Week 1 of the fortnight …
Okay let's go from the top.
Monday. The biggest event from Monday I explained
last week. Other than that, by the time we were reunited 2 hours had been
and gone, (shopping and being apart and getting home to sort the groceries
out). Then we tried to find boots for me, which was a success. They are a
little weird, cus they're from a Chinese store, but it's all they had and I'm
pretty desperate, so I went with it. After all, I don't have long left and I
don't wanna be coming home with black frost-bitten toes. Hahahah. Then we tried
to do email.... But we couldn't get wifi ANYWHERE. We went to the local piazza
where the wifi is usually really good, but nothing, so then we took a bus to the
chapel.. Waiting took forever, cus the buses to church are kinda poor, but then
when we got there.. The wifi wasn't working there either... So what a surprise,
we ended up emailing in McDonald's again... The only place that worked. So
again, we are at McDonald's for p-day. It has got to stop. I don't even enjoy
it. Then we had an evening of finding to
do. We did inspired street finding, began doing casa and a few people called us
back. Most didn't answer, and only 2 told us they had no interest. So that was
pretty successful. Then we decided on doing street contacting. Met a TJ woman
called S. She seemed interested, asked the difference between us and
'Christians' (we always get that); told her that we are Christians.. And then
started explaining. I was then all 'If you wanna know more, here is our website
and number.......' And before I could finish, she stopped me all "This is
what happened before.. I used to be Orthodox and I wanted to know the
difference between them and TJ’s and now I'm a TJ..." And we were like 'We-heyyyyyy'
hahaha anyways, we had a pretty lengthy conversation with her and spoke about a
number of things like Prophets and Baptism. :) It went really well, although
when I asked for her number, she pulled the whole ‘Idon'thavemyphoneonme’
scape-route; but it's okay, cus she was really awesome. We tried our best and
we have faith that one day she'll call :)
Tuesday.. Well, we began with the lady who
approached us last week asking for clothes. She was a Romanian immigrant. Well,
the day that she approached us I had actually studied service that morning and
well, I feel like everything lately is telling me that I need to serve others
more and so when this opportunity came I couldn't even turn it down. You know,
usually I would have given my apologies and carried on. Well, I gave her our
card with our number, told her that I will look when we get home and asked her
to call me later. Well she did. We found some pretty nice stuff in the 'death
closet' (basically the closet with clothes that sisters no longer want). So, we
put them in a bag and a Book of Mormon of course, with our testimonies and met
her outside a shop, where she was begging with her gorgeous baby girl. It felt
so good to help someone out :) After that, we headed to DDM. DDM was awesome.
It was all about being a good teacher and starting off the day well, in order
to be effective. One thing that stood out to me was when he mentioned a talk
given at General Conference about ponderizing scriptures. Then he spoke about
relying on our testimony when we do our finding. He said "If this person
is ready, they'll hear echoes of testimony. They have felt this feeling before.
Never be afraid of bearing your testimony. Always rely on it." I liked
that a ton, cus sometimes when finding, I'm guilty of being scared of coming
across too full on or a little weird, even now after being out for a year - sometimes
I still find it hard, but it's true - there is nothing more powerful than
testimony. It was a reminder that I needed. After DDM, we all went and got
pizza. Sorella Roberts and I did half and half with a margarita pizza and a
Nutella pizza. It was super good. As we were all eating at the chapel, 2
Americans came in (one was the father of an ex-Anziano who served here). He
initially wanted to take us out for dinner, (he was here on business) but we
had already bought it, so he gave each of us €20. Each of us!!!!!! He was way
too kind. So shout out to Fratello Sorenson!!!!! I wish I knew his first name,
buuut I don't … but I am really grateful for his kindness :) He and his
colleague explained their business. They explained a few things and it all
sounded pretty legit. Sorella Roberts actually uses a ton of their products.
After that, we saw R, which was awesome, as per usual! Then headed together
with her to English course (she goes to the Spanish course that Fratello DP
runs) :) At English course, Fratello DP (A’s Dad) had made cookies for us and
gave us a bag of them. It was super sweet and they were so good!!! Then we
headed home after Corso to plan. After planning, we ate, then I went to shut
the shutter down, but there was a lil lizard on our window and it wouldn't
move! I tried to move it, cus I didn't wanna trap it, but it just wouldn't
move. Then I thought that maybe it froze there and died or something, cus it
was pretty cold for a lizard to be out like that. Then another one came and
that kinda weirded me out. Anyways, eventually I got it to move... Then we went
to bed!
