Merry Christmas!!

What a blessing it was to see and visit with our beautiful Sorella today. We laughed and cried. Pictures will be posted soon.

She has a beautiful request: I want to invite all to take time to remember this beautiful Christmas season to ponder about the gift that He has given to us. How have you felt the Love of the Savior Jesus Christ in your life? Please visit the following link:

O Come, Emmanuel

And a very short update: This miracle was so sweet and so full of relief. Our baptismal date J had told his mom that he was too afraid to inform us that he was not ready for baptism this upcoming Saturday. I had spoken to his mother and she explained that she wished to study the scriptures with him more and try for a baptism in April or March. We had studied and prayed for days to know what to do and what to say the next time we would see him. This past Sunday he had asked to talk to us after church, so we met with him and he immediately began to talk about the baptism. He explained that he wanted to be baptized as soon as possible but that he felt he needed to learn a little more. He also explained that he wished to be baptized no later than the end of the month of January. It was such a relief and such a blessing to see how eager he still was for baptism. When we asked what we could do to help him prepare, he asked us to explain and help him understand the book of mormon. :) We will continue helping him and hopefully see a baptism soon here in Forli. :)

Enduring to the end with a forgiving heart

AHHHHH I love Christmas!!!!! :) We had a beautiful Zone Conference with Presidente here in Forli last Thursday for Christmas. It was so beautiful and soooo happy. (OH and I finally got the packages. It was really funny. My District Leader, Anziano Lloyd handed my 3 big packages and then a box from deseret industry - something I ordered months ago. I opened the one from October - THANK YOU - and am saving the other two for Christmas. Patience. :) But seriously! Thank you sooooo much for the socks. They are AMAZING. They are so warm and comfortable. My feetsies are now so much happier.) L came to the Conference to help out with the cooking - we had some good ol' tacos. SO GOOD. One of the assistants was born here in Forli and taught L. It was such a happy occasion to see Anziano Christensen and Laura greeting each other after a year of not seeing one another. Happiness!!!!

I thought my heart was going to burst with happiness when we had this miracle on Saturday. Our inattiva, G that we have been working with CAME to an activity!!! It was a shock really. We came to her home on Friday night to read some scriptures with her and invited her the activity. As mentioned last week, J (our simpatizzanti) has been pushing her friend G to come back to church.  Right before the activity on Saturday evening, my companion called out to me to hurry down the stairs. When I caught up, I saw G's children. Oh how the members were soooooo incredibly happy to see them! Then about half way through the activity, G herself showed up. :) Everyone greeted her with love. She stayed the rest of the evening. It was so tender and so beautiful!

Earlier that morning, we went to teach L and A, oppure, they taught us. Last week while we were trying to plan for them, we had this huge stupor of thought. They are so elect and so converted. So then, with the help of the Spirit, we asked for them to teach us. So A prepared a BEAUTIFUL lesson of Enduring to end (or persevering to the end in italiano) and forgiveness - how they go hand in hand. It was so wonderful and clear. I had never thought of how in order to endure to the end, we must be willing to have a forgiving heart. Yes both are important but to go so well together... wow. The gospel is so beautiful and simple. Comunque, Al planned this WONDERFUL lesson full of scriptures and even an article of Nelson Mandela. L and A are so kind and charitable. Once they are married and baptized, they are going to be such a HUGE strength for this special branch here in Forli.

Another quick miracle.... on Sunday I was starting to feel a little stressed due to our simpatizzanti who cannot keep commitments but have so much faith and for not reaching goals of FINDING people to teach. On our way home, we passed through a park and saw two people sitting on a bench. My wonderful companion immediately stopped her bike and started talking to them. They were so kind and so fun. We taught them the first lesson in a nut shell and have a return appointment with them tomorrow. Little blessing really help brighten the day. :)

Also, we have been teaching J, son of R (a recently reactivated memeber) and he is just progressing so much towards baptism. :) Hopefully we have a Christmas baptism. We shall keep you posted next week. WHEN WE SKYPE!!! (Oh and you will probably get to meet L and A)

I LOVE YOU!!!!!! Good luck getting ready for the holidays,. :) Thank you for your support and your love. We had a lesson about the family last night and I am just soooo lucky to have an amazing family.

VI VOGLIO BENE!!!

Love,

Sorella Jameson

You bring so much peace and joy into my life

I LOVE CHRISTMAS!!!!!!! Oh it is just soooooooooooo beautiful!!!

