Just Another Week in Italy

So this week was another amazing week in Italy! We taught a lot of lessons and have seen a lot of progress with all our investigators. We found a couple new investigators and even some families who want to take the lessons which is really rare out here. Hopefully they will keep feeling the spirit and want to hear more from us. We taught the plan of salvation a lot last week and I feel truly blessed to know that God cares for me individually. And to not only know that but to know that he created a plan so that I could find happiness in this life and in the life to come is truly incredible.

There was a world wide missionary broadcast last Wednesday and it was really cool. They had apostles and other leaders talk to us about hastening the work. I really liked the challenges we were given to help people feel the spirit and how they stressed working with members. That's really where you get the converts who stay with the church because they have that support system of members to back them up. We are going to work on involving the members here as much as we can and hope to continue to grow the ward here in Ragusa. The Gela Anziani spent the night at our house so we could watch the conference together.

Anziano Rusch and I are starting to teach really well together and hopefully the people we teach can feel the truthfulness of our message. The members are trying their best and it's nice to have people to back is up on our work. We have transfers this week so we should find out if I'm staying in little old Ragusa or moving off to somewhere else. I hope everyone is doing wonderful and I'm praying for God to bless you all.

Vi voglio bene!

Anziano Whiting

Us watching the conference

Ragusa Jungle

This week went really well. We had Samuele and Giuseppe both do baptismal interviews and they both passed! Giuseppe wants to wait a little bit though just to strengthen his testimony and bishop wants to hold off on Samuele and his baptism for a little while so will keep meeting with him. He has missed a bunch of church because he works but he loves us and wants to get baptized. This week he asked us if he can serve a mission and be my companion. It was the coolest thing ever to have an investigator say that and it makes me want to work even harder to stay worthy of friendships with people like Samuele.

Another cool thing this week was Marco getting the aaronic priesthood in church. He's going to bless his family so much now that he can act as a representative of Christ and pass the sacrament. Ha we went to teach Carmelo this week at his house (another one of our swag investigators) and he had a lady there house sitting and we had planned to teach the law of chastity and I wasn't sure if we were still going to teach the same lesson but anz Rusch just went right into it. Ha she liked it and he is really progressing and it's probably good his 10 year old son Matteo wasn't there.

Today we went exploring in the Ragusa jungle that's in the middle of our city and we found this random restaurant that's actually really nice. The jungle is really cool and has a bunch of cave dwellings that are pretty sweet. My camera has been getting fixed though so I wasn't able to get any cool pictures but will see what the iPad can do. Other then that we have been working hard and are excited for the new people we have been meeting.
Vi voglio bene!
Anziano Whiting

6 months

Its super crazy but this past week I hit my 6 month mark in the mission! So of course we had to burn a tie to celebrate ha. And don't worry mom, there was a big toothpaste stain on the tie anyway. Time really has just flown by though and I have loved each and every day of my mission. And another important date coming up is my parents anniversary this saturday! It took them 21 years but they finally have a kid on a mission. 

We also had our scambios this week and I got to go to Gela with anziano jorgenson. It was really fun and we did some cool work together. We found them 2 swag new investigators and hopefully they really start to progress. All our investigators in ragusa are doing great and working towards baptism. We got all our really progressing investigators to church this week which was really cool. Their starting to connect with the members and its really cool. 

I teach the gospel principles class with the africans since none of the members speak english and its always so cool. The africans have such strong testimonies in the gospel and always strengthen my faith and help me want to be me humble each and everyday. They have almost nothing in their lives but the gospel of jesus christ and because of that they know that they are rich and have the most important thing anyone could ever have. And samuele and giuseppe are both really close to getting baptized and we are excited for each of them.

I love you and wish you all the best,

Vi voglio bene

Anziano Whiting

We went to a restaurant and got a Texas and Mexican burger, but they gave us a Swiss and Russian flag.

The Six Month Burning of the Tie!

Marco's Baptism!

This week was super awesome and we finally had Marco's baptism! It was a super spiritual experience and he was so happy to make this first promise with God. On of the members that has been Marco's friend for the 5 years he has investigated the church baptized him, his names pino dimartino. When we went to the church Saturday morning and started to fill the font and it was freezing. Turns out the water heater for the font was out so we used sink water and boiled up a bunch of water for the font. It took almost all day since we had to wait for the water to boil and for the sink water to heat up, but it was worth it.
We also had a cleaning day on New Years where we cleaned the house and had a small lunch with our ward mission leader. The apartment we have is pretty old but we got it all cleaned up. At our ward mission leaders house we ate a cake in the shape of a tree and when he asked his 4 year old daughter if she wanted cake she said"but we don't eat trees daddy" haha it was super funny, I love those guys. We also had our ward Christmas/New Years party last week and the whole ward got together to eat and listen to different musical numbers. We met some pretty cool people that the members brought so hopefully we can start teaching some. Now that Marco is baptized we have to get some more solid investigators. But anyway, I'm loving it here in Italy and I'm praying for all of you!
Vi voglio bene,
Anziano Whiting

The ward mission leader's house with the tree cake

Here's us at the baptism