a missionary's badge...

a missionary's badge...  i have thought about this all week...what does the badge that a missionary wears mean?  what does it stand for?  i just returned from a full week spent with my mom, my sister, my sister in law, my daughter and daughter in law.  we went on a girls trip.  it was a chance for us to do things we had never done...a chance to laugh...to cry...to spend time with other women who inspire us to be better.  this year has been a changing one for my family and we are learning how to be brave.  we had t-shirts printed with the logo..be brave on them.  we wore them on the plane going and on the plane coming home.  i guess to bystanders it was quite the sight to see 6 women wearing matching shirts that said be brave on them.  everywhere we went people asked about them.  they wanted to know what they stood for...what group we were representing...what we were doing...where we were going. this made me think of a missionary and his missionary badge that he wears everyday.  even though we don't always have a badge or a matching t shirt on that sets us a part from others i hope that we can still stand out in a crowd and be noticed for what we stand for and what we believe in and by our actions...

tate's message...


One thing that I would like to share with you guys this week is a principle that elder salas  taught us about missionaries. But it applies to real life as well. In this life people pass through 3 phases. The first is simple. Where we are totally focused in ourselves. We are figuring out who we are. We are finding out what we want and who we want to be. And it is fine to be in this phase for a while because if we don't figure these things our then we will never progress. The second phase is when we start to focus our lives in others. We start to really figure life out. We start to know who we are and what we can become. We don't have to focus so much on ourselves and we start to want to help others. We focus on them and serve them. This phase is where people do one of two things. They either hit a trial or find a problem or get tired and they eventually get back to the first phase when they were only focused in themselves. And they stop progressing and feel that life has no purpose. Or they take another route, keep progressing and find eternal happiness. They find a joy that makes them realize that even when they have problems or trials, that they weren't made for this world. That god had more than this life for them. And they do whatever they can to get there. They dedicate there lives to doing what he wants them to do. And most important they do whatever it takes to help others to find that same knowledge. Our purpose in life is to get to that third phase. Elder salas posed the question "what phase are you in?!"  I think that's a good question to ask ourselves. I know that the purpose of our life isn't to do what the world thinks or what our friends or family think. It's to do what god wants. And if we don't understand that then we don't understand why we are here on earth. I had an incredibly spiritual week and in grateful for every moment. I hope we can all 

come to know that god has much 

more planned for us than this 

imperfect world and all it contains. 

All we have to do is go find it.

Wow this week was incredibly busy. Monday started off really really chill. Just were getting stuff figured out for the end of the week. But Monday night we went over to president house and had meeting. Still just about prepping for elder salas.

 Tuesday was a weird day.   we were traveling with president from 6:00 AM and doing some special changes until 6:00 PM. That didn't really help with all the craziness of the week so it was a very late night.

  elder salas got there Wednesday morning. We headed over there and we got the opportunity to have meeting with him and also to eat lunch with him. What an incredible man. He took every opportunity he had to teach us something about life or about the mission. I could truly feel his Christlike love and I had only known him for a few hours. We headed out to do the conference in curico and it changed my life. Practically for the next three days we were instructed by elder salas and i learned so many things

Wow this week was incredibly busy. I love you guys. I love it out here and I know I will bawl like a baby when I have to leave. Have a good week. 

Elder Harding.