Bittersweet

Ben was only able to send us an email the day before he came home as his last email. 

Oh, my sweet baby boy! ️ I am overwhelmed with emotions today! Happy, excited nervous, anxious, sad but mostly GRATEFUL! 

Ben, you have given me an experience that I will NEVER forget.  In 2 years time I have had to learn to deal with heartache (missing you), trials, (of all kinds), happiness (for your success), worry (for you and our family), missing you and your calming spirit, patience, learning to trust, but also coming closer to my Heavenly Father more than I thought was possible. 

Your example of endurance through adversity, strength, courage, bravery, tenacity, and love has taught me more than I could ever express. Thank you for sharing your experience and journey with me. YOU, Ben are an AMAZING example of Christ and I feel so lucky to be your Mom. 

I'm sure you are a ball of emotions too, but I really hope 1 of them is excitement to see everyone who loves and has missed you. My phone has BLOWN UP ALL DAY with family and friends who are SOOO ANXIOUS to see you and spend time with you! It warms my heart Ben to know how loved you are! The people of California love you, the people you have served with and everyone back home. You should be so proud of the job you have done serving the Lord these past years. 

Enjoy this last day/night. Soak it all in sweetheart . You are AMAZING and I am so excited to spend the days with you hearing ALL about your incredible journey in the mission field. 

"Well done thou good and faithful servant"

LOVE MOM️

QUESTION:

#1- What would you like to do tomorrow? Go grab a bite? Have people over here? 

Oh my gosh, Mom, I can't begin to express how many emotions I have right now. Yes, I am excited to see you guys! It is also super hard to leave the people I have come to love over these 2 years. I fill complete and know I accomplished what God expected of me. Thank you for your encouragement and support throughout these 2 years!

The members have been so kind to me. It is really hard to leave this Chinese group.

I have been crying ALL DAY!! Happy tears, nervous tears....I can almost feel that hug! 

Answer: Probs go get some food is fine, I doubt I will eat anything until I get home. I did have Duck Neck, so if we could avoid that, that would be great.

We Are Going Out With A Bang

大家好！我快死了... 

Hello everyone! 

It is true... I am in the last week of my mission, sadly. I have truly come to love these people with all of my heart. I have come to love God's Chinese children I since I have been here on my mission and it's hard to say goodbye!! 

HOWEVER!! We are not going out without a bang! We have many miracles lined up for this upcoming week. The Lord still continues to prepare his people to receive the Gospel even when his missionaries only have one week left. Hahaha.

We have 4 baptisms this Sunday for 4 different individuals. They all have their unique stories and I have been so grateful to play small parts and their conversion. I don't have a lot of time to talk about all of them. But I will post about them later on. 

Shannon Yang a convert of mine from about a year ago. Will be going through the temple this weekend to get her endowments out. I'm so excited about this very eventful week. I get to go to the temple twice and have 4 baptisms! I could not think of a better way to finish my mission. I love this work and I am so excited to see all of you next week. I'm not sure if I will send out a group email next week. But that doesn't really matter because I'll see you all in person!

我爱你们！ I love all of you see you soon!

A Little Extra from Ben to Us:

Guys, I have never had such a large mix Of emotions in my entire life! I have gotten told about a million times this week I am basically dead haha. We had our outgoing testimonies at Multi-Zones and I cried my eyes out haha. I have only cried one other time in my whole mission. But it was about to let it out in front of 55 missionaries haha. I have come to love these people with all of my heart! I can not express the gratitude and the true love I have for these people! 

Now let me take a moment to talk about how lit last week was and how lit this week will be. 

We currently have 4 people bring baptized on our last Sunday! Talk about going out with a bang! Every one of these people have amazing stories and were found in different ways. I could not think of a better way to go home than that!!!

We also have the pleasure of getting to go with Shanon to the temple on Saturday to get out her Endowments!!! Man this last week is amazing. God is sooo good. Let me give you a rundown of some of these lessons and how everyone is doing. We are sooooo busy right now. 

First off Sunny: 

We taught her the remainder of the commandments this week and it went great! She had been reading every day in China and brought us all back books from Beijing and gave them to us as gifts! She had her baptismal interview on Sunday and is good to go! She asked me immediately after to baptize her on Sunday! Her friend told me while she was in her interview that I was her favorite haha. She said I had played a very major role in her conversion! Aka God played a major role haha. We are excited for her this Sunday! 

