THE LAST MELON

Well..........Never really thought this day would come where I would be sending my last email. I thought Cotopaxi (one of Ecuador's most active volcano) would explode before this day came. But here we are! Alive and well! Even though I knew that this day would probably never come, I have been preparing this email since the first week I was here lol but nothing is coming to me... To this day I still feel so undeserving of the many blessings I have received despite my never ending weaknesses. I would definitely not recommend ending a mission to anyone. It is the worst time of your whole life. I was trying to tell my companion how I really felt but it's just something that you have to experience. Satan sure is real. A real force that hates every big or small amount of good. These weeks have been super hard to keep it together. I feel like a wreck with everything going on lol. I thought puberty and crazy hormones were suppose to end already but that sure is not the case here with Elder Reynolds. I feel somewhat the same ending as I did beginning my mission. Leaving a home and life I love and going to another country excited, scared, and nervous. Not really knowing what to expect on the other side but somewhat ready to take it on. I honestly do feel as if I am leaving my home. This crazy country and people that I have come to love is tearing my heart apart! Ending the Best 2 Years of my life--until now--is something that I can't explain in words. I love this guy who God has made me become. Coming on the mission was definitely the hardest decision of my life...With that said, I can't think of my life without the mission. It scares me to think that I almost didn't come. It scares me to think of all these people I have come to love, thinking of them still wondering, maybe searching for something they know they need but don't know what it is. It scares me that these experiences I have been able to have would have never came to pass in order to help me learn more. God is good. I am so thankful for Him putting me through the furnace of fire in these 2 years so that I am able to be ready to take on for what comes next. This mission is the hardest thing I have ever done. All the previous hardest things I have done--the college football practices, the weight of having to juggle school and work, all of it has no comparison to what a mission can offer. I have been taken to my lowest of lows and my highest of highs. Everything that I thought I couldn't do without, turns out I could go on! The mission really teaches you "a que fuente han de acudir" (to which source they have to go) for everything. The think I would say I prize the most in the mission is my personal relationship with my Heavenly Father and the trust He has given me. Something that has always hit me has been that God loves everyone, but He doesn't trust everyone. I have felt God's love more abundantly in my life in these 2 years than in any other time. It's the one of the most assuring feelings one can feel. But let me tell you, the ability to know that God trusts you is something out of this world. Letting Him know through your thoughts, actions and very being that if He needs an errand to run, He knows He can turn to you. That in my opinion is the best feeling out of them all. I have seen so many things on my mission that I will never be able to deny...come what may but the miracles I have seen here and the things I have felt I will never be able to deny the existence of a higher being or deny that I know these things are true. I still haven't seen anything with my physical eyes or felt anything with my physical touch...which I thought for sure I would be able to see or feel after serving Him for such a long time! But I am convinced that even with seeing, it still wouldn't be enough for me. I am so thankful for a God that knows me better than I do so that He can do what will be best for my good. I know I need God in every moment in my life. After 2 years of working with Him and gaining so much experience, I need Him. I need my main Man. The guy who will never fail me. I love how people can change. I love that doctrine that really people can change. What a blessing it is to see that and to also undergo that change. For those of you that knew me before the mission...yeah that guy won't be coming back next Tuesday hahaha jk. But I really just love change. Yesterday an ex Bishop got up to talk about faith and told a story about the Stake consejeros (counselors) wife and how she became a member. At the age of 14, she had been attending for about a year going on 2. She couldn't get baptized because her dad wouldn't give her permission. One day, near to her 15th birthday, she came to his house and was overly glad and said I AM GOING TO GET BAPTIZED! After a little bit more of digging into the details of how this miracle was able to happen, he found out that as a 15 year old...her only wish, all she wanted from her dad was this...the permission to be able to get baptized. She said "Papi, all I want this birthday is that I get baptized, I don't want anything else except baptism. Please." It made me reflect on what I have. I was baptized at the age of 8 and for sure took it for granted up until the time I went on a mission. All these blessings we have, absolutely everything we have as members of the church is priceless. When I heard that, I immediately felt I was hit by a train. At the age of 15 she knew what we or I had and the price and sacrifice that was to be paid. How incredible. I am so thankful for being in the truth. Even though it took me nearly 23 years to realize a little itty bitty portion of what we have, I am so glad for the patience of God in order to work until I could accept and be thankful for all of this. I am so glad for Joseph Smith and his example of not giving up. How easy it wouldn't been to deny all that had happened and been able to lead a normal life without the persecution of so many people. To not have had left his wife husband-less and kids fatherless. But no. Because he knew. He believed. And so do I! I know we are in the truth. There are so many blessings waiting for us. I know God is just waiting to bless us and may even be blessing us in ways we just don't recognize. Like I said before, I am so thankful for a God that does what He does because He knows and loves us more than we can comprehend. I know that we are in the truth. I know the Book of Mormon is the key to know if all this crazy stuff we talk about is true. And the best part is you don't have to ever wonder for yourself. We have the right and privilege to know for ourselves. I remember being so envious of everyone that got up and shared that they KNEW and when all my friends came home and sharing that they have been changed and they KNEW...I was so prideful to just judge them and roll my eyes and keep to myself knowing that no one can really know. But it is. It's real. All of it. It's unexplainable that you just have to experience by yourself. I know that there is a God and that He loves us beyond comprehension. I know that people can change through the atonement. In our lowest lows we can find peace. I love these people here in Ecuador. I love Ecuador. I am so happy to have had the opportunity to serve a mission. To have been called to serve and assigned to labor. I still remember that day more than 2 years ago when I opened up my call...the day I went to board the plane for the MTC...the day I got to the mission field...the first baptism...wow. What a ride. I love you all. Can't wait to see everyone when I get back! Thank you so much for your prayers in behalf of the missionaries. It's been a supreme privilege to have been able to be a full time missionary. I would recommend it to all. This is the life. I LOVE YOU!!
Elder Reynolds

"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for it they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them."

Ether 12:27