Rome 5 | week 21

Regan and Anziano Blair helping Fratello Garcia paint his new apartment

8.25.2014

This week we had a couple interesting experiences. The first one happened when I called up the Fratello Gessati to see if he could come to a lesson/dinner with us and Francesco. He agreed, but said that he had to check with his wife to know what time he could come. There was a serious miscommunication that went down that was probably all my fault. We all met up at the Poggio train station and Fratello Gessati brought his wife and 3 kids. It was so awkward and everyone was looking at me, haha. It was okay though. We stopped to buy some more food, and we had a really good lesson on prayer in which everyone was able to share some experiences and thoughts, and then we ate lasagna, pizza, grilled out, and ate a bunch of fruit from Francescos garden. It was awesome. However, half our members still think i dont speak Italian. Probably because I dont. 

Ok I wanted to write about our Nigerian friends and the Jehovahs Witnesses we taught this week, but my time is short and I only have time for one more story. At the beginning of this week, Anziano Blair and I set a goal to teach 70 people out on the street not including our current investigators. We worked so hard to stop as many people as possible, and Sunday afternoon we had 35 gospel conversations with a total of about 45 people. I was honestly thinking to throw in the towel, and call 45 a good effort. However, a miracle happened. 3 weeks ago, our Romanian friend Stefano told us he would come visit our church if we agreed to visit his church. Yesterday we met him at his house at 2 and we went to his church which was a Roman Orthodox church. The service consisted of about 45 minutes of prayers/songs. Then everyone ate together which was really cool. There were 3 plates of food (pasta, some sort of romanian meet dish that was good, and then a dessert). In between each plate, the priest read from the Bible for about 15 minutes. While we were eating, at least 5 people asked us who we were. We responded that we were missionaries for our church then changed the subject, because the last thing I wanted to do was start proselyting in another church during their services. Super bad idea. Anyways, at the end of the service we waited for the priest to greet eveyone as the exited, and we stayed behind to thank him for letting us come. While that was going on, 5 deacons (not sure what they are called) started a conversation with us about who we were. When the main priest finished his thing, he came over to talk to us, and everyone else that was still in the chapel turned to watch what was going to happen. I didnt count, but it was at least 25 people. After like 2 minutes of thanking him for letting us come and complimenting his work, he switched the topic to Mormonism. It was the first time in my life that someone told me to my face that Joseph Smith was a false prophet who made up a story to get money and followers. I will never forget the next 20 minutes for the rest of my life. I looked him right in the eyes and testified of the Restoration through the Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, and prophets that walk the earth in these days. There was a spirit that came into the room that no one could deny. He responded by taking our temple pass along card and saying that if we were true Christians, we would use our money to help the poor instead of building elegant churches. Then we talked about what the church does with money, how we are paying to serve these missions and how there are no paid leaders in our church, but everyone pays tithing to build the kingdom of God throught the whole earth. After we finished explaining that, it was over. They didnt want to talk anymore. Then he made fun of us for something and we thanked them again and left. We went with zero intentions to talk to anyone about the church, but we realized how inspired it was when we were leaving and realized we had just reached our goal of teaching 70 people for the week. Definitely an experience I will never forget. 

The most inspired part of it all was what President Waddoups emailed me the week before. He told me that we would never reach our goals if we relied on our own strength/wisdom, but only on the Lords. 45 people was seriosuly our best effort, and then the Lord made up for the rest Sunday evening. It helped me realize how inspired my leaders our and how involved the Lord is in our work when we give him everything. Have a good week.

Anziano Smith