Hello Everyone!
I hope everyone's week has been good. Mine has been pretty crazy. First off, I got called to be District Leader for Rapid City and surrounding areas...pretty crazy. I'm over 4 sets of elders and a pair of sister missionaries, Pres. Cannon is also in my district. Its pretty humbling, I'm the 3rd youngest missionary in the district out of like 10 missionaries or somethin, so I feel pretty inadequate, but I know that who the Lord calls, he qualifies. So hopefully I will be able to humble myself so I can be strengthened by the Lord.
Well I didn't get into Rapid until Thursday evening. The whole next day we went to whats called Zone leader/District Leader Council. It was comprised of Pres. and Sis. Cannon, one of the AP's, and the ZL's and DL's from 3 of the zones. So about about 16 of us, basically all the leadership on the west half of the mission. It was an awesome meeting and really helped me out with what I can and will be doing as District Leader.
I'm loving Rapid though, and my new companion is pretty cool. His name is Elder Rigg and he's from Las Vegas. Dunno if I said this last time but he's only been out for 3 months now, so 1 transfer less than me...so we're a pretty young companionship.
We got to visit some pretty cool people so far, some recent converts who are way awesome and really excited about the gospel. We have like 4 baptisms lined up for the month of February, which is crazy, seeing how I haven't had a baptism yet. And its pretty crazy being in a ward again...so many people its ridiculous, just as I was getting used to being in a branch now I have to adjus to a ward again. Biggest difference is wards are a lot more independant, and branches tend to rely a lot more on missionary support.
But the work is great, its been snowing here like crazy, weird because last week it was 60 degrees in Rapid and now its about 8.Well that its for now, I'll have more to talk about next week after I've been in the area for a little longer.
Oh ya, last email I said you could use two different addresses for me. I was told wrong. Only the mission office one works(apparently we don't have the key for the mailbox at our apartments and the landlord won't give us one). So if you want to send me a letter only use:
2525 W Main St. Suite #311
Rapid City, SD 57702
Well, I hope everyone is doing well and is keeping up on their Book of Mormon reading! I love you all!
Love,Elder Fitt
Monday, January 26, 2009
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Subject: I'm getting transferred!
Hello everyone,
Yup, transfer calls came this Saturday and I'm getting transferred to serve in Rapid City! Pretty exciting. I'll be serving with Elder Rigg, who has only been out for 3 months, so it'll be pretty interesting. My new mailing address will be:
Elder William Fitt(duh)
614 Sheridan Lake Dr. #102
Rapid City, SD 57702
or
the mission office's address
2525 West Main Suite #311
Rapid City, SD 57702
Both work. Anyway, its been a good week. We got to visit our regular less-actives and read with them, which is always good. One, Rachel, who I've talked about before...answered the door without any pants on, it was kind of awkward...luckily her shirt was long, but it still was pretty weird, she covered up of course once we got in to teach, but still...
We got to teach Lynn Rouillard(a referral we've been trying to get to church and visit for a while) and her husband Bill finally. It was an awesome lesson and before we even asked them to read the Book of Mormon they were like, man I wanna read this, or something like that...pretty exciting. She wasn't at church because of the flu, sadly, and he works on the weekends, but they should be good for Elder Nelson and his new companion.
Got to do some service this week, helped a less-active guy with his house that he's remodeling. We helped him lay laminate wood flooring, which was pretty fun. We also helped him later on sand baseboards...not so much fun, but its always nice to do service! We also helped a member lady put together a crib, baby changing table and dresser that she bought...she fed us afterwards but dang, those things are confusing, especially when you're crammed in a little apartment, thankfully we brought Elder Moulton along, a senior missionary in the area, and he helped a lot. Directions just don't always cut it...
Other than that the week was kind of slow, Elder Nelson got sick one day so we stayed in so he could rest. But all in all it was a good week. And I'll be in Rapid on thursday, so if you were planning on sending a letter to me, send it to the new address, thanks! I hope everyone is keeping up on their Book of Mormon reading, and their reading from Preach My Gospel! I know that it will bless your lives and as missionary opportunities cross your path you will be more able to accept them and have the Spirit be your guide. Have a great week everyone!
