Anziano Anderson

Ciao Tutti!

I hope that everyone had a great week and that you are all enjoying life! Don’t know what the weather is like back home but it feels like the fall here. It is really nice during the daytime and is a good temperature. It cools off at night enough to throw a sweater on. People here though have been wearing pants, coats, scarves and what not for months it seems like though. So it definitely feels like the fall! We had a great week this week and we were super busy once again!

This week we had two awesome lessons with our part member family again and we are doing our best to help them out in any way that we can. It’s amazing to see their progress and all that they have learned and are putting into practice. We really feel the spirit strongly when we are all together and we know that they are really making a lot of progress spiritually. They have been keeping their commitments and we are just really trying to find a way for them to arrive in church.

That is the big struggle right now for all of us to try and figure out. We hope that we will find a solution and we are positive that Heavenly Father will bless them as they continue to do all they can to obey His commandments and continue to grow their testimony. I feel very privileged to have been able to know them and be able to work with them. They have such a big faith and are really doing what they can to change their lives through the gospel and working hard at it.

We had the opportunity to do two scambi this week that both went really well. For one of them we were here in Catania again and I was able to go and work with Anziano Parkinson in his work which went really well. We had a great time and were super busy the whole day with lessons and some other errands that were necessary to do. We had a great time teaching together and I felt like we did a great job clicking in the short time we were together. It was super fun and we had some really cool lessons. Anziano Parkinson is awesome though! He has a great fire about him and is willing to work super hard. He has been fun to be around in the house and he is a great kid. We are always messing around with each other like brothers so we always have a very supportive and fun atmosphere.

Traveling to Siracusa was nice this past Saturday to get down there for a scambio with the Anziani. It was a great time and they did a great job planning it out so we had some great lessons all together.

It is so cool how many youth they are meeting with and are helping down there. It is awesome to see these youth accept the gospel and commit themselves to such change. We have been able to feel a great spirit with them and we are all really hopping they will continue to move forward with all that they are learning and putting into practice. I love how excited and happy Anziano Andersen is and how he is always sharing the great miracles that they are seeing down there.

We had a cool P-day today and what we thought was a service project. We went to go and help pick apples off trees up on the mountain so it was really great to be able to go up with the these members. We felt bad thinking that it was a service project that we were headed to. We were able to get some Catania Jerseys that are throw back from the late 50s early 60s which is super awesome. It has been a great day and we are looking forward to a nice family home evening tonight and hope that the lesson on eternal families goes well. We have been super busy this whole transfer and I can’t believe how fast it has gone past. I would love to stay here and keep working here in Catania so I am really nervous about the transfer calls tonight.

This past Sunday I was able to give another talk, but this one ended up being a little different than normal. We were invited by our wonderful senior couple, the Edgels, to come and join them for church in Sigonella on the military base and we each gave talks. It was super weird to be around so many Americans and hear English in such abundance. I was able to talk on the importance of faith and it was a really good learning experience to be able to write and give the talk.

Something that came into my head in a lesson this week while teaching on faith was to ask an inspired question where I learned something really neat. I asked this guy what the fruits of faith are. I was really intrigued by this and was able to reflect on all the blessings that come because of our faith. I was intrigued to see and study about all the things that come because of our faith. These are just a few:

Hope, Charity, Repentance, Knowledge, Miracles, Answers to prayers, Guidance, increase of faith, etc. I really enjoyed speaking on the subject and learning much on faith and how important it is in our lives. I had some quotes that I shared and I want to share this one with you all. This is a quote from Anziano Neil L. Andersen.

My dear friends, your faith did not begin at birth, and it will not end at death. Faith is a choice. Strengthen your faith, and live to be deserving of the Savior’s approving words: “Great is thy faith.” As you do, I promise you that your faith, through the grace of Jesus Christ, will one day allow you to stand with those you love, clean and pure in the presence of God, in the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

I know that we can all have the choice to act on and grow our faith now, see, and reap the blessings the Lord is so ready and willing to give us. I am thankful for the gift of faith that we can all obtain in this life and cultivate as we go through our mortal journey. Thanks for all the messages this week and I will talk to you all soon!

Anziano Garrett