Wednesday... We were supposed to have a lesson with
.. Got to the chapel after having confirmed that morning, to then get a
cancellation, so we headed straight over to E (R’s wife). She is the wife of
the guy who got baptised a few weeks ago. The Anziani are working with her and
she is supposed to be getting baptised this Saturday :) The Anziani were out of
town (in Sassari) cus Anziano Molnar is ZL, so he was doing a scambio. They
want daily contact with her and so asked us to teach her a lesson. It was all
about Priesthood organization and auxiliaries. Nice one! Haha. She had a few
questions to start with, but seemed to get it. She is so lovely. I love her so
much! I don't like cats at all, you know me, but she had a few lil kittens and
there was this one, all white with light blue eyes. SO cute and beautiful and
it kept trying to jump onto me. During the opening prayer it tried jumping /
crawling up my leg (like they do with fences) and I freaked out and she laughed
her little head off hahahahaah.. but yeah, she is super ready and so cute! She
was having a lil mare about what to wear for the baptism, cus she doesn't like
the baptismal clothing they have at the church.. Hahaha. She considered wearing
her wedding dress, but it's too big. She's super funny. I think she wants to
just buy a white top and skirt. I'm hoping everything works out. She's adorable
though I'm super excited! After her, we headed straight over to R for pranzo.
We got there and she'd already prepared the sauce for the pasta. We just had to
do the pasta. Then she pulls out these fish. Like still with the eyes and
everything. There's 3 of them (one each) and she asks us to grill ‘em haha. So
we did. I don't know how to tell if it's ready... Like do you wait til the eyes
burn, or does it go crispy like bohhhhhh. No idea. Anyways, it seemed done, so
we took it off and hoped for the best. There were a ton of bones, but it was
actually really good. I'm getting super good with eating fish these days :) You'd
be proud! We read the scriptures with her. In the future though, we are gonna
try use the films. We think she'll understand and remember them better, cus
they're simple and easy! After that we studied Italiano .. Had 2 lessons
planned and both of ‘em cancelled last minute on us too, so we ended up
finding. Anyways, we've been trying to see this one less active for a while
now.. We were in the area and so decided to try her. We both felt like we
should... So we get there and nobody answers the cito... but then this man let
us in. Then we ring the actual door to the apartment, and again, no answer. So
I'm there praying so hard that somehow we get in to at least leave a note for
her. Then, the same man came and so we explained who we were looking for and he
let us into the building. Well, he tells us the floor that she lives on, we get
in the lift, ring her doorbell and again, no answer. It just didn't seem right,
everything seemed to work out so perfectly up until now.. We decided to just
leave her a note and post it in her box downstairs. Well, we finished the note
and headed downstairs. As we were walking out the lift, a lady is entering. (Bear
in mind we have never met L, so we have no idea what she looks like) .. but I
had a little feeling it was her. She looks up and is so so so happy and she is
all "Sisters, I am L!!!!!!!" .. and so we were like "Yes, we
were looking for you!!!!!!" Well, she had just got back from work, but she
let us in and chatted. We shared a spiritual thought. She loved it. She even
said she'd try and come to church on Sunday. I went away from that lesson
feeling so happy and full. These last few weeks have been tough, but this
tender mercy made it worth it. Then we did some finding. It was thundering and
lightening, but no rain. The sky was really beautiful and although we were
slightly scared of getting electrocuted we carried on hahah. After finding, we
got the bus to head home to plan. Have I ever mentioned how huge our areas are
in this mission? So enormous, it's actually insane! Anyways, on the bus there
was the cutest little girl, oh my. Her name was S and she was chatting away to
Sorella Roberts. :) .. so we left her and her mom with a Mormon.org card before we got off :) and that was our day!
