Sorella Spencer's Adventures in Italy : When in Rome

I am in love with everything about this country. I have an Italian companion so I'm really starting to understand the language, which is greatly greatly deepening my relationships with the people. I love gilatto, and all the art, and the love that all Italians have for their families, the gospel, their heritage, everything they interact with. The greatest thing I have learned thus far on the mission is love. If you do everything else right in your life, if you go to church every week, have a good job, and are consistently contributing to society, and you never passionately loved something whether that's a person, art, or a hobby, you will have lived life to a lesser degree. You will not have lived the life that our Father in Heaven wanted for you. I sincerely believe that all the other things are important, the commandments that we are given, the lives that we are expected to live, but they are less important. If we love our Heavenly father, his children, and all the things that he created for us, everything else will fall into place. I would love to see members of the church stop focusing on the rules and start focusing on love. If we genuinely love our Heavenly Father we will want to keep his commandments. I feel like sometimes we are treating the symptoms instead of the problem, if we loved our Heavenly Father we wouldn't lie, steal, or cheat, so instead of teaching lessons on lying, stealing, and cheating, encourage to consider people to think of how their Heavenly Father touches their lives everyday.
This week was really cool. We went to a Halloween party of a family in our ward, and they asked us to give the spiritual thought. The other sister's gave a spiritual thought on the armor of God (and the elder's dressed up in a "costume" of armor, how clever are they.) It was really interesting, because normally I try to participate when missionaries do spiritual thoughts, just to get conversation going, and for the first time, the spirit prompted me not to say anything, and our spiritual thought evolved into a beautiful testimony meeting, and there were tons of non members there. From this experience we talked to 2 people who are interested in learning about the gospel! (one of them was an immigrant from Nigeria, who I later found out was actually a member, so I have no idea why he said yes when I asked him if he wanted to learn more about our faith. My only thought is that we were speaking a different type of English, and I talk quickly when I'm nervous, so he didn't really understand what was going on and was just agreeing with everything I said to make me stop talking.) and a less active member told us that he was interested in being reactivated! So because Christmas is coming up, I would like to ask all of you for a Christmas gift. Host a Christmas party, or a small dinner, or a FHE, and invite your non-member friends, and then ask the missionaries to give a short spiritual thought. As missionaries we can't do this without your help, and our only goal is to bring people unto Christ, and it is infinitely more effective with the help of members. Also if anyone has any EFY music, or Piano Guys, or Christian rock, or Christmas music by any artist that they are no longer using I would be very very happy if you put it on a jump drive and then sent it to my mother, but the Christmas party is more important, so the music is just an extra. :)

Last night we had a small miracle. We had a member appointment in the evening, and the buses were being really unreliable, so they agreed to come pick us up near the home of the less active we are working with. They called to let us know they were there but they couldn't find us and we realized that we had given them the wrong street. We gave them the correct address and they told us to wait in front of a flower stand in that area that they were familiar with. As we were waiting in front of the flower stand the owner came out to talk to us, and we ended up talking a lot about English course and a little bit about the gospel, and he was fairly responsive. So we invited him to come to courso, and then went to our appointment. That night I couldn't stop thinking about him, so we are planning on following up with him this week, to see if he is interested in taking the lessons. I am a huge believer in fate (that may not be the best word to use in this context.) especially on the mission, so I am really excited to see how that turns out.
Also the language is coming along great! My companion is Italian so she is learning English as I'm learning Italian. It's great for a couple of reasons. A) My comprehension is going up soooo much, and I am better able to communicate with ward members and investigators. B) I really feel like I'm contributing. I can help teach her as she is teaching me, which makes me feel like I'm actually contributing. Also we have English and Italian investigators, so she needs my help with the English speakers, as much as I need her with the Italians. I feel like I am finally doing missionary work instead of just watching.

Vi voglio bene
Sorella Madyline Spencer

The following are pictures from the Mission Blog kept by Sorella Waddoups.