Love,
Elder Fitt
Yup, transfer calls came this Saturday and I'm getting transferred to serve in Rapid City! Pretty exciting. I'll be serving with Elder Rigg, who has only been out for 3 months, so it'll be pretty interesting. My new mailing address will be:
Elder William Fitt(duh)
614 Sheridan Lake Dr. #102
Rapid City, SD 57702
or
the mission office's address
2525 West Main Suite #311
Rapid City, SD 57702
Both work. Anyway, its been a good week. We got to visit our regular less-actives and read with them, which is always good. One, Rachel, who I've talked about before...answered the door without any pants on, it was kind of awkward...luckily her shirt was long, but it still was pretty weird, she covered up of course once we got in to teach, but still...
We got to teach Lynn Rouillard(a referral we've been trying to get to church and visit for a while) and her husband Bill finally. It was an awesome lesson and before we even asked them to read the Book of Mormon they were like, man I wanna read this, or something like that...pretty exciting. She wasn't at church because of the flu, sadly, and he works on the weekends, but they should be good for Elder Nelson and his new companion.
Got to do some service this week, helped a less-active guy with his house that he's remodeling. We helped him lay laminate wood flooring, which was pretty fun. We also helped him later on sand baseboards...not so much fun, but its always nice to do service! We also helped a member lady put together a crib, baby changing table and dresser that she bought...she fed us afterwards but dang, those things are confusing, especially when you're crammed in a little apartment, thankfully we brought Elder Moulton along, a senior missionary in the area, and he helped a lot. Directions just don't always cut it...
Other than that the week was kind of slow, Elder Nelson got sick one day so we stayed in so he could rest. But all in all it was a good week. And I'll be in Rapid on thursday, so if you were planning on sending a letter to me, send it to the new address, thanks! I hope everyone is keeping up on their Book of Mormon reading, and their reading from Preach My Gospel! I know that it will bless your lives and as missionary opportunities cross your path you will be more able to accept them and have the Spirit be your guide. Have a great week everyone!
Love,
Elder Fitt
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Hello from SD!
Hi everyone,
If I learned anything out here so far on my mission...its that I will not live in the Dakota's once I get home! They're nice and all...but the wind is killer. Anyway, this week was pretty sweet.
First part of the week was pretty slow, up until Wednesday. Then we drove up to Eagle Butte(town on the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation) and had a district meeting there. It was good stuff and we started an exchange. Elder Schoppmann came down to Pierre with me. He's an awesome Elder, really humble and hardworking, it was a privilege to serve with him. He's actually from a Navajo Reservation in Arizona, from a town called Page. He isn't Navajo, but his family has a ranch on the land.
Anyway, we had a lot of success together. We were able to visit a part-member less-active family who we never had contact with and scheduled a return appointment with them to teach their family. The husband is Catholic but didn't mind us coming back to talk about the gospel. So I'm excited about that.
Then we spent most of Thursday tracting because a lot of our regulars weren't home. First half of the day was fruitless, but the second half was awesome. We tracted into a former investigator, and she wanted us to start coming back and teaching her. She came to church this week, her name is Pat Hill. So that was way good.
Then we also tracted into a lady named Rachel who said she "wanted to talk to us" but had to clean up her house real fast. So we stood outside her door while she tidied up and were kinda scared...no one wants to talk to us. Turns out she was really genuine. She has been studying religion for a while, she's a non-denominational Christian looking for truth. We taught her the Restoration lesson(if you don't know what that all entails, read Preach My Gospel Chapter 3, lesson 1. Actually, I'm challenging you to read it, every family should have a copy in their home, its an inspired book and will really strengthen your testimony!) Back to my story, so we taught her the lesson and she asked a ton of really great questions, and when we asked her to read the Book of Mormon she told us how she always wanted to read it but never had a copy!! She told us she would study it out before we come back again and we asked her to pray about what she studies. She could be
really golden as long as she doesn't have any too farfetched ideas that turn her off of the truth.
Other awesome stuff happened in the week, Brother Gravatt told us some more sweet stories and 4 ways on how to torture and kill a man slowly that the Natives implemented on their criminals...kinda interesting.
Sunday was awesome. It was Branch Conference and President and Sister Cannon came. All the meetings were great and afterward we had potluck, yum. After all that President Cannon help a big meeting with all the leadership of the Branch, and us missionaries, and basically told us what he thinks the branch needs and how to fix it. He also really pushed the point that the branch needs to make use of their full-time missionaries, so hopefully the branch will want to become more involved in missionary work and reactivation work and so on. Things are really looking up, and from what I've been told, Pierre is one of the hardest areas in the mission, so its nice to come here first so I know how to deal with it!