Thursday.. Mamma mia!!! Today was a day. We had an appointment
with B, which went really well, as usual... Then we did more finding. Casa casa,
ex investigator finding etc. Some said to come back. Others didn't. Before
English course though, we met with M!!! Who has now read up to chapter 22 of 1
Nephi!!!!! He's gold. Still insists he's Catholic, but 100% accepts the Book of
Mormon as sacred scripture! :) He asked questions about the Plan of Salvation
too, so that was super awesome! :)
English course went well, always so fun! Oh,
something super cute about today was that during the day E (R’s wife) called to
tell us, she found white clothes for her baptism and she was super
excited!!! I love her!
Friday... Today was awesome. NOBODY cancelled.
Miracle!!!!!!!!!!!! We began withhhh weekly planning. Then we ate fried potato,
chicken and rice. After that we went back to our inspired street, again.. No
one answered, and those who did were not interested. Then we headed over to V.
She is awesome. We shared a talk about becoming fully converted by Elder David
A Bednar, one he gave in October 2002. It is an awesome talk and if you get the
time to read it, I'd recommend it :) After that, we headed to the park to see B.
We were early, so did some park approaches. We were totally fearless. We took
turns and nobody passed us without hearing from us haha . It was awesome! Well,
we got to these grannies on the bench and it was Sorella Roberts turn. She
begins "buonasera, noi siamo le missionarie per la chiesa di Gesù Cristo
dei Santo degli Ultimi Giorni, e siamo qui per....." And they look at us
absolutely blank, then this posh little London accent comes from nowhere at all
'We're English' and so then, we start speaking English. Hahaha I don't
know if they thought that would be an escape route hahaha but it was awesome.
They were here for a friend’s wedding. They had heard of us before and they
were super sweet. Told me all about the English weather right now, all about
how mild it is there. I told them how it started to cool down here last week and
they were all "What? Really? We think it is oh so hot!" Anyway, that
was funny. We carried on speaking to everyone and then weeeeeeeee saw B. B was
awesome as usual! Such a difficult situation being underage, but wanting so, so
much to be baptized! :(but she is awesome. Totally understands everything.
Accepts and keeps commitments with everything. She's just golden! The spirit
was totally with us! We could each feel it! :) After, we headed home to make
brownies for V for tomorrow (we decided to pop in with a treat and a quote to
cheer her up) and then also for the baptism for E :) which will be on Saturday
:) Oh and while we made brownies, I made calls. No-one was interested and we
had some really funny responses like "no non era io" .. even though
they were the person who was taught, cus it was their name and they knew
exactly who we were. Anywaysssss, that was that day haha.
Saturday.. We began heading to the church
(obviously all of this happens after our studies) to meet M. She is late, so we
practice some hymns, cus we decided to begin by singing a song :) She arrived
and we began singing the duet of "È dolce l'ora del pregar" (sweet
hour of prayer) then we decided to watch the Restoration since that is
something that we feel she doesn't quite understand and we've tried explaining
it many times and so we figured it would be a good idea.. More profound and all
that jazz. She loved it. Like really, really did love it. I felt prompted to
ask her if she knew that Joseph Smith was a true prophet and if this church was
the true Church of Christ. She said yes, with surety. Then I felt like I needed
to re-word the question and so I asked her if she has prayed to know it if it's
true and she said ‘no’ because she already knows. Soooooo there it is! Anyways,
she was going on and on about how she knows it's true and basically shared a
testimony that you'd typically hear a member share. Then Sorella Roberts
invited her to be baptized and she was all 'si mi piacerebbe un giorno' (yes, I
would like to one day), then goes on about how she isn't perfect and wants to
know more and be more sure etc.... Then speaks about the scripture about
turning the other cheek and how she can't do that. Then we try to explain the
atonement and you know, we shared our testimonies of the atonement and how it
not only covers our sins and afflictions, but also our trials, difficulties,
and pains.. Struggles etc. I love her a lot and we expressed that, explained
why we invite her to take this step, promise and testify of blessings. You know
how it works. ANYWAYS I forgot to mention. While we were practicing hymns, I
felt a prompting to look at the phone really randomly. Well, I did and C (one
of our investigations who we didn't get to see this week) was calling (another
side note; we sent out a text yesterday inviting our investigators to the
baptism.) Well, she was calling to tell us she would love to come and that she
would be there! I think out of the 20+ years she has known the
missionaries, this is the 1st time she will have stepped foot in church? At
least going from the records that we have!!! So we are suuuuuper excited about
that!!! Then we headed to V with the brownies. We sent her
his quote with them.. "If this person is ready, they'll hear echoes of
testimony. They have felt this feeling before. Never be afraid of bearing your
testimony. Always rely on it." She
was super grateful and told us that we might see her at the baptism AND THAT
SHE MIGHT COME TO CHURCH ON SUNDAY! .. which is a huge step because one, she
always says no when we ask and two, because we didn't even mention it!!!
