Rome Forum - October 2015

Rome Forum Article

October 2015

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“Bee Bold”

We recently read a letter written by Kevin and Nancy Duncan written to their missionaries in the Chile Santiago Mission when they were serving there.  It contained some valuable information.  We want to share an excerpt that we believe will help you become more effective missionaries.  

“Don’t be afraid to be bold. For some, approaching a stranger and talking about religion can be a very scary experience. I know, as a new missionary, I was afraid.  Overcoming fear takes some time and effort. The most effective way to gain courage and then confidence is to just dive in. A little practice will go a long way in helping you develop the courage it takes to be an effective missionary [role play]. And even if you do something wrong you will learn and grow from the experience and be better because of it.

You may not recognize it, but the Lord in His wisdom carries the message of salvation to the world through young men and women for a very unique reason. It is easier for young missionaries to be bold without being overbearing. Missionaries age 18 and up have some hidden advantages – merely because of their age. Children and teenagers look up to them and want to be just like them. Peers their own age feel a connection with them and find it easy to believe their message. Older adults don’t feel threatened or intimidated when approached or taught by 2 young adults. You can always be bold without being offensive.  People expect it of missionaries. Alma’s counsel is to, “Use boldness, but not overbearance” (Alma 38:12). By the end of their mission, most missionaries learn to be bold. But it is such an advantage if you learn how to be bold early in your mission.” 

When missionaries first arrive in the Italy Rome Mission, they feel a great excitement and zeal for the work.  After the first, second or third transfer, that enthusiasm is replaced with the inevitable bout of homesickness and the mission is not what they expected it to be.  Perhaps they experience what the Apostle Peter felt.

During the last transfer period, each of you had the opportunity to listen to a talk given by President Uchtdorf where he talked about “Fear Not”.  Many of you felt a connection with the Apostle Peter—some because of your boldness and some because of your fear.

In another talk, President Uchtdorf said:

“While serving with the mortal Christ, Peter displayed both boldness and fear. Such could also be said of the missionaries serving today across the globe. It was Peter who, following his Master’s lead, walked on water. And it was Peter who became frightened by the boisterous wind and began to sink, crying out, “Lord, save me.”

“The Lord did save him, and as Peter followed Jesus he continued to show remarkable courage, mixed with a good measure of human weakness.  He was always willing to take risks, to open his mouth and say what was in his heart. At times this led to blunders, but more often it led to precious learning experiences not available to those who held back.”

Peter’s human challenges are often found in missionaries.

“They arrive in the mission field brimming with confidence — in themselves, in the Lord, and in their mission president. They are ready to baptize the entire city, starting with whoever opens the first door they knock on. They will walk on water if you tell them there’s a golden investigator on the other side of the lake. And they are quite certain that they will never, ever, get discouraged or tired or fearful.”

Until they do.

“Because lurking beneath their confidence and zeal are human imperfections, inexperience, and fear,” said President Uchtdorf. “And if they are to become the kind of disciples, the kind of leaders the Lord expects, they will need to face and overcome those weaknesses, just as we all must in our individual journey of discipleship.”

“We all start out a little rough, but with some polishing and refining, with an ever-growing conviction of the Savior’s Atonement and Resurrection, we can become an effective instrument in bringing souls unto Christ.”

We encourage each of you to “bee bold” as you daily strive to overcome your fears and share the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Preach My Gospel was written to help you know how to overcome these fears.

President Uchtdorf concluded his talk with this counsel:

“As you dedicate your work and will to Him and put your worries and fears in His hands, He will make you a great and fearless witness of Him, of His gospel, and of His Church. He will make you great missionaries.”

We pray each of you will be blessed as you strive to become “great missionaries”.  

We love you and pray you will “Bee the best you can bee!”

Presidente and Sorella Waddoups

King Benjamin and Bees

June 3, 2015


(Here are some of the thoughts I shared at the Senior Missionary Conference.)

“Bee the best you can bee!”

Because our mission theme is “Bee the best you can bee!”, I want to share some thoughts about some “B” things. 

First, King Benjamin was a prophet whose name begins with “B”.  I hope my service is like that of King Benjamin.

Mosiah 2:9-17

9  And these are the words which he spake and caused to be written, saying: My brethren, all ye that have assembled yourselves together, you that can hear my words which I shall speak unto you this day; for I have not commanded you to come up hither to trifle with the words which I shall speak, but that you should hearken unto me, and open your ears that ye may hear, and your hearts that ye may understand, and your minds that the mysteries of God may be unfolded to your view.