2nd:

Rosie is another one getting baptized on Sunday. We finished all the lessons with her and she is good to go! She came over to dinner with us at Shanons home this weekend! She has been amazing through the whole teaching process. Very little concerns and in fact referred herself! 

3rd. Mr. Wang

We literally found this family last week but they are so ready!!! They leave back to China right after we go home. They would be baptized together except she just gave birth last week which was, in fact, a C-section. However, they came has a whole family to church! Mr. Wang will be baptized on Sunday!

4th

Michelle is someone we are teaching all the way in Palm Springs which is about `. 5 hours from our home... However, she is amazing and will be baptized out there on Sunday. Her baptism is at 1:30 and the rest are that night at 7:00. She flew through the lessons in about 2 weeks. Elder Lai and I have been the only ones that taught her through the whole process. She said she is so excited and we are too! 

Anyways as you can see the miracles are never ending. I still haven't fully registered the fact I am going home. This just seems like my life haha. I love this work and I am sooo excited to see you. But my heart is truly with the Chinese people I have served for these last 2 years. Love you both soooooooo much! See you next week. 

Come Unto Me And Be Baptized In My Name

The Work Never Stops

Hello everyone! 

I have very little time and I apologize this weekly will be a little lame.

A few things to know:

The work is on fire right now. We are currently a 4 man companionship which has been quite the trial. But has been very fruitful and we have many many new people this week. 

We are teaching so many amazing people right now. We are planning to have 4 baptisms on Nov 18th which is coming up soon. These 4 people are doing amazing and truly could hit their goals. We have a very busy week ahead of us. We hope to have them already by that date. 

Sunny is doing soooooo amazing, she is in China right now but stays in contact with us. She said she still read the BOM every day. She is even reading it with her parents who love it!! Huge miracles, we are excited for her and know she is going to hit her date.

I would talk about all the other people but we have so little time! I am so excited to work hard these last 2 weeks. Elder Crowther and I refuse to go out without a bang! We want to do some amazing things this past 2 weeks. We know there are many amazing things on the way.

We had a Stake Conference this weekend and had a member of the 70 come visit. He is a great guy and we took a picture with him after.

LOVE THE WORK AND I LOVE ALL OF YOU! 

Elder Nelson 孙长老

A little extra from Ben's recording:

For some reason my cute son cannot keep track of his recorder, haha Thank heavens for Elder Crowther having one that Ben could borrow. 😀

Sunny is still on date for Nov. 18, which the boys are excited about. She went to China for a minute and told the boys that she went "clubbing" and drank a bit while she was out. Uh-Oh. But...she felt so guilty and in her words, "prayed deeply" for forgiveness and is back on track. One thing about her story that is cool is that when she went home, she started reading the BOM with her parents and they LOVED it. They expressed that is brought them peace. So who knows where that will lead, but hopefully she can continue to share her feelings for her Savior and this gospel. 

They met with Pius again and he has fallen back a little, but the boys LOVE him and they have gained hopefully a lifelong friend.

Rosie is doing really well and is on date for the 18th as well. Ben is pretty excited for these 2 potential baptisms, right before he goes home. 

Ben and Elder Crowther got a random call from someone that lives in Palms Springs who has a friend that is extremely interested in the gospel. The boys went out to see her and found that she is "on fire". They put her on date mid-December and she said, "Wait! aren't you going home soon? I want to be baptized before you go." Sooo, they put her on date for the 18th as well! 3 BAPTISMS FOR THE 18TH, the boys last Sunday!! They are meeting with her 3 times a week and working really hard to see if she can make that date. 

The Wong family is next. The wife just had an emergency C-section and there were complications with the baby who had to stay in the hospital. They do not have insurance so they were paying EVERYTHING out of pocket, which was getting too hard for them. Needless to say with LOTS of prayers, the baby was able to come home! YAY! The husband wants to be baptized ASAP, so the boys put them on date for the 18th as well! WHAT!! This is so CRAZY and EXCITING for them and these investigators! 

