Good morning world,

It has been a good week this week. We have some new investigators who have some baptismal dates and so forth. The highlight for me this week was the Zone Conference that we had onThursday. Meetings like that always are a spiritual recharge of batteries. It was a great meeting. 

The meeting was focused on Alma 5, which is one of Alma's greatest chapters that he rights in terms of testimony and doctrine. I encourage everyone to read it. Also, President Ostler told us to write down some different questions that we want to be answered at the conference, so I did that and I received answers to every single question that I had. Sister Ostler also talked about Gratitude. She focused on how the secret to joy is through gratitude. I haven't always been the most thankful person ever, but she challenged us to write down 5 new things everyday that we are thankful for. So I am doing that. It really opens up your mind and heart and really makes you think about how many things in the world that we have to be thankful for. There are unlimited possibilities. After the, "Gratitude" talk, as a group we really broke down Alma 5. Some of the missionaries had to speak about different verses in Alma 5, including my companion who spoke about Alma 5:27. That was really hard for him because he really struggles with English, but he did a good job. I really like what President Ostler said about Alma 5, "It is bold and straight forward, but it pushes us and moves us in the right direction, step by step." So I encourage you all to read that sick talk. Following that talk, one of the AP's Elder Beagley gave a talk about finding joy in the work. He mostly talked about becoming a consecrated missionary, about how we need to lay everything on the, "Altar Of Sacrifice," to become the most effective missionary possible. Now that is easier said than done. I love the quote he used though, "In victory or defeat, peace of mind can only be found in perfect effort." You may have heard that, but I was unable to write down who wrote that quote. That is a great quote that anybody can apply into their lives. So that was a great talk. If any of you remember Elder Zeyer, he was in the MTC with me a long time ago, he is now the new AP in the mission, he spoke about the "Gold Mine." That is just the golden places to find people to baptize. After that, Elder Bolnick, (who was also in the MTC with me,) talked about really teaching repentance to these people really means and what we need to do to have power in this work. He did a great job, he has changed a lot since we met at the airport those long months ago. It was good to see him too. The final talk that hit me was when the Elders and Sisters split up, so the Elders go with President Ostler and then the Sisters go with Sister Ostler. It seems that we always talk about being a father. The mission is really preparing us to be a righteous Father and Husband. We watched a talk from Elder L. Tom Perry from the 1970's. It was all about being the father that we need to be in times of turmoil. He basically chastised the fathers back in that day, but I was thinking about how much things have changed since those times. Fathers are more important now then they have ever been, and I am grateful to have the father that I have in my life. President talked about being a father is closer than we think it is, which is kind of a scary thought haha. Anyways, that was zone conference on Thursday. We also got to see some people that we haven't seen in awhile. I saw my first son Elder Garol and Elder Webster and also Elder Baquiran. Of course Elder Eteaki as well. I miss that big fat guy aha. We always just laugh when we are together. And of course he still eats a lot. 

About the work here in our area:

We have tried to apply the things from zone conference that we learned into our area. For example, we went through the ward directory and made a list of names that we don't know in our area who are "Less active," and we have been trying to find them. We found a few people, but we weren't able to teach them because of not having a third lalaki with us. Because we can't teach a girl unless we have a guy with us 18 years old and above. So yeah, we are going to go through LA members to bring them back, and invite their friends to come with them. The Manuel family is still doing great. They are still looking good for the 24th of September. Hopefully they can be interviewed for baptism on maybe the 17th or so. I look forward to that day on the 24th! I also feel like I will be transferring on October 5 to a new area. I have kind of stopped hoping to stay in an area for more than 4 months, because in every area I have stayed there for only 3 transfers. So why change tradition now? We will see what happens. 

We have some new baptismal candidates as well. This one kid named Rovick actually OYMed us. He knows Elder Baquiran, if any of you remember my first companion from Rizal. We taught him and some of his neighbor friends and some of his siblings and then his grandma, they all accepted a baptismal date for November 19. We are trying to find through the members, so I think in the coming weeks we will start to see some good things come out of using the members in our area. 

