Week ~ 29

Hello world,

It has been a good week. We are tearing it up here in Rizal. I almost
hate being assigned here. It is SO gorgeous. I just can’t even get
over it. I want to swim every dang day. I haven’t swam in the ocean in
over 10 years, so I am well overdue. It is such a blessing but also a
curse to be assigned in one of the most BEAUTIFUL areas in the whole
world. I will argue that all day long. Last night, I was standing out
on the beach, looking up at the Milky Way and the moon was just above
the horizon. I was just a foot or two from where the waves came. I
couldn’t help but think that all of this isn’t just a coincidence, and
that it came from an Eternal God! It was GORGEOUS and just perfect.  I
love it here and I love the members. 

We are working so hard for this baptism goal on December 26th of this year.
We are going to make it happen. I am excited for the next couple of weeks. 
It is a little stressful. But we are doing pretty well here in Rizal. We had a TON of
new investigators this week. Which is always awesome. It was a crazy
week; we came home from Narra on Wednesday. So it was a short week.
But basically it is always a short week here in Rizal. We have really
been focusing on Sis. Riza and getting her and her kids to the waters
of baptism (the ocean).  They are hard cookies to crack. But it’s
going pretty well! We have FHE tonight. We are doing a bonfire on the
beach tonight ;) I am so pumped. So that should be gorgeous aha. I
will email you all next week how trunky I get ;) jokes. But yeah. We
taught them 2 times this week. We committed her to live the WOW. She
has some problems with that, but it hasn’t been for a couple of weeks.
So we are praying for that. Since Rizal is the choir here in the Narra
District (stake), we have been putting that together. Everybody knows
that Elder Lambert has not a single lick of singing talent, except for
when he is singing in his car. But, there’s no cars here for me. I am
very blessed that my anak, (son) sang in a choir in college and knows
how to put it together! So we don’t sound half bad! We are singing
“How Great Thou Art.” So we sound good! Everyone that joins the choir
gets free fare all the way (4 hours) to Aborlan where we have the
conference! So we are trying to get Sis. Riza to join with her kids.
They came once to practice, but only once. So we will see what happens
with that. We have lots of members participating. We have a family,
who is less active, who we are trying to get to join. They are 3
girls; one is 18, 16, and 14. They all have waaay good voices. The
older two seem to come! But the 14 year old just won’t. But we went to
teach all of them at their moms “store” thing. They cook food and
people buy it there. We were there with some members, Sis. Mia Resane
(16) and her little brother Kim who is 13. Yeah he has the same name
as my mother what of it. 

Anyways, this one guy came up to the store
thing, and he starts looking for something to eat. I started to talk
to him about how gwuapo he was ahahaha. Just cause it was a way to
start the convo. Sister Mia looks at me and
says, “Elder Lambert! Do you realize who that is?!” My thought was, “I
have no idea.” Just because I don’t know any Filipino celebrities. But
I guess he was some famous singer/actor from a very famous Filipino
show called “Showtime.” It was cool to talk to him. He was of course
talking to me in English because he is good at it aha. But it was
cool. On Saturday Sis. Marilyn Diosma (the 18 year old) showed up to
choir practice with this guy! I don’t even know his name, but since we
are singing a Christian hymn, he knows it too. He sang it for us and
he is sooo talented. I was super cool to talk to and see this guy.

This week was pretty normal, for Rizal ahaha. The rats are gone! The
landlord came last Monday and they sealed the hole! I haven’t heard
any since and they aren’t in our house! Woooo! So that’s a plus.
Nothing too crazy this week. Just lots of planning for the coming
weeks and baptisms! If anyone wants to know, I’m not fluent. Sometimes
I still don’t have a clue what people say to me. So that’s
frustrating. But I usually have an idea… I am progressing though.
Slowly but surely! I love this work. Sorry for the short email aha. I
sometimes can’t remember what happened during the week aha. Love you
all!
PS. the internet stinks so bad i cant attach pics...
-- 
Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth