Rain, an American and the Fire Department.......


April 24th-

A rather cold week in Brindisi. It started with a  big rain storm on Monday, we continued to have colder weather. It may have been stormy outside, but there was sunshine in our soulls!! ;) And you wont believe who we came across today. Remember those kids we met last week?? Oh yea, and they even  did some missionary work with us again! This time we gave the kids a phamplet. Hopefully they will take the good missionary work they have been doing with us back home. They said they told their parents to call us, but we never heard anything. Hopefully we'll hear back from them this week!
Then Sunday night we were walking around doing some finding when all of a sudden we hear someone yell MISSIONARIES!!! We turn around and this man is walking towards us with a big smile. Turns out he is here from the United States working and says that he always says he sees missionaeries in Italy when he comes and loves talking to us. Turns out he is Catholic, and just thinks we are really nice. He even asked if he could watch us do some finding for a little bit! Haha, it was fun talking to someone from America. 



Then for P-day we went and played volleyball with the whole zone. It was a blast to see everyone again! I do need to work on my volleyball skills though haha.
The best place to go for advice is the scriptures! Especially the Book of Mormon. In 2 Nephi 32, Nephi says "feast upon the words of Christ".  This little scripture doesn't say "snack upon the words of Christ", NO it says to "feast"!! Through feasting on the words of Christ, really searching the scriptures, we not only strengthen or build our testimony, but we can find help in every aspect of life. In the scriptures we can find answers to difficulties, prayers, questions and many other things. I challenge everyone to not just read the scriptures, but feast on them! 

Anziano Andersen 🚀
Romans 1: 15&16    🌍

May 1st-



This week was an interesting one....P-day was nice and Tuesday started out pretty normal. Exercised, ate, did studies, all that good stuff. Then it came time to leave our apartment, but when we go to open the door and it doesn't open. We spent the next 15 minutes trying to figure how we were gonna get out. We even started  tying bed sheets together and to repel out the window, no lie! Well, unfortunately, we didn't have enough sheets to repel out of our 6 story apartment, so we called fire department to come and rescue us. I guess Satan must have not wanted us to go out that day.  We hit the usual finding grind for the rest of the week. It's been a little slow here, but hopefully we can change that real quick! For P-day we went to that festival we were supposed to go to a couple weeks ago. It was pretty fun, it really brought a lot of people from Brindisi together and that was way cool to see.



One of my favorite scriptures is a scripture in Matthew, and it says "He that findeth his life shall loose it: and he that looseth his life for my sake shall find it." (Matthew 10:39) It's when we forget ourselves and go to the service of others that we can find ourselves. Pretty cool the joy we can get from serving our friends, neighbors and family. Thanks for all the love and support you show me, couldn't thank you guys enough. Have a good week!

May 8th-

 

It was an eventful week to say the least! We had Anziano Jensen join us in Brindisi for a couple of days because his comp finished his mission so he headed up to Rome a little earlier. It was fun being in a trio again. I even got to give him a haircut!! I think I did a pretty good job ;) Then last Monday we had transfer calls. This is where it gets fun! So we all thought that I was going to be transferred out of Brindisi and Anziano Bellini was going to stay because he just got here, but it ended being the exact opposite!! He ended up getting transferred and I am staying. I am pretty excited to be staying. There is alot to do here, and the work is starting to pick up again. 

My new companion is Anziano Jackson. He is an absolute stud. Working with him is going to be a blast! It will be cool to see what unfolds this transfer. Then for  P-day we headed to Monopoli and Polignano a Mare again. Even though I have been to Polignano before, it is still just as breath taking as it was the first time. 

I was reading in Mosiah this week when King Benjamin was addressing his people. And he said something that was really cool, talking about our Heavenly Father he said   (He)"is preserving you from day to day, by lending you breath, that ye may live and move and do according to your own will, and even supporting you from one moment to another" (Mosiah 2:21). It's easy to take a lot of things for granite, but when you look around you and see all the little things we have, how can you not just be grateful?! Thanks for all your love and support!! I hope you guys have a great week! 

