This week's title comes from a quote from a member this week haha. His name is Dennis (he's from Gabon where they speak French and he now speaks Italian and said a sentence in half Italian - half English with a French Italian African accent haha pretty cool) and the second half is because this week, on March 1st, I hit my halfway mark!!! WHAT??? Weird how over a year ago I had my mission call. Time is the weirdest concept. I'm used to my mission. And I love it. I don't want it to end. (Every time I go through these thoughts I just have to say LIVE IN THE MOMENT AND ENJOY EVERY SECOND)
This week, to give you an idea of how diverse it is in Rome, we had five meal appointments. We ate food from the Dominican Republic (my personal favorite this week), then food from Italy, then food from America, then food from Bolivia (that was quite the experience I will have to tell that story another time haha), then food from Africa (but Dennis's food was like a very mild mild African. I wouldn't consider it African besides the fact that we had fried plantains.)
There is something very cool that our stake is implementing this year that I would like to share with all of you. After much fasting and prayer, the leaders of our stake came to a conclusion of how we can prepare ourselves a little bit more for the temple to be finished and how we can get involved in member missionary work!! The missionaries will be delivering a Book of Mormon to every single active member. They are to take that Book of Mormon, write their testimony in it, and give that Book to someone who will meet with the missionaries to have the first lesson. The goal is that by December every member will have been able to hand out the Book of Mormon to someone who will meet with the missionaries. It is going to require a lot of faith, but I really think it will help these active members to feel the fire of missionary work!!! Someone said at the end of their testimony, ".....and I am grateful that we have a temple here in Rome." Which really struck me. He didn't say "even though it isn't finished and we don't know when it is going to be finished and it was announced almost ten years ago" he just said, "I am grateful we have a temple here in Rome." These people truly are so lucky and it is so easy to point out the things that we DON'T have, but just helped give me a great reminder that we must be grateful for the things we DO have.
This week in my personal study I finished Alma chapter 36 and I really loved Alma'S final testimony to his son Helaman. After describing his whole conversion story in GREAT detail. When I read it I really feel like I understand completely all of his feelings. And then in verse 30 he says,
30 But behold, my son, this is not all; for ye ought to know as I DO KNOW, that inasmuch as ye shall keep the commandments of God ye shall prosper in the land; and ye ought to know also, that inasmuch as ye will not keep the commandments of God ye shall be cut off from his presence. Now this is according to his word.
I really loved that. By reading his conversion story YOU KNOW that HE DOES KNOW what it is like to feel that sorrow and that pain that comes when we disobey the commandments of God. And his first advice, that he repeats several times over and over again, is the KEEP the commandments. IT'S SO IMPORTANT.
Hitting half way in the mission is really strange. I really actually feel like I have been here for a month and am still in my first transfer. But then there are times when we run into Americans and they ask what it is like to be on a mission or what the weirdest thing is as being a missionary here and honestly I just think. "I don't remember what it is like to not be a missionary. Was I ever not a missionary?? Everything is just normal." I still feel like I have SO MUCH to learn and so much to grow. This week I reread one of my favorite talks and it really has been helping me with how I have been feeling as of late and this quote says,
"Riconoscete onestamente i vostri dubbi e le vostre preoccupazioni, ma prima di tutto, alimentate il fuoco della vostra fede, perché OGNI COSA È POSSIBILE A CHI CREDE."
Everything is possible to those who believe. And I have to honestly keep saying,
"Lord I believe, help thou my unbelief."
VI MANDO TANTO AMORE 
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SORELLA G
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