Photos recent baptism

Elder Schellenberg  interesting meal

Elder Schellenberg, ? and Beverly-newest member-Elder Smith aa wonderful Baptism

All is Well, no its great

Well. I know it has been a long, long time since I have written an
email to all of you...for that I apologize. However, the past however
long time has been amazing. Missions are truly so, so wonderful.

In other news....I am being transferred! Which is big news for being
in this area for ten months now...in basically the same Ward. It is
exciting. I should be returning to Charlottesville after a few
transfer...this is to get a different experience, learn some things.
Stuff like that. But right now I don't know where I will be going,
but I will be training! That is also quite exciting, so most likely I
will end up going to a brand new place, with a brand new companion. I
guess new is good! So we will see how that goes. It will all be good
though.

Also, last Saturday(20th) a friend we had been teaching for three
weeks was baptized! Her name is Beverly, and is super faithful. We
invited her to stop drinking coffee and tea, and she hasn't drank any
since(well she was confused one time we came over she asked us about
something she was drinking, found out it had tea in it, so she dumped
it down the drain. It was really awesome).

So that is how things have been recently, they have been great! I hope
all is going well for you keep improving, loving
others, and serving as described in D&C 4(which typically is focused
towards missionaries, but the principles apply everywhere!) I know
that doing so brings the Spirit to our lives, and allows us to have so
much joy during hard times.
Love
Elder Smith
Beverly's baptism

Excited to see the Changes in people as they come to know Christ

Well, happy 11th month mark. It was a good day for the 11th month. The morning went well, then in the afternoon I know something came up…I don’t know what it was…but something. If I remember I will write it down again. Then we went and met with GuanYunFei…and it was alright. I think we will see if we will continue to meet with her. After that we drove out to Reasford road with our bikes. Biked around there a little bit. Talked to a really nice guy named Eric, not ready right now but hopefully will be ready later to receive the Gospel! Then we talked with an Eric…who was super, super nice(and this is bad but by his first appearance I wouldn’t of thought that it would go that way) but he was really nice and we had a good conversation with him. Then he agreed that we could come back next week!(after being surprised, confused, and a little amused about how we ride bikes around and what we do and stuff). The we went over to the Quillon’s for dinner…(well before that I ran off the end of a cul de sac because the brakes on my bike don’t work very well. SO then Elder Schellenberg messed with them, thought he solved the problem…but it was basically the same, and now the handle is just harder to pull…but oh well.) the Quillon’s was good. They had really good tasting bread, it was a little awkward…however most dinner’s with members is awkward for me…oh well…then we had dessert which was..interesting. They had lemon sugar cookie ice cream..that was super super tasty, as well as Cranberry orange cookies or lemon cookies…those were less tasty. Then we shared a thought, after admiring their giant copy of the Book of Mormon. As well their mini library. It was good, shared the story in Alma 20, as well a bit about Sammy’s experience right now. It was good, I guess Sister Quillon is also a convert so she could relate a bit to that. Then we left, and we left on time! That was cool. The Quillon’s were a big help with that. Then we went and did some Chinese finding around Forest Lakes, ran into a Korean member with the last name of Hong…other than that found three other Chinese houses…but weren’t able to talk with any of them. Also YangliJing canceled…oh well. It was an interesting night.

Went to Beverly with Brother Johnson(Troy) and his nephew Hadyen, who is visiting him. It was really, really good. Wow, was it amazing. So this past little bit we have been worried about her son Justin, who isn’t interested in reading scriptures with us, nor talking to us….and so we have been praying about that a lot how to get things worked out. So after the lesson, Brother Johnson brought up the idea of taking Justin to Boy Scouts…and that is when the Spirit really testified to me the importance we need to pay to Justin more. It was a very special moment. I am really really grateful for Brother Johnson being there, he also suggested for her listen to conference which is great as well. He is super awesome. After that Beverly said a really, really sincere prayer. After we left, there were many miracles that we can feel, however a really awesome one is that Brother Johnson’s nephew Hayden is considering the idea of a mission…and our lesson tonight with Beverly…well it was probably one of the most ideal lessons to encourage that. Yeah, that was great. I always love going out with Brother Johnson.

