Gli Anziani

We LOVE our senior missionaries!  It’s really, really, really hard to see them go.  We have learned so many incredible principles from their diligent efforts and stalwart examples.  What a privilege it is to be able to serve with them!

I hope that each one of you reading this blog—every parent of a missionary, sibling, or whoever comes into contact with this post will make the decision to serve a mission.  There is no greater joy.  It is the best decision that you could ever make.

For those of you who fall under the delightful senior missionary category (don’t shy away from your age, embrace it!), I echo the words of Elder Robert D. Hales:

“My brothers and sisters, if you have felt stirrings to engage in this work, however quiet those feelings may be, do not procrastinate the day of your service. Now is the time to prepare; now is the time to be called, the time to sacrifice. Now is the time to share your gifts and talents, and now is the time to receive God’s blessings for you and your family. “There is a constant need for more couple missionaries,” President Gordon B. Hinckley has said. As this work rolls forward, that need is increasing. Let us, in our richest years of experience, maturity, wisdom, and most of all, our faith, rise to meet that need as only we can.”

Please, please, please heed this call!  We need you. 

Elder and Sister Herndon

We are so excited for the new couples who have come to join us here in the Italy Milan Mission. Elder and Sister Jacobs will be going to Pordenone, Elder and Sister Peterson are headed off to Bergamo, Elder and Sister Lynch will be taking over for Elder and Sister Ritchie in the office, and Elder and Sister Herndon are headed home from Pordenone. Wow! We are so excited for these wonderful people who will make an irreplaceable contribution to the Lord’s work here in Italy. And we thank Elder and Sister Herndon for their devoted service and loving efforts. What great miracles we have seen at the hands of our beloved senior missionaries!

         

Elder and Sister Jacobs                                                              Elder and Sister Peterson

Elder and Sister Lynch     

“Your life is your preparation. You have valuable experience. You have raised a family and served in the Church. Just go and be yourselves. The Lord has promised that angels will go before you” (see D&C 103:19–20). Elder Robert D. Hales of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, “Couple Missionaries: A Time to Serve,” Ensign, May 2001, 25.

As you make the decision to serve, know that angels have gone before you. 

These senior missionaries are those angels.