We started out our week dealing Italian Bureaucracy. We showed up to the government building, where the people waiting had already began making their own list of who arrived first. Then we all headed up into the office, and they gave us a number based on when we wrote our name on this list. Why didn't they just set up the numbers outside for people to take? That would be too simple, that's why. We then waited in line for four hours. I took this time to teach Sorella Muce about the DMV. When we finally were called on, Sorella Muce was allowed about 5 seconds to ecplain what she needed before the woman working said "sorry, we can't help you. NEXT." Sorella Muce wasn't going to let that fly, so she called up the bureaucrats in her home town of Merate, and then passed our phone through the window for the bureaucrats in Messina to talk with. They argued and yelled at each other for a couple of minutes, then decided that they actually could help us out. I'm not quite sure if Merate just has a lot of power, or if maybe they just know a little better how the goverment works, but either way, we're grateful for northern Italy.
Sorella Muce turned 25 this week! I've learned though that I'm never to mention that to her. Sometimes she'll just stop what she's doing and say "the 20s go by too fast Sorella. Too fast." Anyway, for her birthday her sister came down from Milan, set a surprise party for Sorella Muce in the church, and then left. So when we went to English course that night there were decorations and food all set up for us and our students. I guess that's what happens when your family only lives so many miles away.
This week, for the first time ever, someone I invited to church on the streets came!We were stopped by a man, who said he had met the elders in the past and then hadn't seen them again. He said he was interested in our English Course, but I thought I'd invited him to church anyway. He showed up! Unfortunately, he was a little confused and thought that English course was also on sundays, but hey, he got a good little intro as to how our meetings run.
This week in my scripture study I have read a lot about the pride cycle. The people follow God and respect His commandments, He blesses them, they become prideful and ignore God, and then everything goes wrong. There's a verse in Helaman chapter 12 that says "Yea, and we may see at the very time when he doth prosper his people, yea, in the increase of their fields, their flocks and their herds, and in gold, and in silver, and in all manner of precious things of every kind and art; sparing their lives, and delivering them out of the hands of their enemies; softening the hearts of their enemies that they should not declare wars against them; yea, and in fine, doing all things for the welfare and happiness of his people; yea, then is the time that they do harden their hearts, and do forget the Lord their God, and do trample under their feet the Holy One—yea, and this because of their ease, and their exceedingly great prosperity." When I read that, I immediately asked myself "Why in the world does Heavenly Father keep blessing children who in the end "trample" Him under their feet?" The answer I came up with was this: We have a perfect Father in Heaven who loves us with the purest type of love. He loves His children more than we can ever understand and He gives them unlimited chances to recieve His blessings. Because of Jesus Christ's infinite Atonement, we have the chance to start again. and again. and again. Does that mean we can be prideful or sin whenever, and then instantly have a get out of jail free card? No. We have to work for it. But forgivness, healing, and blessings are always available to us if we look for them. I know that there is power in Jesus Christ's Atonement. I know that we have a perfect Heavenly Father who loves us and will care for us if we try to follow Him.
I love you all!!
Sorella Maxfield
No comments:
Post a Comment