Week ~ 21

Dear world,

This week was very difficult. According to Pres. Ostler, Rizal is probably the most difficult and by far the most remote area in the mission. But boy is it fun. We are hiking every single day! It is so gorgeous here and I love the fresh air I get to smell all the time. 

This week I had one of the most powerful moments in my mission. We have 2 families and 2 individuals in our small branch here preparing to go to the temple in Manila. Which means that we are teaching them temple prep. One of the individuals we are teaching is Bro. Alvorado. I have NEVER EVER seen so much faith in one person. He has 1 arm, his knee is messed up way more than mine is ha-ha. He walks about 2 miles to church. Before, he "crutched" to church. He fasted and prayed that Heavenly Father would help him be able to walk enough to get to church. Now he is able to walk to church. We went to visit him on Saturday and he said to us, "Elders, I can't come up with my 200 pesos limit to go to the temple, it is very hard to find any work here in Rizal, especially since I can't do much with one arm." He KNOWS how important it is to go to the temple to become endowed. His wife, who is less active was yelling from the other room in his house/hut thing, "Find a different church! These Mormons are forcing you to go to the temple! Find a new church! If you use that 200 pesos to go to the temple, our kids won't eat!" I couldn't believe what I was hearing. We all basically started crying. He bore a POWERFUL testimony about Joseph Smith and the Restoration. He went and got the Teachings of Joseph Smith book and showed us where he had been studying. He knows this gospel is true. He has been fasting to find the money to be able to go. We told him how much we wanted to give him money, and we assured him that his endowment would be that much more meaningful if he came up with his counter part. I felt impressed to share the story about Alma the senior, and how his people were being persecuted for their beliefs. I told him how the Lord will always visit us in our afflictions, and that this experience is only building his faith. It was such a powerful moment in my mission. These people are LITERALLY sacrificing food on their table, just so they can go to the temple to be sealed and endowed for time and all eternity. I have kind of felt a little bit of regret as well, about how I have not gone to the temple as much as a I should. We have how many temples within an hour of us in Utah? I had the opportunity to DRIVE MY CAR to the temple 10 minutes away. It is such a blessing for me to be living in such humble circumstances here in Rizal. The people here are humble, and I am living humble. I had the "opportunity" to go out and pump water with our pump so I could take my bucket shower. It was awesome. 

I love it here in Rizal. I have come to the realization that my stay here will be the most difficult and the most rewarding in my mission. This week Elder Baquiran was getting some stuff off the shelf and a BIG mouse, not quite a rat, but a mouse ran down and I chased it down and killed it. We have some pretty heavy duty rat traps that are too heavy duty for the mice! But the new cover on the door is keeping more from coming in ha-ha. I am kind of used to them now. As long as they don't crawl on my when I am sleeping ;)

There are also lots of Muslims here. We don't go really to their areas very often. For the people asking, every Tuesday we take a 2 hour shuttle ride to a city called Quezon. A shuttle is basically a big van. that has air con! woo! The road is awful and its hard to sleep. We take that to Quezon for district meeting. No cars for us. Every one here does have a cell phone. But most of the time they don't have "load." which means they cant call or text on it. But they have them! Also, I do actually eat! I eat oatmeal that I bathe in brown sugar every morning, that's pretty good actually. Lunch we do rice with some kind of canned meat. For dinner I like to do fried rice with some eggs and stuff. Nothing special. The Rizal "market" day is every Tuesday, so we don't go to that because its not P day.. So that's cool. Sorry no pics this week. 

I sure miss Elder Leofo hahaha. We had fun and worked SO hard haha. Its alright though. Hope this email is good! 

Mahal ko po kayo lahat!

Elder Lambert

Week ~ 20

Week 2 here in Rizal! Very difficult here. And very hot! The members here are so amazing! Very active and very faithful. At least 30 of them are! We had branch conference yesterday, so the district presidency came 5 hours from Puerto to our small branch. It was super awesome. The members wanted so badly to feed them, and they planned so well but the members here are so incredibly poor that they couldn’t really carry out the plans! It was still so awesome. This week we really focused on getting people to come to branch conference. This week we had 74 people at church! Tons of less actives and we had 5 investigators! That is like a record for here haha. It was a great experience. 

