HILLS & VALLEYS

Xenopedae

Elder Dehlin Challenged me to use the word Xenopedae in my email this week so there it is. That's the best I've got. 

But, Buenas Buenas!!  

That literally translates to good good but it's how everyone here says hello. Spanish is some fun stuff. I thoroughly enjoy it. I know I'm always saying time is flying but this week was a whole new level of quick. I swear yesterday was P day. 

We got to do some solid service again this week. Almost as fun as the service we did last week with the whole bee gee business. Almost. This week we helped a Sister in the ward clean her yard up a little bit. She had been collecting a lot of stuff in her yard so we got to move things around and cut down the weeds. After a while we found a super old super cool car hidden away in the back. The picture doesn't do it justice but this thing was loooooooong. There were all sorts of fun treasures all over her property. I felt like those dudes on that History Channel show that go digging through old barns and junk yards and find cool stuff. Ah! American Pickers that's what it's called.  

On Monday we had tons of fun! We went to Baldwin Hills and did a little hike called the Culver City Steps. It was a "little hike" haha. It was short but it was a beast. Basically it was a big ol hill with stairs going straight up all the way to the top. Elder Windous and I thought we'd be cool and run all the way up them. Easier said than done. It was definitely a fun one tho. The view from the top was Awesome!!! From left to right we could see just a sliver of ocean, then Santa Monica and the temple, Beverly Hills, Whilshire, Hollywood, and Downtown. Man LA looks pretty pretty from above.

Then for zone conference this week we went to the "Valley" aka San Fernando. This was our first zone conference since our missions merged so it was pretty unique. It was so weird getting out of the busy city of LA. The valley is sooooooo quiet. It was strange. I felt as out of place as an animal in the Xenopedae family trying to fit in with the Mephitidaes. It seems like there are no people there compared to LA. Plus there are lots of pine trees and there's no humidity. When it gets hot in L.A. it gets hot like Jalapeños, but when it's hot in San Fernando it's hot like ghost peppers. Hace muy calor! And being in suits made it even warmer. They said a few weeks ago during the little heat wave it got up to 120 degrees! Hijole! Speaking of peppers tho! Elder Windous had another fun experience this week. We had a little lesson with a member and after we were done we were talking about the little garden he is growing on the roof of his garage. One plant had these tiny little peppers on them that were bright red and green. Elder Windous picked one off the plant. Popped it in his mouth. And then couldn't feel his tongue for the next 20 minutes. Once again, all he could say was, "bad idea!" haha Those little peppers had some pretty good kick to them apparently.

Getting back to zone conference tho. It was Awesome! We are trying to merge the two mission cultures together and take bits and pieces of each and make it the new mission culture. Because of that we inherited this Book of Mormon social experiment that the San Fernando Valley did in the past. Originally it was a project done by some BYU students all over the world but eventually it got approved by the church as a proselyting tool. Basically the idea of the experiment is to take away all previous bias and opinions about our church and the Book of Mormon and let people experience reading the Book of Mormon for what it really is. So when we do this experiment we do it in just regular clothes. No white shirt and tie. No name tag. Just regular clothes. Then we have this stand that we set up in a busy public place around LA like an outdoor mall or tourist attraction. Then we ask people that walk by if they want to do a social experiment. We have them read a single page from a "religious text" and have them look for and highlight all references to diety. After they do this we ask them what they thought, what they liked, if there was something that stood out. And it's really amazing the responses that people have shared so far. Just from reading one page of the Book of Mormon these people are having great spiritual experiences. It just goes to show the power and the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. And the best part is about a third of all the people that do the experiment want to learn more and have us come by to teach them. So awesome!! 

One of my favorite quotes about the Book of Mormon is from Joseph Smith. He said, “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.”

   

We invite all men everywhere to read the Book of Mormon, to ponder in their hearts the message it contains, and then to ask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ if the book is true. Those who pursue this course and ask in faith will gain a testimony of its truth and divinity by the power of the Holy Ghost.