May 15th-

What a week! I'd say this has been one of the coolest weeks I've had. The work has picked up so much. For one of our lessons we talked about how the Bible and the Book of Mormon testify of each other and how they go hand in hand, and it was so cool to see how it just kind of clicked in our investigators head. He even made it to church yesterday, and after he said that he thinks he is going to start coming to church with us! In our lesson with him on Sunday we had our recent convert talk about his baptism, and his experience he had. You could just tell that he brought the spirit with him when he was bearing his testimony. It was awesome. Then a couple days ago we were making some calls and we came across this one guy who sounded very excited to hear from us. Well we met with him Sunday night and he told us how he met the missionaries about a year ago and lost contact with them. But now we have a lesson set up this week and I'm excited to see where it goes. Then for P-day we went to this place called Ostuni! This is the place you think of when you think Italy! It was so cool!

 

David A Bednar once said "Ordinary people who consistently do small and simple things that are right before God will bring forth extraordinary results". Doing the little things like reading the scriptures and praying are some of the best things we could possibly do. It keeps us on the path that we need to be on to make it back and live with our Father in Heaven! Love you guys! Have a great week!!

May 22nd-

I love the Jasmine! It smells just like my grandparents in California.

The weather is starting to warm here in Italy. I'm not so used to this warmer, humid weather, but what can ya do. This week was quite a busy one, but good. So Tuesday night we headed to Bari to do our interviews with president, then have zone conference the next day. It's always fun to head down there and see everyone. On our way back we had quite an adventure. We rode back with the Anziani of Lecce as usual, but when we got off the train we realized we didn't have our phone. We had left it on the train. As soon as we realized we didn't have the phone the train started closing its doors, so I sprinted to where they were sitting, knocked on the window and pointed to our phone. Sadly we weren't able to get our phone in time. So that night we found a train to Lecce and stayed the night there. It ended up being alright because we made some banana pancakes that night.

Saturday morning we were able to head over and do some service for the sweetest lady in the world. They are moving back to Texas this following week and needed some help moving some larger furniture so we headed over and got to work. We had a lot of fun doing it. Then she fed us a delicious American meal, fried chicken, potato salad and beans! Haha it was good to have a little American food again. Then she generously gave us a ton of food they weren't going to bring with them to Texas. It was really nice of them. On Sunday we had something awesome happen. One of our investigators we have been working with for a while agreed to be baptized in a few weeks. I hope we can keep that date and keep progressing, he is such a great guy. It's been awesome watching him grow in the the gospel. He is the most sincere guy I have ever met. For P-day we were able to play the beautiful sport of soccer! I don't think you could ever get bored of playing. 

On Wednesday we got a good training from our mission president. He brought up a really cool point that I would like to share, he said "it is better to be all in, than just partially in". I think we cannot only just apply it to missionary work, but life as well. We cannot act one way through out the week and then a completely different person on Sundays, "No man can serve two masters" (Matthew 6:24). There will come a point in our lives where we are going to have to decide if we are going to "be all in" or not in. And it will always be better to be on the Lords side, no matter what. I know its something I can definitely work on. Anyways love you guys! Thank you for all the love and support you show me, I definitely couldn't have done it with out you!

May 29th-

Brindisi just keeps getting better! We have been seeing tons of miracles here! Our investigator who is getting ready for baptism is doing great. We see him quite often, and he comes to church a half hour early every Sunday! Pretty cool to see. We were also able to finally visit this guy who we think is ready for the gospel. Unfortunately he works a ton, but the times we do meet with him it goes really good. This weekend they had the "festa della madonna". It's pretty much just another reason to have a party haha. They closed off the whole main street for this thing, Italians don't mess around with their festivals here! They are so fun!

The flies and the mosquitos have been coming out so we bought an electric fly swatter this week. We like to leave the patio door open because it gets pretty hot inside the apartment so in turn a bunch of flies and mosquitoes come in during the night. I think we have killed off at least half of the population of flies by now.  This P-day it was just a little more relaxed, we just headed to the mall, looked around, then came back and played some basketball. My comp likes basketball, so its well play it every once in a while. 

This week I came across a cool quote by Richard G. Scott, he said “Just when all seems to be going right, challenges often come in multiple doses applied simultaneously. When those trials are not consequences of your disobedience, they are evidence that the Lord feels you are prepared to grow more". Some times when challenges arrive its because the Lord knows that we can grow. They aren't always long lived, and it's from those challenges that we are able to grow and develop. Thanks for all your support!! Hope you have a good week!

