By This Time Next Week...

Hello Family!

Good news today about my visa. I'm going to the consulate in 45 minutes to sign the paper work and get my fingerprints taken. That means I should hopefully be in Mexico by this time next week. It was kind of a last minute thing, we got back from the Temple and went to the travel office and they told us to be ready to go in an hour. It doesn't really seem real yet, but it will be really weird going out into the real world for the first time in 11 weeks. So that is an answer to just about every prayer I've said for the past 2 weeks. I'm glad I got to stay the overtime though because we get to go to the temple almost everyday. I think out of the 14 days extra I've been here we've gone to the temple 9 or 10 times.

Conference was awesome!! I loved it so much. I feel like I felt the Spirit so much more this time than in any other Conference. I talk about this more in my letter to Melissa, but we watched it in the Gym, with 2000 other missionaries all dressed up in suit coats. There was another 2 or 300 in the overflow. On Conference weekend, there is nothing going on except Conference. It was really nice because I could focus on Conference the whole time without distractions and really try to decipher what God was trying to tell me through the prophets. I think my favorite talk was by Patrick Kearon in the Priesthood Session. I wrote about it in Melissa's letter. I also loved President Monson's Priesthood address, but it seemed to me like there was something a little different this conference for him. He seemed much more serious, and much more animated in his mannerisms and speech. When he was talking about Satan and how he operates in the Priesthood session he seemed almost angry. I think it is a warning that the war against Satan is real, and there are real casualties. We know that the war will heat up before Christ comes to finish it, so we should be on our guard and step up our game everyday...because Satan is. He also talked about how Satan lulls some into carnal security. I think before my mission I could have fallen into that category. We think to ourselves, "well, I'm going to church and sometimes I read my scriptures so I must be doing enough for God." That is a very dangerous thought. One thing I have been working on is to always have something I am working on, something I am studying and applying. I think C.S. Lewis said that "Christ does not require much of us, He requires all of us." We can't afford to hold back any part of our hearts from God, he needs us to give it everything we have. In the vision of the tree of life, Lehi points out that they went forward, "fell down," and partook of the fruit. The fruit represents eternal life and salvation and exaltation in the Kingdom of our Father. But they fell down before partaking of the fruit. To me that meant that if are to truly make it, if we really want to be exalted we must wear out our lives in the service of the One True God. We must give all our effort, time, resources and heart to the Lord and allow him to carry us the rest of the difference.

The MTC had a choir that sang in the Priesthood Session and we wanted to do it sooo badly, but our departure date was too soon so they didn't know if we would still be here for it. That would have been the coolest thing, to sing to the world, recorded for the generations to come. But oh well, if God had really wanted us to do it He would have allowed us to.

I will try to write another letter after the consulate, I don't know how much time I will have or how much information I will have. I think I will be able to call once I get my travel plans. Thanks for everything, I love you so much.

Braden