Prato

 Whatttttt an email?

Yes, I'll try to write a bit about what's going on here in Prato!
•Our friend Ashley chose a baptism date! I've never seen someone change so much! She went from not really believing in God to being so sure of His love for her. She also has such powerful experiences with the Book of Mormon. He holds it close to protect her and finds scriptures that help her with everything she has faced.
•Our members are powerhouses at bringing the spirit and helping us! We've had lunches with members and friends or recent converts and the members bare such strong testimony.
•Working with less actives has been a little focus here. We were able to visit a family with a member and it was great to hear them share their testimonies and be open about struggles.
•We have some great missionaries in our district. I've had good exchanges. One took me to Siena. I felt like I was living in medieval time. They live in the city walls just around from a little piazza with a fountain (like what?!?!)
•We have seen so many miracles all across the mission and have seen so much growth. When I arrived we were finding under 200 people a week and it stayed like this until about 6 months ago when we hit a historical high for our mission with almost 500. This week we passed 900.
•An update from our mission goal. We wanted 75 baptismal in the last quarter of 2023. And we had 81. For this quarter we have the goal of 84 and want to ask again for prayers from everyone to help us!

P-day things:
I've seen Florence every p-day so far and I'm not complaining. I never thought I'd be like less than a €5 train ticket away from the city. Every time I see something new that just amazes me. Not to be too 'of the world' but we went to Gucci Gardens which was such a fun experience (more of a museum than garden). We've seen the leather markets, the Duomo, and many other cool spots, views, and shops! It lives up to the hype.

A missionary shared Ecclesiastes 3 the other day and I love the words to much. Here's the first bit:
1 To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven: 
2 A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; 
3 A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; 
4 A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; 
5 A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; 
6 A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away; 
7 A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; 
8 A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace. 
9 What profit hath he that worketh in that wherein he laboureth? 
10 I have seen the travail, which God hath given to the sons of men to be exercised in it.

I've seen many of these different seasons even through my mission. But I think the biggest thing I've learned recently is what it means to really put forth our faith. It is to act without knowing. To do something that may not mean sense, just because it's what we know is right. Or because we have been commanded to do so. And after we are tested and tried are we able to receive the knowledge we so desperately asked for.

I also wrote a whole talk about how following commandments leads to true freedom but its all in Italian and written on paper. But here are some quotes I found that I love and I may have already shared before but its worth another look:

"Sin is my rejection of God’s original offer of grace and partnership. . . . It’s me trying desperately to cobble together, through any means necessary—idolatry, vanity, theft, adultery, violence, deceit—some bundle of good things that more closely matches what I wanted than what God gave. It’s me wanting to win more than to love. It’s me choosing the hollow isolation of fantasies over the shared difficulty of God’s reality."
Adam S. Miller, Original Grace: An Experiment in Restoration Thinking 36-38

Therefore, how can you and I really expect to glide naively through life, as if to say, “Lord, give me experience, but not grief, not sorrow, not pain, not opposition, not betrayal, and certainly not to be forsaken. Keep from me, Lord, all those experiences which made Thee what Thou art! Then let me come and dwell with Thee and fully share Thy joy!”
“Lest Ye Be Wearied and Faint in Your Minds”--Neal A Maxwell

Thank you all for your love and support I miss you and hope you all are doing well! Hope it's not too long before you hear from me again!

Pictures: 
Gucci Gardens
Florence Duomo and City Center with replica of Michelangelo's David
Train ride into Florence and bookstore in Florence
With fellow Prato missionaries on a pday in Florence



















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