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!

Monday, November 25, 2013

Letter #13 and Pictures from Bari, Italy

Dear Family and Friends,

This has been such a wonderful week and I am so excited for Christmas. It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas in Bari. This saturday I got my transfer call, and me and Sorella Mikesell are staying together in BARI :) I am so excited! I love a good Barese Christmas. We really wanted to stay together but I did not think it would happen. TADA! Dreams DO COME TRUE!  
Me and Mikesell along Lungomare in the rain with Città vecchia in the background
For those of you who know me, you will be well aware that I have been listening to Christmas music my whole mission and wanted to put up lights the beginning of November. Me and Mikesell are going to deck our halls :) 

I feel very blessed that I get to stay in Bari. But Sorella Mikesell has been planning some good things to keep our missionary fire. For those of you who have served missions you will know that it is easy to become complacent especially when you have been with the same companion or in the same city for a while. Every morning I have been praying that I will continue to feel gratitude for the miracles that happen and keep pushing myself to do better. 

Earlier in the week during Ward executive committee meeting, the 1st one with our new bishop, all of the fratelli expressed how much they would like to come to lessons. I realized that we had been slacking on getting members at our lessons. We put a new emphasis on calling them and inviting them to come. We had a lot more member present lessons this week. Some fell through, but I hope the members feel more involved. Their comments helped remind me that the Hastening of the Work is not just for the members to step up, but also the missionaries. We need to help the members come out of their comfort zones. I need to help them grow and strengthen their testimonies so that they will feel confident and prepared to share the gospel. We have had such great lessons this week BECAUSE the members came. It makes such a difference. WHY? Because missionaries are weird, and we don't speak Italian!

Just last night during gospel principles class, the teacher was able to help a new convert, Gaetano, so much more than I could have. This new convert asked me earlier that week a question in the Bible and my answer was very generic. The teacher was able to go in depth and find the root of his problem, which was he did not know if He should date non-members. The teacher was able to share personal stories of when he had the same problem. He had made a goal to be married in the temple and he went to YSA conferences all over Italy until he found a girl who he liked and was worthy. I never could have related to Gaetano's problem. I know this is an odd example, but while I was sitting in the class it really stood out to me.

This week we had scambis with the Foggia Sorelle in Foggia. Me and Sorella Mitsvotai had a really funny experience. We were going to go stop by one of their investigators, Luigi and his wife Anna Rita. When we were approaching the palazzo I saw a hurst and a priest all decked out in his finest robes. I thought it was strange. Then I walked over to the portone and they had Manifestos for the deceased, Anna Rita. I said, "Hey, Sorella Mitsvotai - wasn't that the name of your investigator's wife?" Indeed it was! She had died the day before and it was her funeral, hence the hurst! I know it was bad taste, but I had to stop myself from laughing!! What are the odds! Seriously, the same day we go to visit them is her funeral. I think it is really funny. We were going to talk about the Plan of Salvation and focus on the Resurrection. It was not by chance that we were there. We wanted to go and give our condolences, but there were a lot of people so we decided that the Sorelle will call him in a few days. 

Tomorrow we have an English Thanksgiving party and their graduation!! They are all bringing food and we are going to have a few Thanksgiving foods for them to try. I volunteered to make apple pies (note the title of the email) I bought all the ingredients today. And got to work. After the first pie baked I opened the cupboard and realized,... We only have 1 pie pan. How can I make 5 pies? I freaked out. All of my problem solving skills went out the window. I tried to put it in tall cake pan with a Frankenstein crust and this is when Sorella Mikesell arrived. She calmed me down, and explained that a deep dish apple pie will not work well. We decided on a 9x13 with double the recipe. I will have to do it later tonight! Thank goodness for Sorella Mikesell! 

I love you all so much and I am praying for you!

Love, Sorella Preston

Our district!! Left: Me, Slla Mikesell, Anziani Barrow, Line, Kunz, Juhasz, Carr, Peachey


Posted by at
Labels: ,

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)