Ben will be giving his final testimony😢 this upcoming week and Elder Crowther and Ben were picked to teach one last training on baptisms and how to get people from point A to point B. What an honor to teach one last lesson to all the Elders. 

They had the privilege of having Elder Joaquin Costa of the 70 come and visit and speak to them for Stake Conference. Ben said he is a really great guy and they were able to talk to him for a bit. 

Ben's body "hates him right now" as he puts it, but as he says, "it will NOT stop me from finding the Elect". He is such a great example to me of perseverance and enduring to the end. Hopefully, the Lord will continue to bless him and Elder Crowther so they can Finish Strong these last few weeks! 

Pie To The Face

万圣节 快乐!!

This week has been quite the roller coaster of excitement out here in the amazing California Riverside Mission! 

Here is a quick Recap of the week:

First off we met with Sunny again! WOOWOW she is so amazing, she blows me away every lesson. She has been praying and reading very diligently, her faith has been growing immensely! We taught her the Word of Wisdom and were on that topic for a hot minute. She said this will be a major trial for me, but I trust in God. She has been doing amazing and we plan to move her baptism to an earlier date! We believe she will be baptized in the next 2 weeks! WHOOT WHOOT! 

Second, we met with my good friend Pius. After he showed us his 30-year-old rock collection and a small sermon on each rock. We were able to teach him about the Word of Wisdom also. He is smoking about 20 cigarettes a day... So it will be quite an adventure for him. But he loves God and knows our church is true. I have faith he will be able to accomplish his goal! Please pray for him.

We are also working with Rosie. She is so fun and is also eating up the lessons! We met with her on Tuesday and put her on date for Nov 18th to be baptized. She has also been praying and reading every day! She came to our Trunk or Treat party and had a blast throwing cupcakes at my face! 

Lastly, as I hinted at above we had out Ward Halloween party! It was CRAZY! We had soooo many Chinese people there. Majority of them I had no idea who they were. We were all over the place meeting them and getting contact information ;). We played a game where you stick your face through a hole in a tarp then everyone lines up to through cupcakes at your face! Doesn't it sound sooo fun? When we missionaries had to stick our faces through everyone got in line.... We had all of these Chinese people a lot from our English class ecstatic to nail us! I will drop a video down below of me getting coated in whip cream! It was quite the event.

Elder Johnson is heading to Taiwan tomorrow, finally! Therefore we will be having a 4 man companionship... we will be working two areas at once and constantly rotating companions. It should be quite interesting.

JUST KNOW the work is going great. God is good.

Love all of you! 

Halloween Party 

Ben's Email to us (with a little extra😊)

Again I have no clue where my recorder is... However, time is approaching that you will see me in person! This week had some amazing miracles!

We started teaching a woman by the name of Larina. She is from Taiwan and was very interested in our message. Everything we taught stuck with her and she has been praying every day. She looks like she has a lot of potential to be baptized

We were also able to teach Sunny again this week. We taught her the Word of Wisdom and that was fun! We went back in forth for quite a while on why it was necessary. She LOVES coffee and wasn't too excited to give it up. Also that she loves to go drink with friends. However, she is very humble and was willing to try and has kept it all week! Until she drank on Saturday... However, we are going to continue to help her! 

We met with Pius and also taught the WOW. He is smoking 20 Cigarettes a day... So that one is going to be a process! Please pray for him to have the strength to overcome it. 

We met with Rosie and put her on Date for Nov 18th. She is also really solid and willing to try! She can go to church on Sunday and our ward Halloween party. We hope she will hit that date. Since it is my last Sunday. 

Lastly, we had the Ward Halloween party. It was awesome! We had like 55 Chinese peeps come to it. More than half were non-members. We had a game where we put our face into a tarp and people through cupcakes at us... I had many people nail me right in the face. Everyone was sooo excited to nail the missionaries. We had like all the Chinese people line up to get us haha. A fun activity and we saw lots of success because of it. 

All is going well out here! Time is flying. Elder Johnson is heading to Taiwan today... So we are going to have a 4 man companionship. Which should be interesting. 

LOVE you guys! 

A little side note: We got a call from the Mission President telling us that Benjamin ended up in the hospital with "inflamed intestines" that had him buckled over for quite some time. I'm sure you can imagine that I AM FREAKING OUT, but we have been reassured that he is doing great and ready to get out and work again! 