10  I have not commanded you to come up hither that ye should fear me, or that ye should think that I of myself am more than a mortal man.

11  But I am like as yourselves, subject to all manner of infirmities in body and mind; yet I have been chosen by this people, and consecrated by my father, and was suffered by the hand of the Lord that I should be a ruler and a king over this people; and have been kept and preserved by his matchless power, to serve you with all the might, mind and strength which the Lord hath granted unto me.

12  I say unto you that as I have been suffered to spend my days in your service, even up to this time, and have not sought gold nor silver nor any manner of riches of you;

13  Neither have I suffered that ye should be confined in dungeons, nor that ye should make slaves one of another, nor that ye should murder, or plunder, or steal, or commit adultery; nor even have I suffered that ye should commit any manner of wickedness, and have taught you that ye should keep the commandments of the Lord, in all things which he hath commanded you—

14  And even I, myself, have labored with mine own hands that I might serve you, and that ye should not be laden with taxes, and that there should nothing come upon you which was grievous to be borne—and of all these things which I have spoken, ye yourselves are witnesses this day.

15  Yet, my brethren, I have not done these things that I might boast, neither do I tell these things that thereby I might accuse you; but I tell you these things that ye may know that I can answer a clear conscience before God this day.

16  Behold, I say unto you that because I said unto you that I had spent my days in your service, I do not desire to boast, for I have only been in the service of God.

17  And behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; that ye may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God.

The life and service of a missionary is much like that of a bee.

Bees

*Spend all day collecting pollen.

         Pollen is sticky and stains clothes and hands.

         Produces the most perfect food on earth.

*Work hard to build the hive.

*Leave the hive every day.

*Work hard looking for perfect flower with pollen.

*Go from flower to flower pollenating trees and flowers that later produce fruit and beautiful things.

*Some people acknowledge the good things they do and other’s hate them and try to kill them.

*Know the Queen Bee is awaiting their return.

*Only live for a season.

*Others will benefit from their efforts.

Just like bees, because of the busy time we spend in the mission field, we and our families will receive eternal blessings

Summer Bees

September 4, 2014


Every August during summer vacation (Ferragosto or August Festival), the missionaries complain because "it's hot and there's nobody to teach and everybody is gone to the sea".  Presidente just keeps reminding them that he knows all those things and it's not really true because there are still people around.  After all the complaining and excuse making, when the final numbers for August came in, the Italy Rome Mission had 20 baptisms during the month of August.  Wow!  That's amazing!  Especially considering the fact nobody was in Italy all month long.  

The missionaries are "Being the best they can bee!"

Because Italy is getting a temple, we feel Satan's influence continually.  He is trying to stop the work of the Lord from progressing here.  He might be able to hinder, but he will never stop it.  Fighting the battle against evil can be tiring and depressing.  Sometimes the missionaries feel like everything is working against them (and it is), but in spite of that, they are still doing great things.  

Right now is one of those times when the mission is experiencing real growing pains.  There is a lot of sickness and unusual things happening.  It seems like there is an overabundance of depression.  The work on the temple is extremely slow and not much progress is being made.

The Rome East Stake has asked the members to dedicate their fast this month to progress on the work of the temple and that the workers will be able to do the perfect work that a temple requires.  As a mission, we have asked all of the missionaries in the Italy Rome Mission to be involved in this special fast.  We have also asked them to include investigators so they will be touched by the spirit and accept the gospel of Jesus Christ in their lives.  We are also asking for a special blessing for those missionaries who are sick, injured, or ailing in any way and also to bless all the missionaries with increased vigor and strengthened testimonies as they attempt to bring others unto Christ.  We called the President of the Milan Mission and asked if they wanted to join in this special fast and they were eager to do so.  There is power in numbers and we are calling upon heaven to bless Italy that the work of the Lord will progress here.  We have faith the Lord will hear and answer our plea.

Bee chart showing baptisms for month of August 2014

FTB

As missionaries, our purpose is to help bring others unto Christ.  In order to accomplish this goal, we must do three things.  The first thing is to FIND others to teach.  Once we have found someone who is interested, we must TEACH them the gospel principles.  The third step is to BAPTIZE them.

The missionaries refer to these three steps as FTB or find, teach, baptize.