Elder and Sister Wirthlin came down and helped us with our apartment. They are the senior couple assigned in our zone. He put  cover on the door so the rats cant get in. And they gave us 3 huge metal traps. Last night I didn’t hear any! So that’s good. Also we had a spider that was about 3 inches… IN THE HOUSE. So that was awesome. The rats are hopefully no more… 

The work here is GORGEOUS. We went to visit a less active, and her front yard is basically the picture I am sending home! HOLY GORGEOUS.  I just want to swim, but that’s not allowed soooo. That’s cool haha. We have been teaching 2 families and 2 individuals who are preparing to go to Manila next month to go through the temple! President Ostler has sponsors set up to pay for it. In order for them to go to the temple, they need to “promise” to pay a certain amount of money. They have all promised to pay 200 pesos, which is about $2… But that is very difficult for them to come up with! They are gonna do it though. IT is so cool to help people make those covenants! That’s about it this week, our investigators I don’t really know too well. And they don’t read… so that makes it so hard for them to progress! Very different challenges from my last area. But I like it a lot here so far. 

I think Elder Baquiran will be transferring soon, so I need to memorize the area! This area is huge as well, so that makes it hard. Also, rumor has it that the batch of missionaries coming in is about 40, so big transfers of training in 4 weeks! We shall see. But I don’t feel ready for that. Especially in an area like this! I guess we will see. The pictures I have are a Nanay we taught yesterday who ALWAYS wears that awesome hat with weed on it. Then just us walking in our area! And of course the beach. SUPER gorgeous. I love you all. That’s all for this week. Mahal ko po kayo lahat!

Elder Lambert

PS If anyone wants to know the food here is expensive, and there isn't a lot to eat to start with! I am having to be creative with hardly any ingredients. Also, the members can't feed us because they can't afford it. I am expecting to lose more weight haha. But no worries everyone! I am happy and sweaty and my companion is awesome! ;) PS Nana, I wish I could swim but I need to be obedient haha. Love you Nana! Also this is the spider I had to exterminate because I don't do spiders that big in my house. Ang simbahan ito ay totoo. Mahal ko po ugn work ito!

Elder Lambert

Week ~ 19

Slipped and fell in the mud!!

Palawan!!!

Hello everyone! I am officially in paradise! PALAWAN BABY. Holy cow it is gorgeous here! I have been assigned in a town called Rezal. It is about 6 hours from the Palawan "airport." So we are sooo far from anyone. It is so different from the city! I do appreciate the fresh air though. We haven't really been into the mountains yet, because it is difficult to proselyte there, but from my house the mountains are beautiful! When I got the call I was going here, Elder Leofo started screaming and laughing ha-ha, because Rezal is one of the toughest places in the whole mission! There are 2 elders here, me and my companion Elder Baquiran! We live in a house all by ourselves, (I'm not a fan of that but thats okay) He is Filipino from a province about 2 hours away from Manila. He can speak English but he doesn't like to. So that pushes my language limits ha-ha. The members here are awesome. All 30 of them are hahaha. A SUPER small branch. They are all awesome. This area is going to be very difficult compared to my last area. Lots of people here can't make enough money to go to church, so that makes it SO hard to get people to church. Our area is HUGE too. And on top of that lots of people speak a different language, like up in the mountains and stuff. So that will be interesting. This has been a very hard adjustment for me, I live with one other person, who I hardly even know, I live with mice and rats, we only have power from 9:00 Am until 1:00 Am, so that's cool. I also shower with a bucket. That is super hard. Our sink doesn't work either ha-ha. SO we have to wash dishes in the shower "area." This is quite the adventure for me right now. My companion is very quiet, kind of emotional too. He had a nervous breakdown at me last night for something so stupid. I wasn't even quite sure why ha-ha. But he will probably transfer in 6 weeks. I am gonna admit I miss Elder Leofo! He was so awesome ha-ha. I think this companionship might be one I need to bare ha-ha. He is a little feminine but I will try to love him! (not that i don't) but yeah .... He is good though! He is a GREAT teacher. Like so so good. Tomorrow we drive 3 hours just to get to zone meeting. Also if anyone wants to know, Elder Sacay (my trainer) is one of my zone leaders. He was alright as well ha-ha. Annnnyways. This area is already so awesome. Basically the missionaries do everything but be the branch president ha-ha. That's okay though. The church has been here in Rezal for about 5 YEARS! So it is brand new. I will say, it was VERY hard to leave the Vinculado family and brother Johny back in Mandaluyong. I miss them a lot. I am assuming Vinculado got baptized. I am 99% sure ha-ha. I will do my best to find out. But yeah... This is gonna be a good change and I feel like I will be here for 5 months or so! I feel very blessed that the Lord and President Ostler trust me enough to be in an area farthest from the mission office! I hope that's enough info for everyone for now... I need to go buy some mouse traps because I will not stand opening my drawers and having mice in my clothes one more time! Ha-ha I love you all! PS i fell (slipped in the mud!) my first day here in Rezal ha-ha and the beach is about 5 minutes from my house ;)

