January 26, 2015

Carissimi Miei,

 

So great to hear from you all this week! Thank you so much for taking the time to send all of the updates! Its so good to hear that everyone back home is doing well. This week was a great one for us, and I can't wait to tell you all about it :)

 

So just to give you a quick update, all went well with transfers. Part of being an STL means that we have to help out the sisters in our zone who were being moved, but we got everything all taken care of without any problems! Now we are ready to get started on a new transfer. We have capi conference coming up this week, but we wont have zone conference until the end of the transfer this time around. Which means we will have a bit more time to work on our training, so we will see how that goes! 

 

Things over here are going really well! I honestly feel so blessed to be a missionary here at this time. Our investigators are doing great. Let's start with Leo :) we got to spend a lot of time with that man this week. First we had the grand opportunity to teach him the law of chasity. He had a lot of questions, but the lesson went really well. In the end he understood why it is important and said that he would live it. Then later on in the week we went to clean the church with the Scotchi's and Leonardo came too. It was a great opportunity to just talk to him a little bit and see how things were going. and he told us that as he has been reading in the book of mormon he has felt more peace in his life! bahh! his little testimony is just growing and it is the most wonderful thing to see. Also this week there was a baptism that was held in our building for one of the other wards and Leonardo came to see it. It was an absolutely beautiful service, he loved it. And afterwards he was just making jokes about who would be singing at his baptism, who would be giving a talk, how he probably won't be able to fit through the tiny door that leads to the font. haha but really i dont know what we are going to do about that last one. BUT. little by little we are getting him ready for the 21st :)

 

We also had another investigator come to the baptismal service - alida! She is our investigator who has a niece who is a member of the church in dublin. she loves the church, but it is very hard for her to believe that there is a God. But she loved the baptismal service, and honestly was a bit overwhelmed by the spirit that she felt there. I think it was the first time in her life that she felt something like that, and so powerfully. She said that she needs a bit of time to study and try to understand on her own, but that we can call her and see when we can come visit with her. So we are excited to see the progress she makes this week.

 

Also we actually got a new investigator this week who is very similar to Alida. Her name is Anna and we found her on the train. She was raised in the catholic church, but say that she never really felt the presence of god in her life, and because of that now she doesn't think that there is a god. However, like alida, she would like to believe Him. So we met with her for the first time this week, and the lesson went really well. We just took some time to talk about who god is, how we can feel his presence in our life, and above all that we are his children and he loves us. It was just such an incredible opportunity to bear testimony, and honestly i felt like it was one of the most sincere that i have ever borne. Through trials that i have gone through this week I have become so much closer to my heavenly father and felt his love so strongly in my life, and it was just so incredible to see how through that i was able to become a more effective instrument in his hands to help one of his children. Her entire countenance just completely changed throughout the lesson, it was so beautiful. We are excited to see her again.

 

Our other investigators are doing well! Unfortunately Luca was out of town this week, but now he is back so hopefully we will see him soon. And we started teaching a cute little filipino family this week! Their names are ray, jasmine, and christian, and they are so dang cute. 

 

Our meno attivi are doing fantastic as well! This week we met with la coppia navarro, and we really just wanted to stress the importance of coming to all three hours of church. we have talked about it before, but we just wanted them to understand the importance of it. So we talked about the plan of salvation and how in order to have an eternal family they need to be ready to go to the temple, and to go to the temple they need to come to church. It was hard to be so direct, but we knew it was what they needed. And sure enough the next day they showed up at 9:30 for church :) it was so wonderful! and rosita came too! gosh she is just BEAMING with joy right now because she has been coming back to church. But seriously i dont know if i have ever seen someone so happy. It is incredible to be a part of :)

 

Sorry its a bit jumbled and all over the place but there are the updates for the week! There are so many incredible things going on over here, and I feel so humbled and so grateful to be a part of it. I love you so much and I am so grateful for each of you. Ci sentiamo presto :)

 

 

sorella marsh