I just know that when I read the Book of Mormon it can completely transform my day. It brings a feeling of warmth and peace into my life that I can't get any other way. I am so grateful for the Book of Mormon in my life and I really do know that what Joseph Smith said is true. He really did see Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. And he really did restore Christ's church to the earth. I am so grateful for the gospel in my life and for the opportunity to share it with others! 

Have a great week!

-Elder Burgon 

Site of the Childhood Home of the Beach Boys

LG

Hello Hello! 

Life's good in the hood! 

The good times just keep rollin. 

We went down and spent P day with Elder Dehlin and his trainee. It was a party. Lots of fun being in Palos Verdes and doing some of the stuff that I did while I was down there. We went to the Korean Bell and checked out the still killer view. I've been telling Elder Windous about all the fun stuff I've done around the mission and now we have a list of things he wants to do before he leaves. So we've been hitting some of my favorite spots. 

Another memorable moment from p day was when I decided to try an almond smoothie. Pretty unique right? Not the most common flavor for a smoothie. Probably not the most common for a reason. Either nuts don't make for the greatest smoothies or someone mixed up the almond milk with the cleaning chemicals because woo wee it tasted funky.  

This week we got to go to the temple and do some yard work for service. While we were there we took a break and started walking back to the car to go put on some sunscreen. Elder Windous was walking in front of me when all of the sudden he started doing the limbo mixed with some seriously good disco moves like someone just started blaring the bee gees. Well it was one sort of BEE gee thats for sure. One of those in ground sprinkler box things was open and had a HUGE bee hive attached to the lid. There were about a billion bees swarming the thing and they decided to give Elder Windous a good scare. After he recovered from his disco induced cardiac arrest and record setting 100m dash he looked back and got a crazy look in his eye. Now it's at this moment that I would like to pause and reflect on the story of Lot's wife. What do we learn from this story about looking back? Hmm? BINGO! Don't do it! Elder Windous forgot this inspired scripture story and saw the most tempting smörgåsbord of gooey goodness a man could possibly lay eyes on. That beehive was no hornets nest. It was one big old heaping pile of mouth watering honeycomb with freshly regurgitated gelatinous bliss filling its inner hexagonal cavities. His eyes got all big and with a hypnotic tone to his voice he said, "I've never had honeycomb before. I have to have some of that honeycomb." With that declaration of depredation and just enough time for me to whip out the handy dandy Cam Corder de la telefeno cellular, he made a mad dash for for the insect encrusted comb. I say mad dash because that is the only possible reasoning for one to decide this daring decision was a good one. He'd gone mad. As he approached the heavily guarded precious prize time seemed to slow to crawl. He brought his shirt collar over his nose to provide plenty of protection against a billion bees. He swooped around and attacked from the right flank. As the comb came within arms reach he thrust out his winnie the poo paws and latched hold on the object of his desires. It was at this moment that he knew he messed up. The ubrupt cascade of angry anthropods pouring from the sprinkler box quickly brought him out of his mad hypnotic haze and snapped him hurriedly back to reality. Oh there goes gravity. The bees won't give up that easy. He dropped the honeycomb and booked it out of there faster than Peter Pan heading to never land screaming at the top of his lungs, "BAD IDEA! BAD IDEA! BAD IDEA!" He ran to flee the ferocious fliers until he could no more. Hooting and hollering like never before. Until the grounds crew pops their heads from the office door. Needless to say, there is honeycomb no more.  

Elder Dehlin's youthful exuberance for spewing spine tickling speeches in each and every one of his transcendent weeklies inspired me to spice up my writing style. How'd I do? 

In other culinary covering news, I had cow face this week. Not bad. It melts in the mouth as they say. 

In other other culinary covering news, our stake had a pioneer day potluck. Woo wee was there some fine dining I tell you what. They had cuisine from all countries of the world! They were only lacking Lychee from the land downundah. Which was also a flavor on the smoothie menu from earlier and in hindsight I definitely think I should have gotten one of those instead. 

In other other other (less culinary covering) news, E Windous woke up thinking Sunday was p day and his coverage of that cranium cunundrum made my life. 

