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Sciacca – Week 3
Transfer 15, Mission Week 92

Ciao tutti!

I hope all is going well now that all the Christmas festivities are in full swing and you all need to enjoy this month of December! Things have been nice and busy as normal this past week and we are loving it!

So we had a busy week being able to see some people and then we were in Palermo a couple of days as well! It all has been going super well and we are doing a lot of great things down here in Sciacca!

We had a great lesson with one of our investigators last week and he has been doing really well. It was a super touching lesson and we were able to pass over the restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ and see what his testimony and remembrance was regarding that lesson. He remembered a lot in detail about the lesson so it was able to be a simple pass over with a great opportunity to go into some more detail with him. We look forward to being able to see him tomorrow night and talk about the plan of salvation with him. He is a great kid and I really feel like he will make it to baptism for sure if he keeps working hard to find his answers.

We had a referral that was given to us the other week from a member that lives in Bari that was passed to us through the Palermo 2 Anziani. This lady has been so prepared from God! She was so excited to hear from us and meet us the other day! She is really wanting to make sure that she is drawing closer to God and finding greater peace in life. You can tell and feel this sincere desire that she has. It is so cool and special to feel the spirit as she asks questions that you know she just needs the answer. We are excited to see where we will be able to go with her and how we are going to be able to help her and guide her down this path to finding greater happiness! We are excited at how prepared that she is. So a few weeks ago she had a moment to sit down and reflect on where she stands before God and felt like she just had to make some changes. She kind of went through her head and went over all the commandments that she needed to make sure that she was keeping and coming up in that was the word of wisdom. She was all of a sudden able to realized without evening having a knowledge of the word of wisdom to give up smoking and drinking alcohol! It was so cool to hear that testimony from her. She is great and we are excited to be able to see her again this week!

We had a rare occasion this week and I am sorry for putting this down all the way here! We had some emergency transfers this week and I got a new companion  who is Anziano Campbell! I will definitely miss Anziano Hughes and hope that he will keep finding success all along the way! We were only together for a short period of time, but it was really great! I am glad that we were able to share the experiences that we did and I was able to learn from him! He is great and will keep doing amazing things! Anziano Campbell is awesome though and he is from Layton, UT. We are getting along great and we are excited to see all the things that we will be able to do here together and accomplish with one another. We are going to do great things and we are already seeing a ton of miracles together. I hope that we will continue to be able to have a great time with one another and recognize all that the Lord can teach us and is blessing us with.

We had a great time in Palermo for Specialized Training and I was able to learn a lot that we can apply into our work here in Sciacca.

We are excited to see what we can apply from what we learned to make sure that we can get to where we need to go. President Pickerd went through all the baptisms from this past transfer and it was great to be able to see all the pictures and hear all the miracles that are happening in the mission! One was this new convert that was baptized a week or so ago! She was the sister of this new convert that was baptized a few months ago! So the new convert was in fact someone I spent a pday with in Segesta with the Palermo zone leaders and Anziano Spencer a long time ago! She was doing well when they were teaching her, but then the Anziani decided to rest her for a little and she was picked back up a few months ago and was so ready to learn again and made it all the way to baptism. I think it is super cool because last winter when I was on a scambio in Palermo Anziano Palazzo and I were doing street finding for a Christmas sondaggio and we stopped this new convert’s other sister (one that isn’t baptized yet) and that is how she met the Anziani. It is amazing how different everyone’s stories are and that she was able to finally make it to baptism. Super cool to see how it can all start with one simple conversation on the street and helps you know to just keep going and opening your mouth.

This week went really well and we are excited to see what next week has for us. We were able to walk forever yesterday all the way out to a less active’s house and I think that they were super excited to have us over and they were surprised that we walked that far to go and see them, but it went super well and we had a great little lesson with them last night. Hopefully we will be able to see some great things happen with them because the wife is the only member of the family and they have 3 boys. Would really be amazing! Everything is going great though! We had fast and testimony meeting yesterday and I am thankful that we have the opportunity as we serve God and do the acts that Jesus Christ would do for others to come to really know our Savior, not just know things about him.

This talk that Elder Bednar gave last general conference really touched me and I would invite you all to read it because he really helps us realize that is important to know the Savior and we can do so through the simple steps that he lays before us.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2016/10/if-ye-had-known-me?lang=eng

It is a great talk and don’t forget to keep checking Mormon.org on how we can do these acts of service daily this month! Love you all and hope that you have a great week!

Love,

Anziano Garrett

Palermo Zone, December, 2016

Palermo Zone, December, 2016

Palermo Zone Anziani, December, 2016.  My new companion, Anziano Campbell, is on the far left.  He is in his 4th transfer.