Sunday August 7, 2016
Well the morning was really good. We went to church, and…wait for it…Beverly bore her testimony!!!! She was the second one too!...wow she is super, super amazing. The rest of church went well. We were able to have Gospel Principles with WangZheng…we basically just taught the Restoration…however it was good. Then during Priesthood Raider Mendenhall was able to be with Justin throughout Priesthood…it was really quite great. After church, we basically just went over to the Heaths for an early tasty dinner of smoked baked beans, pork, and rolls..with Sweet and condensed milk and coconut milk…wow those were both really good. They are a really cool family. Also they have a salt gun…to kill flies. Then we tried Ahykiya. Not home. Then talked with an old potential named Christian, real nice. Not too willing to do much right now. Then we met a super awesome lady named Joan (not pronounced Joan of Ark) and she is moving in a week, however, this happened to her in Pennsylvania. Which is kind of crazy we had a good conversation of God being in our lives, having faith, and joy, and being guided she was super nice and awesome to talk with. I loved it a lot, we gave her a Book of Mormon and will stop by tomorrow. After that it was a little late so we headed home.

-Elder BothBeverly&JoanMadeItAnAmazingSunday

Summer is flying by for Elder Smith

Elder Smith has been busy so has only been send his journal and is a little behind here's some of the latest news of Elder Smith in Virginia still in Charlotteville but now is doing the YSA ward and a Family ward until the students

come back to UVA

Friday July 15, 2016
Well we did weekly planning for most of the afternoon, so that was pretty simple. Then we went out with Robert for some time, we stopped by Ernest and were going to look in his area for a bit. Then it turns out we talked with his daughter Misha, who was really nice, and intersted. Actually got a card from the YSA sisters a few days before. She has a few interesting ideas, and is studying Egypt of something. However, she is really intersted and willing to look into the Book of Mormon. It was a really great lesson. Robert invited her to come hear him sing in the choir haha. He is awesome. After that we sang in the car with Robert for a bit...none of us sing super well, and not really sure if we even sing the right notes. However it was still really good. After that we went over by Inglewood drive area...tried talking with some people. We knocked on Jay's door haha, he was busy, but made us eat some watermelon first haha. Then we checked his number...and it was Liu's number...so we were really confused. We may have talked with Ahkiya a bit...don't really remember. If so her friend was there who doesn't think authority or any of that is important in any way for a church and stuff. She didn't like us very much, and I don't think Elder Schellenberg appreciated her very much. We talked with Ahkiya a bit afterwards though. It was good, other than that nothing much. It was pretty decent though.
-ElderJayLikesToForceWatermelonOnUs


July 16-Saturday
Well, service went well.(we went to Loaves and Fishes) I was a client guide this time...I don't enjoy it very much. I was scared someone would ask for more food than they can have...and it happened. Only once I think...but she squandered me for some more food...however I messed up on her applesauce as well....hopefully it will go well. Then we taught Chen, he is funny. George couldn't meet today. We were able to meet with Ernest, he is super super nice. And noticed that we aren't as pushy as the Jehovah Witnesses. Other than that nothing much. We met with Jackie at Four Seasons, rained a little bit. Then we tried to meet with Illuminee, she wasn't home...went up to Roy's neighborhood for a bit, then we were able to meet with Roy again! We met with Brett Parker one of the newer recruiting coaches or something(he is really young and from Texas) he is really cool though. We had another really really good lesson with Roy. She read 6 chapters too! It was great. Then, the Spirit gave me really good idea of how to teach. Our plan was to focus on the Plan of Salvation, but also read from the Book of Mormon. So instead we mixed them! Taught the Plan of Salvation through the vision Lehi has of the Tree of Life. Again, it was really, really great. She loved it all, the time flew by. Wow, is she ever wonderful. Also super grateful for the awesome idea the Spirit was able to give me to teach in that way. it was such a blessing. She is again excited to come to church, is getting extra sleep so she can for sure make it tomorrow. It was great. Oh one more little tidbit, we mentioned making baptism a goal...and she was totally willing to do that! We set a date for July 30th(kind of selfish looking for a baptism on my birthday, however I was corrected with that pretty quick...wait and see.) she is going back to her home country for vacation in a few weeks. So we decided on August 30th instead. However still super great news.
-Elder ManNoIdeaHowToExpressTheMiracleThatIsRoy