Have a great week!

-Elder Burgon

*Disclaimer #1: No bees were injured in the making of this movie

*Disclaimer #2: Thanks to technological advances is puncture proof gardening gloves no missionaries were hurt either

El titulo de mi semanal

HOLA AMIGOS! 

This week was so awesome because 

one, we got to go up to the temple, 

& two, we got to go up to the temple again with O__!! 

The first time we got to go up because we had interviews with President Haynie and those are always suuuuper great. And while we were up there we were able to help the office submit O__'s paperwork so she could get a temple recommend! We got her a temple recommend on Friday and then went up to the temple with her Saturday morning! She was super excited to go before she went back to Nigeria. 

And coolest thing ever. She is already doing missionary work! She told her sister-in-law that she was going up to the temple to do Baptisms for the dead and invited her to come check out the visitor center. So while we were inside the temple O__'s sister-in-law had a visitor center tour LOVED IT! She also brought her little 18 month old daughter so they enjoyed the area in the visitor center for all the kiddos. They made some new friends and had wayyy too much fun with stickers. Fun stuff. 

But before we went up to the temple we called ahead to make sure they could fit us in and they said they had an entire stake of 100 youth coming to do Baptisms in an hour. So they said to get there quick or it was going to be packed like a can of sardines. And we are about an hour drive from the Temple with LA traffic so we were like eek. So we rushed up there and by some miracle we were just barely able to sneek in before the rush. pfew. 

Being in the Temple was just so amazing. This was my first time going to the baptistry in the LA temple and the spirit was so strong. O__ was so excited to give others the opportunity to accept the ordinance of Baptism. She enjoyed it so much she said it was even cooler than her own baptism. I can't even describe how strong the spirit was. 

While we were in the temple we met lots of other people who had recently joined the church as well. One guy told us he was scrolling through Instagram and saw a post of a girl he followed. He looked at her profile and it turned out she was LDS. While he was looking at her photos he found out about the Los Angeles Temple visitor center, went and did a tour, met with missionaries, and was baptized 3 weeks later. How cool is that?! 

After we got out of the temple I had a pretty fun "small world" moment. We were walking back to the the visitor center and all of the sudden I heard someone shout "Elder Burgon." I looked back and saw the Blackburn family running down the temple stairs! It was so cool! They were there for their sons wedding and we just bumped into each other. Twas lots of fun! Their other son and I knew each other before da mish and went into the MTC together about a year ago so it was cool to see his fam again. 

But man this week was a great one! 

Hope this next one is a great one for you too!

Alma 26: 14-16

Yea, we have reason to praise him forever, for he is the Most High God, and has loosed our brethren from the chains of hell. Yea, they were encircled about with everlasting darkness and destruction; but behold, he has brought them into his everlasting light, yea, into everlasting salvation; and they are encircled about with the matchless bounty of his love; yea, and we have been instruments in his hands of doing this great and marvelous work. Therefore, let us glory, yea, we will glory in the Lord; yea, we will rejoice, for our joy is full; yea, we will praise our God forever. Behold, who can glory too much in the Lord? Yea, who can say too much of his great power, and of his mercy, and of his long-suffering towards the children of men? Behold, I say unto you, I cannot say the smallest part which I feel.

Have a great week!

-Elder Burgon

P.s. Elder Windous really likes climbing trees

Hot like jalapeños 🌶️

Hijole! 

Busy busy busy! 

Bueno bueno bueno! 

This week was an insanely awesome week!... part 2!

We had a good 4th of July heat wave here so it was nice and toasty. On p-day we just drove out behind LAX, got up on a hill, and just enjoyed the ocean breeze. Nice and cool. Then the rest of the week started off super great because O__ was Baptised!!!!!! 

Everything came together really well and O__ was so happy! She felt the spirit so strongly at her baptism and she said she didn't even feel like herself any more. She felt totally new. Some members who were baptized just a few years ago talked with her for almost an hour after her baptism and it was so great. The members are just awesome. I swear they've done more to help O__ than the missionaries have. O__ is wanting to go to the temple and do temple Baptisms before she leaves which will be so cool. 