I think that was all for this week. I think it was the greatest week of my life because I made salsa. Yeah, I MADE SALSA. In the house, we have a blender, so I made it a goal to make salsa this week. I was able to get all of the ingredients here except for cilantro. The cilantro is only at the market at night and we weren't able to go through there at night. Tomatoes here are so cheap, they just don't quite taste the same as they do in the states. It wasn't too bad actually! I am a little bit getting sick of rice.. So me and Elder Reber are trying to experiment with some classic American food, sometimes it is a little expensive though. I think that was a nice break though, the chips weren't very good though... Sayang. But we did our best! So that is what one of our pics is, and then the other one is the adventure that we had going to and from Zone Conference. We took the PNR (Philippines National Railroad) which is like a real train, with real savages that ride it. They literally don't care at all how many people they fit into that thing. We had to squeeze into it, like ants trying to get into an ant hill. And then one of the trains was too full so we had to wait for the next one, so we sat down and took some selfies. Not a bad trip. 

I think that is all for this week. We will be starting like week 4 in this transfer starting today, time is moving. I am coming up on almost 6 months left in my mission. Its going fast, some of the boys are home. I am not sure how I feel about it. I have lots of work to do. Anyways, I love you all!

Elder Lambert 

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth

Good morning world,

I am blessed right now, my new roommate Elder Reber has this cool thing called an Alphasmart, its this little typer thingy that I can use to type on like Sunday or something. So right now I am typing this before church.

Anyways, its been a good week here in Tondo. We have been doing our best to keep moving this work forward here. We have a few new people here that we have been teaching. Sometimes its just really hard to get a return appointment with them, or even worse, when we have a return appointment, they sometimes aren't there. The struggle is real. The Manuel family is of course doing really well. We taught them a few times this week. One of the times we taught them on exchanges. It was me and Elder Reber that worked together. That was fun. He actually does his best to speak, and the people understand his situation because he is less than 2 weeks old in the Philippines. Anyways, we taught the Manuel family about service. It was just a pretty simple lesson where we shared in Mosiah about when you are in the service of your fellow beings, you are really serving God. The spirit was there, it was just a good lesson. Elder Reber did a good job. That same day me and him went to teach an investigator who lives with some members. He is part of a church called, "Iglesia ni Cristo." If you wanna know more about that, google it haha. Anyways, his name is Ronald. He wants to learn about the message, but thats all. He doesn't want to move forward in coming closer to God through baptism. So thats his concern. The other concern is sometimes he just isn't there when we go to teach him. That one is my favorite ;) haha. We still do our best. He is cool though. After we taught him on exchanges, we had to do the most American thing ever, so we got Mcdonalds. I smashed a Big Mac meal and a nice Coke. I definitely forgot my camera for pics, but we are planning to go on exchanges again, and I feel like we will return to Mcdo. It was a good exchange though. Yesterday we taught the Manuel family again. We shared and really clarified about Priesthood and how it works through auilleries. We tied that to callings and how they will be getting a calling after they are baptized. After the lesson, we talked about their marriage. We set a goal for them to be married and baptized September 24. We are going to do everything in our power to make that happen. I really want to see that happen, I am a little tired of transferring before baptisms happen in my areas. So we are going to push for that to happen. We told them they should talk with bishop today after church to get a plan with how we can make this happen. And that actually happened! We set the date for the wedding and the baptism on the 24th of this month! So we are excited.

I think they are the most progressing so far in our area. The best part about it, is that their kids aren't as naughty as they used to be. Most of the time they just leave during the lesson which is the most perfect thing ever, so the spirit can actually be there in abundance. The lessons have just gotten better and better over the weeks we have been working with them. This week we also had to go give a blessing to a cousin of a member who conveniently got dengue. So we had to go just outside our area to go to a hospital to give a blessing. I am trying to think of some other stuff that happened this week... Oh yeah, a drunk guy wanted to fight us and told me I don't love God because I didn't wanna sit down with him and discuss about religious things. He was yelling super loud, like sonic boom loud. It reminds me when Jason Erekson would walk in and yell at me and Nick when we were playing video games haha. But this drunk guy was yelling at us for like 5 minutes. Jason wouldn't do that haha.

We also have this old member who was baptized like 30 years ago that we teach. He is now a member of Iglesia ni Cristo. He has no idea about the church or anything. He is like 80 years old and his brain is a little bit gone because of an accident that he had. He tells us the story of the accident EVERY time we go over there. Haha its hard not to laugh or giggle every time he tells the story. He is a funny guy, his name is Romy. He also explained that when he was baptized in Makati like 30 years ago, that he and the Elders were naked. So that was a priceless story for the books that us, as well as the member who was with us can remember for forever. So those visits are always a hoot. 

