Matt's email 10/11/2010

So I have to tell you all that this week was just awesome. It was by far the most tiring week that I have had thus far on the mission, but it was amazing. I think the motivation that I received from conference really helped. I can tell you, after seeing 2 full sessions of conference on the mission, that there is not a greater time in the life of a missionary than the 2 days of conference. I didn´t want them to end, but sadly enough they did. But about this week... On Tuesday we had interviews with President Lindahl. I can´t get over how legit that man is. He connects so well with his missionaries and he honestly is like a dad out here on the mission. The only thing he wants for us is to be happy and work. He is always willing to help with anything and he is just an amazing person. In the interview he asked me if I would rather have a really young latin companion or if I would rather train a brand new gringo. I told him that it would be awesome to train, but that it would be great to improve my spanish. I know he will make the better choice and I wouldn´t be surprised to receive a phone call on sunday telling me that I will be training. Then on Thursday I went out to do some more baptismal interviews and met a lot of investigators in other areas in the district. I love interviews. The Spirit that is felt is just incredible during them and it is an awesome time getting to know someone and such a spiritual level. The only downer of the week is that Vazquez has started counting down the days and is talking about home a lot. I think he is way excited to leave this country and he makes me think of home a lot, but we are still working and finding people so it´s all great. We will find out transfers again this next monday so I am sure I will have some news. We will also be baptizing a few people this Saturday so I am super stoked. As for Viviana and her family... Well we called to set up an appointment to go and teach them again and she told us that she needed us to come pick up the Book of Mormon because her husband wouldn´t let her switch religions... It was hard trying to swallow that one, but we told her to continue reading and praying and when the Lord softens up the heart of her husband to let us know. She seemed pretty upset, but I have trust in the Lord and I know He can do anything. I have seen miracles on the mission and I don´t doubt the power that He has. This week is going to be crazy. Tomorrow in the morning I have to go to Mendoza to a leadership meeting with Elder Aidukaitis, then on Wednesday and Thursday I will be doing divisions and doing interviews again, then on Friday we are going to Mendoza as a zone to have zone meeting, then on Saturday we will be baptizing. It is a pretty packed week, but it will be awesome.
I hope all is going well back home. I have been trying to imagine what you are all doing without Marc and I and I just can´t do it. I hope you all have a great week. Keep the prayers coming. Thanks for all the support and love. Thanks for the packages mom. I´m sure they will be here soon. At least I hope so. I love you all. The Gospel is true. The church is perfect. The Prophet really does talk with God. Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world. I love Him. The Book of Mormon is the most true book that we have. It can change lives faster than anything else. God loves us. I love you all
Love
Elder Burr

A photo of Matt

Matt is on the right end of the second row.

Marc's email 10/04/2010

Mom

Matt still hasnt written me neither has anybody from our family so they suck. tell adam thanks for the ipod and i really appreciate it. how is taelyn? But about conference I loved is from this perspective. I could relate almost every talk on how i could be better and i enjoyed that. i think overall i have changed alot and my testimony is very strong. I love the new testament and am almost done with luke. reading through those reminds me of israel and i loved israel. i loved all of the places and i love knowing what the places look like that i am reading about. yeah that parking ticket i told you about so its not all my fault but im sure you liked the surprise. just make sure when you pick out my picture you pick one that doesnt make me look like a homo. might be hard to find but im sure there are some. and to answer your question yes i email on tuesday. Tell the family to write me either dear elders or email me cause i want to hear how they are doing. I love you mom and realized how great you really are while ive been here. i know you have only wanted the best for me and im sorry for how i was before i left. you are the best lady in the world and i wouldnt trade you for anything. I hope you have a great week. I love it here by the way i will write a letter next week cause i am out of time. love you mom

Matt is made a District Leader

Dear Brother and Sister Burr,

 

            It is a pleasure to be working with Elder Burr.  He has recently been called to serve as a district leader and is growing and maturing as a man and as a servant of the Lord.  Thank you for the support and encouragement you give to him.

           

            Your son’s mission brings many blessings to him, the people he teaches, and the other missionaries around him.  I’m sure that you have also felt the blessings that the Lord gives to a missionary’s family.  A district leader is assigned to a group of elders, normally two or three companionships.  Once a week he presides in a meeting with his district.  He will prepare talks and classes that will help the missionaries in his district improve their teaching techniques and knowledge of the scriptures as well as the missionary lessons. He is responsible to stay aware of his district’s health and spiritual progress.  He also does proselyting work with each of them.

           

            As district leader, Elder Burr will give baptismal interviews.  What a wonderful opportunity and blessing it is for him to sit and discuss with baptismal candidates their progress and the covenants that they will make.  He determines whether or not the candidates have fully repented and if they are prepared to be baptized.  We know your family will be blessed and see the growth in Elder Burr as he shares with you the experiences and challenges that he has as a missionary and a representative of Jesus Christ.  I pray that the Lord will bless you and your son continually in your efforts to build the kingdom of God on earth.