Then we had the 4th of July and it was cray zay! We had to be in our apartments by 6:00 so I had all this studying planned but.... It was LOUD! Like VERY LOUD! My apartment is surrounded by other apartment complexes so we couldn't see too many fireworks. But boy could we hear them. Even with our apartment built to block out airplane noise it didn't stand a chance against the fireworks and all the car alarms they were setting off. Man LA goes all out with fireworks! I thought Utah was crazy haha nope. 

We also got to go to the second Mormon night in less than a month. This time for the LA Galaxy. It was lots of fun and it's cool that some of the sports teams in LA are doing these Mormon nights. Now we just need to get the Lakers on board for when the Jazz are in town next season . What was really cool tho was they had a handful of missionaries sing the national anthem at the beginning. 20,000 people seeing some missionaries on the jumbotron. Now that's some good publicity if I do say so myself. We ended up needing to leave the game early to make it home on time because we bussed there with a recent convert. But after waiting for the bus for an hour and a half, we realized it wasn't coming. And then we realized that most of the busses stopped running. And then we realized we were stuck at the game.  Luckily our district leader was able to save the day and drove all the way out to pick us up. Fun times. 

And yesterday was great as well! Of course. Great week. I had the opportunity to confirm O__ and she is just killing it. We had a lesson with her to start off her new member lessons and she was just blowing my mind with how solid she is. Satan definitely didn't want her to be Baptized and confirmed so he sent some opposition and temptations her way but she wasn't about to let that stop her. She knows what's right and is doing everything she can to stay on the straight and narrow. 

I just love being a missionary so much and getting too work with incredible people is a huge blessing. 

The Gospel is so true! 

Have a great week!

-Elder Burgon 

Jamaica We Have A Bobsled Team

🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲 

"Feel the rhythm, feel the rhyme, get on up, it's MISSION time!!"

🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲 🇯🇲

HOLY. COW. THIS. WEEK. HAS. BEEN. SO. INSANELY. AWESOME! 

I think it's impossible to put this week in words but I'll give it a try!  

I started off the week by going to the mission office to meet up with my new companion! Training is the best!! Being around a new missionary always brings back lots of memories from the beginning of my mission. So much fun! Seeing all the new missionaries walk in the room looking tired and nervous reminded me exactly of my first day. Goooood times! President Haynie matched us up and my new companion is Elder Windous!! He is seriously soooo awesome! He's from Ely Nevada and if you can't tell from the title and start of this email he is heading to Jamaica!! How cool is that?! We actually have a person we are working with who is from Jamaica and one of our ward missionaries is from Jamaica! I'm guessing he came here for a reason  just a guess tho. 

Well I tell you what. I've seen this every time I've trained. Having a new missionary in an area, with all their greenie fire and optimism, ALWAYS brings miracles! And boy did we ever see miracle after miracle after miracle this week. It's probably because Elder Windous came to the mission super prepared and ready to kill it. The miracles started in the middle of the day on Wednesday, our first day to go out and do some solid missionary work. Normally in the middle of the day it's pretty slow because everyone is at work or out of the house, especially in the middle of the week like Wednesday. BUT! For this midweek, midday finding time it was the exact opposite of slow! It was fast! So fast that I felt like a chicken running around with my head cut off at times. As we went from house to house visiting members and talking to people I was starting to wonder if June 27th was some kind of holiday where everyone has work off and has to be available for the missionaries to contact. And be willing to set a return appointment with us. And give us food. Holy cow the food. What's that scripture say about not having room enough to recieve it? Yeah we seriously can't fit any more food in our fridge . We talked to lots of people and I swear we set hundreds of return appointments. Ok maybe a little less. But it was awesome! Super solid stuff. It also helps to cover two huge and awesome wards. There's a lot of people to teach and get to know and we are loving it! 

Ok now for some more miracles! 

