Ciao!: Week 91: April 3 (Roma)

SARDEGNA

Hey family!! This week was so great and I absolutely loved General Conference! My favorite talk was from Elder Bednar (a living apostle) about our callings as missionaries and other callings that we have in the church. It was a really interesting talk and really helped me out a lot. I was able to watch 4 of the sessions and we watched each talk in Italian. It was really a cool experience to watch in Italian, especially when my good friend Jonathan Calvagna (the missionary that was with me in Terni, who I have worked with a few times here in Rome) does the translations from English to Italian. It was just like listening to my really good friend while watching conference, which was a really cool and interesting experience for me.

In a few hours we are about to take a plane to fly to Sardegna for our Zone Conference tomorrow. I am really excited, especially because I have never been to Sardegna before and I have heard that it is beautiful. It is called "The Rock" in our mission haha; the missionaries are having extreme success with their work in that area, so I am excited to do a scambio with the Zone Leaders there. Everyone that I have talked to says that it is the "Promised Land," so that will be cool. We fly back tomorrow and then have a few more trainings this week and also next week. I am excited to be able to work with all the missionaries and learn from them. I have also always loved seeing missionaries at the beginning of their missions and then watching them change as they are in the missions longer and longer. It’s powerful to see how they become God’s missionaries, doing His work.

As for the work, things are going really well. I love teaching and finding with Anziano Battaglia. We both get along really well and have a lot of fun together. We were teaching our investigator (pic below) who was progressing extremely well. Unfortunately, he moved to Calabria this weekend, so we won’t see him anymore. However, he wants to meet with the missionaries there. The last lesson he came to with us, we invited our bishop to be there too. Our friend sat down and said that he had a list of questions that he has had as he has been studying the Book of Mormon. He then began to ask us very profound questions on the Fall of Adam and Eve, God: if He has a body or not, remission of sins, the sacrament, priesthood power...etc.. He asked very sincerely and then we were able to explain and our bishop was a huge help as well, so it was a really great experience. He is looking for the truth and is really an incredible guy, so I really hope he continues to meet with the missionaries and gets baptized.

It has been something interesting to learn--and I am still learning how--to do our own work, like finding and teaching our investigators, with all the meetings and trainings we have. I just love it, though, when we can go back on the streets and talk to people. Even when I have to distract drunk old men who are yelling at us as my companion is talking to a new investigator on the street, I love it so much. I love being a missionary and I love thinking about the thoughts from Elder Bednar as he said that the most important thing about my call is that I have been called to be a representative of Jesus Christ. Yes, I have been called to serve here in Rome, Italy, but the most important thing is that I am His Representative, doing His work. I love that.

I love being a missionary so much. We are having a combined conference with Rome this week as well, which will be great to see my cousin at. Then next week we will be going to Taranto, Bari, and NAPOLI!! I am so excited. We leave on Sunday by taking a 5 hour train down to Bari. It will be great.

I love you so much, family! Even though I don’t have a lot of time to write anymore, just know that I am working my best and trying to remember what was stated in Conference this week... to go All IN.

Love you guys!! Have a great week!!!

Vi Voglio Bene!

Anziano Spencer