Heeeey everbuddy!

Another week come and gone my goodness! I can't believe i'm already writing again. We've had a fun pday so far...we woke up early and ran out to the ocean to watch the sunrise, and we did our personal and language study out there.

This last week has been INCREDIBLE. We had zone conference on Thursday, and we had an incredible training from our zone leaders that I think will change our entire missions. All they talked about were the key indicators (our numbers) and what we can do to bring them up. It's really true, the higher your key indicators, the higher the baptisms!

I read this talk the other day, don't ask me where, that says that we need to be talking to at least 10 people a day about the gospel. So we made it our goal to talk to 10 people a day, and try to give out a book of mormon every day. So the day after zone conference, Friday, we went to go to an appointment, but our investigator wasn't home, so I said, "it's probably because Christ wanted us to find someone else". We felt prompted to go to a palazzo, and we rang everyone, but no one let us up. As we were walking away, a lady at the door was staring at us, and so we introduced ourselves and she kept saying she already had a religion, and "all roads led to Jesus," and we were losing her interest. Finally, I felt prompted to ask her "Do you read the bible?" and she said daily. Then I handed her a book of mormon, and said that it was another testament of Christ, scripture like the bible, and I told her the story of Joseph smith. She got really quiet, and the spirit was emanating. We asked if we could come back and teach her, and she said yes. Wow.

On Saturday, we started off the day by going to our inactive miracle friend Antonio, and we found out that he actually isn't inactive, he's not a member. Apparently he was baptized, but he wasn't confirmed, but he told us that he would like to recieve the Holy Ghost. I was so shocked! We might have to rebaptize him because we don't know if they have his records from his baptism 5 years ago. Crazy.

That afternoon we went to meet up with a potential investigator at the park...after waiting for a half hour we decided to give up. As we were walking away instead of letting us get sad I said, "It's probably because God wanted us to find someone else here!" As we walked through the playground, I saw a man with his wife and son, and I walked up to them and before I could get 3 words out in english he said, "I speak english! I'm from Maryland! Are you mormons? I see you everywhere! I've talked to your elders before, but nobody has ever told me what you're about!" We were more than happy to do so, so we explained to him the entire first lesson. He loved it all, and when we got to the Book of Mormon we invited him to read it and pray to know if it was true. He said, "I don't think you can convince me, but I will pray about it to know for myself if it's true and then be baptized if it's right." We were okay with that. Then I told him that they're building a temple in Rome, and that his family can be sealed forever and he was SO EXCITED! We had already talked for an hour and a half by that point, so he said, "okay, we'll meet next week and you can tell me about God's plan for us and how I can live with my family forever!" Wow. He and his wife are so great...he's already been following the spirit his entire life. He said he had prayed to know where to go about 5 years ago for work, and he felt the most random need to go to China, where he met his wife. He said "I KNOW that's why God wanted me to go to China...so I could meet my wife!" Oh I love them all so much!

It's true that 100% obedience brings blessings! We have 4 new investigators in less than a week, which is the norm for missionaries to find in an entire TRANSFER in Italy....all just by trying as hard as we can to do 15 hours of finding work a week, talking to 10 people a day, giving out 3 BOMs a week, and having members at every single lesson. The harder we work, the more we are blessed! We're also trying to be bold, and we are weeding out our investigators to find those would want to be baptized, so we can spend more time finding the golden investigators. We just tell them that's our purpose, and it's actually helped us to overcome a ton of "icebergs" that have been keeping our investigators from progressing.

My companion sister Crandall is incredible. She is such a blessing, and she is the best missionary ever. I am learning so much from her and her untiring diligence in becoming better!

"If you want a thing bad enough to go out and fight for it, work day and night for it, give up your peace and your sleep and your time for it. If only your desire makes your aim higher never tire of it. If life seems all empty and useless without and all that you dream and you scheme is about it. If gladly you'll plan for it, fret for it, sweat for it, pray with all your strength for it. If you only go ater the thing that you want with all your capacity, strength and sagacity, faith, hope and confidence, stem pertinacity. If neither poverty nor pain nor famine and gaunt, can keep you away from the thing that you want, if dogged and grim you besiege and beset it, you'll get it!!!" -Vaughn J Featherstone.

I love you all so much. Questo è il lavoro del Signore. So che sono qua per portare i suoi figli alla vita eterna. So che con tutto il mio coure che questa è la chiesa restaurata, e questo è il lavoro meraviglioso. Vi amo, e Dio vi ama anche...non mai dimenticarla. Voi siete sempre nel mio coure, e i miei preghiere.

Baci e Abbracci!

Sorella Jenessa Miles

ps, if you don't understand italian, 'google translate' works incredibly well! ;)