The Home Stretch

Continuous Flow Of  Miracles 

Hello EVERYONE! 

These weeks are flying by and I am FREAKING OUT! Actually, I am currently in heavy denial of the fact that I am going home soon. Nothing has hit me hard enough yet to make me feel like I am going home soon! Luckily there is still plenty of time left! 

A thought shared to us by a member in our Stake Presidency "Christ performed the majority of his work in the last part of his life. If he had given up on the home stretch we would not have most of his important teachings. More importantly, we wouldn't have the Atonement which changes all of us. Like Jesus Christ, God can use you to do his most mighty miracles in this last part of your mission". 

That has fired me to keep working to the end. Even though missionary work never ends ;). We have seen so soo sooo many miracles as of a recent I can't even begin to cover all of them. I am so grateful to have such amazing companions who love doing the work by my side! 

One major miracle I would like to focus on this week was MAGGIE'S BAPTISM! Maggie was baptized this Sunday and it was such a special event. Maggie has progressed extremely fast through the lessons and ate everything up! She had almost fully read the Book of Mormon by the date of her Baptism and was proclaiming its truthfulness to all. The Spirit was so strong at her baptism and she bore such amazing testimony. She shared the following scripture to express the feelings of her baptism: Moroni 8:25-26

"And the first fruits of repentance is baptism; and baptism cometh by faith unto the fulfilling the commandments, and the fulfilling the commandments bringeth remission of sins;
and the remission of sins bringeth meekness, and lowliness of heart; and because of meekness and lowliness of heart cometh the visitation of the Holy Ghost, which Comforter filleth with hope and perfect love, which love endureth by diligence unto prayer, until the end shall come, when all the saints shall dwell with God."

She truly is an amazing miracle. I am so grateful to have played such a small part in her conversion process. 

Just know that the work is on fire right now and we are seeing so many mighty miracles. We are working with many people who are going to be baptized very soon! Elder Crowther and I hope to have 2 more baptisms before we head home! 

I love all of you, have a great week! 

Elder Nelson 孙长老

Maggies Baptism

Elder Wille's (my old comp) and his fam came to visit us.

Ben's Email to us (with added details😉)

First off I can not find my recorder anywhere.... I am SOOOOO sorry! However, you will see me in person in like 4 weeks so it will all work out in the end.

However, this week was full of many mannnny miracles! 

We taught some amazing lessons this week and I would like to focus on the highlights. Just to let you know we are staying really busy and the Lord has blessed us immensely as of recent and I could not be any more grateful! 

First highlight: Sunny

We were able to teach her again this week! WOWOOW she is on fire! She has been reading every day and praying she LOVES the Book of Mormon. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and she just ate it up! She was so in tune with the spirit it was tripping me out! We taught at one of our less actives homes and their kids are nuts!! Like they run around screaming and smashing their heads on anything they can find! So we are trying to teach her during all of that craziness however she stayed dead focused! We invited her to baptism and she took a date no problem! We plan for her baptism on Nov 18th ( Our last Sunday)! She came to church on Sunday and LOVED IT! They had the primary program and she was tearing up through the whole thing! We are so blessed to have the opportunity to teach her! 

Second: Pius

We were able to teach a good friend of mine named Pius again! I met with him about 6 months ago and he left for Taiwan forever. We had lost contact during the process and were really sad. We got in contact with him last week and were able to meet with him! He was amazing, he was so humble and ate everything up. He also took a baptismal date for Nov 18th and ran over to his calendar to write down the event! Another huge miracle. We pray that this time around we will be able to help him into the Waters of Baptism! 

This obvs was the icing on the cake this week. Maggie was found worthy for baptism and was baptized on Sunday at 7:30! It was such a spiritual baptism. She has been on fire through the whole teaching process. She had almost fully read the BOM and has always been a spiritual Giant! She bore her testimony at her baptism and it was so special she said the following:

"To describe how I feel about my baptism today I would like to quote a scripture from Moroni:
 "And the first fruits of repentance is baptism; and baptism cometh by faith unto the fulfilling the commandments; and the fulfilling the commandments bringeth remission of sins; and the remission of sins bringeth meekness and lowliness of heart; and because meekness and lowliness of heart cometh the visitation of the Holy Ghost, which Comforter filleth with hope and perfect love, which love endureth by diligence unto prayer, until the end shall come, when all the saints shall dwell with God."