Oh ya, Elder Nelson and Schoppmann swapped back on Friday, so I'm back with Elder Nelson, which is good too. Anyway, I hope everyone is doing well, is reading their Book of Mormon and will also take my challenge to read PMG Ch.3 Ls.1 "The Restoration." I know that if you do the Lord will bless you and your testimony will increase in the knowledge that the gospel is true!
Love,
Elder Fittpotluck, yum
If I learned anything out here so far on my mission...its that I will not live in the Dakota's once I get home! They're nice and all...but the wind is killer. Anyway, this week was pretty sweet.
First part of the week was pretty slow, up until Wednesday. Then we drove up to Eagle Butte(town on the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation) and had a district meeting there. It was good stuff and we started an exchange. Elder Schoppmann came down to Pierre with me. He's an awesome Elder, really humble and hardworking, it was a privilege to serve with him. He's actually from a Navajo Reservation in Arizona, from a town called Page. He isn't Navajo, but his family has a ranch on the land.
Anyway, we had a lot of success together. We were able to visit a part-member less-active family who we never had contact with and scheduled a return appointment with them to teach their family. The husband is Catholic but didn't mind us coming back to talk about the gospel. So I'm excited about that.
Then we spent most of Thursday tracting because a lot of our regulars weren't home. First half of the day was fruitless, but the second half was awesome. We tracted into a former investigator, and she wanted us to start coming back and teaching her. She came to church this week, her name is Pat Hill. So that was way good.
Then we also tracted into a lady named Rachel who said she "wanted to talk to us" but had to clean up her house real fast. So we stood outside her door while she tidied up and were kinda scared...no one wants to talk to us. Turns out she was really genuine. She has been studying religion for a while, she's a non-denominational Christian looking for truth. We taught her the Restoration lesson(if you don't know what that all entails, read Preach My Gospel Chapter 3, lesson 1. Actually, I'm challenging you to read it, every family should have a copy in their home, its an inspired book and will really strengthen your testimony!) Back to my story, so we taught her the lesson and she asked a ton of really great questions, and when we asked her to read the Book of Mormon she told us how she always wanted to read it but never had a copy!! She told us she would study it out before we come back again and we asked her to pray about what she studies. She could be
really golden as long as she doesn't have any too farfetched ideas that turn her off of the truth.
Other awesome stuff happened in the week, Brother Gravatt told us some more sweet stories and 4 ways on how to torture and kill a man slowly that the Natives implemented on their criminals...kinda interesting.
Sunday was awesome. It was Branch Conference and President and Sister Cannon came. All the meetings were great and afterward we had potluck, yum. After all that President Cannon help a big meeting with all the leadership of the Branch, and us missionaries, and basically told us what he thinks the branch needs and how to fix it. He also really pushed the point that the branch needs to make use of their full-time missionaries, so hopefully the branch will want to become more involved in missionary work and reactivation work and so on. Things are really looking up, and from what I've been told, Pierre is one of the hardest areas in the mission, so its nice to come here first so I know how to deal with it!
Oh ya, Elder Nelson and Schoppmann swapped back on Friday, so I'm back with Elder Nelson, which is good too. Anyway, I hope everyone is doing well, is reading their Book of Mormon and will also take my challenge to read PMG Ch.3 Ls.1 "The Restoration." I know that if you do the Lord will bless you and your testimony will increase in the knowledge that the gospel is true!
Love,
Elder Fittpotluck, yum
Monday, January 5, 2009
What Happened to 2008?
Hello everyone,
Man, this year flew by, especially the last 4 months. I hope everyone had a Happy New Years and stuff...we kinda did. Played some games and read a lot, because we had to come in at 5pm.
Anyway, the work is still pretty slow. It seems as though everyone is still in the vacation mode, hopefully that will change this week with school starting up again and such. The week went decently though, it had its upsides and downsides of course. We'll start with the downsides, heh. We were supposed to have 5, yes 5 investigator's at church on Sunday, pretty ridiculous number for Pierre. But, all 5 dogged us. Oh well. It was going to by Lynn, her daughter as well as Austin, Jace and Jace's cousin Clayton(who has sat in on 2 lessons now). But it seems some way or another they found an excuse to not make it, oh well, there's always next Sunday!
Well let's see, have some crazy stories from this week. First off, we got to meet with The Gravatt's again, the less-active family who always tells crazy stories. Turns out, Ivan, when he was in high school, was an Olympic level runner, I guess he said he ran a 1:47 half mile and a 4:48 mile, now I don't know what Olympic times are like...but I cannot picture this guy being able to book it that fast. But he didn't want to go to the Olympics because he wanted to be a cook instead. Also, he told us Mexico is floating on the ocean. Its like a woven basket and just floats on the Pacific and that Mexican's were brought over from Spain by the conquistador's to be their slaves. Haha, pretty crazy.
