General Conference was awesome!

It's been a long week, but a really good one. On Tuesday we got to go clear out to the east side of Lubbock and do some service at the African American Museum. It was really fun. Another sweet thing we did this week is we got Elder Hastings to try some new things! We bribed him that he could dump a gallon of ice cold water on his companion Elder Nelson's head for every new thing he tried. He tried an orange, grapefruit, asparagus, beet, and gum (the gum took some persuading. We settled for it was worth 3 gallons plus a gallon for every min he chewed it). In the end, Nelson will get 9 gallons dumped on him, haha! 

Wednesday we had a zone conference, which I was dreading. We all had to bring our cars because they installed the "black box" or "Elder Tiwi" into our cars. Basically it monitors our speed, seat belt wearing, and aggressiveness of driving. I've already been yelled at by it a couple times... The conference was really good, though. Pres. Heap talked about how there's really three laws we can obey to get to one of the three kingdoms of glory (for ex: cel. law means don't get angry, ter. law means don't kill, and tel. law means kill whoever). I can't explain it as well as he did, but basically we are told everything God wants us to do and we have the ability to use our agency to choose the law we want to follow and so where we want to go. 

And of course, general conference was awesome! Saturday morning we got to go to an activity our ward had. We helped hide Easter eggs and had breakfast then watched conference with everybody at our church building on 114th st. For the rest of the sessions of conf we watched at the stake center (on Frankford Ave), except for the priesthood session we went to a members house because the elders quorum put on a bbq for it. I bet Jake is pumped for the temple in Thailand, huh? I freaked out when I heard them announce that, haha. 

I have learned so much about agency and it's importance in God's plan as well as opposition this week. One of my favorite talks was probably Pres Eyring's in the priesthood session. He talked about how we need to be able to be in tune enough with the spirit that we know what Christ would say in every situation rather than just when we need it like deciding to go on a mission or such. Also, Elder Holland's talk had my palms sweating the entire time, haha! I love you all and hope this week is splendid for y'all.

- Elder Carlson