Finding, Finding, Finding!!!

Looks like you are having so much fun at Snowbird!! Love Kelsey’s dress. What a babe.  Okay this week has been great! Last P-day we got to spend it in NAPOLI! Where pizza was born. We walked through the whole city which is full of all these alleyways and a million HUGE churches, it is crazy. We also saw Castel Nuovo (see included picture) which was actually built by the French.  I love Napoli, seriously one of my favorite cities, too bad that sisters can’t serve there yet. And of course…we got the pizza.  AND IT WAS SO GOOD.  Seriously heavenly. Nothing in the world compares to it. I even had dreams about it. Don’t worry dad, I’m taking you there!! 

Napoli

Napoli

Napoli

We also had zone conference and it was super great. I love zone conferences. I always leave them feeling on top of the world and that I can accomplish anything in the mission.

Zone Conference

Zone Conference

 Right after Zone conference we had an exchange, or as I call it Scambio, with the sisters from Pozzuoli (one of the cities that Paul preached to! I’m right in the middle of the bible!). I was given the choice…finding or teaching a lesson. Sometimes I suck at finding, but when I get into it…I can be really good. Right after Zone conference I just felt so…motivated that I knew I had to do finding. Sorella Baker and I hit the town and talked to people for over four hours. It was awesome! We talked to EVERYONE, met a ton of great people searching for the truth,  got a lot of numbers, etc. It was actually a lot of fun and it feels really good to work hard and share the gospel with so many people. Doesn’t matter who rejects you. One of the miracles that we saw was we were walking down a street and there was this lady talking on the phone (I normally don’t talk to people on the phone, because I feel like it bugs them) and we decided to invite her to English course anyway. She looks at us, tells her friend on the phone who we are, and hands us the phone. This lady then tells about how she just got a job offer but she has to learn some English and had no idea what to do…then here we are, offering free English lessons…it was a huge miracle for her. She asked to meet with us the next day. She is actually really interested in the gospel and is now a new investigator for the Pozzuoli sisters! So awesome! 

Scambios

The next day I did a scambio with Sorella Marsh (from Murry, she’s the cutest!) and we taught this new convert who is like 75 years old! He has this awesome testimony and wouldn’t even let us teach him anything because he wanted us to teach all the people on the benches by us. I love people like that. This scambio I learned to stop having mental roadblocks. Like sometimes I don’t like to talk to people on cell phones or old people because they way stuck in tradition and don’t want to change. But that’s not always true. I need to talk to EVERYBODY because you never know who will accept your message or what miracles the Lord wants to show you. 

Scambios

When we came home from the scambio, I looked at our list of investigators, and most of them aren’t progressing or won’t even answer the phone to see us…so we kind of dropped a lot of them…which meant a lot of finding here in Battipaglia this week too! We don’t have a lot of great contacts from those efforts, but we talked to a lot of people this week and I know a lot of them were prepared. Even if people aren’t going to accept your message, I know that God places them in our path for a reason and I could definitely see that happening this week. Also, with this extra time we had time to call up all of the less actives in Battipaglia. Let’s just say that the number of less actives is about 20 times as long as the active members here and it took all morning to call everyone. God showed us more miracles as a lot of them answered and wanted us to come see them! Now we have a good list of less actives to strengthen here!

Also, our mission lately has trying to get family search and indexing going really strong here. Sorella Williams had a lot of success in her past city with it and we’re trying to get it all organized and use it as a great finding tool. Now I have a favor to ask of all my relatives…well first off, I am so grateful that a lot of my family history is done and that someone uploaded a ton of photos of my great-grandparents online—I printed some of the pictures off and people love see them! But I would love to also have some stories or details about them…Any stories or facts about my great grandparents or ancestors would be greatly appreciated!! Already, we’ve seen a lot of miracles with family history! When I talk to people on the street, I first try the gospel and then if they’re not interested…I tell them about this free service we offer to help them find their families…People LOVE it! So many people want to find out more; it’s a great finding tool! Thank you!!

This week…President gave us a call (it is so scary to see his name on your phone because who knows what he wants). He actually called Sorella Williams to tell her that her grandma passed away. She knew that is was going to happen, but it was still sad. Her grandma was really catholic and did not want her to go on a mission. The next day, the Elders gave her a blessing and it was really cool. It talked about how her grandma is okay and that she will be a great missionary in the spirit world and that she is learning how to teach from watching Sorella Williams’ example. It was so cool. The other side is closer than we think!

I know this gospel is true! I love being a missionary and trying my best every day to bring people unto Christ, even if sometimes it’s really hard! I love ITALY!!!

Lastly, I will leave you with a funny fact about the members at Battipaglia. People REALLY love animals here, okay they really love CATS and DOGS here. . Every time I’ve told an Italian that I ate dog in China…they FREAK out and think I’m the worst person in the world. You do not harm cats or dogs here. They are sacred. Anyway all the members here pray for all the animals in all the prayers. They pray that they can all be safe, have health, find homes, and don’t have to suffer. I love the animals too, but I just think it’s funny haha!

LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!!!!!!