We also got cast out by some crazy guy when we were tracting. He opened his door and proceeded to tell us we were false teachers and the Gold Plates were a scam, because he had "researched" it on the internet. Then he pointed at his little Christian Jesus fish on his door and said "Jesus Christ, Be Gone!" And slammed the door, it was pretty awesome, but hard to not rebuke him for being so...so...unsmart? I dunno, it was funny.
I guess I did say I we had some good news too. That would have to be the fact that the holidays are over, we've been getting quite a bit of media referrals from the HQ in Salt Lake. The only problem is they're 160 miles, round trip, which really hurts the mileage budget. Oh well.
The work is still exciting and I love being a missionary. I've recently been reading from Jesus the Christ, and like Elder Ricks said in one of the letters that I got sent a while ago...once you pick it up you can't put it down. I've been reading it like crazy and loving every bit that I can understand (...man Talmage uses some big words that the little dictionary in our apartment hasn't even heard of).
Anyway, I hope you all have a great week, and I hope you all accepted my challenge to read the Book of Mormon. And if I didn't say every day, I'm saying it now, read it every day and the Lord will bless you for it and your testimony will grow. The church is true!
Love,
Elder Fitt
Man, this year flew by, especially the last 4 months. I hope everyone had a Happy New Years and stuff...we kinda did. Played some games and read a lot, because we had to come in at 5pm.
Anyway, the work is still pretty slow. It seems as though everyone is still in the vacation mode, hopefully that will change this week with school starting up again and such. The week went decently though, it had its upsides and downsides of course. We'll start with the downsides, heh. We were supposed to have 5, yes 5 investigator's at church on Sunday, pretty ridiculous number for Pierre. But, all 5 dogged us. Oh well. It was going to by Lynn, her daughter as well as Austin, Jace and Jace's cousin Clayton(who has sat in on 2 lessons now). But it seems some way or another they found an excuse to not make it, oh well, there's always next Sunday!
Well let's see, have some crazy stories from this week. First off, we got to meet with The Gravatt's again, the less-active family who always tells crazy stories. Turns out, Ivan, when he was in high school, was an Olympic level runner, I guess he said he ran a 1:47 half mile and a 4:48 mile, now I don't know what Olympic times are like...but I cannot picture this guy being able to book it that fast. But he didn't want to go to the Olympics because he wanted to be a cook instead. Also, he told us Mexico is floating on the ocean. Its like a woven basket and just floats on the Pacific and that Mexican's were brought over from Spain by the conquistador's to be their slaves. Haha, pretty crazy.
We also got cast out by some crazy guy when we were tracting. He opened his door and proceeded to tell us we were false teachers and the Gold Plates were a scam, because he had "researched" it on the internet. Then he pointed at his little Christian Jesus fish on his door and said "Jesus Christ, Be Gone!" And slammed the door, it was pretty awesome, but hard to not rebuke him for being so...so...unsmart? I dunno, it was funny.
I guess I did say I we had some good news too. That would have to be the fact that the holidays are over, we've been getting quite a bit of media referrals from the HQ in Salt Lake. The only problem is they're 160 miles, round trip, which really hurts the mileage budget. Oh well.
The work is still exciting and I love being a missionary. I've recently been reading from Jesus the Christ, and like Elder Ricks said in one of the letters that I got sent a while ago...once you pick it up you can't put it down. I've been reading it like crazy and loving every bit that I can understand (...man Talmage uses some big words that the little dictionary in our apartment hasn't even heard of).
Anyway, I hope you all have a great week, and I hope you all accepted my challenge to read the Book of Mormon. And if I didn't say every day, I'm saying it now, read it every day and the Lord will bless you for it and your testimony will grow. The church is true!
Love,
Elder Fitt
Chrismas Email Update
Hello Everyone,
I hope you Christmas' went well. Mine was, of course, a little different than usual, but still good. We have soooo much junk food now, its crazy. From packages and members and investigator's...its sickening just thinking about how much sugar is in the apartment. I'm thinking about giving it to some of our other investigator's...haha.
Anyway, it was a slow week. We only got to teach one lesson, and that was to Angelo. We did help Markata box some stuff up, she's moving on Tuesday across town, and we're gonna help her with that as well. But no one was home or was busy all week long with family, so it went by pretty slow.
