Serving An 18 Month LDS Mission

In the LDS church, when a girl turns 21 she has the opportunity to choose to serve an 18 month, self-funded mission. I have wanted to go on a mission since I was a little girl. My parents both served a mission in Rome in the 1970's. In 2001-2002, my sister Letty served as a missionary in Hong Kong and my brother Algot in the Philippines. As soon as I turned 21 I submitted my papers. The Prophet and 12 Apostles determine through inspiration which of the more than 300 missions worldwide each missionary will be assigned. I was overjoyed when I opened my mission call and discovered that I was called to Rome, Italy! I feel immensely blessed and I feel that God has been preparing me to serve the Italian people. Each week, while I am on my mission, I will send my sister Letty an email and pictures to post on the blog. I won't see this blog till I come home, so I will be unable to directly respond to your comments until then. However, the sidebar will always have a current street address for me, and I promise I will respond to your letters! If you would rather write via email, just email your letter to my sister and she will print it out and send it me with her weekly snail mail!

Wednesday, July 17, 2013

Letter #11 and Pictures from Cosenza, Italy

Dear family,

I love you all and I am so grateful for all of your prayers.

Monday and Tuesday the 15th and 16th of July we had zone conference. It was amazing!! I got to meet Sorella Waddoups and she is hilarious and President Waddoups. They both have so much vision for the mission. I am so excited for the miracles that are waiting.
 
The conference was different because President Waddoups does things differently, but they are amazing. We did a lot more role plays and interactive things but it was fun. He speaks pretty good Italian. He served here 45 years ago in 1968 when it was "The Great Italian Mission" - even before mom and dad came. They gave a very nice introduction of themselves and of their family.

They both are very in tune with the spirit. During my first interview with the President, the spirit was so strong and I knew everything He was saying was coming from God specifically for ME and it was a great testimony that God's priesthood power has been restored!

They gave a lot of advice for us and they also talked about obedience. They said that they do not want to come in with a lot of rules because the white handbook for missionaries is so thorough. And if we are obeying all of those rules and commandments then we will have the Spirit and we can bless the lives others.

One of the things that President Waddoups talked about was the Rome temple. He said that He knows that God is not just building that temple for the 25,000 Italian members (only half of whom have temple recommends.) He is building it with a much larger number in mind. God wants that temple busy when it opens.

During the leadership training meeting that I was blessed to be part of as a sister training leader, Sorella Waddoups said one of the greatest things. She said that even if those of us in that room would not see the temple opening (and none of us will) we are the ones preparing people to enter. In the same meeting President was talking about the temple and he pointed out that the temple will be finished in 18-20 months. That gives us only 6-7 months to find and baptize - to bring back and rescue, the souls that will enter. Because they need to be members for at least 1 year!! We have to get BUSY.

That really put it in perspective for me. Only 6-7 months!! We have a lot of work to do :)
The conference was wonderful and very empowering. We even played Bingo using Smarties  :) Sorella and President Waddoups had been primary teachers before they came here! It was the BEST :)

I love you all. And I am excited to see everything that will happen in these following months. And I am excited to be the best I can be and really be a servant of the Lord.

I hope you have a great week and I will be praying for you!
Love,
Sorella Preston

Me and my MTC pals at Zone Conference

Sorella Preston, Sister Waddoups, Sorella Worsham
 

Bus ride home
 
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