November 9, 2009 Come on in the Weather is Fine!

Hello Everyone,
I hope you all are doing well. We had a good week and got to finally enjoy some warm weather! I got to be in the 50's for a few days and I was about to wear a short sleeve shirt, but since the weather here is so deceptive I thought better. But it still was great to enjoy the sun a bit before the cold of winter sets in soon.
The weather was also nice for all the service we got to do this week. A friend of the Valdez family (members of the branch) that we had helped out previous gave us a call seeing if we'd like to help rake the yards of some widows of the church that he attends. So we got to do that it was a lot of fun. Man theres a lot of leaves out now, but it was good to be of service to these sweet ladies.
So transfer calls came and went and I'll be staying in the area for at least another 6 weeks, so I'm really excited. I didn't want to leave at all so I'm glad I got to stay.
Not too much else happened out of the ordinary but we did have stake conference this weekend which was really good. Got to listen to President Layton and his wife as well as the Stake presidency and President Rees and his wife, who are over the Bismarck temple. He has an interesting story of service in this area because he served in Fargo as a missionary and at that time it was a branch. Now its a stake. But also he was the mission president of this mission about 9 years back. And now hes the temple president for the mission's temple. So it was neat to hear stories from him as well.
But things are going well and I'm enjoying the work. Hopefully we should the baptism for Xander this coming Saturday. We didn't have it last weekend because of stake conference. But he's still on track and is doing awesome. We got to see the Perez's some more and had a good meeting with them. Unfortunately for us they're going to be in Mexico for the next month visiting their son. They'll be in the state of Guanajuarto in a town called Uriangato...so hopefully they get to meet up with some missionaries there and learn more. We gave them an address to the closest churchhouse in that area and they plan on attending.
And now another story from tri-zone that Elder Zwick had related to us, its pretty crazy. He told us a story about how he was called to be the mission president in Chile, or at least for one of its missions, I don't know how many it has. Anyway, told us how the first day he got to Chile, the first telephone call they get from anyone is from one of their missionaries in the southern end of Chile who was calling from a phone booth and the only thing he was wearing was his companion's overcoat.
Apparently they were prep'ing for a baptismal interview at the church and a group of terrorists came in, held them all up at gun point and made this missionary take off all his clothes in front of the seminary class that was going on. Then they doused the clothes in gasoline and lit them on fire.
The missionary was calling to see what they should do, since the building was burning to the ground while they spoke. Then President Zwick commented on the shock of the situation and how they felt completely lost and incapable of performing the calling. But they followed the Spirit and things turned out ok.
Well a while later Elder Richard G. Scott of the 12 came to the mission to tour it, and wanted to visit the town where that happened. We he came he promised them that if they were diligent and obedient that the Lord would repay and multiply. At the time it was only one small branch of I think 40 people. By the end of Elder Zwick's mission, it was its own stake! The Lord truly does love us and has amazing blessing in store for us as we endure(not just make through, but make it a positive experience and grow therein) our trials.
Well I hope you all have a great week and give the missionaries in your area tons of referralls!
Love,
Elder Fitt