BLESSINGS!
During pranzo I finally got the chance to read
Ammon’s email. I loved the letter and 'Come and see' finding idea. We have been
finding all week and we're trying to think of more productive finding tips and
ideas and this really stood out to us! So we planned out our letter after that.
After that, E had asked us to come early to plait her hair, so we headed
to the chapel to help her out. She was so so so excited! We took some pictures
and then the service began. OH also, C CAME! She had called in the morning like
I said, and since then had fallen and was in a bad way, but her husband, P told
her she had to come, so they both came anyways, and absolutely loved it! The
service was very beautiful. Simple, but stunning, just how baptismal services
should be. She had asked me to play the piano :) Anziano Molnar did one talk
and Vescovo C did the other. HER HUSBAND R, WHO WAS BAPTISED ABOUT 3 WEEKS AGO
PERFORMED THE BAPTISM. It was literally incredible to hear. I wish I could say
that we played a part in their conversion, but the credit all goes to the
Anziani, past and present. Well, really it goes to the Lord, but for the small
part that we have been able to play in this, mainly in being her friend and
stepping in for that one lesson, we are really, really grateful. R and E are a
choice couple and now they are well on their way to becoming an eternal family
:) She had also asked us to help her get sorted after the ordinance itself,
which was a pleasure too. This woman is adorable. She has such a sweet spirit.
Ahhhhh I love baptisms. Then as we were helping her out, R came in with this
adorable beautiful pearl bracelet he had bought for her as a baptism
gift. Seriously, this couple are ADORABLE. Gosh it melted my heart! She bore
her testimony afterwards. She was a little lost for words and she gets really
shy, but she did so well, you could see in his eyes how proud R was of her.
Wow. I can't even explain how much I love them both. After the service, they
had bought some things to eat and so people got to mingle. Oh, I also forgot to
say that R was there too :) Then at the end we all headed back home on the bus
together.
Sunday. What a wonderful Sunday! I have really,
really come to appreciate Sunday's more and more since being here on the
mission. I'd probably go as far as to say it's my favourite day of the week
these days! Well, we got there to be greeted by E, who had to come to church
without R today, as they put him on a shift at work. It was a real big deal
that he wouldn't be there for the confirmation, but they both accepted it as a
trial, and handled it with outstanding faith. As I said, choice couple. They’re
incredible. Anziano Molner conferred the gift of the Holy Ghost. The blessing
was beautiful. She was so calm. She sat next to me during the sacrament meeting
and after she had been sustained as a member of the church she told me how calm
and at peace she felt. Well, as the
lessons went on she introduced herself to all the members, literally everyone.
She said 2 prayers, one in gospel principles where she volunteers herself as
soon as Fratello A asked for a volunteer to offer it. Then they asked her to
offer the closing prayer at the end of Relief Society. She even gave some input
during Relief Society, even though she is naturally a very shy person. Ahhhh
she is just incredible. Everyone loves her. :) After church, we had
correlation, then popped over to do G’s second to last lesson as a new convert!
Sorella Roberts taught about the Priesthood and I spoke about missionary work,
genealogy and temples. It went really well as per, as I've said before, G is
golden! After the lesson, we ate a bit of brownie together :) She was superrr
excited :) Then we headed over to A :) :) :) :) yeyyyyyy! We spoke of the talk
"What lack I yet" and invited her to do as President Harold B Lee
invited each of us to do when he said... “Every one of us, if we would reach
perfection, must [at] one time ask ourselves this question, ‘What lack I yet?’”
