Torino is Huge!

Cara Famiglia,

Welcome to Torino! This city is awesome! It is wayyyy way bigger than any city I've served in before. I am serving in the Torino 1 ward, which has four Anziani, we live with the other two. The apartment is pretty nice, we live on the 7th floor of a palazzo and from the balcony we can see the Mole Antonelliana (this big building that dominates the Torino skyline, look it up!), as well as that mountain from the 'Paramount Pictures' thing in movies way off in the distance. We travel around mainly on bus and tram, and lots of walking. It is nice to not be on a bike. The ward is pretty big, probably around 80-90 people come every week. For real though, this city is just massive, especially compared to Legnano/Busto/Gallarate. There are endless people to talk to, it's great!

The work is going really good too, we are seeing tons of miracles. Just a couple days before I arrived Anziano Russo and his companion miraculously found a less-active Nigerian member who is married to a non-member guy from Ireland. So they set up an appointment for us to see him, and we went and taught him. And now he has a baptismal date for the 15th of January! His name is Matin, he is super bravo. We gave him a Book of Mormon and the next day we called to follow up and see how it was going, and he had read 12 chapters! He is really just a super cool guy. We are also teaching an awesome Peruvian guy named Antonio, he is also doing really well with the Book of Mormon and came to church on Sunday! His friend Sandro is also kind of involved, but seems less interested. Yesterday was full of miracles, we taught six lessons! So we are praying a lot to stay humble and grateful for all the lessons the Lord is blessing us with.

This week I found a really awesome scripture in Alma! It is in chapter eight, verse ten:

10 Nevertheless Alma labored much in the spirit, wrestling with God in mighty prayer, that he would pour out his Spirit upon the people who were in the city; that he would also grant that he might baptize them unto repentance.

I may have mentioned this before, but I love the idea of 'wrestling with God in mighty prayer.' Prayer is something I think we can constantly work on, and to make our prayers 'mighty' takes a lot of practice. I am really grateful for the power of prayer in missionary work, and I can truly feel and see the evidence of all of your prayers every day. I know that this is the true church of Jesus Christ, and that the Book of Mormon is true. I love you all lots!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith