Week 65

Hello my friends and familial peoples! How is everything going in your various places? I hope fantastical. Well this week was in fact a week. I'm not sure why, but every Wednesday, it is incredibly difficult to remember the past week. A part of me wishes I could just say, "the week was good. Bye." But my mom would not be super thrilled about that hahha

Interesting things from this week... During English class we talked about ghost stories. That was weird. We've got some characters in English class so we had some interesting stories. Basically it was people playing with sketchy things and doing sketchy things to basically summon spirits... Yeah... We told them they should avoid that. English class is always interesting. It's always us missionaries and then a bunch of random people from around Modena who speak English and aren't members. They're a cool group. Lots of diversity.

Unfortunately the baptism didn't happen this Saturday because he got called to work this entire weekend last week which was not cool. But we will probably do it this coming week, or maybe Saturday. We are talking about it with him later today and get it all reset. But it'll definitely happen. I might be gone though hahhaa. Transfers are next week and I've been here for 4 transfers, 6 months and I am finishing training Anz, Mattson, so I'll most likely be out of here. I love Modena. This place is awesome and I love the people here. I'd also like a revitalizing change haha. Whatever the Lord wants, I'll do it. Another one of our friends will be baptized in a couple of weeks too. We've seen some really cool miracles here the past month. We've worked with some really awesome people and they are ready to be baptized. It's just a matter of scheduling now.

Yesterday we attempted to make this Siciliano dish called Arancini, which means little oranges, and you'll see why. So it's basically a rice ball with red meat sauce in the middle, fried with a milk batter.
Not that difficult to make, unless all you have is a plastic ladle to fry it... But yeah it was quite interesting. We didn't have a recipe or anything, just guessing on everything. So we made some sticky rice and cooled it down, then we had the ragu (meat sauce) cooking all day, made from scratch and it turned out really well actually. Then we took a ball of rice and threw a dollop of ragu in the middle, rolled it in the milk batter, and then in the fry oil and it went all crazy on us, oil going everywhere. But it worked! There are some pictures and a video at the end hahha. Interesting stuff. But yeah when done right, they look like oranges and they are delicious.

So there are a few things I wanted to share from the scriptures this week. The Bible is still awesome. So Paul is writing to the saints in Corinth and he writes this simple, yet powerful statement.

Let all your things be done with charity.
This is something we all must put into practice. There are levels to actions and choices.
Doing the wrong thing.
Doing the right thing.
Doing the right thing for the right reason.

Paul speaks of that last level, doing the right thing for the right reason. In the end, all things must be done because one, we love God, a pure love towards Him, and two, because we love others as we love ourselves, again a pure Christ-like love, charity towards them. Everything we do must be done from the heart and for the love towards God and our fellow man. Sometimes we get to entranced in the blessings we receive from following the commandments. We have our eyes single to the glory of the mansion being prepared for us in Heaven instead of having our eyes single to the glory of God. Elder Ballard once said at a mission president conference, "If a missionary wants to do the right thing for the right reason, he will do it for Christ." If ANYONE wants to do the right thing for the right reason, he will do it for Christ. Don't get me wrong, it is fantastic that we are all following the
commandments and serving in the Church faithfully and serving those around us, but we have to make sure we are doing it for the right reason. Jews in the time of Christ would pray to be seen of men. It is this concept. Doing the right thing for the right reason. Honestly, doing this, I've found it even easier to do the right thing. Whenever I think about a blessing I'll receive from doing something, I sometimes think, "I mean I can survive without that one little blessing." But when I think about doing it because God asked me to, I think, "oh dang... I can't survive without God. I better do this." Do it for Christ. He did it for you.

Paul then states this.

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;

Though our trials, troubles, and afflictions may be difficult at this current time, the glory received, that is the pure, everlasting happiness, joy, and love we will feel together in the Celestial
Kingdom alongside God, Jesus Christ, and our families, will far outweigh anything we can possibly face in this life. No experience, no tear, no heartache will be wasted. These bring us closer and closer to this eternal weight of glory, as Paul describes it. We will experience a joy greater than we can possibly imagine.

I know without a doubt in my mind that these things are true, that God loves us, and that Jesus Christ lives. I know Christ suffered and died so that we would not have to. I know that He did it out of pure love for us and that because of what He did, we can live with God again and we can overcome any obstacle in life by His grace. I know He will give each and every one of you the strength to do this through the enabling power of His Atonement because He has done it for me.

You are all fantastic and I wish you all an amazing week!
Do great things today!
Anziano Benjamin Guthrie