She accepted, THEN SHE FED US THE SPICIEST SPAGHETTI I HAVE EVER EATEN
hahahahahahahahahahahaha. It was so good, I'm starting to handle spicy food
really well. Roberts still struggles bless her lil socks hahah, but it was
super good. I love A. She is getting more and more open with us. She told us
more about her life, and I respect this woman so, so much. She's so strong.
Wowaaaa.
When we got home, Sorella Roberts thanked me for something that I
said during the lesson with A, when I explained how the atonement works and
what it covers and the way I explained it.
OH ALSO VALERIA CAME TO CHURCH FOR ALL 3 HOURS!!!!!!!!
Well, that was my week! Some parts have been tough,
and some parts have been incredible. God always makes up for the hard times.
It's true what they say. The mission is a roller coaster and I totally
understand it. It is, however, the best roller coaster I have ever been on. I
am loving every minute. I love his gospel. I love being a missionary. I love my
Father in Heaven and his son Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for the opportunity
I have had for the last 15 months and will have for the next 3 to wear Christ’s
name on my chest. What an honour!
All my love, baci e abbracci ...
Sorella Ashleigh Robertson xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
Week 2 of the fortnight ...
Lunedì.. Well, we decided to do spesa at the shop
near the Anziani's apartment, then to get bits like veg, fruit and meat at the
market close to that shop. We figured it would be quicker, as we were supposed
to be meeting A for our p’day. It was quicker, but way more expensive, so we
won't be doing it again. We got home, went to a Piazza Italia to snag the wifi
and emailed you all! 😍😍 After that, we headed to Centro to meet A. She took us to a curry
place. MAMMA. I have missed curry so much. It was super good! A little taste of
what I have to look forward to haha. I had butter chicken.. and it was super
good. Then I had onion bahjis and a naan bread 😍 Right after that, we got a bus to go shopping. I got a typical Sard
ring. It's super pretty and I wanna go back and buy more 😍 It's real silver and it matches my Pandora and I'm just a little bit
obsessed.
After that we did a little more shopping and relaxing. Then Fratello
DP (father of A) picked us up and took us home. :) In the evening, we did that
Family Home Evening con gli Anziani. A came with a friend and Molnar did an
awesome spiritual thought. R and E bore testimony, which was actually so
awesome to see and that was Monday!
Martedì.. Well, we started doing the finding
project that Ammon mentioned last week. We have been receiving a lot of
cancellations and a lot of potentials and investigators have been too busy to
see us and so it’s resulted to constant finding, and we just got very bored of
doing the same things and seeing little success and so I suggested it as a new
idea and we both got super pumped about it, and so we got the talk in Italian,
wrote up the letters (I hope they're grammatically correct, cus I didn't ask
anyone to proof read it Hahahah awks) and then went and started giving them
out. I don't know how door to door works for Ammon, but here in Italy, everyone
lives in apartments. So rarely do you get the change to actually knock on a
door and get a face to face experience... Also, with these apartments it's not
often that someone lets you in willingly. Usually you ring the cito (buzzer
thing to get into the gate... Usually there are 2.. The gate and the door to
the apartment itself) and they'll tell you they're not interested, or just hang
up... Or sometimes they won't even answer 'chi è?' and they'll just let you
in.. I guess that's cus they're expecting someone else?) Anyways, those who let
us in, without knowing who we were, we found their postbox and posted them,
however, this has never happened before, but two people in an apartment close
to the church asked us to leave something to read in their post box, so we did.
Hopefully they'll have an interest and come on Sunday! :) After all of this
finding, (oh, also we got followed by a man while we were doing this, so we had
to take a detour to lose him Hahahah Italy Rome missionary life. This doesn't
happen as regularly as it did in Ragusa though, so we're blessed! Anyways,
after we had a lesson with R. SHE PRAYED AGAIN wheyyyyyy! She had voglia
woooooo!! She is so cute mammaaaaa! I love that woman. President told us to go over
the Restoration over again, so we did. It went welllll :) After that, we went
for interviews with President. It went really well. Obviously I had a few
questions for him and that was that. OH, ALSO, during the day our investigator
M sent us a text beginning like this "il mezzo mormone (cioè io)"
.... He called himself a half-Mormon whattttttt. Anyways, that was cool and we
got all excited haha. Then it was more finding until English course, which went
well. Then after English course the Assistants decided it was about time to
tell me what I was supposed to be doing for the conference (the following day);
so that was, really handy! Ha..