In our mission, we tell the missionaries to "Bee the best you can Bee".  One of the missionaries asked another missionary what FTB stood for and he responded "Fill the Beehive".  It was a pretty clever play on words since we have a chart that is a beehive and we put a bee on the beehive for every person who is baptized.  We are trying to fill the beehive.  The beehive holds 40 bees.  Our goal is to have 40 baptisms each month.  The new Rome Temple will have two endowment rooms and each endowment room will seat 40 people.  Each month we are trying to baptize enough people to fill an endowment room.

This is the first time since we set the goal that we have used the graphic.  We are very proud of our missionaries.  During the month of December, the missionaries had 18 baptisms.  That's enough to fill nearly half an endowment room.  We are attempting to FTB!

Palermo Stake Conference

November 16-17, 2013

(Oops!  This was still in draft form and I forgot to publish it.)

Palermo Stake Conference was held November 16-17 so we had to stay in Sicily for that.  The Palermo Stake covers the entire island of Sicily.  Even though it's called the Palermo Stake, the conference is held in Catania.

 For the first time, the actual conference was held in Catania at the church house but was televised in several other locations so members didn't have to travel so far to attend.  This is something even our stake in Utah had done for a few years.

The biggest difference was that the Saturday afternoon leadership session was held in the city of Enna which is a totally different city in the center of the island and about a two hour drive from Palermo and a one hour drive from Catania.  Enna is one of the little cities that sits high on the top of a mountain.  Those are my favorite places to visit in Italy.

Another major difference is that the afternoon leadership session is split into two parts with the priesthood in one room and the sisters in another room.  It's almost like a giant Stake Auxiliary Meeting only with all the men meeting together and all the women meeting together.

Immediately after the afternoon session, everybody joined together for the Adult Session of conference.

This was the first time I've attended the Saturday afternoon session in Italy and was totally surprised when I walked into the building on a college campus where the meeting was being held and was immediately ushered into the sister's meeting.  I thought I would have that time to comb my hair and pull myself together a little bit since we had been traveling all day.  I was wrong.

During the adult session, the Stake President leaned over to me and asked if I would give a talk since one of the speakers was ill.  Yes, I'd love to--NOT!  Again, a loving Father in Heaven came to my rescue.  I normally carry a copy of the conference talk I prepared and had translated into Italian in my briefcase, which I didn't have with me.  That morning I had slipped a copy of it in my purse without even thinking about it.  Another little miracle.

During the Stake President's comments, he talked about bees and how they work together to build a hive and take care of each other.  Each day of their life is spent spreading pollen so trees can produce fruit.  They spend their entire life doing good.  I loved looking at the faces of the missionaries as he talked about bees because the theme of our mission is "bee the best you can bee".

I had an extra bee pin in my purse so the next morning before conference began, Michael and I presented the stake president with a bee pin.  He was so touched.  The tears just ran down his face.  He immediately pinned it on his lapel and wore it proudly.  It made me smile to see him.

The theme of the conference was missionary work and how members and missionaries need to work together.  During his talk, Michael had every missionary in the audience come forward and either read a scripture or give a 30 second testimony.  Benissimo, they did great!

As soon as conference was over, we slipped out a side door and drove the three hours back to Palermo and got there just in time to catch a plane back to Rome.  I've always heard the saying "There's no rest for the wicked" but I've added another line that says "There's no rest for the righteous either!"

Letter to president

The theme for our mission is "Bee the best you can bee!"  Bees are industrious and produce one of nature's purest foods.  We can "Bee Honest", Bee Obedient", "Bee Perfect" "Bee on Time", or any other kind of "Bee".  

I got stung five times by wasps as i was doing a service project this past week. It was fairly entertaining according to my companion at the time and the anziani that were also there...I was shaking so badly after though and i couldn't really walk on my left leg the day after due to the feeling like i had a bruised muscle, but the work has to happen so i just did anyways. I also kinda related the wasps to being like satans counterfeit for bees...not sure if that is appropriate but i just thought that the work of bees are accknowledged by good ( his righteous children) and his children who are of the philosophies of man tend to be okay with the concept of just being wasps (they apparently like to attack the Lord's servant in His olive grove). This makes more sense in my head but i might not be geting the full message across here. The fruits of our labors as bees is the food of life, honey. But from my understanding, wasps don't make anything that benefit others but themselves; No honey, no substance that gives life to others besides themselves. That is the difference between a righteous person and the acts af a natural man. By his fruits ye shall know them. Do we work to create subtance in others lives or do we simply think only for the benefit of ourseleves? Gives a different Outlook for our mission theme! At least for me! Who knew that being stung five times would make me think about this!