The area is doing alright. We are really excited for the Manuel family. Actually this week we have really a ton of new appointments with OYMs that we will be meeting with. So we are hoping for some good things to happen there. I love you all!

PS here is some pics of me and my comp and the umbrella that I rock everyday. 

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth

Hey world,

Before we begin, 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE WORLDS BEST MOTHER! 

LOVE YOU MOM. :) THANK YOU FOR ALL YOU HAVE DONE FOR ME AND WHAT YOU STILL CONTINUE TO DO FOR ME. ALSO, ALWAYS REMEMBER THAT WHEN I SHOW A FAMILY PICTURE TO THE PEOPLE HERE, THEY ALWAYS ASK IF YOU ARE LIKE 30 YEARS OLD? :) SO KEEP THAT UP! LOVE YOU MOM! MISS YOU ALWAYS. ❤ I HOPE YOU HAD A GOOD BIRTHDAY.

Update on life: I no longer have that nasty sickness.

Update on life #2: I have a new companion!

His name is Elder Panugau. He is from Bicol. He speaks Bicolano. One of the many languages here in the Philippines. Its interesting when he finds someone from his province he goes straight to speaking his language. I can understand enough of it to get by, but I sure can't speak it. He is a really cool guy though. I met him in Palawan almost a year ago when he was being trained. I never thought we would have been companions. He is a huge Tupac fan, for those of you who know who that is hahaha. He is a funny guy. I am really slacking on the picture part of my life right now. I will get one of us next week. So Elder Langi is in Palawan now, hopefully he will get fluent in Tagalog out there. I miss that guy. My other roommate was replaced by a fresh new missionary straight from Sandy, Utah! His name is Elder Reber, he is a pretty chill kid doing his best to learn Tagalog.

In our area right now, I am really looking forward to having a companion who I can go 50/50 in the work. It has been about 9 months now since I have had that, so I look forward to it! The unity that we have in this new companionship is looking really good so far too. The Manuel family is doing really well too. Now when we go to people, especially them, I know that can understand everything! So we are going to OYM the whole world and get a big teaching pool. We are in dire need of some new people. The Manuel family continues to go to church. Even if their kids are naughty, they still manage to make it there to church every Sunday. Even better news, THEY GOT THEIR NSO PAPERS DONE FOR THEIR MARRIAGE  They will be picking those up on the 31st. So we can start with the planning for the marriage. We are really hoping for this September maybe the 3rd week we can have them baptized. We don't really have too many people moving forward other than them.

Yesterday at church we taught about how to give referrals during a combined EQ and RS lesson. It went well. We are hoping for more referrals be given by the members here. We also touched on fellowshipping for the investigators and LAs that come to church, because there isn't much of that going on. So we are trying to change the culture at church with that. We can only do so much, just do our part. 

The pics I have are of the 2 Tongan homies here in the mission. Elder Eteaki is in my zone so I see him sometimes. And then us with the Manuel family :) 

Not much else going on, just working hard and sweating you know? Love you all! 

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth

Hi World!

Hi world,

Finally I found a computer that I can actually email on. These internet cafes here are a little difficult to work with some times. So, we do our best. I am not going to lie... This week has been one of the hardest weeks of my whole mission. Tons of rejection and some let downs a TON of diarrhea. I guess I will give a quick run down on the whole sickness thing. Feel free to skip this part for those of you who aren't interested. So for about 2 weeks now, I have been having some diarrhea. It has been a joy! I have taken so many pills for it and nothing has been happening. I texted the nurse last Monday and she has basically put me on an all liquid diet. I basically haven't had a meal in about a week now. I have probably lost like 8-10 pounds now. It has been rough.Wednesday through Saturday were so long. I have never been so hungry my whole life. To top it off, I got the sickness that my roommate has had as well. So a nice sore throat for the cherry on top. I have been on straight liquids from about Wednesday really. I could count on one hand the food I have eaten since then. We didn't work Saturday or Sunday because my body has been so week. It has been hard. I am doing my best but you can only push your body so hard when you aren't eating very much. But, I have felt the hand of the Lord as we work hard! Its like the sore throat and sickness goes away when we talk to someone on the street, Its a really cool feeling. It felt like it was melting off of me. Really awesome :) The Lord loves us, he really does. So yeah.. There is the physical run down for the week ;) 