I went to an opthamologist last week because Sister Cannon (mission presiden'ts wife) said I had to. Turns out I have a common problem I guess with my eyes where the oil glands in them produce a little too much oil, so when they mix with my tears to create the solution with coats they eyes, sometimes it is too thick. That coupled with the collection of dust and stuff in the air makes it easier for my eyes to get infected and is what caused my eyes to burn and hurt so bad. Anywho, fixing it is really easy and its just a matter of using really hot water when I clean my eyes every night to help loosen the oil and dust that gets in my eyes during the day. So problem solved(I hope)!
Highlight of the week was probably branch volleyball...haha, sad to say. It was a lot of fun and we had a good turnout. It got pretty competitive near the end of it and during one of the volleys I dove to get the ball and got a massive rug burn on my palm(the church gym's floor is carpet not hardwood). So that was fun, but I'm happy to say we won that match!
Oh ya, we did get a new investigator this week, which is exciting. Her name is Cora and has had some relations with Mormons in the past when she was raising her children. We're gonna visit her again this week and hopefully things progress well.
Also, our referral turned investigator Lynn, is really trying to make it out to church with her family but her husband has a big drinking problem, not to mention other things. But I'd like to ask you to keep her and her family in your prayers, she has a really sincere desire to come closer to her Savior and its really sad to see her husband stand in the way of it.
As the new year approaches I would hope that everyone would recommit themselves to come closer to the Savior. I know I will and I know that is what He wants. As we shape our thoughts and desires to things that He would have us do, our lives will be happier, we will be able to endure trials with more patience and fortitude and I know that the Savior will bless you for it. Also, I would like to commit you all to start reading the Book of Mormon all the way through again, or pick up where you left off. You can never read it enough, there is always something new you can learn from it and it will bless your life!
Anyway, enough of my challengings, I hope everyone has a wonderful week and stays safe in the weather and worries that surround this coming holiday!
Love,
Elder Fitt
I hope you Christmas' went well. Mine was, of course, a little different than usual, but still good. We have soooo much junk food now, its crazy. From packages and members and investigator's...its sickening just thinking about how much sugar is in the apartment. I'm thinking about giving it to some of our other investigator's...haha.
Anyway, it was a slow week. We only got to teach one lesson, and that was to Angelo. We did help Markata box some stuff up, she's moving on Tuesday across town, and we're gonna help her with that as well. But no one was home or was busy all week long with family, so it went by pretty slow.
I went to an opthamologist last week because Sister Cannon (mission presiden'ts wife) said I had to. Turns out I have a common problem I guess with my eyes where the oil glands in them produce a little too much oil, so when they mix with my tears to create the solution with coats they eyes, sometimes it is too thick. That coupled with the collection of dust and stuff in the air makes it easier for my eyes to get infected and is what caused my eyes to burn and hurt so bad. Anywho, fixing it is really easy and its just a matter of using really hot water when I clean my eyes every night to help loosen the oil and dust that gets in my eyes during the day. So problem solved(I hope)!
Highlight of the week was probably branch volleyball...haha, sad to say. It was a lot of fun and we had a good turnout. It got pretty competitive near the end of it and during one of the volleys I dove to get the ball and got a massive rug burn on my palm(the church gym's floor is carpet not hardwood). So that was fun, but I'm happy to say we won that match!
Oh ya, we did get a new investigator this week, which is exciting. Her name is Cora and has had some relations with Mormons in the past when she was raising her children. We're gonna visit her again this week and hopefully things progress well.
Also, our referral turned investigator Lynn, is really trying to make it out to church with her family but her husband has a big drinking problem, not to mention other things. But I'd like to ask you to keep her and her family in your prayers, she has a really sincere desire to come closer to her Savior and its really sad to see her husband stand in the way of it.
As the new year approaches I would hope that everyone would recommit themselves to come closer to the Savior. I know I will and I know that is what He wants. As we shape our thoughts and desires to things that He would have us do, our lives will be happier, we will be able to endure trials with more patience and fortitude and I know that the Savior will bless you for it. Also, I would like to commit you all to start reading the Book of Mormon all the way through again, or pick up where you left off. You can never read it enough, there is always something new you can learn from it and it will bless your life!
Anyway, enough of my challengings, I hope everyone has a wonderful week and stays safe in the weather and worries that surround this coming holiday!
Love,
Elder Fitt
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