4-19-10

Family and Friends,

I'll start off with a story from last week. We have several investigators who live in Denison, which is 45 miles north of where we live. If we drive there and back in the same day, that is 90 miles minimum, far more than we are allotted daily. Elder Mitchell talked with President Kunz a few weeks before I got there, and got permission to stay at a member's house there, so we could save on miles. The member is Anthony Lewis. He is about 30, and African American, but due to a healt issue, he has the maturity of a 16-year-old and stutters. He knows about everyone in the town of Denison it seems. So last weekend when we were spending the night there, something interesting happened. We were in the spare bedroom sleeping, when at 3 in the morning, there was a ring at the doorbell. about a minute later, Anthony's phone started ringing. He answered it and then went to the door while talking. He let someone one and talked to him for a bit. I was trying to block out the conversation to I could go back to sleep, but I heard the stanger end by saying, "You're a pal Anthony." There had been a party across the way earlier, with alcohol and loud music and such. This guy was too intoxicated to get home, so Anthony let him sleep on his couch. He's so nice.

The next morning, Anthony left to work at 6:00. We woke up and stayed in our room for a bit, wary to go out. When we did, we discovered that this guy was still there. Two missionaries, in someone else's appartment, with a sleeping drunk guy on the couch. I never thought that would happen. But we minded our own business. We both showered and poured cereal, which we ate in the room. During our studies someone came to the door and knocked. They ended up taking the guy out and probably back home. Needless to say, we were a little relieved to have our (Anthony's) appartment back to ourselves.

We had a little miracle this last week. We were in Harlan, one of the towns we work in, I think is is about 2,000 people. We had been searching for a less-active family that lived there. We had knocked the door that the branch roster said they lived in, but no one ever answered. Later that day, we felt like we should go try to find some new investigators (knock doors) in a trailor park in town. Our teaching pool in Harlan is rather small and we are trying to build it up. We saw a man there pushing a lady in a wheelchair, so we talked to them. The lady talked more than the man, so we asked her if she had ever heard about the Book of Mormon. She said no, so we stared to talk about it. We asked them what they thought the Bible was. The Man spoke up and said it talked about what had happened in the past, and what was going to happen in the future, right before the end and when Jesus would come again. We thought it was a strange answer. We finished talking about the Book of Mormon and asked them why they thought there were so many churches. The man spoke us for the second time and said "There is only one true church and all the reset are made up." "Which one do you think is true?" "Yours. The Church of Jesus Christ." Based on what he had said before, we assumed he was talking about having Jesus in your heart being true religion (lots of people say that). But no, he was definitely talking about the restored Church of Jesus Christ. It turns out that he was the less-active we had been searching for. However, before we knew this, he went on to testify to us and to the lady in the wheelchair (who was a friend) of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. He had moved from his old house and to that trailer park, so it was good we got a hold of him. Miracles happen.

Well, that's about all for this week. More later. Love you all. Write me and tell me how you are!

-Elder Burnham