Anziano Andersen 🚀

Romans 1: 15&16    🌍

A Month of Changes, Lawn Care, and Easter

It was a stellar week here in Italy!  Transfer calls were Monday night and I found out that I am staying in Brindisi! I was super stoked when I heard the news, because I still have a lot of work I want to do here before I leave. This week I stayed in Lecce until my new companion arrived on Friday. It was a blast hanging out with Anziani Lancaster and Jenson, I've learned a lot of good stuff from them! 

It was weird not being with Anziano Vrska, I felt a little lost, haha. He is going to be missed for sure. We had a lot of good times.  On Friday I met my new companion! His Name is Anziano Bellini, and he is a spiritual giant! Haha he is literally 6 foot 6 inches. He is so tall! Maybe if I just start eating what he eats I'll grow a little. It has been fun to get to know him, and I am excited to be working with him in the future.  He was born in American Fork then moved to a city in northern Italy called Brescia. I was able to show him around Brindisi. It was then that I realized how lucky I am to be involved in such an important work. It really has been such an awesome experience that I have had so far. The people here have changed my life in so many ways. It has been truly an amazing opportunity. This Pday it was a little more relaxed. We took a bus to to check out the ocean. We ate lunch and threw a Frisbee. It was pretty fun. 

I want to share something I learned from the Doctrine Covenants: "Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not." (D&C 6 36). There will be times in your life when your testimony wavers,  people may tear down what you believe, and make you second guess everything. When that happens, turn to what you do believe to know is true. An apostle once said 'to doubt your doubts before you doubt your faith'. Be confident in the testimony you have, even if its small. You guys are awesome! Thanks for all the love and support!! Hope everyone has a good week! 

This week was a little bit slower. We unfortunately had a lot of lessons fall through and one of our awesome investigators found work a couple hours north and decided to move. It was hard to hear the news, but I'm glad he was able to find work. I guess this upcoming week we are just going to have to find another person as ready as he was!! On Wednesday night we went over and helped teach a member. We were teaching about the restoration of the church and my companion used a Rubix Cube doing it! Haha, he can solve one of those things wicked fast, it was cool to watch. We also had an awesome weekend! 

The whole world was able to join in for this event, General Conference! At home, we always had a tradition to make crepes and so this year I learned how to make crepes for me and my companion! It was a blast! But instead of lounging around all day in our pj's, we suited up and headed off to the church to watch it and it was awesome!! 

There were so many different things I enjoyed about conference. 

One of the my favorite things that was talked about, was the wonderful plan that our Heavenly Father has for us! Isn't it such a reassuring feeling to know that, one: we have a Father in heaven who knows us better then we know our selves that loves us beyond measure, and two: He gave us a way to make it back to live with Him and our families for all eternity? I think it's pretty cool that we have Heavenly Father rooting for us, wanting us to make it back to Him. I hope everyone had a good General Conference weekend, and felt the love that our Father in Heaven has for us! Hope everyone has a good rest of the week, love you guys!

Another fun week in Brindisi! This week we had Zone Conference on Monday so we had our Pday on Tuesday instead. This week has had its ups and downs. I'll get the sad news out of the way first. Monday morning we had some guys come and take a bunch of stuff out of our apartment that wasn't ours and was just kind of taking up space. Well I guess they thought my pull-up bar was apart of that junk!  When I got home Monday night and I saw that my pull-up bar was missing, it  was one of the hardest nights in the mission! Some how I made it through though. It's okay though, accidents happen. 

Then later this week we went and did service for a less active couple in our ward who actually speak english. The sister is from Texas and her husband, who has other beliefs, is from England! They were so fun to go do service for! They live in Ostuni which is about 30 minutes from us. We went and weed-eated all of her weeds in her little tree grove!! It took me back to the good ole days of mowing lawns!! The smell of gas and grass! 😉 Haha it was good. Then she fed us a wonderful meal afterwards! On Sunday we got invited over again!! It was pretty crazy to get fed two days in a row. I was dying I ate so much food haha. Then of course this Monday we had our Zone Conference, which was awesome! They really focused on the importance of the Book of Mormon and using it in lessons. It was cool! 

This upcoming Sunday a lot of us will be celebrating Easter by painting eggs, eating chocolate and being together as families! But we are also celebrating something much more important. That is the resurrection of Jesus Christ. He leads the path to all happiness, joy and peace in this world and the world to come! He did it all so that we might be able to live again! This Easter we should all try and live more as the Savior did, and look for the blessings that we can bring to the lives of others! Love you all! Have a good rest of the week!!