It was so amazing to see how far she has come in so little time. We are grateful for the opportunity to help her back on her path to her Heavenly Father. God is Good and we hope to continue to help others come back home.

We are so busy right now and are working with so many amazing people! Too many to talk about. Just know we are seeing miracles daily and the Lord is always blessing us! Love you guys!

Elder Nelson 孙长老

God's Work Our Hands

The Miracles Just Keep Coming

Hello everyone! We have been blessed immensely as of recent and I am so grateful! 

Here are a few of the highlights for this week:

First off we were able to meet with Jo again (an older woman from Taiwan). She had been reading and came prepared with a lot of questions. We started with a prayer and right after the prayer, she started crying! Like a lot! We were kind of thrown off but began to start explaining the spirit and how it works. We helped her realize the feelings she was having and it ended up being an amazing lesson! We taught the Plan of Salvation and answered so many of her questions. She came to church on Sunday and had a great experience, we are excited about her future.

ANOTHER HUGE MIRACLE! We got a random call from a Chinese member who had just moved to our area. She told us she had a friend who was really interested in our message! We went over the next day and met Sunny. Sunny had been to our church a few times about 4 years ago. She had many questions and wanted to find God's true church. We had an amazing lesson and she pounded us with questions. She wanted to know everything NOW! She has such a large desire to grow her relationship with God. She came to church and loved it! She has a very sarcastic personality like me so we get along very well haha! 

We have been very very busy with all the people we are teaching. We have seen much success as of recent. We are so grateful to the Lord for blessing us so much. The last person I really want to focus on is Maggie. Maggie is going to be baptized this upcoming Sunday!! Again another miracle. We met with her and she has read the majority of the Book of Mormon, she knows its true and this is God's true church. She has been on fire and loves everything about the church. She plans to head back to China in January and we know she will be a huge part of helping the work in China! 

I am so grateful for this time I have to serve my, Lord. It is going by so fast and I can't believe I only have 5 weeks left... However, we are going to continue to see many miracles in these last few weeks.

God is Good.

Also, I forgot to mention we had a 70 come to visit our mission by the name of Elder Nielson. It was so amazing, he taught me so much about the importance of finding and the miracles we can all see. I am so grateful for the many tender mercies I have seen as a missionary! 

Elder Nelson 孙长老

We went and hiked Graffiti Waterfall...it was super sweet 

Elder Crowther, Elder Simpson, Ben

So Many To Teach- So Little Time

The Last Transfer...

I have officially entered into my last 6 weeks in California.

I do not want to leave this place, I love the Chinese people and want to continue to find the prepared. The Lord has blessed me with Charity for these people and I could stay with them forever. 

This week was full of many MIGHTY miracles! 

We taught many new friends this week and most of them accepted dates for baptism! The Lord has truly blessed us tenfold as of recent. Elder Crowther and I are going to make goals to see miracles this last transfer. Also, hopefully to get rid of this muffin top I have acquired haha. 

The big miracle this week was Jacob. Jacob was baptized on Wednesday and what an amazing experience that was! He only had 10 days here in America and we met with him everyday!!! He accepted the Gospel at such a fast rate. The Lord had truly been preparing him for many years all for this moment. Jacob his a huge example of endurance and diligence. He is very humble and has a large desire to come unto Christ. I am so grateful to have played a small role in his conversion. He took us out for lunch the following day before he left. He thanked us for all we did and said our goodbyes. It's hard to send them back to China, but I have faith the Lord will guide them. He promised he would bring his friends and family unto the Gospel! We are blessed to have been able to teach him and plan to have more baptisms coming up soon! 

We also had the pleasure of watching General Conference this weekend and WOWOWOW! I love General Conference. It is always spiritually uplifting and I always receive revelation for me and others. I always bring questions that I have been pondering. I find it amazing that EVERYTIME they are answered. I know these men are called of God, I am grateful that his church is still being guided today.

I want everyone to know these last 6 weeks will be full of miracles. SO BE PREPARED! I know God lives and I am grateful to represent him.