Mercoledì .. I woke up early, cus the Assistants
wanted to meet at
8:00, so we had
to leave the house at 730. Bearing in mind I still haven't had time to even
think of my part of the addestramento... So we leave, they run through everything
and ask me about my part.. So I tell them that by the time we finished the
meeting yesterday and got the bus home, we planned, ate then went to bed. Then
in the morning I barely had time to get ready, so hadn't prepared anything. So
they gave me like half an hour before the leadership meeting. I have never felt
so unprepared in my life. At least it was just a 20/30 mins part of their
addestramento.. The meeting went well, then the conference happened. It was all
about the importance of role play and being prepared and how to set goals and
working to achieve them. The rest was pretty much general stuff that happens
every zone conference. Oh, they also emphasised on inspired questions. There
were a ton of role plays. One which I led.. That was all about planning. The
day before they gave me a list of how to plan, which were: To have a vision, to
set goals to achieve vision, to plan accordingly, and accountability. They
wanted me to introduce it not by doing a role play, so I was super confused.
They were like "You can use a video or a talk or something" no more
or less. This is basically all they told me, so imagine how confused I was.
Anyways, in the end I decided to take the talk "What lack I yet?"
From the last General Conference, I used the examples of members who asked this
question .. And basically linked it all to these points. I can't really
remember everything I did. I think they may have even cut me short. I really
don't remember, but alla fine. It seemed to go well :)
The Assistants really
are great and it was probably the best zone conference I had ever been too. They were super prepared, or at least seemed it, regardless of how unprepared I
was hahaha anyways pazienza! Oh also, my fave quote of the conference had to be
when Sorella Waddoups was like "I was born 10 mins before Halloween,
that's why I'm a little witch!" After, we did
more finding, yeah, another week full of finding! .. Then we had planned a
lesson with A, but didn't have anyone to go with us, so we couldn't do it just
at the chapel, so we asked him if he could meet us at the café nearby. He was
totally cool with that. Well, we get there.. The nights are freezing these
days. Boiling hot in the day but the nights’ .. mamma Mia! And he was waiting
there, right next to the park. We called him to ask where he was and he told us,
so we made our way to find him. He also
brought along a friend. So there were 2
of them!!!!! We get to the lesson... but his friend, who is also an English
course student, who is much older .. Starts asking me questions (A knew about
the restoration, he didn't), so I'm there explaining the restoration to him,
and Roberts is there talking to A about covenants and then we left. It was really
cool, cus I got to teach B the Restoration and Roberts invited A to be baptised
and he said that when he knows the Book of Mormon is true that he will. We need
to teach him how to pray for an answer, cus he still doesn't feel comfortable
doing so. Anyways, after that, we get home to find out the Sassari Sorelle and
all the other missionaries missed their train by like 10 seconds and the next
one wasn't until the following morning, so they came tooooo. We had fun! We
chatted, ate and went to bed!
Giovedì.. Well, today weeeeeee began with a
lesson with C. She has a pot on her foot the poor thing! She fell off a chair
or something like last week (just before E’s baptism), so she's getting around
on a wheely chair...we taught both her and P, her husband. While teaching them,
she asked about a family... Who are members and the name didn't ring any bells,
so she called them to ask if they still come to church (she pulled the whole 'I
went to the baptism and I didn't see you') and then the lady said how they
don't go anymore, because her husband doesn't want to... Soooo in a way, we
kinda got a less active referral from an investigator :) and it's a family too,
so hopefully we can work with them! After, we made some calls to ex-investigators
and contacts from the phone, but nothing much came of it. We saw an adorable
Filipino woman on the bus who knew the missionaries from before. She told us she
used to meet up with them, but then it was our stop and so we just had time to
give her our card with our number! Hopefully she'll call! Anyway, we got to the
afternoon and 2 people cancelled on us... which meant more finding, so we went
into the park. I saw a man on the bench and I spoke to him. He knew the
missionaries from before and we were able to have a nice conversation. He
didn't completely reject me and I left him feeling a little better than before.
