Baptisms!

Cara Famiglia,

Well this week was just fantastic! It was rainy and cold but everything turned out really well. Piacenza is full of miracles and everything is going great. Today we went to Bologna for P-day and it was actually a cool city, we saw some good stuff. The sad note was the last letter of Elder Dickson! I can't believe he's going home! It is scary how fast time flies. Tell him he had a beast mode mission.

As the subject line attests, the number of baptisms that took place for the Piacenza Branch this week was more than one! Rosa, Gianpaolo's wife, got baptized! And also Valerio!!! He had his interview Thursday and passed. We were going to have it be this next weekend but since we already had to go to Modena anyway for Rosa's baptism our Branch President recommended we move it up and save a trip for the members! So we had a bit of a last-minute organizational scramble but the baptism went really well. Valerio got baptized and afterwards bore his testimony and it was really great. He loves the Book of Mormon and is glad to have finally found the truth after what seems like a lifelong search. A lot of the members are really warming up to him too, which is cool. He will receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost on Sunday!

Other than that we are still teaching a number of people. We haven't been able to see Angelo and Paola recently but Angelo came to church on Sunday and he is still awesome. It is tough to meet with them sometimes 'cause of work schedules and stuff, but they are great. We are also still teaching Lalit, the kid from Nepal. He also really likes the Book of Mormon and wants to be baptized but his family is kind of against it. Pray for softened hearts!

My spiritual thought this week is a quote from President Monson's conference talk 'Consider the Blessings' from the most recent conference. After talking about a number of simple but powerful spiritual experiences he says:

"I never cease to be amazed by how the Lord can motivate and direct the length and breadth of His kingdom and yet have time to provide inspiration concerning one individual—or one cultural celebration or one Jumbotron. The fact that He can, that He does, is a testimony to me.

My brothers and sisters, the Lord is in all of our lives. He loves us. He wants to bless us. He wants us to seek His help. As He guides us and directs us and as He hears and answers our prayers, we will find the happiness here and now that He desires for us."

After reflecting on some of the more pivotal spiritual moments in my life I found that they were for the most part simple answers to prayers, even if the answer came a long time after the prayer. I know that our Heavenly Father has a great love for every single child and he knows us perfectly. I am grateful that he knows what is best for me and what will bring me the most joy. I know this is His work and that He guides it constantly. I love you all lots!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith

Birthday Space Transfer!

Cara Famiglia,

Ciao Siena! Ciao Piacenza! I love that you can use the same word for goodbye and hello in Italian! But yeah, I am now out of Toscana and in the great city of Piacenza. It is basically halfway between Modena and Milano, and in fact the district is us, Reggio Emilia, and Modena, so I will finish in the same district I started in! My companion Anziano Benson went to Busto Arsizio!!!!! He is so lucky, that city rocks! My companion now is Anziano Thompson, who is also from Idaho Falls(in fact he went to the same high school as Anziano Benson), and who is in his third transfer. He did his first two in Busto, so it has been cool to hear what was going on there.

Seeing as how I literally just got here this morning, I'm not super up to date on the work but I can just say that it is stellar! Piacenza has seven baptismal dates and a ton of investigators! When President called to tell us where we were going he said 'Piacenza is leading the mission in baptismal dates' and in the rest of the district there are seven other dates. So we will have our hands full! My companion is awesome, I can already tell!

Thanks to everybody for the Birthday wishes! Special shout out to Grandpa and also the Benson family who sent me a really great card. I hope they know how awesome of a missionary their son is and how much he is going to tear it up in Busto.

My spiritual thought is really simple, but I really loved President Eyring's talk from the Sunday Morning session of Conference about the 'pavilion' blocking us from God. I would also cross-reference Elder Holland's talk and encourage us all to leave our nets behind and join the cause of Christ with all our heart, might, mind, and strength. I know that this decision we make will change our lives, and as we pray 'thy will be done' we will find our lives more fulfilling than whatever we could fill them with. I love you all lots, and I know this work is true!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith

General Conference!!!!

