October 15, 2014

Ciao tutti!

Lots to report this week.  I'm excited to tell you about my past week.  But first I wanted to let you all know that today marks my 6 months left...scary stuff.  But lots of time left and lots of people to baptize still!

Drum roll please!  Last week we were able to teach 21 lessons!!  It took a lot of focus and hard work.  Because we weren't able set appointments with many of our investigators, we ended up teaching many of our lessons on the street with people we would stop.  Our hard work lead us to find 6 new investigators!!

Our hard work and focus lead to other miracles as well.  Perhaps the biggest miracle was that we set a baptismal date with our investigator Matteo.  In our lesson with him on wednesday, I told him how he's got a lot of beautiful things coming up.  He is having a baby in December and they want to get married before that.  I told him him that it would be amazing to add to those events a baptism.  He accepted.  The only problem we have now is that he has to find a way to come to church.  He always has to work.  We invited him to pray for a miracle that he would be able to come to church.  We told him that if he has the true desire to come to church, God would open up the way for a miracle.  So this week we prayed really hard for this miracle.  This sunday I was talking to his girlfriend and she said he has been praying hard.  Guess what?  He can't come to church next week but the week after that, he's going to be completely free to come to church!  Miracle!  She also told me that they are planning to be married on the 24th of November...his baptism will follow shortly after on the 29th.

Well that's a lot.  Needless to say, things are going well here.  I love you all!  Ciao!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg

October 8, 2014

Ciao tutti!

Just keeping it real in Trieste!  On monday we had a really great Zone Training Meeting.  The words that the zone leaders shared were truely inspiring.  One quote that I like was "A rising tide lifts all ships".  When we do our best and are concentrated on what's important, other people see that example and automatically start being better themselves without knowing.  My challenge to you this week, be the rising tide! Lift those ships around you!

This week we are trying hard for 21 lessons. We have been struggling to get appointments with people so we have had to resort to our own efforts to teach lessons on the street.  Monday we had a goal of 3 lessons.  We got to the end of the day and we only had two.  We were just getting off the bus and we had a bel pezzo di strada before we got home so me and Anziano Santiago decided to say a prayer to ask Heavenly Father to help us find someone to teach before we got home.  We began stopping people and no one would listen at first but eventually we stopped a woman who let us talk about Jesus Christ and read a scripture from The Book of Mormon.  We said a prayer with her and we reached our goal!  So that was great but then last night we were in the same situation.  But we needed two more lessons to reach our goal of four lessons.  On our walk home we were able to stop and teach 3 people within a time period of 15 minutes.  Two of them gave us their number.  When you set goals, ask the Lord for help, and go to work, the Lord will always help.

Well that email is long enough!  Gotta run!  Love you all!  Ciao!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg

October 1, 2014

Ciao tutti!

October 1st!!  Wow!  That's another month mark for a total of 17 months.  I'm getting old as a missionary.  But I still feel young and full of energy!  Gotta hold onto that until the end.

This week has been pretty rough.  I felt bad because it was Anziano Santiago's first full week in the mission and we had nothing going.  All of our investigators were out of town or sick.  A lot of our appointments fell through.  So saturday night I prayed that we would get some member visits on sunday.  The next day, we felt the love of the members and we got a couple of member visits set up.  We are going to make sure that they are doing their missionary work and we are doing ours. 

I'm sorry I don't have a spiritual thought for you all this week.  I am short on time.  But next week I will try to make it mind blowing!  Gotta run!  Vi voglio bene!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg

September 24, 2014

Ciao tutti!
Come state?  Everything is still great in Trieste.  I picked up Anziano Santiago on thursday and we are doing great work!  We are already seeing lots of greenie miracles.

The other day, just as we had got on a bus, we heard some kids talking about how they thought we were "Testimoni di Geova".  We quickly corrected them and explained who we were.  One of the boys told us that he used to say prayers but he doesn't go to church.  We explained that we bring a book that is another testiment of Jesus Christ.  He told us that his mom would be interested and he gave us her address.  As this was going on, another woman started talking to my companion and he invited her to English class.  Then another woman started looking at my name tag and I asked if she knew who we were.  I left her with a pass along card and also invited her to English class.  I was super happy afterwards because bus finding is something that I have really been working on.

A spiritual thought that stood out to me this week was about self efficience.  Not in the sense of gathering and storing food.  But in the sense of happiness.  I am fully convinced that in life one of the greatest lessons we need to learn in this life is how to be happy.  We have an eternity to live and we will be eternally happy if we make the right choices in this life.  But I think that in order to be eternally happy, we have to learn in this life to pick ourselves up and dust ourselves off when we fall. We all face hard times in this life and they make us sad sometimes, but it's important to remember to be grateful, to know that we are children of a loving Heavenly Father, and that our good choices will bring us a lasting happiness in the future.

Love you all!  Have a good week!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg

September 17, 2014

Ciao tutti!

Well I have transfer news!!  Are you ready?  Drum roll please!  I am staying another two transfers in Trieste!!  And you know why?  Because I am training!!  Woohoo!  I'm kind of excited and nervous at the same time.  I'm a little bummed that I have to stay in the same city for so long...however I do love this city and there's nowhere else I would rather do it.  I'm going to miss Anziano Gardiner too.  So will the rest of the ward here.  We have so many friends.  We really did good work together.  Guess I will have to make another companion work...a greenie...un verdino.  This will be fun. 

Last week on our way home from zone conference, we talked to a girl on the train.  We spoke in English because she really wanted to practice.  The conversation eventually led into if she was a religious person.  She told us a little about her background.  We talked to her about The Book of Mormon and she was really interested.  This past monday, we had a lesson with Martina.  We brought one of the girls who is preparing to go on a mission.  The lesson went really well.  She told us that she likes that she can express herself and that she is discovering new things that she never knew before.

Gotta go!  Love you all!  Ciao!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg

September 10, 2014

Ciao tutti!

Another great week in Trieste!  Transfers are just around the corner...but I don't think I'm going any where.  We're a little worried about Anziano Gardiner...we will miss him.

We are still having amazing lessons with Matteo.  He told us that since we have been coming to see them, he has noticed a change.  We asked him how he was feeling and he told us it's a lot like the salt metaphor that we explained to him.  It's hard to explain.  We took our recently activated member Max to the lesson and he bore powerful testimony of the blessins that come when we obey the commandments.

Sorry for the brief email.  I'm about out of time!  Love you all!  Ciao!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg

September 3, 2014

Ciao carissimi,

Hope you're all doing well.  Another great week here in Trieste!  We have started into september.  That's so crazy.  Time is just cruising.

This week, we saw our new investigator Matteo a couple of times. He's doing really well. He's reading The Book of Mormon and asking his girlfriend questions. On sunday, his girlfriend, Alice came up to us and thanked us for the work we are doing. She told us how much it means to her. She told us that many missionaries have tried in the past without success. She told us that now he wants to invite us over for dinner, ask us questions, and be our friend. We have really made a good connection. I don't think it was because we are just good missionaries (even though we are ;) ) but I believe that the Lord knows when it's the right time for everyone.

My mom asked me to share a thought in my email from my studies.  I was reading in the Liahona this week and I found an article that I really like about the different ways we can do missionary work and how it was done in the Book of Mormon.  I'll share the link

The Work of Salvation: Then and Now BY ELDER L. WHITNEY CLAYTON Of the Presidency of the Seventy

Well I better be on my way!  Love you all!  Ciao!

-Anziano Cody Petterborg