Buongiorno!
I hope that everyone had an amazing week! This week was great for us!
I want to start out with one of my miracles of the week. So we were doing finding one morning and we were going around sharing a video and talking to people. We were near a hospital at this point. This one family looked like they were in a hurry so I tried to hand the mom a pass along card but she didn’t take it. It did look like they possibly weren’t from here and so we kept walking along the side of the hospital building. All of sudden I just felt something wet land on me in different places on my body. I just asked Anziano LaPray, “What was that?” I asked a few times and looked around myself. I finally noticed that a bird had managed to poop on me. The iPad case took most of the hit thank goodness, but needless to say it was on my hands, iPad, head, pants, and shirt. So I was like we are going to go clean up in this hospital. We walked to the side door that was just behind us where that family was. They asked if we spoke English and they were needing help getting in. We took them around to the front after finding out that side door wasn’t open. They were needing help getting medicine for the little girl since she had a ton of mosquito bites. We offered to translate for them and went to ask for help. They directed us to the pharmacy to get them where they had just come from so we told them we would help them out but I needed to clean up first. Went and cleaned up then we went to the pharmacy and helped them get the medicine they needed. While I was cleaning up I was just thinking that the bird really did poop on me for a reason. I was so thankful to be able to have a small service opportunity.
I didn’t get to tell much about Anziano LaPray at all last week. He is from Idaho Falls, Idaho. He graduated in the same class as me, but I am still older. He is really awesome though. We have the same taste of music, movies, books, tv shows, video games, etc. We do have a lot in common. He is super funny too which keeps things fun for sure. We are getting along just great and I am excited to be working with him. He is a really hard worker and is an awesome missionary. He is really good at Italian too which helps and both of us are learning from each other. He is super fun to work with and is just super cool.
This week though we got to meet with a good amount of investigators.
We walked to a little town about 8km away and it was a beautiful walk.
We had a referral over there that we were going to meet and it ended up being a wonderful lesson. On the way back we found there was a bus we could take and we decided to wait for it. Thank goodness too because it just started to pour. It reminded us of the Rock Bottom episode of Sponge Bob. We had two good lessons yesterday that we thought went well.
I love the Joseph Smith quote in the introduction of the Book of Mormon.
Concerning this record the Prophet Joseph Smith said: “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.”
The Book of Mormon is so essential. Absolutely everything hinges on that book. Without a keystone an arch falls. I love the beginning of this talk by Elder Tad R. Callister given in General Conference of October 2011.
“Years ago my great-great-grandfather picked up a copy of the Book of Mormon for the first time. He opened it to the center and read a few pages. He then declared, ‘That book was either written by God or the devil, and I am going to find out who wrote it.’ He read it through twice in the next 10 days and then declared, ‘The devil could not have written it–it must be from God.’
“That is the genius of the Book of Mormon–there is no middle ground. It is either the word of God as professed, or it is a total fraud. This book does not merely claim to be a moral treatise or theological commentary or collection of insightful writings. It claims to be the word of God–every sentence, every verse, every page. Joseph Smith declared that an angel of God directed him to gold plates, which contained the writings of prophets in ancient America, and that he translated those plates by divine powers. If that story is true, then the Book of Mormon is holy scripture, just as it professes to be; if not, it is a sophisticated but, nonetheless, diabolical hoax.”
This talk overall is just really really good. I really liked it a lot.
It is so true though that if the Book of Mormon is true that Joseph Smith really is a prophet of God, he truly saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ that spring morning, and that Christ restored His church and the fullness of the everlasting gospel on the earth once again. I am so thankful for the Book of Mormon and the knowledge that it is true that has been given to me by the Holy Ghost.
One thing that I really liked that I read from general conference yesterday was called ponderizing. Here is an excerpt from the talk.
“My second invitation is quite different from and much more important than the first. It is this: I invite you to “ponderize” one verse of scripture each week. The word ponderize is not found in the dictionary, but it has found a place in my heart. So what does it mean to ponderize? I like to say it’s a combination of 80 percent extended pondering and 20 percent memorization
There are two simple steps:
- First, choose a verse of scripture each week and place it where you will see it every day.
- Second, read or think of the verse several times each day and ponder the meaning of its words and key phrases throughout the week. Imagine the uplifting results of doing this weekly for six months, a year, 10 years, or more. As you make this effort, you will feel an increase in spirituality.
You will also be able to teach and lift those you love in more meaningful ways.”
This was a really good talk and it is something I am going to start doing every week. I invite you guys to to do this as well. It is a really neat idea to me and will help us have good uplifting thoughts throughout the week on our scripture we choose personally for us. Mine this week is Proverbs 28:1
1 The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion.
Sorry this email is so long, but I had a lot I wanted to say. I love you all so much and hope that you all have a wonderful week and hope to hear from you all soon!
Love,
Anziano Garrett
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