Happy Easter!

For Easter we were given more candy than we need haha. There's this little boy in our ward who is about Elsie’s age, and he's seriously the cutest sweetest little kid.  Every Sunday him and his family show up to sacrament meeting, and he runs strait to us no matter if sacrament has already started and gives us a piece of candy. Last Sunday he ran to us with a bag of Easter eggs, and he was running into all the old ladies in our row. 

First of the week started super super slow, but its ok! We saw God's hand every single day. Monday we tried a bunch of people, but we couldn't find anyone home. I felt prompted to go try his former that we had tried a few times, but was never home. Anyways we went and tried her, because we still needed to teach the restoration for the day and she was there! Now we are teaching her!

Then Tuesday the same thing happened. It was getting pretty late, and we were trying to find someone to teach the restoration to, so we prayed and for some reason the only person we could think of was a less active who we had started teaching even though she was probably working or busy. Anyways we tried her, and there she was!

Wednesday we had an awesome lesson with Ana our investigator, and we decided to teach her the Word of Wisdom, and turns out she's already living it! So that was cool! She is super awesome hopefully she can get baptized soon!

Thursday we knocked, because we were out of people to visit. We decided to try a trailer park with a bunch of less actives and formers in it. We tried it and one of the first trailers we knocked we didn't even get past saying our names, and she just let us straight in! We taught this lady named Edelia the restoration, and we are going to visit her again Saturday!

Saturday was women's conference and also our day to go finding. We were just going through our ward list, and we saw the name for this member named Veronica. We went to go try her, and we knocked on her door and saw this lady inside get up and walk to the other door, so we walked over to it and she opened the door and all of a sudden 7 Chihuahua's came running and barking at us! I literally thought I was going to be eaten! Anyways turns out she wasn't trying to rudely tell us that she didn't want to hear our message, but that they were actually kind of wimpy dogs and more scared of us then we were of them. We ended up teaching her the restoration, and it went really well! Then we tried a few more less actives latter that night, and had a lesson with a boy our age who wants to come back and set an appointment with another part member family!

Sunday was probably my favorite! We went less active finding again and had a super huge miracle! We tried this family on our list, and when we got there we saw this couple outside of the trailer. They weren't the people we were looking for.  We contacted them, and honestly we were kinda expecting to be told that they weren't interested in hearing our message, but to our surprise the man whose name is Angel said that he wanted to hear our message! He told us how 2 days ago he realized that he felt something was missing in his life, and he wanted to become better and give himself over to God. So he was praying and telling God about how he didn't know what church to go to or how to get closer to Him, but he was asking Him for guidance. He told us he was super surprised that God answered his prayer so quickly! That was just so cool because it just truly shows that God is watching over us and answering our prayers. Not only was us showing up to that families house a miracle to Angel, but also to me. I had been feeling a bit discouraged that day, but God guided us to someone who needed His message. We were able to share with them the little Easter video and both Angel and his wife Maricela loved it! We have an appointment with them for next Sunday :)

 I'm so grateful for the restored gospel and that through it we can receive a new life. Because of what our Savior did for us we can become clean and change no matter how far astray we have gone. I'm so grateful for the chance to help others realize this and help forwards God's work. I love you and hope you have an amazing week!

Love,

Hermana Burgoyne

Zach's call

I'm so excited for Zach! That is super cool! We should probably just take a trip to France once he gets back :).

There have been a few really cool miracles this week!  So for one, I told you about how we got a referral from a member in El Rio last week for his mom and sister. Well his mom's name is Ramona. She is a super sweet little old lady. We had a couple of lessons with her this week. At first she didn't seem all too interested in our message, but she would let us teach her a bit. Then Saturday she went to her granddaughter Arely's (me and Hermana Flake taught her when we were serving together) baptism. It was really cool because we were all so excited that Arely was finally getting baptized after almost a year of investigating the church, but also because the last transfer I was in El Rio her dad got baptized, and finally now we are teaching his mom! It would be super cool if she got baptized too! Anyway, when we originally asked Ramona if she was excited about Arely being baptized she was really indifferent to it, but during it the spirit was super duper strong and she was in tears. It was cool to see how it changed her just by being able to see someone she loved take that step. After, we went up and talked to her, and she just kept telling us how beautiful it was. It was also fun, because I got to see a bunch of the people I have been missing since I left.

Another miracle this week is that we finally had another lesson with our investigator Liz. This month we've had a goal to teach the restoration every single day, and we are very lucky that we haven't had a lot of problems teaching it. One of the blessings that I've seen from it was with Liz. Hermana Townley and I were knocking about a month ago, and we ran into her. She had been suffering a lot at the time due to some things going on in her family. We went over and shared some scriptures occasionally to try and help her, but we never really got the chance to sit down and have a real lesson. Originally we didn't feel like we should start by teaching her about the restoration, because we didn't think it related well to her situation.  We decided to plan to teach her about the Atonement and the gospel of Jesus Christ. But obviously God knew better because for about a month we were unable to get in contact with her and we were super upset about it. But then when we got the challenge to try teaching the restoration as much as possible we decided that if we saw her we would just teach her that.

We were going to a lesson that we had planned with her next door neighbor last Tuesday, but she wasn't there. Right when we were about to leave, I felt prompted to go and try Liz one last time. So we went to her door not really expecting her, but when we got there she opened it and let us right in! The even cooler part was that she opened up to us and told us about how she had been looking for some more direction in her life for her and her family, but she felt that the church she was baptized into wasn't providing her enough of that. She told us how she was looking for answers and praying for God's guidance. It was really cool, because we were able to testify to her about how we knew the restoration would change and bless her life so much, and how we knew God had sent us there as an answer to her prayers. She had us come back the next day, and we were able to teach her the restoration. She is super interested and just wants to do anything she can to start living the Gospel. Anyways we have a lesson with her tonight so we are hoping to put her on date for baptism.

