Elder Braden Miles, Washington DC South Mission: September 16, 2013

As you know we went to the Nationals vs. Phillies baseball game on Friday night. It was awesome! The DC North Mission was also there, so there was 500+ missionaries at the game. Besides knowing that the Nats won, I can’t remember much else about the game. I guess I was too busy having fun and enjoying being at a sporting event again (haha). Brother Harper (Bryce Harper) didn't do too hot in the game. Probably cause he was nervous about all of us being there ( haha). There were people from the church media at the game taking pictures and several of them stopped me and Elder Johnson and took our picture in front of the field, so maybe we will be on an article or something!

Elder Miles and Elder Johnson at the Nationals baseball game.

The game was at 7 pm and we didn't get back until about 12:30, so we got under 6 hours of sleep. I felt fine the next day and not too tired. President Riggs sat near us at the game and was saying that the Brethren are excited to see how our week was. If the work didn't struggle, we will get to go again next year because we were well behaved, and an apostle will throw out the first pitch! The metro was pretty cool to ride on and there were tons of people taking that to and from the game.

This week we went on an exchange with a ward member (Brice Bunker) who is related to Tanner Hafen. He is siblings with Tanners mom. I've talked to him before and he mentioned he had some family out in the same area that I lived in, but forgot to mention it was a good friend of mine (haha). There are so many kids from Lone Peak out here. My district leader Elder (Jeramiah) Van Dyke played baseball at LP. I went on exchanges with him the other day and it was pretty cool to talk about it with him. Besides him and me there are four other Lone Peakers. Plus Josh Smith is coming soon and that will make it 8.

Funny sign on a door.

We found a super funny plaque on a door the other day (see attached picture) it was directed at missionaries and said they don’t want anyone knocking on their door for religious purposes, but we did anyways :D (jk). We didn't because they would have gotten angry (haha). Pretty much everyone has a peep hole on their door. They think they are invisible behind it or something. We can see them through it because there is light that comes through it and when it goes dark that means they are looking out. When we see them looking out we just smile and wave!

I love the study time we get in the morning! We get an hour but it goes by so fast and I wish we had more time! Before my mission I could barely read scripture for 10 minutes without dozing off or losing focus. I’m about halfway through Jacob right now and I love studying. We shared 2 Nephi 32:3 with some of the families and less actives. It is about "feasting upon the words of Christ". I love the word "feast" because it means we shouldn't just read, but take it all in, study it out in our minds, and apply it to our lives. Then it gives us a promise. It says "The words of Christ will tell you ALL things what ye should do". President Riggs is big on finding "absolutes" in the scriptures. (Like the words all, must, cannot, etc.) The scriptures will always tell us what to do, not just sometimes. I love reading the scriptures and my knowledge of them has grown a lot even in the last couple months. When we talk to people I always have scripture references pop into my mind and I am trying to follow those promptings to share them with the people. I love this gospel and I encourage everyone to FEAST on the scriptures and not just read them!

-Elder Miles

We just got back from DC and I thought I'd send some pictures. Have you look on CNN? There was a big shooting in DC today and a manhunt was going down while we were there. No big deal. The FBI was questioning some guy outside while were eating lunch. It was pretty crazy. The shooting took place just outside the Nationals Stadium that were we at a couple days ago. I took a pic of the FBI cars and the CNN report we say. Beside that it was pretty cool. We also went to the American History Museum and talked to Kyle Morris' dad. He just cam up to us in the museum and started talking and he was like "Braden Miles from Lone Peak!?" It kinda freaked me out (haha).