Stake Conference, Elder Stone & Elder Holland

This past weekend was our Stake Conference. It was amazing! I showed up 45 minutes early for the adult session of Stake Conference only find myself sitting on the hard chairs. That left me completely whiny and ornery!! I told myself that I would only stay 15 minutes and then I was leaving. Okay, that is what I told myself--but in all reality--I knew I was not going anywhere. So, like I said, it was simply AMAZING!! Elder Stone (from the 70's) spoke on faith. It was very powerful and it was awesome to feel the spirit so strongly!!! His stories were powerful, he was powerful, the spirit was powerful. (I am glad I stayed longer than the 15 minutes that I granted myself.)

Then, Elder Holland spoke. I am going to quote from Gerb's blog--She writes,"Elder Holland spoke of the many trials that any one of us could be facing, and the challenges that come with those trials. We can, in a sense, feel broken. He then shared with us that God loves broken things and knows how to fix them. We only need to have faith in his love and let him heal our broken hearts and broken spirits. He reminded us that clouds must be broken to shower the earth; grain must be broken to produce bread. So when we feel like all hope is gone, like there was never a time we have been truly happy, we need to just endure & save ourselves for the days of happiness that are inevitably ahead." Thanks Gerb. You wrote it so nicely!

I just loved his one liners such as:

"Pull up your socks & quit worrying!"

"Work hard & do your best!"

"Hang on & be believing!"

"Endure & save yourself of days of Happiness a head!"

"Tough it out!"

"Endure--sit-up, stand straight, and be big people!!"

"When you are in the roughest sea and there is a huge storm, stay in the boat! Don't bail--where are you going? What are you going to do- doggie paddle!"

"I could just SPIT!"

He told us to NEVER say that God does not love me. One thing that really touched my heart (well, everything touched my heart--I knew I was suppose to be attend and feel what I felt) was when he said that God gave us his greatest lamb--He knows what it is like to hurt. He spoke of the tragedy in Lehi. He told us to hang in there even in the darkest night.

On Sunday, we had our new Stake Presidency sustained. Elder Holland spoke quite while on sustaining of leaders. He said what goes around, comes around. Someone might not have been sustained today as a Stake President, but he might be the one the next time. Then, he spoke to the youth of our Stake. He said that (once again quoting from Gerb's blog) the gospel of Jesus Christ can be summed up in one phrase for the youth of the church - the title of a Bryan Adams song, "Everything I do, I do it for you." Leaders, parents, isn't that what it's all about?"

It was an amazing two days. I am grateful that I was able to attend. I love the feeling of my heart when it gets a little bit of the most needed thing in the world--the touch of the spirit from our Heavenly Father.

Gerb, I hope you don't mind if I use some of your notes in my talk in Sacrament Meeting on Sunday. Yep, I get to speak once again--it was only 3 weeks ago that I spoke in my ward about Christmas and now they are asking again. CRAZY!!! What are they thinking!!