Elder Lambert

****NOTE: There will be days, maybe even weeks that we won't hear from Elder Lambert. The internet is not readily available... :(

Elder Lambert arrived on Palawan

Mom I am alive ha-ha. The connection stinks here. I wont be able to email every Monday FYI. This area is very difficult. There are 2 missionaries here right now. This is an adventure and we are very isolated. I will hopefully email you Monday, if not, on Tuesday.

Love Elder Lambert

PS Please don't worry about me i am just fine here!

Week ~ 18

Another one gone! The Vinculado family is still awesome! We had to teach them 4 times last week in order to hit all the lessons they needed. I wasn't quite sure how well they were going to understand a living prophet. We hadn't really taught them very well on that. I was a bit nervous about that lesson. Friday we taught about President Monson and we explained the basic organization of the church. They asked how  the prophet is called, we stopped the lesson there and explained we would come back tomorrow and have a picture with all the apostles and stuff! They agreed. But before we left we told them to study about Joseph Smith and to pray about him and Pres. Monson. So the next day we came back about 3 hours before their interview and showed pictures, we also gave them the Liahona magazine that's the conference edition! So we told them to just read from it and all that! Of course they agreed. They just had a problem with not actually knowing who Pres. Monson is, but they accepted him now!

After that we went to the church and they had their interviews. The Zone leaders did their interviews, Elder Handy one of the ZL's came out after brother Mike's interview and he said he had a concern, we froze. I was so scared. Then Elder Handy walked over and said that he was solid! That he was ready for baptism! BEST FEELING EVER. Then Cecil came out and she was done! The baptism is set for September 12th! But, one catch, I AM TRANSFERING TO PALAWAN.

The only thing that I know so far is that I get one bag that is about 50 pounds... So that's gonna be interesting ha-ha. I am super sad actually to leave my womb... I was born in this area! HAHAHA that's okay though. I am going to literally mission paradise! Should be super super pretty. That will be nice. Also they don't speak ANY English there so my Tagalog is going to improve! This week was good though! We were blessed with a referral from a ward member! He actually wants to be taught. So I guess Elder Leofo will have a good time with that! I don't know who my companion is yet, but I will find out tomorrow!

Not much for this week honestly. We just did lots of finding. Talked to lots of people. We have been teaching Brother Johnny a lot too! He actually is one of my good friends in the ward now! He doesn't have a job because he went to church and not work... Ha-ha that could go either way, but his choice. He said he is just gonna fast and spend time with the family and do what he can! He has so much faith! I am gonna be sad to leave him... But it's what I have to do. That's all I have for this week folks! The pics I am sending is our district picture of us having a party for another Elder. And then the picture of the Vinculado family is of them but their daughter wouldn't look ha-ha. And then a hot pic of me on our ward mission leader's bike;)  I love you all!

Elder Lambert 

Palawan

Palawan

Headed to Palawan!! So exciting! Safe travels Elder Lambert...