We have had amazing miracles with one of our simpatizzanti - si chiama J. She is from Africa and has a baptismal date for later this month - she was a referral from her husband who we found two transfers ago on the sidewalk (P). We decided to pass-by J last Thursday to say hello and set up another appointment to visit her. After speaking, we offered our service to help her clean her home, which we did the following morning for 3 hours (and it was only the kitchen hahaha). It was such a beautiful opportunity to serve her while we got to know her even better. She has had such a difficult life and yet she is still so faithful, so kind, and so loving. By the time we left, her heart was soft and more open to us. A few days later we visited J to teach her a lesson and do some more service. She told us that she talked on the phone with one of her dear friends who was a member of our church, G (the miracle we had the week before with the meno attiva!) When she told us that she had talked to this Meno Attiva, we were so worried that bad things were said. G only said the most beautiful things about the church and J encouraged her to come back to church with her on Sunday. They were basically doing missionary work for each other!! J told us to visit her and try to convince her to come to church this weekend with her. It was such a tender miracle! When we visited her yesterday, she prayed, giving thanks to Heavenly Father for bringing us into her life. J said, "When I see you outside the window I am filled immediately with JOY and happiness. You bring so much peace and joy into my life." We promised her that this is something that she can keep with her through the gift of the Holy Ghost after her baptism. :) AHHH I love her soooo much!

And a random, fun little side note - we saw Anziano Gibbons on Sunday (remember him? He was with me in Genova for the whole 6 months) He told me my Italiano has gotten SOOO much better! It really surprised me. :) Oh how I love to speak Italiano.

Another really fast and funny story - we often go to do missionary work with our amazing side kick A. He is absolutely hilarious and a wonderful member of the ward. We had taught for a short time a very, VERY Italian woman si chiama L. Oh mamma mia... she is just a SPIT fire! Kind of like Grandma but MORE because she is not Mormon and she is Italian. A just LOVES her! He is normally a quiet person but when he was with her, this fiery side comes out and he just gets so Italiano. We went to go visit her and it was just one of the funnest lessons I think I have ever been in. She has invited us over for Christmas Eve to teach us how to make Mascarpone. (Sorry.. not a super great story but just really funny)

Vi voglio bene!!

Sorella Jameson

PIC: Ravenna oggi :)

PS: I absolutely LOVE my companion with all my heart!

Our Savior can help us with ANYTHING

Oh mamma mia... we are having so many miracles here in Forli. :)

Thanksgiving came and went suuuuuper fast (just like every day in the mission field) so I am a little worried about how fast Christmas will go by. That being said, being a missionary during Christmas time is such a beautiful experience. I just have this LOVE and joy for the little things - like all the Christmas lights and decorations - and especially for the birth of Jesus Christ. We can sing more often to the people, talk more about the beauty of the gift, and just all rejoice more together. I wish it were more like this through out the year but it really is so magical! :) For Thanksgiving, we ate at L's and Ao's home and celebrated A's birthday. It was sooooo beautiful. We invited one of our "dry members" who is 89 and very lonely. L is such a loving and accepting person that she immediately began to show love to him. The next several days were just filled with miracles that touched our hearts. The work is rolling forward in Forli!

This weekend we had one of the most tender and touching miracles. The Jefferies have been working with an inactive member of the branch by the name G. We had never met her and had only heard "Good Luck" when we talked about visiting her. As Sorella Jefferies has gone to visit teach G, her heart has been softened more and more. Sorella Jefferies suggested that we go and visit her, bringing some banana bread because it was her favorite. On Sunday we went, not really knowing what to share and going with the intention of getting to know G and follow the Spirit. This woman is such a special and beautiful child of God. We felt prompted to just sing some Christmas hymns which invited the Spirit and made it very easy to talk about the love of Christ. I then asked if I could share my favorite scripture (Alma 26:35-37) and we shared how much God loves her and has not forgotten about her. G began to cry and explain that she missed this, how she had forgotten these things that she once loved and believed in, and how she wanted to come back to church. The Spirit was so strong and guided us along to say the things that G needed to hear. It was so beautiful!

To finish, I just wanted to share an insight that I read this morning in parallel to the chapters in Mosiah 23 and 24. So many of us are faced with trials and challenges that we must overcome. At times we feel there is no hope. I have seen this so often with meno attivi or with simpatizzanti here and it just breaks my heart. They often say to us that we cannot possibly understand what they are dealing with because we are so young. Yes that may be true. But the thing that I know with every single FIBER of my being is that our Savior Jesus Christ can help us with ANYTHING in this life. I just love these chapters in Mosiah because it explains so clearly that we WILL have trials but that, with the promised covenant that we make, the Lord will help us. 

In regards to Mosiah 23:21, Elder Orsen F. Whitney said "No pain that we suffer, no trial that we experience is wasted. It ministers to our education, to the development of such qualities as patience, faith, fortitude, and humility. All that we suffer and all that we endure, especially when we endure it patiently, builds up characters, purifies our hearts, expands our souls, and makes us more tender and charitable, more worthy to be called the children of God... and it is through sorrow and suffering , toil and tribulation, that we gain education that we come here to acquire and which will make us more like our Father and Mother in heaven."

Now I must apologize that this is a little bit shorter than usual. :) 

VI VOGLIO BENE!!!

Sorella Jameson