Cara Famiglia,

GENERAL CONFERENCE! It's like Christmas as a missionary. It was crazy to hear the age change for missionaries, and I'm looking forward to seeing all the missionaries that will now be coming out, I expect a lot more! It was a really really good conference, I will give a report later on.

The work in Siena is going really well, we are still working with Selifa and Noeline. Noeline is doing especially well, as we taught her twice with a member this week and she watched some of General Conference and liked it! We also watched the Restoration movie with her and it really helped her understand a lot. She is excited to prepare for baptism on October 28th!

Also this week I got to do an awesome scambio in Pistoia with Anziano Gibbons! He is also from Idaho Falls and is an awesome missionary. We taught a guy on a well, that is a first in the mission! We didn't have a talk about living water though. But it was a really fun and successful scambio. We placed a Book of Mormon with a cool Italian lady and also taught a nice Muslim man from Morocco who was also interested in the Book of Mormon.

So conference was truly awesome! I really loved President Uchtdorf's first talk. It was really cool to just think of life in a different perspective and how it illustrates the principle of 'acting' and not 'being acted upon.' I liked this quote:

Life is not meant to be appreciated only in retrospect. “This is the day which the Lord hath made … ,” the Psalmist wrote. “Rejoice and be glad in it.”

I know that as we do our best to follow the example of our Savior Jesus Christ and love every day as much as He did we will not have the regrets that President Uchtdorf talked about. I am grateful for the Savior's example of loving, daily, constant service and hope I can do better to follow Him. I love you all lots!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith

Verona Week 4!

Cara Fam[i]glia,

This week was a pretty good week. Big news is that we finally got to take off the suit coats! It was great because it was really hot last week but now that we have the coats off it's getting colder. But it's okay, because the things that matter are going well.

This week we set a record for lessons taught in one week since I've been here, but we are still desperately needing to reach the mission goal of 20 a week (=double baptisms!) We are working really hard finding and there has been a lot of training recently about spiritually planning and executing our plans incredibly precisely to reach the goal of 20 each week. We are kind of struggling because without our investigators answering the phone it is tough to set up appointments with them. But we will do much better this week.

Unfortunately we haven't been able to see Gladis or Isaac or Emilio since the last email, but there will be more news on them next week. We had a cool miracle the other day after a miserable day full of being stood-up and lousy finding success, when we found a new Brazilian investigator named Claudio and a cool guy named Edmond afterwards. Both learned more about the restored gospel of Jesus Christ and both became new investigators! We also finally got to be able to teach Michael, the 18 year old Brazilian kid who is really searching. He is very spiritual and just needs to read the Book of Mormon and he'll know it's true. Pray for all of our investigators lots!

Conference was awesome! We got to see all the sessions except the Sunday Afternoon one, which unfortunately we never get to see, but we will read the talks when the Conference Liahona issue comes out. I really enjoyed a number of the talks, especially that of President Uchtdorf in the Priesthood Session, also the Donald L. Hallstrom talk from Saturday Morning. Money quote from the 'why' or Priesthood service talk: “We need to be constantly reminded of the eternal reasons behind the things we are commanded to do. The basic gospel principles need to be part of our life’s fabric, even if it means learning them over and over and over again. That doesn’t mean that this process should be rote or boring. Rather, when we teach the foundational principles in our homes or in Church, let the flame of enthusiasm for the gospel and the fire of testimony bring light, warmth, and joy to the hearts of those we teach.” We need to be constantly thinking about the gospel this way. It's not just a bunch of things to do, but a pattern of life that we need to seek to improve each and every day. I know that as we truly 'learn' the fundamental principles of the gospel over and over and over again we will be happier and closer to God. I know this church is true, I know the Book of Mormon is the word of God, and I know that Thomas S. Monson is a prophet called to lead the Church of Jesus Christ in these latter days. I love you all lots!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith

General Conference

Cara Famiglia!

 

Well this week was awesome, highlighted of course by General Conference, which was a spiritual powerhouse. I really liked basically every talk. I liked Robert D. Hales saying "Many times we pray for patience, but we want it right now!" and also Tad R. Callister's talk about the Book of Mormon was really good. But like I said, they were all amazing as you know. I love that we have living prophets and apostles guiding the church and receiving modern revelation! It is incredible! And a second temple in Provo, Utah! That will be awesome.

