2021-08-21 Sister Ella Xin Qiu Chong Endowment at the Philadelphia Temple

 2021-08-21 Sister Ella Xin Qiu Chong received her own endowment at the Philadelphia Temple. It was a gorgeous summer day. Sister Chong was accompanied by President and Sister Huang. The following are the words from Sister Chong's own testimony:

 归主为圣

在费城圣殿的塔楼上，非常清楚的写着：

HOLINESS TO THE LORD THE HOUSE OF THE LORD

归主为圣

主的屋宇

2021年8月21日，是我人生中最重要的时刻。因为我要在耶和华的殿，接受个人的恩道门教儀。神只允許我們在特別的地方才得以接受，那就是聖殿。聖殿確實是主的屋宇——神聖之地，遠勝世界其他任何地方。在聖殿裡，我會更加了解救恩計劃，以及如何跟隨基督完美的榜樣。在聖殿中，我可以獲得神最偉大的祝福。在聖殿裡，除了接受個人的聖殿教儀以外，還可以代替過世前沒有機會接受教儀的祖先和其他人接受教儀。聖殿恩道門是知識和能力的特別恩賜，神將此賜給已經準備好接受的人。为了这一天的到来，我一直努力加努力，使自己得以配称，拿到圣殿推荐书。

第一次来到圣殿，我期盼已久的心久久无法平静。曾几何时，为什么感受不到天父的爱？日子过得辛苦而又千篇一律？

家庭：致全世界文告【全人類，不論男女，都是照著神的形像所造，每個人都是天上父母所心愛的靈體兒女，因為這樣，每個人皆有神聖的特性及目標。】神是非常爱我们每一位儿女，祂的幸福计划终而达成神圣目标：超越死亡，获得永生。当我进入圣殿的那一刻，天父的爱充满了整个生命，圣灵注入我心。在主的屋宇中，每一个细小的声音都强烈的震撼着我。我将带着“破碎的心和痛悔的灵魂”站在那里，思考这样问题：我當做甚麼事才可以承受永生？C. S.路易斯在他一篇特別令人難忘的散文中，想像主對我們說出類似這樣的話：「我不要……你的時間……〔或〕你的金錢……〔或〕你的工作，我要的〔就是〕你。〔事實上，我要你把〕仍是自然人的整個自己交給〔我〕。……〔然後〕我會給你一個全新的自己。事實上，我會把我自己給你：我的……意念將成為〔你的意念〕”心灵终于被打开，

歸向救主，全心全意地前來跟从他。遵守诫命，坚定信念，持守到底。

[Photo]

事隔两个月之后，我再次来到费城圣殿。圣灵一直陪伴着我，度过世间最幸福美好的时光。去圣殿，与神最接近。神圣而圣洁，幸福而圆满。以上的分享是奉耶稣基督的名，阿门！

Read More

Moving Smith Family

On a crisp autumn day, 11 people converged on the 11th floor apartment home of Drew and Jenny Smith to help them load their moving truck. With dollies and carts and sheer muscle, the loading took a little over two hours. At their new townhouse in NE DC, the unloading took about an hour. Afterwards, the Smith's provided pizza, drinks, salad, and dessert to the volunteers. Congratulations to the Smith's on their new home!

Read More

2021/9/25 慶中秋樂團圓

 蒙哥馬利中文分會在9/25/2021舉辦慶中秋樂團圓的烤肉活動，地點在景色秀麗的Black Hill 郡立公園。經過一年多來新冠疫情的摧殘，猛然間意識到，團圓就是最大的幸福，久別重逢的弟兄姊妹們相互問安關懷，彼此暢快地談天說笑，這是一個家，一個溫暖的家，一個團圓的家。

李亭慧

Read More

Aquatic Gardens

On Saturday July 17, we gathered together the front of chapel and carpooled to the Kenilworth Aquatic Garden. Five sisters and three children attended. We are amazed by the beauty of the water lilies and Lotus. We walked around the garden and took beautiful pictures. It was a hot day and after an hour or so we left to return home.

Read More

Family History Fireside

On the last Sunday evening in May 2021, the Branch Presidency invited Jared Lin, a genealogy enthusiast and friend of the Branch, to present his experiences at the Branch Family History Fireside. Dan Bendall, our Branch Temple and Family History Leader conducted the fireside, with Adam Fugal translating. The virtual fireside on Zoom began with an opening prayer by Debbie Bendall.

Jared introduced FamilySearch with its advantages and challenges. FamilySearch is a crucial tool in creating family trees, establishing family history records, and preparing records for temple ordinances. It is based on cloud storage and allows from all over the world to cooperate in building a family tree, thus saving time and effort, and allowing us to see the results easily. However, it is an open platform like Wikipedia and is accessible by everyone, thus allowing more errors to occur.

Jared demonstrated some important and unique features of the Chinese Familysearch.org site, including the Family tree functions, various Search methods, creation of Memories, fun family history activities, and preparing records for temple work. He showed some personal examples in establishing a family tree map and getting to know his ancestors. Then Jared turned some time to his wife, Ruth Lin, to share an experience she had in finding an ancestor.  The closing prayer was offered by Ben Tsai.

Brother Lin invited his whole family to attend this special fireside. To them, it was most meaningful, because they are part of Jared's family history. In total, over 30 people attended the virtual fireside, including participants from Maryland, Virginia, Fiji, and Taiwan.  We thank Jared for taking the time to prepare the slides and to show us the neat things he has accomplished so far in his family history. Thank you for sharing with us the joy of genealogy work.

Read More