                                                                                                           

                                                                                                With love,

 

                                                                                                James B. Lindahl

 

                                                                                                President James B. Lindahl

Matt's email 10/04/2010

This past week has been absolutely awesome. On Tuesday I went down to Mendoza with the zone leaders and the other district leader to a leadership training meeting deal. It started on tuesday and lasted until Wednesday night. It was awesome. President and the assistants talked a lot about getting our districts and zones excited about the work. He told us that as a mission we are going to have baptized over a thousand people this year. That is the goal at least and we are going to kill it. It was also great because we got to eat some Hermana Lindahl brownies and way legit food. On Tuesday afternoon we were all assigned to go to particular areas around Mendoza and work the rest of the day. I was put with an Elder that just transferred into my old zone. We were all challenged to put as many baptismal commitments as we could and were told the winner was going to get a tie. The elder I was with and I committed 5 people to baptism in one afternoon and ended up winning the tie. It was an incredible day. Then just to top of the week yesterday we were walking to the stake center to watch conference and we were approached by some random guy on the street. He literally ran up from behind us and chased us down and he told us that he had a question about the bible that was really bothering him. Since we were way close to the church I told him we were going to run in, drop our stuff off, grab a Bible and that we would be right out. It turns out that nobody in the church had a Bible in spanish so armed with my English Bible, Elder Vazquez and I went out to try and help this guy. He had been reading in 2 Timothy 1 and had a ton of questions. After me trying to explain to him what the verses were saying I basically just bore testimony to him and told him that each of us are blessed with knowledge of certain things. These certain things make up a testimony that each of us possess and if we put our testimony and our trust in God, He will help us through all our trials. He went on to explain to us the problems of his life and we told him that he was about 30 minutes away from hearing from the prophet of the world. He came in, watched all the Mo Tab concert and the entire first session. It was awesome bringing in a random guy from the street to hear the prophet. It was one of my mission goals that was fulfilled. Last cool story of the week. On Friday I was doing divisions with an Elder from another area. We had an appointment that fell through and so we just started walking and knocking doors until the next appointment we had. The whole time we were telling each other that if we walked to the end of the street and knocked every door some sort of miracle was going to happen. They are always in the Ensign right? Anyway after entering a few houses and walking a ton we arrived at the last house of the street. Pretty common story so far... But this man was too far from common. We started to talking about the concept of eternal families and God and all that good stuff then he assured us that he had a spot reserved for him in Heaven. After seeing a pack of cigarettes on the table I asked him if he had been taking care of the blessings God had given him. He asked if it was becasue of the box of cigarettes that I had seen that caused me to ask the question. I told him that it was and he replied, "you have no idea." He then told us his entire life story. When he was 9 he started smoking weed. By the age of 13 he was doing and selling cocaine. He bought his first brand new truck when he was 14. He continued this lifestyle until he was 24 and decided after killing 17 people that he was tired of that kind of life. He also taught me a great lesson: God can forgive man, Man can forgive man, but it is nearly impossible for man to forgive himself. It was awesome. I can´t say that we put a baptismal date with this guy, sadly, but we are going to continue teaching him and hopefully things will work out.
To answer the conference question... Yes we had the opportunity to watch all the sessions in English. It was great. I absolutely loved every talk. The themes were all pretty common: Follow the teachings of the prophet, repent and live a life full of faith and the Spirit, and make wise, careful decisions. Man it was just awesome. I hope everything goes well at home. It sounds like Dave Salo is going to have a lot of fun with his new toy. I love you all and wish you all a great week!
Love
Elder Burr

Marc's first email home 10/02/2010

Hi mom,
Life here is ok it is not a party but my district and companion are the best i could have hoped for. Ill write a letter next week in detail cause i have no time for email but yeah life here is alright. It is not what i expected but it could be a lot worse.  I told dad alot of what to tell kyle but he just has to stay positive and has to realize that he is doing the lords work and is not here for himself. If he comes for himself he will probably start punching himself in the face asking why he is here. thats what i want to do when i lose sight of why i am here. My roommates are tight. every night we are in bed by 1029 and they dont mess around so that is good for me. I can honestly say we havent disobeyed one rule yet and i hope to keep it that way. I love this work and know that the Savior is the redeemer of the world. I know Jesus Christ atoned for everyone of us and i am always thinking about israel and how awesome that really was. We are all children of God and that is how i have started seeing everyone and i can already see a change in my life and i love it. I love this work and cant wait to get out. Mom you are the best and i love you so much thank you for everything. For right now i think i am good on stuff that i need. just i know your brain thinks of good things to send so i will be happy with anything. Thanks for everything mom i love you i am out of time. 

Matt's email 9/27/2010

This week was awesome. We had the opportunity to find and teach a lot of people that are ready to receive the Gospel. It was amazing to knock a door and find someone that had just been praying for someone to help her out. That was something that I always wanted to experience on the mission, and I finally did. It was also nice to get into a house, talk a little bit about the purpose of baptism, and have someone commit within the first 10 minutes. She was incredible. She basically told us she wanted to be forgiven of her entire past and we told her we knew the perfect solution. She pretty much set her own date and told us she was going to talk to her husband and daughter about it too. Her name is Viviana and the husband is Jose Luis. They are incredible.
I´m sorry to say that besides that, not much has happened this week. The weather has been getting super hot and I have to put sun screen on my beak every day to keep from getting skin cancer. It is pretty stunning falling asleep sweating and waking up sweating, but I love it.
I hope you all have a great week and you know that I love you!
Love
Elder Burr