December 29, 2010

From: Monica Gean Miller

Hey famiglia,

Wow it was so great to talk to you all. Everyone looks great and it gave me a huge boost to finish strong. Even if the next day was hard again all over! Haha To be honest the work right now is really hard. We saw the family on Monday. Unfortunately it seems that Satan gets them to think about their problems more than having faith in Jesus Christ. It is hard to get them to keep commitments because there is always an easier excuse. We are going to try to focus more on their 21 year old son who is awesome and super receptive to the spirit. We think maybe if we can get him to make progress he will be the one to now set the example. All in all, we are praying a lot to find the elects that are out there, just super hard to find.

We were doing house the other day and found a man. It turns out that his wife is the sister of the branch president in Bitonto who is NOT a member, and their daughter got baptised about 4 years ago. Their daughter now lives in Milan, and 5 months ago her husband was also baptised. We knew NOTHING about this family. Turns out the Branch president in Bitonto baptised their daughter, AND son in law, and has been working for years trying to get them to receive the missionaries in their home. We randomly found this family, and they let us in! Right there at the door. We then saw them in church on Sunday, and they were with their daughter who was here for Christmas from Milan! We talked to the branch pres of Bitonto and he is convinced they are ready to accept the gospel in this period since they willingly let us in, when before they had sent the sisters to them many times and they never let them in. Were guided! Cool story.

I know the gospel is true. This week for the first time I had a realization that my time is running out. I love feeling the spirit every day here in the mission. I know it is because we are literally set apart from the world, but also I know it is because we DO a lot to INVITE the Spirit into our lives. I love that feeling of joy and wanting to just do good, that the spirit gives us. I hope that even though you all are in the world, you do things each day to invite the spirit to be present each day. I know that we can always have that JOY that the Spirit gives us if we want to have it, but it takes conscious effort. I love you all so much.

Con tanto affetto,

Monica

XoXo

...Sorella Miller