Elder Nelson 孙长老

18 people! 18 people are how many these boys are working with at once and they are loving it! One of them is named Hobart. He is 18 yrs old and has a lot of questions, but is very skeptical of the world. He told Ben that he just wants to get rid of his sins, so he is willing to work at it. 
Leon and Jenny are a couple that is on FIRE and doing so good with the lessons. They just want to do what is best for their family and bring them to the Celestial Kingdom. 
Maggie in one of their next investigators and ...is their TOP PRIORITY right now. Maggie is "SUPER PREGNANT" as Ben says and they are trying to get her baptized before she gives birth. LOL 😂
Side note: Ben is fighting with a fly while he is doing his recording, which is hilarious because he is losing his patience and ready to freak out! Apparently, he is recording next to a cow farm and so they are all over. So funny to hear him try to give a report while being in a Mortal Combat Fight with the fly. 
Last week as they were teaching Maggie a younger couple came in named Doris and Robert. They have only been in America for a few days and came in for English Class. They were a little early and so Maggie invited them to sit and learn the lessons with her while they waited for it to start. Ben was teaching about The Plan of Salvation and it worked out perfectly for all of them. 
Ben went on exchanges this week with Elder Stoley and they ended up teaching a woman named Joe. As they were teaching her she "went hard in the paint" as Ben says and just rapid fired questions about everything. She is a fireball and Ben is excited to see how it all ends up. 
Ben and Elder Crowther had dinner with the Browns who found out that they only have 6 more weeks left and so she was grilling them about wanting them to meet her nieces and confessed that she had already sent her pictures. LOL 
It freaks Ben out a little to even think like that, which is good because these 2 boys are determined to make these last 6 weeks count the most! I can't wait to hear about all they have accomplished! 

Elder Briggs Going Home

Jacob's Baptism and Lunch @ Little Buddha

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs Package

Lunch with Elder Crowther

God Is Good

God Is On The Move

Man oh MANN! What a week we had!

We were able to put 7 people on date for baptism this week and found 8 new people to teach this week. The Lord has been blessing us as we have stayed diligent. We met so many prepared people this week.

First-person we taught this week was named Jacob! Jacob is a huge miracle. He found us on WeChat and asked if he could be baptized when he came to America. However, he only has 10 days... which is a lot shorter than it normally takes to be baptized. We began meeting with him every day to help him be ready. He has been absorbing everything like a sponge and excelling very quick. We think he will hit his goal of baptism for this Thursday! A huge miracle that came from out of nowhere. We are so excited for him and the diligence he has put in to learn. He has definitely been prepared by the Lord.

Another amazing family we met with this week go by the name of Jimmy and Nancy. We met Jimmy outside really late at night shirtless smoking. He was EXTREMELY interested and wants to find a Christian church. We met with them on Friday and they ate up everything we taught. They took baptismal dates with no hesitation and came to church on Sunday! GOD IS GOOD! They look very solid and are meeting again with us this week.

In conclusion, we are meeting with a ton of peeps right now. Too many to write about all of them which would also be a lot for you guys to read! Just know that we are seeing many miracles! 

Also, the fact I go home next month is FREAKING ME OUT! But I am working to the end, that is for sure! 

Love all of you have a great week! 

Sorry no pictures this week, WE WERE SWAMPED ALL WEEK! 

Elder Nelson 孙长老

This week Ben talked more about Joanna (the woman who was baptised in the bathtub). She wanted the Elders to go with her to Ashley Furniture to translate a problem she was having with a purchase. She wanted to return some furniture 30 days later and the manager was not having it.  Needless to say, they spent time translating and negotiating with Ashley Furniture on her behalf. It was a little out of the norm, but nice to do something a little different. LOL

The boys ended up having a crowd of people and employees around them wanting to hear them speak Chinese. Most of them could not believe they spoke the language. Haha

Ben is now the "Dead Missionary" which is what you are called when you are almost done with your mission. LOL Apparently all the other missionaries start to make fun of you for being the "OLD" one. 😁 He is struggling between excited to come home and NOT wanting to be done. Of course we are thrilled to see our son, but we know how much his mission means to him and all that he is learning. I know the Lord is blessing him and will help him work hard through this last stretch. Ben is right...GOD IS GOOD! ♥