Buona Pasquetta tutti! Here in Italy we don't just celebrate Easter on Sunday, nope we celebrate the day after as well! I hope everyone had a good Easter! We had the wonderful opportunity to be fed by someone in our branch! Oh man, I don't think I've ever been more full in my life! It was delicious! Right before we left they told us to call if it started raining (as it had earlier today), and we agreed and started our long journey home. Well about 10 minutes into our trek, it just started to just down pour. We soon realized that we had forgotten our phone at home. As we continued in the down pouring rain some gentleman stopped and offered us ride. We gladly agreed, and had a nice conversation with him. After the short ride we thanked him and wished him a happy Easter. 

     

Earlier this week while doing finding, we met these two little kids who were around 7 or 8 years old. Well they were a little curious about who we were, so they approached us and asked us. About a hundred questions later, we walked away with two kids handing out the  pass along cards with us. We soon convinced them that they should probably go home because their parents were wondering where they were, but told them they could give the cards to everyone in their family. The kids happily agreed and we went our separate ways. 

     Alma 11:42 states "Now, there is a death which is called a temporal death; and the death of Christ shall loose the bands of this temporal death, that all shall be raised from this temporal death". Jesus Christ made it possible for all of us live again after death. I am so grateful for His resurrection, and the perfect plan our Heavenly Father has for us. Hope everyone had a wonderful  Easter! Have a good week!

     

Anziano Andersen⛷⚽

When Mom gives you money to ride!

When she doesn't....

See Mom! I really do keep things clean!

A Month of Growth, Finding and Saying Goodbye........

 A fun, event filled and loving week here in Brindisi. First let's start of with Tuesday. Valentine's Day! Man oh man was that day filled with some love. The trainer and I took on the dangerous and rigorous task of making sugar cookies for our English course we teach. Though hard, and with much trial and error on the frosting, it was accomplished! Our students loved the American cookies. It was definitely a Valentine's Day well spent.  










Thursday was my trainer's birthday! For lunch, our investigator who was recently baptized, made us an African dish. 

Lunch with our investigator.

It was quite interesting, not bad at all! 

On Sunday he received the priesthood, it was such a cool and spiritual experience. Then the guy I told you about last week, who literally walked into the church and asked to know more, came to church again! He is such an awesome guy!! In our lesson with him on Saturday we asked him how his reading of the Book of Mormon was going. He told us it went 'pretty good'. We were totally stoked when he told us he'd read not only the chapter in Alma we asked him to read, but the first 13 chapters in Nephi! Haha, we were so surprised, and excited! It was cool to see him so interested like that. I'm going to love teaching this awesome guy!

Ortranto

For P-day we went to Otranto. It is this city that is over 1,000 years old and just absolutely gorgeous. The water here is so clear. We visited the beach, an old castle, and a very old church. I know surprising about the church, right? 

 Haha, this church was different than others I've seen so far. The floor was had mosaic artwork that was incredible. They had this room full of skulls of people that were killed because they would not give up being Catholic when Muslims took over (this happened a long time ago, definitely not recent). It was really interesting.  I think the beach and the view was my favorite. It was so gorgeous.

While reading the scriptures this week I came across a verse in Alma that I really liked. It says "27 And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." Sometimes humbling yourself isn't the easiest thing to do. Trust me lol. But when you do, when you put it all out there and you let our Father in Heaven do what nobody else can, He will make those "weak things become strong". 

Thank you everyone for all of the love and support you have given! Love all of you!

Anziano Andersen⛷⚽

Elders in the Bari Zone with President Pickerd

Great week! On Wednesday we had a wonderful zone conference. It's always fun seeing President and Sister Pickerd and the other missionaries from our zone! Then our investigator who walked into the church has been doing so good. He has expressed a desire to be baptized! He has been to church the past three weeks and loves reading the Book of Mormon. He is such an amazing guy!

Saturday was a fun day. In the morning, we had the opportunity to work on a members olive tree farm. Service opportunities like this don't pop up very often, so we took full advantage of it! It felt so good to do manual labor again! It was a beautiful farm. We were fortunate enough to be fed a delicious lunch. On Sunday our new convert passed the sacrament and that was amazing to see! Then after church got invited over to a members house for some delicious lasagna. We were defiantly fed well this week, haha, I loved it!