Then, I was able to reflect on how good I feel when I speak to people..
Especially people who are interested, which if I'm honest, isn't very often,
but it happens every now and again. We continued throughout that evening taking
turns talking to people and each person who I spoke to just made me feel that
much better. We had two quality conversations with two wonderful women, one
from Ukraine and one Italian. We even got their numbers. Then after, we had a
lesson with our half Mormon investigator, M. It went really really well. His
lessons we do slightly differently. He just has so many questions, but we spoke
a lot about the importance of gaining a testimony of the Book of Mormon (he's
now read up to 2 Nephi 8!!!), but hasn't yet prayed about it. We emphasised the
importance of praying too, to understand and to receive a testimony. He told us
he is worried the answer will be yes and he will have to let go of all of his
Catholic traditions, such as the Madonna and the Saints, but we are really
seeing a lot of progress with him. He agreed to pray. Towards the end, I felt
inspired to ask him what it would mean if he prayed and did receive an answer
of the Book of Mormon .. He didn't know how to answer, so we are hoping and
praying that it is something he can reflect on this week. After all of this, we
got home and I reflected on what happened that day. It was hard, but it
honestly was so rewarding. I was able to experience first-hand the blessings that
you receive from putting forth faith and action, even during the difficult
times, or the times where you are feeling so discouraged. I was able to relight
that testimony of how if we do our part, God will make up for the rest. What I
thought would be the 'worst day ever' turned out to be a learning experience
for me.. and probably the best day of the week, so from this, I wanna encourage
you to never give up. Even when things seem impossible, too hard, pointless,
discouraging or any other negative thoughts, because if it is right (and you
will know if it's right, as usually it's not easy haha), you need to do your
part, asking Heavenly Father for heavenly guidance and he will not only help
you to do your part, but he will make up the rest. :)
I also wanna give a shoutout to my companion for
being there for me, having patience and just being the sweetest, most caring
and most spiritually sensitive person I've known. I love her! :)
Venerdì ... We began with weekly planning, which
went well! :) Then we saw R :) :) and spoke about diligence, then we saw B :)
and spoke about the law of chastity and the word of wisdom. She knows
everything, so it obviously went really well. She has very high standards,
which she has set for herself and she's not even a member yet! She's so
awesome. I love her! She also agreed to ask her parents if we can do a FHE at
her house with her family :)
I'm running out of time.. I'll go through the
weekend quickly..
Sabato.. We began seeing A C! The cute lady who
gave us a ton of food! We got her to pick her fave chapter from the Book of
Mormon and basically the invite was taken from one of the last General Conference
talks about Ponderizing :) She accepted, then gave us pasta and a chicken leg.
Love that woman! Oh, she also made us a fresh cake! .. and then we saw V
followed by the spending the afternoon doing ex investigator finding. Some
schedas have no number, but an address so we went to try and find them.. Then
we did a gesso with the Anziani :)
Domenica.. Church was great! I played in sacrament.
One hymn nobody knew haha. It reminded me of the Green. Good times! Then
Anziano Molnar did the gospel principles lesson and I translated for their
African Simps. R came to all 3 hours 😊😊😊 then after, me, Roberts and R went for pranzo at Sorella S’s house :)
SHE IS AWESOME. As we were waiting for the bus after pranzo, I read Dad’s poem
and WHAT?!?!?! ... DAD ... I DIDNT KNOW YOU WERE A POET. I LOVED IT AND IT MADE
ME CRY, BUT I LOVED IT SO SO SO MUCH AND I'M LITERALLY GONNA TREASURE IT
FOREVER AND EVER!!!! Thank you so so much. It made everything so much better! I
love you!
Then we had correlation, then the final lesson with G, so we made pancakes
together afterwards and then home and that was our Sunday haha woo!!
I'm typing this up right now, while eating salsa
and Doritos. Heaven!
Just wanna bear a short testimony that I know that
this is the Lord's work. I know the church is true and I'm so grateful to be a
part of it!
I love you all millions and miss you all too, but
know that I think of you and pray for you every day.
Keep being amazing,
All my love and then some
Sorella Robertson
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