I am sooo excited to hear a Prophet of the Lord!

Waiting for General Conference to start.

Salt Lake Temple

Committed to serving the Lord!

Awesome companion, Elder Greenacre.

Hey Family!

  This has been a productive week.  One of the highlights was when we went on exchanges.  I went in our district leader's area and we did plenty of walking around, talking to everybody, sharing the #BecauseHeLives video and handing out the pass along cards.  We were walking around and we literally talked to everybody!  Some of our appointments fell through, so we walked around and did some contacting.  I think one of the highlights of that day was when we had dinner.  Elder Evans had talked to this family previously inquiring about breakfast for dinner.  But since he wasn't in the area at the time... I got to have it!  While I was in the area we taught a young boy who is 9 years old and he's been talking about baptism.  We talked about faith, repentance and also about the promises we make at baptism.  It was actually pretty easy teaching him because of the copious amount of 9 years olds I taught in Spanish Fork!  We also shared the video Because He Lives.  It was a pretty good lesson.    

   So the sister of our recent baptism is on date for baptism!!!!!  When she left to go back to her hometown for a week, we asked her to pray about a date for baptism.  And she replied in April.  We are pretty excited about that!

   Now to the real deal of the week.  General Conference!  It was a lovely morning.  Got up, got prepared for the day ahead, jumped in the car with a few other missionaries, and drove to Lehi to meet up with President McCune and the other missionaries who were also going.  From there we jumped in the car with the APs and off to SLC we went.  We arrived a couple of blocks from the Conference center.  As we were walking we saw numerous protestors and anti-christs.  Then we went into the Conf Center and found our seats and took a bunch of pictures.  Talked for a while and then watched as General Authority after General Authority walked into the Conference Center.  I wished that I was down in the front row talking to all of the Apostles as they greeted everyone.  After a few minutes went by, the entire room went silent as President Monson, President Eyring and President Uchtodorf walked into the room. You wouldn't believe the spirit that just floods the room as they walk in. It gave me chills! Then conference started and we had the opportunity to hear the talks in person. Listening to each one of these folks who were called of God speak to us testifying of the gospel is a life changing experience! I'm thankful that we get to re-watch/re-read these talks on Gospel Library. I'm going to have to re-read President Packer's talk being that no one could understand a word he was saying. Watching him sit there in his chair giving his talk..man I felt so bad. He looks terrible! I fear his time may be coming. It's kind of cool to think that when he passes, he will be greeted by God without a single fear. Serving as an apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ for many years...and he's still coming along! It was so cool to listen to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir! Their singing combined with the power of the volume of that incredible pipe organ! I'm sure Sister Harris would kill to play that thing! Amazing! I think one of my most favorite talks was from Elder Perry. As I watched him stand at the pulpit....check-TOWERING over that pulpit....he is TALL! 6'5, 93 years old, and flippin awesome! Elder Perry is still chuggin along!

   As conference came to a close, we all gathered outside with President and Sister McCune for a picture! This is kind of crazy but as I walking down the street to temple square, I was walking with Elder Laffidy (an elder who was in my MTC district), he noticed this young lady who, to both of us, looked very familiar! I don't know if I've told you already but Elder Laffidy is from South Carolina, and so he went to EFY at Southern Virginia University just like I did. This young lady whom we noticed was a counselor at EFY when he and I went! Her name is Hollie and it was super crazy to see her again! She said she recognized our last names and we were reminiscing the good days. Anyways, we continued on to temple square! We saw person after person...even saw a dude dressed up like Satan standing outside the gates talking bogus stuff about the church. There were a few people who I knew that I bumped into there. Pretty cool! Took plenty of pictures! While we were hanging out there it became very apparent to one of our group leaders that we needed to get to the Front Runner (train) station quickly otherwise we would miss it back to Lehi, UT! He gathered all of us and we literally (I'm not joking) ran all the way from Temple Square to the train station! We got there with only 5 minutes to spare....holy moly. I bet we looked ridiculous. A bunch of Mormon Missionaries running through the streets of Salt Lake hahaha! All in all we got back in time.

     We then watched the remaining sessions of conference. It was a really good time! Spent that time with a few of our favorite awesome families. Good times!

Anyways. Good week! Fantastic weekend! I won't ever forget it!

We have a fun hiked planned today for p-day so we're off to do that!

Until next week! Love you!

-Elder Ahrens