 

This week was good with investigators. We've taught [Saul] five lessons in a row with members present and he is the man. He's really sincere and super humble and understands everything really well. Unfortunately he stood us up to come to General Conference in Milano but he's still awesome. He just needs a super solid testimony of the Book of Mormon and he'll get baptized! But he is progressing really well. We kind of dropped Umberto, he just was not reading or praying and didn't understand why he should, even though our member just tears it up the lessons. We just bore testimony and talked about how prayer and scripture study are exactly what he needs but he wouldn't commit to do it! We might see him sometimes in the future. Also we had an awesome scambio two days ago where we found an Italian family of five! They are really nice and we are going back to see them on Sunday, so we're super excited to teach them. Basically everything is on fire in Busto Arsizio.

 

This week's spiritual thought is one of my favorite scriptures of all time in the Book of Mormon that I read this morning, in 2 Nephi 26:27:

27 Hath he commanded any that they should not partake of his salvation? Behold I say unto you, Nay; but he hath given it free for all men; and he hath commanded his people that they should persuade all men to repentance.

It's great! Christ forbids absolutely nobody from salvation, we are the ones who forbid ourselves! I have gained a great testimony on my mission of the power of us to determine our own salvation(in a way) by making the right choices. I know that the best choice is to follow Jesus Christ and his perfect example, and I know that this is His church!

Lots and lots and lots of love!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith

Miracles and Conference Time Again!

Cara Famiglia,

Well we had some more great miracles this week! Busto Arsizio is amazing. It is good Anziano Webb and I are staying together because we are absolutely tearing it up over here! Last Thursday was amazing! (Probably because it was Austin's birthday!) It started in the morning, when we went to do some Parco. We weren't having much success, but then we found this guy named Renzo who was fixing something on his bike. We stopped and talk to him a bit, and then asked if he wanted to sit down. So we proceeded to sit down and present the Joseph Smith story and the Book of Mormon. We were about to just leave the Spanish Restoration Pamphlet because we didn't think we had a Book of Mormon in Spanish with us, but then BOOM! Anziano Webb pulled it out of his magic backpack! It was sweet. Then we proceeded to fix a baptismal date with him for October 22nd! Right there on the bench in the park. He is the man. We've taught him again since then and he actually gets it! He is awesome, so definitely pray for him. Then that afternoon we taught two lessons in casa! One was with a teenage kid from Morocco, the other with a 17 year old kid named Fanso from Senegal. We gave Fanso a Book of Mormon in French and taught a lesson in the hallway. It's really apparent that a lot of the teenagers here actually do want to know God, and are just trying to find out the way! Then we finished Thursday strong with a member present lesson with Solomon, our awesome Ghanaian kid who is progressing really well. He's another really sincere and smart teenage kid just trying to find the truth. He wants to be baptized but his parents are kind of against it, so pray for a miracle to happen there!

Other than that we are just keepin' on. We had a sweet lesson with another Temple Square Referral named Valeria, but she asked for a bit of time before she meets with us again. Oh well, at least she has a Book of Mormon now, and she even gave us one of her friends as a referral! We are still trying to work with [Ravith] and Elisabeth, but they are super busy, as is Luis. Umberto is doing okay, last night's lesson didn't go to well but we really want him to succeed. He just doesn't pray! Pray for him to pray! Anyway, the work here is just awesome, thanks for all your prayers and support!

This week's spiritual thought is centered on General Conference this weekend, for which I am soooo excited! It's gonna be awesome. I was reading through a bunch of the past conference issues and I found two talks that I really liked. One is called "That Your Burdens May Be Light" by Elder L. Whitney Clayton of the Presidency of the Seventy. Money quote: "Burdens provide opportunities to practice virtues that contribute to eventual perfection." The other awesome talk is called "Love and Law" by Dallin H. Oaks. I would recommend both as some warm-ups for Conference this weekend. I know that this is the true church of Jesus Christ, and that the Book of Mormon is they keystone of our religion. I love you all!

-Anziano Benjamin Smith