At the beginning of the week we got in contact with Elder Dehlin and he told us about all the people that they had been working with in this area. There was this one person named O__ that he said was really cool but they hadn't had much contact with. We tried to get in contact with her but she doesn't have an American phone number. Luckily we have Facebook  We sent her a friend request and waited for her to accept it. On Friday she accepted the friend request and we sent her a message asking when she was available for us to come by. She quickly responded and told us that she was available for us to come over right then! We went over and met with her and what do you know, Elder Dehlin was right. She is SUPER AWESOME!!! Our first lesson with her was incredible! She told us her story, incredible btw, and let me tell you this was some seriously good member missionary work in action. 

So here is her story. O__ lives in Nigeria but Y__, her husband, lives here in Los Angeles. Y__s mother who lives in Colorado joined the church a while ago and has been telling O__ and Y__ all about it and encouraging them to attend sacrament meeting. Y__ eventually did attend sacrament meeting here in LA sometime last year and really liked it. Then he started encouraging O__ to attend but she didn't know where a church building was in Africa. But around Christmas time last year O__ flew to America to visit Y__ and his mother. On Christmas eve while she was in Colorado O__ decided to attend church with her mother in law. As she walked through the doors into the church building O__ said she felt something that she never felt before. It was a powerful feeling that she couldn't fully describe. She said it felt like home. Like she was getting a giant bear hug. And everyone there was so happy and seemed to have an aura around them. As she walked through the church building she felt so much love as everyone introduced themselves and got to know her. She said she was overcome with this feeling and she never wanted it to leave. She knew she had to keep coming to this church and her mother in law told her to get in contact with the missionaries. After Christmas she flew to LA to visit Y__ and she was able to get in contact with missionaries here. They came over and taught her how Christ's church has been restored to the earth and explained what those feelings she was having at church were and why she was having them. As they taught the lesson she knew it was true and she knew those feelings were the Holy Ghost telling her it was true. But the day after the lesson she had to fly back to Nigeria and start working again. Luckily the awesome missionaries that were here at the time were able to find the church building closest to her in Nigeria and get her the address and the Bishops phone number. Once she was back in Nigeria she did everything she could to go to church on Sundays even tho it was hard to get work off. She was able to attend church pretty regularly over there for six months learning everything she could just by asking questions in her gospel principles class. Even after her powerful experience she still had questions and concerns. But over time as she searched the scriptures her questions were answered, her concerns were resolved, she learned about Christ's baptism, the priesthood and proper authority, and she decided she wanted to be baptized with the correct authority like Jesus was. But she didn't want to be baptized just anywhere or by anyone. She wanted to be baptized in LA by the first missionary that taught her. So she flew out here and we met with her for the first time on Friday and she told us all this. Then she said she leaves to go back to Nigeria on July 14th and the only day her husband has to attend her baptism is July 3rd. So she wants to be baptized July 3rd. Four days after we met her! Hijole! 

So I am sure you can imagine the scramble that has been happening to see if that is even possible. We talked to our district leader, he talked to the zone leaders, they talked to the assistants, they talked to President Haynie, and he wanted to talk to people in Nigeria. That sounds nice and easy in a streamlined sentence like that but boy was it crazy! Plus after getting everything approved we've had to relay all the info to the people in the ward, officially teach O__ the lessons, and coordinate the whole baptism . It's been crazy but I wouldn't have it any other way. Busy with setting up a baptism and helping someone come closer to Christ is the best kind of busy to be! And Elder Windous probably just had the most epic first week in the mission field ever. Twas a great week. We've been pretty pumped. 

D&C 18:15-17 - And if it so be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this people, and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your JOY with him in the kingdom of my Father! And now, if your JOY will be great with one soul that you have brought unto me into the kingdom of my Father, how great will be your JOY if you should bring many souls unto me! Behold, you have my gospel before you, and my rock, and my salvation.

Have a great 4th of July! 

Ether 2: 12 - Behold, this is a choice land, and whatsoever nation shall possess it shall be free from bondage, and from captivity, and from all other nations under heaven, if they will but serve the God of the land, who is Jesus Christ, who hath been manifested by the things which we have written.

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!

-Elder Burgon

#proudtobeanamerican