Sister Sydney Burningham

                            This is Erica, her husband and two kids, she just got baptized last week!



 Mon, Jun 2, 2014 at 8:42 AM

 Stage Fighting.

Family and Friends!

What a wonderful week.  The time is going by all too fast, can you believe it is June?  I can hardly believe the time has gone by as fast as it has.  Everyone told me when I got to my mission that the mission goes by really fast for a really long time.  I suppose that is pretty well accurate.  Okay, also I haven't had horrible Harry Potter withdrawals on my mission but lately Sister Sume has been quoting it, haha so I was thinking about how to relate it to the mission because a lot of imaginary things have some truth to them at least.. okay I promise I'm getting to something good here haha so when Harry and Ron are in Divination class with Professor Tralawney Ron says to Harry "Well you're gonna suffer, but you're gonna be happy about it.." and I was thinking that sometimes in our lives we suffer, it is part of mortality but we can always find the joy in the difficult times and the difficult times will ultimately help us become who God wants us to be.  I just figured all of you would love a Harry Potter reference today, I quite enjoyed it!

So I don't know if any of you fully understand how opposite my companions are from me, haha.  But they are both real shy and we just have completely different interests so we were telling each other one night about the things we love and Sister Roundy talked about how she did drama in high school and they learned to stage fight, unfortunately I can't send pictures this week, it's not working but I will send you photos, they are hilarious, Sister Sume took a bunch of videos of all of us beating each other up, and I just have to say we are a hit in the zone, you all would love it.  I love my companions and each day we are doing better with our unity in teaching and in everything else.  The spirit is really working within all of us to keep trying and to do better.

We also met a Romanian boy this week.  He goes to the Romanian Church of God and is sort of bored with the "traditions of his fathers"  so probably he'll want to find out more about the Gospel of Jesus Christ, so that was fun!

Erica got baptized!  (Again I'll send pictures next week) but it was a beautiful service, her husband baptized her and Erica's Mom, who isn't a member was crying and just talked about the spirit that she felt, she lives in Franklin Tennessee, but hopefully she will want to meet with missionaries there, the Lord has hastened his work and it will continue to go forth and I am so grateful to be able to witness it. 

In my studies this week I learned about integrity and honesty.  As I've been on my mission the spirit whispers to me about things that I need to change and do better, it's started to really get to the little things I need to be better at.  I was pondering about integrity and honesty and the value that comes from others trusting you and your judgment and trusting in you as a disciple of Christ.  I was reading a talk by Henry B. Eyring from the last conference and he says:

"As you pray and serve others your knowledge that you are a child of God and your feelings about him will grow.  You will become more aware that he is saddened if you are dishonest in anyway...you will be more honest with your employers, you will be more determined to be on time and to complete every task you are given by the Lord that you have accepted to do."

As disciples of Jesus Christ we have a responsibility to be honest, to have integrity and to give everything we are to each thing the Lord requires of us.  We had dinner with this amazing lady who is in drug addiction recovery and works with all kinds of people, she has struggled with it as well in her life, she bore a powerful testimony of the Savior while we were there, the spirit was tangible.  She simply said ( and I will never forget this) "I do the things I do because I love the Savior."  Why do we do the things we do?  Is it out of obligation?  I know sometimes that happens to me.  Do we do it because it is expected of us?  The only way to really change is to do the things we are asked to do because we love the Savior, that's when we change.

I love you all I hope you have an amazing week!  I am loving every minute of being in Tennessee and being a missionary, it's the best life, really.

Love,

Sister Burningham.