Palermo Zone Anziani, December, 2016. My new companion, Anziano Campbell, is on the far left. He is in his 4th transfer.

Sciacca – Week 1
Transfer 15, Mission Week 90

Ciao tutti!

This week has been crazy busy and has felt fast and slow at the same time due to everything that we have been doing! I will start with the good stuff so that way you can know where I am at right now! So I was transferred to Sciacca which is a small city on the southern end of Sicilia! I will be training a new missionary here and we are both new to the city and don’t have a clue about anything at all really. My new companion is Anziano Hughes and he is from West Valley, Utah. He is super awesome! He has so many different hobbies and interests and is very talented in a lot of things. Has a great character and is just super nice to everyone he meets and encounters. I am super excited to work with him and we have hit it off super well! We are excited to see what kind of work we will be able to start up together with the Lord in Sciacca! We are super ready and excited for all of that!

The last week in Catania flew by and we were busy with lessons and saying goodbye to the members that I have had such a great chance to know and love over the four transfers I was there. I really love that city a lot and have a deep love for the people there! It has been great to be able to serve there and be able to learn so much from all the experiences that I have had there. Anziano Ponce and I had some great last lessons and we were happy and really felt blessed for the things that happened this past week. It seemed like this has been one of the busiest transfers of my mission. We have always had something going on and have been all over the place! I am thankful though for all that we accomplished and hope that we can all yet accomplish more over the course of the time we find ourselves here in Italy serving the Lord. I was able to say bye to many families, investigators, members, and missionaries that have all become my dear friends.

It was really cool on the way down to Palermo there was this kid waiting to get on the train, and of course as I have explained in the past everyone confuses us for the Tren Italia workers. So we started a small little conversation before the train took off, but then we continued that with another girl he sat across from on the train. We all started talking and then this lady sitting behind me joined in and before you know it another lady came over too. Our whole cart was just chatting away and I was able to share the restoration and the Book of Mormon with the lady behind me. It was so awesome to be able to listen to each other and just apply the gospel to all of our lives. It was a very special experience and even though she didn’t agree to have the missionaries over just yet she accepted the Book of Mormon and was willing to read it. She promised that upon reading it if she really felt that she needs to go forward with it she will give the missionaries a call. Really hope that she will be able to recognize that spirit and then act accordingly.

We made it to Palermo and had to stay the night there and wait until the next morning to leave. We made it safe to Sciacca and our branch President was nice enough to help us out to get all our bags over to the house. We settled in and ate lunch and were able to do our weekly planning after having a lesson in fact that night with an investigator. It all went super well despite some small obstacles that we will have to overcome because our data in the new area book app isn’t there. [Note:  The area books are where missionaries record contact information, etc., for the next missionaries.  The area books have been on paper in the past, but were recently moved to an app on the iPads.  Apparently, they’ve had a problem with the app.]  It was somehow lost so hopefully this problem will be resolved.

We then started doing permesso things for Anziano Hughes Saturday before heading out to Palermo for Stake Conference. We had great stake conference meetings and I was able to see all the members that came from Trapani! That was such a sweet reunion to see them and know that they are all doing well! I was super happy and excited about that. We had great sessions where we talked about how trials help us grow spiritually. It was hard for us to hear the talks due to technical difficulty so that was a little bit of a bummer to miss some of the things said.

I had a meeting to go to Sunday night and we ended up not being able to make it back to Sciacca that night either so we stayed in Palermo again. So technically I have spent more time in Palermo since I have been here. We were able to take a tour of Teatro Massimo today though and it was cool to imagine what it must have been like back when that place first open to go and see an opera show or a concert of some sort. It was a great first pday for Anziano Hughes and I and we were able to eat some great food from Palermo!

I am super glad to be here in Sciacca and I am grateful to be here! This week we know that it is Thanksgiving and I am excited for you all back home to be able to eat your guts out and enjoy time with the family. I really love Thanksgiving and all that it entails. I think often we aren’t as grateful as we should be for all the many and wonderful blessings that we have. I love that Elder David A. Bednar invites us to give prayers of just thanks for the the things that we have! I love that we can truly just give thanks for the many wonderful blessings in our lives. I love this video that was done by the church entitled:

In the Spirit of Thanksgiving (4:48)

In the Spirit of Thanksgiving Random people on the streets of New York City share a variety of grateful responses to one simple question: What are you thankful for?

