is converted to the Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ. Then in the talk, Pres. Uchtdorf talks about a ward that had a high percentage of church attendance and home/visiting teaching, but after a while, 11 marriages had ended in divorce. He talked about on the outside they were all successful church goers and members, but on the inside, they had distanced themselves from the gospel. We can’t let these outward things gauge and define our testimonies and conversion, because then we will just be fooled into thinking we are strong and when the storms rage, we will fall. Now, I don’t have a perfect solution for conversion, but I know that repenting helps ALOT!! Humbling yourself, moving forward, changing, and most importantly partaking of Christ’s Atonement leads to deeper conversion. And then striving to have the spirit with us.

I am so happy that I can be our here, thanks for the package this week, it really does make me feel so happy. I hope everything is going well!! If you have time, send some pictures of whats going on. I will also start taking more pics!

Mission Life!!!

Aaahhh I am emailing at the Family History Library and the Sister next to me is crying, what do I do?!?!?! But hey, that's the mission life!

So, life is good in the mission. They split our area so we lost just about over half of our  investigators. We just handed them over to these other Elders. It was a little hard, but I know they are in good hands and I will hopefully be able to see them on exchanges. Oh man, being the DL brings all kinds of new interesting things to worry about in the mission life. Exchanges, collecting numbers, going to meetings, and people looking to me for advice. I was on the phone with these Sister missionaries planning an exchange lesson and I asked them, "If we are teaching a girl and we have no guy there besides us, can we still be there?" and they were like, "I don't know, ask your District Leader." And I was like" I AM the District Leader!!!!" hahaha That was a funny little tender mercy from the Lord. He is just reminding me that this is a first and foremost and a service opportunity, and next a learning opportunity.

So my area is only Santa Monica College. No more UCLA. But that's okay, It wasn't the same as being at USC, but it was a really nice place though. I will miss it. 

So SMC is really really, really small and people there are crazy! Most the people there are fresh off the boat. The Chinese program is not developed here at all, so it will be a lot like USC again, just building up from nothing. 

It's pretty cool to have a native companion! Elder Zhang is sick, he joined the Church when he was like 14 in China. It's good in the sense that he teaches me a lot of native slang, but it's bad in the sense half the time we don't know what each other is saying. His English is...minimal...but bless his Beijing heart, he tries!! 

We should have a baptism this weekend!! The guy is a little different, but I am sure baptism will be a step that blesses his life. I am also giving my first baptism interview this week, pray for me that I don't let any crazy people into theC hurch. 

So Darren and Wenqi! My RC's from wwaayyy back when. They are taking temple prep and will probably be sealed like 4 months from now!!! I am so excited!!! They are also applying for the Patriarchal blessing!! Those two make the whole mission worth it. Of course, every person I meet and teach makes it more and more worth it. I really am so happy that I came out. I really don't know who I would be without seeing these things. Thanks so much for your support!! If you guys have any material to learn Chinese characters give me a shoutout!!

love,

Elder Burr