Elder Caiden Brown New York New York North Mission: Faith + Obedience = Success!

Hey family,

What a stellar week with conference, meetings and miracles! Haha, wow, I loved conference!! This time it was my first time watching every session in Spanish and it was awesome, because we had to put even more attention into what was being said! And, we got a lot more out of it! I would have to say my favorite talk from conference was actually from the women’s session - Elder Uchtdorf’s talk… fourth floor last door! President Smith asked us to read this talk in preparation for MLC, and I legit love it! If you haven’t read that talk, read it!!! And if you have read it… read it again!!! One of the quotes that stuck out to me was this, “Faith means that we trust not only in God’s wisdom, but that we trust also in His love. It means trusting that God loves us perfectly, that everything He does—every blessing He gives and every blessing He, for a time, withholds—is for our eternal happiness.” I love this!! I think sometimes when our situations aren’t the best it’s easy to think to ourselves, “Where is Heavenly Father in this situation?” But it’s comforting to know that no matter what situation we are in… that it’s part of the perfect plan of our Father. If we have faith in that plan, if we believe it’s inspired, the hard times WILL be easier! Conference was Bomb!

And so, basically, that was the focus of MLC for this month - that faith + Obedience = success! That’s one of the reasons I love the Book of Mormon!! There is literally nothing that explains better that if we are obedient then we prosper in the land! As a mission we are reading the Book of Mormon together and we were asked to pick a topic and makes notes and mark in the book where it talks about that certain doctrine. I’m reading it keeping the topic of Obedience in mind, and it literally talks about it probably more than any other thing! Haha, it is awesome! Let’s have the faith to be obedient!!

So we had one of those days this week where just nothing was going good. We both were pretty sick, appointments falling through, you know just one of those classic bad days in the Mission field. Now, those don’t happen often, but it was just one of those days. And so, just in my heart, I offered a little prayer asking for something to boost our day. Well, we ended up knocking into a super awesome lady that said she was “waiting for us!” Now, not the biggest of miracles, but it was something that just made me happy and reminded me that God really does have control over every little situation. He really does hear the little prayers of our hearts!

Mom, I was thinking about you a lot this past week and I just wanted to tell you that I love you and that I am so grateful to have a mother like you! You are amazing and incredible! And the things you have done for me from the very littlest to the very biggest have not gone unseen! I say the same things over and over again, and I sound like a broken record, but you are the best ever! I love you more than you know and I just hope you know that!

Thanks so much family and friends for the things you have done for me! Thanks for the support! You are loved from across the nation!
Love, Elder Brown