Operation: Elder Benjamin David Nelson (Part 7) AKA The Power of The Priesthood!

I went camping in Caliente with the Priest Quorum in my ward this last week. We left early Thursday morning and returned Saturday afternoon. It was such a cool camp! It wasn't an ordinary camp. It was meant to be a camp where we A)felt the Spirit and B)did some soul-searching.

Well, I had a lot of sweet experiences, and I won't share them all with everyone. But there is one special experience that I want to share.

Before going to camp, I really felt like I needed to know how to give someone a blessing. It made sense to me; since I was going to camp, maybe something was going to happen where I needed to give one of my old quorum members a blessing.

Well, we got to camp Thursday, and I was spending time with Timmy and our friends Levi and Skyler. We had a lot of fun doing some mountain climbing and some other random stuff. (There was even a game of badminton or two!) I even shot a gun for the first time, which was super cool!

Thursday night rolls around, and it is time for sleep. Timmy, Skyler, Levi, and I were settling down in our tent when I had the great idea to read them some of my old journal entries. Not a good idea! They laughed at some of the stuff I wrote and kind of made fun of me, and I--the fool that I am-- took great offense to it. Even to the point where I jumped out of my sleeping bag and started beating up my friend Levi! Haha.

My first thought: "The Spirit is definitely not with me right now." And so I pulled out a Mission Prep book of mine and started to read it. I could feel the Spirit again, and I fell asleep feeling pretty good.

I'm not sure how long I was asleep, but I woke up to a voice saying, "Ben! Wake up!" I sat up ASAP and looked around the tent. Timmy wasn't in the tent! And so I opened up the tent and I found Timmy outside our tent--bent over, breathing heavily.

Timmy explained to me that he felt very sick and that he felt like he was going to puke. I sat there and watched him for about two minutes, asking him questions about how he was feeling every couple of seconds. My last question was, "Do you think you can come into the tent for a few minutes?"

Timmy took a few deep breaths and then replied, "I think so. Why?" I told him that I could give him a Priesthood Blessing. He questioned whether I was allowed to do that or not, and I told him that I could give him a blessing of comfort like my Dad did for me when I hurt my back a couple of weeks ago.

And so Timmy and I got into the tent, and I gave him a blessing. Immediately after I was done giving him the blessing, he closed up the tent, laid down, and fell right back to sleep. It was easily one of the greatest experiences of my life, and I am glad I made sure that I had the Spirit with me before falling asleep that night. Because if there is anything that I learned at camp...it was definitely the lesson that the Spirit can definitely lead and guide us if we are living our life in a way where we can hear the still, small voice!!

Again, it was a sweet experiences! Today I was set apart as a ward missionary, and that, too, was a great experience. It's cool to know that I will be a part-time missionary--working with the missionaries in my ward--until I depart in November! I love it.

But best of all...I figured out that I will most likely be able to go through the temple on August 8! I just need to call the temple on August 4 when they re-open. I look forward to going through the temple for the first time and then re-visiting often before I depart in November! :)