October 28, 2013
Anyone who is familiar with the
missionary handbook knows that missionaries are not sent out on missions to be
counselors. However, a lot of the times,
that is what they become, even when they strive diligently to not be. So, with that being said, this week we went to
visit K. She is our newest, most awesome investigator. We knock on her door and we can hear her
screaming inside. She comes to the door and is crying. She walks out with us
onto the porch and begins to divulge her life to us. She has 2 little girls and
is pregnant (that we knew.) She lives with her in-laws (that we also knew). She
begins to talk to us about the father of her children. They got married when
they were 14 and divorced about 5ish years later. Due to some problems with her
mom, she moved back into his house and lives with his parents. He works pretty
far away, however, and is gone for several weeks at a time. They aren’t really
dating, but kind of are. It is a strange
situation. She started to tell us about
some things they were going through because she felt like she didn’t know what
else to do. We let her just vent to us
and then started to talk with her about the power of prayer.
We told her that praying with her
"husband" would strengthen their relationship and praying with the girls
would strengthen their family. That is when she opened the door and yelled
"D! COME OUTSIDE!" That is
when we met D. Ohhhh, D. I can’t give you details of the things he told
us. (I guess being raised by lawyers I
have this sense of "Investigator-Missionary privilege" or something),
but let’s just say he has done some things that he should not have done/should
not be doing. He was very open to
listening to what we had to tell him about being a better father and husband
though. We were talking to him about
prayer and he goes: "Yeah, I guess I could pray, like, I don’t
know, once a month; but once a day just seems wrong. Like, I
can’t be doing ________ and pray. And if
I pray I’m going to want to change to be good or something." YES, D, THAT IS PRECISELY THE POINT. K is just crying and says: "I just want to be happy like you guys
are happy", so that was really cute. Anyway, they promised to us and each
other that they would pray together that night. We meet with her tomorrow and
we will see whether they followed through.
If I had any advice to give
people about marriage, it is don’t get
married when you are 14. Also, don’t get
pregnant when you are 13 or 14. That just makes life a whole lot harder than it
needs to be. My children will not be
allowed to talk to people of the opposite gender until they are in college! I love K and we are so excited to help her
change her life!!
In other news, the Primary
Program was yesterday and it was super cute. Our little 9 yr-old investigator
was the only one who gave a part that wasn’t written for her. She bore her
testimony and I was just sitting at the piano a wreckkkkk. She is so prepared for baptism it is unreal.
Sometimes I look at her and think, "I feel like YOU should be teaching ME
about the gospel." She really is an
adult trapped in a little girl’s body. She
is the most mature 9 year-old I have ever met. I sure do love her.
That about covers it for this
week! I love you all!
Hermana Burnham
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