Some

 I did well with my scripture and conference reading this week. I didn't go to the temple, however. I used the excuse that I went last week. We had the most amazing Stake Conference this weekend. I was sure it was going to be about gathering Israel again...that's almost always the topic but it wasn't - well, it was in a roundabout way. Saturday night my takeaways came from two speakers. One is a psychologist and professor at BYU and he spoke on gratitude. It talked about all the practical reasons for it and God's promises. I've been thinking about it a lot lately anyway and it was a perfect answer to what has been on my heart. He said the two most important parts of gratitude are consistency and variety. He has a website called mybestself101.org that he said we can check out. I have only briefly looked at it but it has modules and all sorts of stuff about positive psychology. It was a great talk. The other talk from Saturday night was from my Stake President. He works for the church and is a seminary teacher that teaches the seminary teachers. He talked about the framework for navigating difficult situations. He referred to the church handbook and said that we need to seek to love first, listen to understand, teach truth, nourish faith, and minister. It was really great!

Then, today was phenomenal! The second counselor in the Stake Presidency talked about the church not being a volunteer church but a covenant church. For some reason that hit me really hard. I know that but it hit me differently today and made me think about the things I do in church and why I do them. A lot of times I do them because I feel obligated or have a hard time saying no, but now I realize that I made a covenant with the Lord to give my time, talents, and everything that I've been blessed with to the building up of the kingdom of God and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. It put it in a different perspective for me. 

Then my Stake President spoke again. I haven't witnessed that kind of power in a long time. He actually pounded on the pulpit once lol. He spoke about the great and spacious building and those that point their fingers and mock those that are partaking of the fruit of the Tree of Life. He also called it the beat of the Babylon band. He talked about how the adversary is called the Accuser. So much of what is happening with those fighting against the church are accusations. The claim is that we don't love people, that with church history we are racist, anti-gay, etc., etc. He said the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is the most loving and inclusive church on the whole planet. We are the only ones who believe all are saved. There's no more inclusive and loving doctrine than that. We should not be ashamed but want to spread all over the world how much the Lord loves everyone and wants us all back with Him. 

Anyway, this post does not do it all justice but I can tell you that my doctrinal understanding and my conviction have increased tenfold after this weekend. I cannot wait until General Conference!

My goals this week are to finish the Conference talks and to come up with questions I want to be answered during Conference.