It is super cool and I would invite you all to watch it and then this week to write down everything that you are thankful for. I know that our blessings are so many I don’t think that we will be able to truly count them all! Then offer this prayer of thanks without asking for anything. Here in fact is an excerpt from his talk about prayer given in October 2008 entitled “Pray Always.”

       During our service at Brigham Young University–Idaho, Sister Bednar and I frequently hosted General Authorities in our home. Our family learned an important lesson about meaningful prayer as we knelt to pray one evening with a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

        Earlier in the day Sister Bednar and I had been informed about the unexpected death of a dear friend, and our immediate desire was to pray for the surviving spouse and children. As I invited my wife to offer the prayer, the member of the Twelve, unaware of the tragedy, graciously suggested that in the prayer Sister Bednar express only appreciation for blessings received and ask for nothing. His counsel was similar to Alma’s instruction to the members of the ancient Church “to pray without ceasing, and to give thanks in all things” (Mosiah 26:39). Given the unexpected tragedy, requesting blessings for our friends initially seemed to us more urgent than expressing thanks.

        Sister Bednar responded in faith to the direction she received. She thanked Heavenly Father for meaningful and memorable experiences with this dear friend. She communicated sincere gratitude for the Holy Ghost as the Comforter and for the gifts of the Spirit that enable us to face adversity and to serve others. Most importantly, she expressed appreciation for the plan of salvation, for the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, for His Resurrection, and for the ordinances and covenants of the restored gospel which make it possible for families to be together forever.

        Our family learned from that experience a great lesson about the power of thankfulness in meaningful prayer. Because of and through that prayer, our family was blessed with inspiration about a number of issues that were pressing upon our minds and stirring in our hearts. We learned that our gratefulness for the plan of happiness and for the Savior’s mission of salvation provided needed reassurance and strengthened our confidence that all would be well with our dear friends. We also received insights concerning the things about which we should pray and appropriately ask in faith.

        The most meaningful and spiritual prayers I have experienced contained many expressions of thanks and few, if any, requests. As I am blessed now to pray with apostles and prophets, I find among these modern-day leaders of the Savior’s Church the same characteristic that describes Captain Moroni in the Book of Mormon: these are men whose hearts swell with thanksgiving to God for the many privileges and blessings which He bestows upon His people (see Alma 48:12). Also, they do not multiply many words, for it is given unto them what they should pray, and they are filled with desire (see 3 Nephi 19:24). The prayers of prophets are childlike in their simplicity and powerful because of their sincerity.

        As we strive to make our prayers more meaningful, we should remember that “in nothing doth man offend God, or against none is his wrath kindled, save those who confess not his hand in all things, and obey not his commandments” (D&C 59:21). Let me recommend that periodically you and I offer a prayer in which we only give thanks and express gratitude. Ask for nothing; simply let our souls rejoice and strive to communicate appreciation with all the energy of our hearts.

I am thankful for all the wonderful blessings that Heavenly Father has given me our Savior Jesus Christ, opportunity for eternal life, my family, my friends, my mission, my talents, my abilities, nature, the scriptures, power of prayer, guidance, love, and so much more! I know there is so much to be thankful for! Love you all and thanks for all the support!

Love,

Anziano Garrett

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Apple-picking service in Catania, Italy

Anziano Ponce teaching

Anziano Ponce teaching

Catania District soccer studs

Catania District soccer studs

Catania District anziani, November, 2016

Catania District anziani, November, 2016

Catania District sorelle, November, 2016

Catania District sorelle, November, 2016

Catania District, November, 2016

Catania District, November, 2016

Gospel Essentials

Gospel Essentials

SCIACCA, ITALY - FEBRUARY 22, 2014: panoramic view of coastline with downtown in Sciacca, Italy. Sciacca is known as the city of thermal baths since Greek domination in the 3rd and 4th centuries BC (Licensed stock photo from Adobe Stock)

SCIACCA, ITALY – FEBRUARY 22, 2014: panoramic view of coastline with downtown in Sciacca, Italy. Sciacca is known as the city of thermal baths since Greek domination in the 3rd and 4th centuries BC (Licensed stock photo from Adobe Stock)

SCIACCA, ITALY - FEBRUARY 22, 2014: panoramic view of coastline with dramatic sky in Sciacca, Italy. Sciacca is known as the city of thermal baths since Greek domination in the 3rd and 4th centuries BC (licensed stock photo from Adobe Stock)

SCIACCA, ITALY – FEBRUARY 22, 2014: panoramic view of coastline with dramatic sky in Sciacca, Italy. Sciacca is known as the city of thermal baths since Greek domination in the 3rd and 4th centuries BC (licensed stock photo from Adobe Stock)