Hi All,

It was a great last week. I think the highlight of it all was the visit and mission conference that we had with elder anderson of the 12. he was accompained by bishop davis and elder c. scott grow of the 70 along with their wives. i was again able to play the violin for them in a special muscial number that we performed with another violinist and chior. 

but let me start from the beginning of the crazy week. monday we had a combined zone pday with ilo again. and we had a huge soccer game, of the which we destroyed them. and then we got to practicing for our muscial program fireside thing coming up this 14th and 21st of september. i think i had mentioned this earlier...it is just like what we did in arequipa about 3 months ago. so we have been busy praciticing all those new specail muscial numbers with the choir and others that my comp and i will be performing on the violin and piano. tuesday we had our district meeting as usual and afterwards we were summoned unto the land of arequipa to go and prepare for this special musical number for elder anderson. so we headed tuesday night and got into arequipa late. it was pretty cool because elder chipman and i were the only missionaires outside of arequipa to be asked to participate in this music number. so we stayed at the mission home and had fun times talking with president. haha he even asked to set up justin with his 27 year old daughter! :) thought id pass that info on. on wednesday we were busy practicing for the number and it was great to see a bunch of my good old buddies from all around the mission. in the afternoon i did have some time to go back and visit some old converts and my old pention and other members really quick. how special that was for me! i loved going back into my former area and seeing them and their reactions of surprise and they ran out and gave me hugs! i love them so much! had dinner with the office and with my old comp elder priebe who is now the asistente. and on thursday we got up early. president had cooked us up some french toast for the specail day and we headed down to the stake center where the meeting was to be held. after practicing a couple of times, we got all ready and the general authorities all walked in. it was a very special feeling and you couldnt feel a stronger spirit. the number went SO good. the chior sounded great and my solo parts went well and it was just really a cool feeling. haha good times reliving the elder nelson special muscial number! after we had played. anderson asked me to sit behind him on the stand for the whole meeting!!! it was so cool and his security guard gave me a piece of candy :) my comp and i sure felt really special as he once the meeting was done came up and shook our hands one last time  before leaving (my comp played the piano for the meeting so he was sitting up there by me as well). they talked a lot about hte atonement and how we need to able it more into our teaching and making sure that the people really understand what is the atonement and making them have many spiritual experiences with the atonement. they also talked a lot about honesty in all things and being patient with our testimonies. 

truely our savior lives and suffered for us. he is not just some distant person or picture we look at all the time. he is with us at all times and he loves us so much! 

friday and saturday were some work days. we were asked to go to one of our sisters baptisms to help protect the service because there were a ton of people against her being baptized and threatened to come and storm the chapel and stop the meeting. so we as the zone leaders were busy making sure everything was okay and safe for the whole deal. because we go forward. we do not fear man more than god. and she got baptized. and the lord answered our prayers and we in the end had no problems even though the head protestor came and left to go get all her people. but nothing happened and it was a spiritual baptism service. 

sunday we did a special muscial number with a guy in our ward and the ward just loved it and now we are being asked to do all sorts of special muscial numbers. so dont worry about that violin. it is getting plenty of use!!!! we have also been asked by the stake presidency to play special musical numbers for stake activities and we are trying to swing another one for our stake conference coming up in october. so craziness. but we love it and are happy! the zone is doing great and we are seeing results here in the pueblo of moquegua. 

right now i am again here in arequipa for today and tomorrow as we are here for leadership meetings with all the zone leadrs and with president. we have a huge soccer game planned that we need to get prepared for and then the meetings start later tongiht. 

but i love the mission. i love you guys. congrats to kc once again. so happy for all that is going on back home!

till next week.

Weston

1-4-3  

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      Elder Birtcher

Perú - Arequipa Mission