Conference Weekend

There are two very nice things about the weekend of General Conference. First, the opportunity to listen to prophets, seers, and revelators. The second being able to sleep in from your usual 9:00 am church time. That second one may be a little selfish. Which is against what was spoken of this weekend. Great. It hasn't been a day and I'm already having troubles. I guess that's what repentance is for.

The talks this year were all very good. I found it interesting that Elder Jeffery R. Holland led off the conference. As an established pulpit-pounder he set a tone of conviction and earnestness that really ran through the whole conference. I don't know if it's just been recent events calling for definitive statements from the church, or just the sense of urgency with the call to hasten the work but the talks this conference all seemed very direct and solid. Maybe it was me. (I'm pretty sure it was me). I found the range of topics wonderful. They were encouraging, uplifting, faith building, and instructive. I was particularly touched by Elder Carlos H. Amado's talk. I often listen to talks with the questions, "What am I to do?" in the back of my mind. With talks like Elder Holland's, President Uchtdorf's, or Elder Bednar's it's pretty easy to learn what needs to be done. While taking notes on Elder Amado's, however, I couldn't identify what it was I was to do. I realized that his talk was his testimony - my task was to listen and believe. He was truly prophetic in his talk.

In addition to the wonderful talks and counsel given, it was most enjoyable to spend some time with family. Angel and I invited my cousin down to join us for the day and then I returned to Logan with him to attended the Priesthood session with his brother and our grandfather. We enjoyed talking books between sessions and each got some recommendations from each other. He's a big Audible.com user and has recently finished some large novels. Kanga and Tigger did pretty well considering their ages. As I thought about it, Angel and I need to come up with some good activities for them to do during conference to help them stay interested. They actually listened pretty well for many of the talks, but invariably ended up making enough noise it was hard for anybody to listen. Again, the key word is "considering," but they did well.

I need to remember to keep up on the conference talks. Rereading them is important. I am very grateful to have a prophet on the Earth who speaks and guides us. I've have never been lead astray by words spoken in conference. I need to keep up on them so as to make sure I don't go astray without them.