Anyways lots of other really cool things have happened this week too. I've received a lot of answers to my prayers and a lot of direction on the things I could be doing better to magnify my calling. I'm so grateful for the chance I have to serve God right now and help bring others to him! I just hope I can always do the very best I can!

I love you! Have a good week!

Love,

Hermana Burgoyne

The Work Goes On!

This week we had a lot of miracles. First miracle was at zone meeting on Wednesday we got s referral from a recent convert in El Rio who's daughter (Arely) Hermana Flake and I taught and who is getting baptized this week. Anyways he referred us to his mom and sister who live in our area. Soooo we went over to try them a few times and we finally had a lesson with his mom last night! She actually seems interested. It would be so cool if she got baptized because we would just be gradually helping their whole family join the church! Anyways she really wants to go to church on Sunday with her grand daughters and she's already planning on going to the baptism for Arely this weekend since ya know she's her grandma and all, but yeah!

Also we have this really awesome investigator named Ana! I didn't know if I've talked about her before, but we have been teaching her for a while. She comes to church every single Sunday without fail and has a really strong testimony. She already knows a lot about the gospel because she has a really strong faith in her Christian church and at first she wasn't very open to listening, but overtime she started being more accepting of our message. She just was really struggling because her boy friend has been pressuring her to join our church and she wasn't so sure if she knows it's true. So we gave her a little break for like a month and finally went back last week and turns out she's finally starting to develop a testimony of the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith! Anyways she's pretty much golden. I mean she already pays tithing, fasts, and pretty much lives the teachings of the gospel. but she can't get baptized right now because she is living with her boy friend and money and stuff like that kind of makes it difficult, but hopefully sometime soon they will be able to get married!

Friday was just crazy! Usually we try not to schedule things all day that day so we have time to do weekly planning, but for some reason here they all want us to come over on Fridays. Anyways we had an appointment with the friend of a referral that we had been looking for. She wasn't there, but her friend was and so we taught her the restoration and she wants us to come back this Friday! Then we hadn't been planning on trying this less active hat we had been teaching, but she got a job so whenever we try her she isn't home, but for some reason Hermana Munk felt prompted to go try her and we did and she was home!! Then we went to go visit a less active member we had an appointment with and when we got there his neighbor who we have been teaching, but haven't seen in a few weeks drove up and came over to talk to us and asked us if we were going to have a lesson! We ended up having an unplanned member present lesson and taught the plan of salvation!

Anyways yesterday the new Easter video came out! It's pretty good! Yesterday we had a lesson with some of my favorite members here and we had been planning on teaching about how God is our loving Heavenly Father, but changed our minds last minute and shared the video. But then when I shared it and John 3:16 popped into my head. Anyways we had s really awesome discussion about how God loves us and his ultimate sign of love is by sending our lord Jesus Christ to the earth to save us. I'm so grateful for all my Savior has done for me. I know that through him we can all return to live with God. I'm just so grateful forge chance to share this with others! I love you all so much! I hope you have a good week! Love you!

Love,

Hermana Burgoyne 

Baptism date!

This week has been interesting.  Tuesday we had a fun lesson with Imelda and ended up setting a baptism date! She's super awesome and just really wants to change her life.  She's so sweet, and hopefully she will be ready to be baptized on April 2! Then we also have a challenge as a mission to teach the restoration at least once each day for this whole month. Soooo we have been getting sort of creative. We ended up teaching it to a nonmember who doesn't want to be taught, but teaches us Spanish. She just corrected us on our pronunciation, but it was good!

Wednesday was a really rough day for us, but by the end of the day it ended up being a crazy productive day. Usually a good day for us is having 2 lessons, and that's on the days when we have all day to go visit people.  Somehow on Wednesday we managed to have 5 lessons, 2 of which were member present lessons which we are lucky to get 3 in one week, so it was awesome to get 2 in one day.  We also figured out that one of our eternigators who is dating a member finally is starting to accept the gospel and gain her own testimony. So that was really cool too! We also had a member present lesson with this lady who had referred one of her friends to us. It was cool because the lady drove 40 minutes south to come pick up her friend and bring her to a lesson with us. We also ended up teaching 4 people the restoration!

The rest of the week was pretty normal. We have been working with this less active member named Josie, and she's came to church for the past 2 weeks and turns out our ward mission leader was in her ward before.  They offered to give her a ride every Sunday which was a miracle, because we always have to find rides for her.

Saturday the zone leaders gave everyone in our zone a bike so now we are kind of biking missionaries! We used them on Sunday, and it was pretty fun. I still need to figure out how to ride a bike with a dress on though! Sunday was also good, because we finally got 2 investigators and 2 less actives to church!! It was really cool because the members were so nice to them and would invite them to come sit with them, so we just got to sit back and enjoy it!

Something that really stuck out to me this week while I was studying was when I was reading 2 Nephi 26. I really love that chapter, but I think my favorite part of it is how Christ repeatedly tells us that He will never turn us away. He tells us that He will never turn us away no matter what. I've found a lot on my mission that people are afraid to pray and talk to a God, because they feel like He is upset with them because they have sinned.  However, I know that our Heavenly Father and our Savior will never turn us away. They are calling for us and want us to return to them. I love the quote from a talk by Scott C. Grow from April 2011 general conference that says: "With the exception of sins of perdition, there is no sin or transgression, pain or sorrow, which is outside of the healing power of His Atonement."  I know that the atonement is infinite and that someday we will stand before our Savior, and He will be standing there calling us with open arms. I'm so grateful for the gospel and the power it had given me through all of the hard times in my life.

I hope you have a great week! I love you so much!

 Love,

 Hermana Burgoyne