I came across a really cool quote. Dale Carnegie once said  "If you are not in the process of becoming the person you want to be, you are automatically engaged in becoming the person you don’t want to be”. Pretty straight forward. Working on becoming that person wont always be so easy. In fact, it will probably be pretty hard, but in the end it will be so worth it! Thank you everyone for the love and support you guys show me. I definitely couldn't have done it with out you guys! 

P.S. To everyone who has written me letters, I am going to write you back I promise, I just need to find out were to buy stamps, haha! 

We had an incredible week here in Brindisi. Tuesday was Carnival, Carnival is an ancient tradition occurring the immediate period before Lent. So of course we had to throw a little party for our English class, we brought cookies and drinks and had a fun time!

On Friday, we were able to play soccer with our branch president and recent convert, we wanted to show him what a younger looking ward looks like and the activities they do. It was a blast, he absolutely loved it. 

For P-day it was soccer again!! We had such a great time, as usual! After we headed to the church for some pizza and cake for Anziano Whitakers bithday! Successful P-day for sure!

Earlier this week we met two new people that were interested in the gospel. The first person we met through our recent convert. They were playing ping pong and naturally a conversation started and he agreed to meet with us. While we were talking to this new investigator, another guy heard us speaking in English. He was curious where we were from and what we are doing here. So we shared our message with both of them! They both have gone through things I didn't even know where possible. They are truly an inspiration, their life stories are incredible! Because of their stories, I have gained a greater appreciation for Jesus Christ and His Atonement. The Atonement isn't just meant for those people who are in need of repentance. In Matthew 11 it states:

" 28 ¶ Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light."

The Atonement is for everyone. He felt the pains for both the sinner and the person who is having a bad day, month, year, and sometimes even longer. Whatever struggle you are going through in life, whether they be big or small, Jesus Christ and His atonement can help you. Thank you everyone for your support, I love you all!

We started the week here in Brindisi with beautiful weather and ended the with a storm. By Friday we felt like a tornado had hit us! Okay maybe not that bad but it was windy. Not the most ideal weather for missionary work, haha. This Sunday was Anziano Vrska's last Sunday in the branch, he heads up to Rome this Saturday and then on to home. It was Branch Conference so we had a ton of people in church! We had like 35, I was stoked. Although like 10 of them were from the stake, but we had a lot of other people who don't usually come, come. Oh and our new convert gave a talk today and he did awesome. So that was cool.  We had a little luncheon after and had a good time with the branch.

 I was reading a chapter In Enos. And Enos is telling the Lord about how he is not very good at writing, and that because of this he will be made fun of. The Lord goes on to say " if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble... for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them" (Ether 12:27). We are all given weaknesses. Many of the great prophets talked about their weaknesses. If we have faith in Christ, and we humble ourselves before Him, He will "make weak things become strong". Thanks for all the love and support! Have a good week everyone!! 

This week really started out pretty normal. We taught all of our investigators, did finding, taught our English course and all of the fun stuff. Then Saturday came and it was time for my trainer to go home. I'm gonna miss him. Anziano Vrska has taught me a lot, like baptizing in Italy is possible and don't ever let people say its not. We had fun working together, especially these last couple weeks. It was pretty sad watching him say goodbye to all of the people we have been working with. I hadn't really thought about having to someday say goodbye to everyone I meet here...  I already can tell that leaving this place is going to be pretty hard.  

Lecce

I'm ready to find out who my next companion is. I'm excited to work hard with him and hopefully continue growing the branch here in Brindisi! Because I don't get my next companion tell Thursday I have had to come to Lecce for a week. It's been fun, it is a beautiful city, but I like Brindisi and the people I am teaching right now, so I'll be excited to get back. 

I came across a quote from Thomas Monson talking about patience. Something I need to work on, haha. He said “Life is full of difficulties, some minor and others of a more serious nature. There seems to be an unending supply of challenges for one and all. Our problem is that we often expect instantaneous solutions to such challenges, forgetting that frequently the heavenly virtue of patience is required”. Somethings don't come right away. I've learned that trying to speak a new language. It's important to remember our time and God's timing aren't the same. So be patient with the people around you and yourself. Thanks for all the love and support! Hope everyone has a fantastic week!

Anziano Andersen⛷⚽

Lecce

                       

I talk often of the amazing food! I thought Id take some pictures to share!