Alrighty. Transfer calls came on Saturday and I am staying in Roma 5! BUT Sorella Patterson is getting sent to Catania (Sicily) and my new companion is Sorella Margheriti, and she is Italian! When president called, he said, ''Well, the Lord wants to help you with your Italian...'' and then he told me who my new comp is! I am so excited. There will be an Italian sorella and an Italian anziano in Roma 5, which is literally the best thing that could happen for our work.
Another hard week, lots of finding without much success. We have only gotten two new investigators in the last three weeks, which I think means that my ''greenie magic'' has worn off.
Honestly, there is not much to report, we are still working with Laban and Amède.
Oh, the middle of fall came in a day, one day was sweltering, hot, and humid, and the next was so windy that Slla.Patterson and I had to turn around and change skirts. It’s all crisp, brisk, and breezy here now, and all the leaves are changing. Fall here is almost as pretty as fall in Washington! Especially up in the mountains where we live. It is just so beautiful. The only downside is that 1) I don't have a coat, tights, boots, or long sleeved anything, and 2) our apartment heater only turns on for an hour in the middle of the day, so it really is useless. We wear crewnecks over our missionary clothes until we have to walk out the door, and I am wearing two pairs of flats socks every day (thank you Mom for suggesting that we buy so many. You are brilliant.)
We've had some cool finding moments. The mostras seem to be particularly effective at getting people to stop and talk to us, even if they don't set up another appointment or give us the dreaded ''ci sentiamo'' (we'll hear from each other). So we have a lot of potentials and no idea how interested any of them are, plus with transfers things will be tricky. We both feel like we need to start working with the members more effectively, and I think that will be easier with a native Italian. That's just the trend in the mission. We were doing tracting in Capena, which is where the branch president lives, and we met a man from the Netherlands who lived in the US for a year with an LDS family. And he spoke perfect English, so that was cool. We left him a pass along card even though he said he wasn't really interested.
Most of the branch went to the temple this week, so there was a really wonderful spirit in sacrament meeting yesterday. A member of our stake presidency was there with his wife, and they happen to be the parents of one of my MTC teachers, Sorella Urban! I skyped her mom in the MTC and I got to meet her yesterday. She bore a really beautiful testimony and presidente Urban spoke as well. The other speaker was...me. PLEASE LET THAT SINK IN. I GAVE AN ITALIAN TALK IN AN ITALIAN BRANCH IN ITALIAN IN ITALY. It was terrifying, and I wrote the whole thing out word-for-word which I hate doing, but I really felt like everything was inspired. I spoke about an article from the 2014 August Ensign, "Why We Share the Gospel", by Anz. Christofferson. He talks about the Preach My Gospel missionary purpose and how that needs to become our purpose as members as well. I talked about how I am coming unto Christ as if I were an investigator, how I am seeing the missionary purpose work in the lives of the people we teach, and how we need to make that purpose our purpose. It's a really great talk that everyone should read. That and the one from Anz. Bednar this month called "Missionary, Family History, and Temple Work".
I love missionary work! I never really realized i t before, but something I shared from Elder Christofferson’s talk just keeps striking me. He says that the world has no access to the saving power of the Atonement except through the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And it’s true! The priesthood power that was restored through Joseph Smith is the key to salvation, and if we don't share the message of the Restoration, no one else is going to be able to use that key.
Sorry this feels so all over, usually I try and get my thoughts together before I email, but I was just really distracted today, so writing came in little chunks.
I love you all, I hope everything is going well, and I pray for you every day!
Sorella Decker
Another hard week, lots of finding without much success. We have only gotten two new investigators in the last three weeks, which I think means that my ''greenie magic'' has worn off.
Honestly, there is not much to report, we are still working with Laban and Amède.
Oh, the middle of fall came in a day, one day was sweltering, hot, and humid, and the next was so windy that Slla.Patterson and I had to turn around and change skirts. It’s all crisp, brisk, and breezy here now, and all the leaves are changing. Fall here is almost as pretty as fall in Washington! Especially up in the mountains where we live. It is just so beautiful. The only downside is that 1) I don't have a coat, tights, boots, or long sleeved anything, and 2) our apartment heater only turns on for an hour in the middle of the day, so it really is useless. We wear crewnecks over our missionary clothes until we have to walk out the door, and I am wearing two pairs of flats socks every day (thank you Mom for suggesting that we buy so many. You are brilliant.)
We've had some cool finding moments. The mostras seem to be particularly effective at getting people to stop and talk to us, even if they don't set up another appointment or give us the dreaded ''ci sentiamo'' (we'll hear from each other). So we have a lot of potentials and no idea how interested any of them are, plus with transfers things will be tricky. We both feel like we need to start working with the members more effectively, and I think that will be easier with a native Italian. That's just the trend in the mission. We were doing tracting in Capena, which is where the branch president lives, and we met a man from the Netherlands who lived in the US for a year with an LDS family. And he spoke perfect English, so that was cool. We left him a pass along card even though he said he wasn't really interested.
Most of the branch went to the temple this week, so there was a really wonderful spirit in sacrament meeting yesterday. A member of our stake presidency was there with his wife, and they happen to be the parents of one of my MTC teachers, Sorella Urban! I skyped her mom in the MTC and I got to meet her yesterday. She bore a really beautiful testimony and presidente Urban spoke as well. The other speaker was...me. PLEASE LET THAT SINK IN. I GAVE AN ITALIAN TALK IN AN ITALIAN BRANCH IN ITALIAN IN ITALY. It was terrifying, and I wrote the whole thing out word-for-word which I hate doing, but I really felt like everything was inspired. I spoke about an article from the 2014 August Ensign, "Why We Share the Gospel", by Anz. Christofferson. He talks about the Preach My Gospel missionary purpose and how that needs to become our purpose as members as well. I talked about how I am coming unto Christ as if I were an investigator, how I am seeing the missionary purpose work in the lives of the people we teach, and how we need to make that purpose our purpose. It's a really great talk that everyone should read. That and the one from Anz. Bednar this month called "Missionary, Family History, and Temple Work".
I love missionary work! I never really realized i t before, but something I shared from Elder Christofferson’s talk just keeps striking me. He says that the world has no access to the saving power of the Atonement except through the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And it’s true! The priesthood power that was restored through Joseph Smith is the key to salvation, and if we don't share the message of the Restoration, no one else is going to be able to use that key.
Sorry this feels so all over, usually I try and get my thoughts together before I email, but I was just really distracted today, so writing came in little chunks.
I love you all, I hope everything is going well, and I pray for you every day!
Sorella Decker
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