The work this week was also very difficult because of the sickness. Thursday me and Elder Cebuco had exchanges in his area. We taught 7 lessons and I thought I was going to die at some points. Going home to go to the bathroom gets a little tiring, even expensive too! It takes its toll on the work. The exchange went well too. Elder Cebuco will be training this next transfer. I am also assuming that Elder Langi will be transferring on Wednesday, so we will see who my new companion is. So we have been teaching Sis. Eugene Mae and preparing her for baptism hopefully for this coming week! We have been working so hard to try and get the ward to fellowship her and make her feel welcome. Its so hard though because she is a really quiet person... Anyways, to shorten everything up, she texted us on Friday and told us that she doesn't want to continue to be taught... It was a heart breaker. Not gonna lie. After what I was feeling and then that to top it off it was tough. Its hard not to think, "What did I do wrong? Or what could I have done better?" Sometimes we do our best, and people don't use their free agency wisely. What can you do. We just keep going. Other than that we went to some members this week and just taught them about missionary work. That is our goal, is involving the members. Hopefully something good comes out of that in our area. We are really working hard so we are looking for something good. Not much else to report on for the work. 

This week was stake conference as well! Those are always a spiritual boost. We were nervous about investigators like the Manuel family being able to make it to that, but hey, they did! They went with the members all the way to the Santa Cruz chapel to be able to see what happens as well as feel the spirit. The conference was of course great. President and Sister Ostler were there as well and gave some great talks. President Ostler spoke about forgiveness and the Atonement of Jesus Christ. He really spoke about how we need to forgive people that have hurt us, even if they have hurt us over and over again. The Lord won't forgive us if we don't forgive the people who have hurt us. No matter how big it is. So that was a good reminder. The conference just was really good, they touched on missionary work a lot. The stake is struggling a little bit, and we are hoping and praying that people will get more involved with it. 

I am really hoping to see some miracles in this area, especially starting a new transfer. Based on history, this will be my last transfer here in Tondo if history is repeated, so we will see how that goes. I have some pictures from the conference. I will see if i can send them in a minute. It is a bit of a process, so we will see. I love you all! Thank you for your prayers:) I really feel them and I feel your love from every one of you :) 

Love you all! 

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth

Rain, rain and more rain!!

Hello world.

So as you all may have seen it has been really rainy here because of the baguio that came through here. The rain here has been HORRENDOUS. I have never seen it so hard in my whole life. Its also a joy because the Philippines has no mountains which also means no drainage. That just translates to the flooding be REALLY BAD! The pics that I am sending are only like up to our calves on our legs. We continued walking and it almost got up to our waist (at least my waist haha). So yeah. We aren't actually allowed to walk in the floods but when there is no other way... You kind of have no choice. So yeah. That was an adventure as always. 

This week was really busy. We had interviews with President on Tuesday and then zone meeting on Wednesday. So that cut into the work a lot. That was a little rough. But it all went well and worked out. We went to lots of LA members this week. There are a few showing signs of wanting to come back. So in the coming weeks we will be kind of targeting them. This week was tough in terms of people coming to church. Last week our attendance was a whopping 149 this week it dropped to 98... So yeah I guess that's what happens when there is hard rain. The only investigator that came to church was Eugene Mae so that was a little rough. She seems to be doing good though! We taught WOW to her this past week and she said she has no problems so that's always a plus. We are hoping her for baptizing her on Mom's birthday which is this coming August 27! So we are doing all we can to make that happen. Also the Manuel family has been experiencing some tough things. All of the little kids keep coming down with fevers one after another. So they haven't been able to go and get heir marriage license yet. They said that this week they will make that happen. Hopefully Wednesday they can get that so we can move that forward. Other than that we are kind of refreshing the area in terms of people to teach. We have dropped a few and are hoping to go through the members to get some good investigators. We have lots of appointments with members this week in hopes that we can get some good referrals out of that. So we will see how that goes. 

Other than that nothing else really happened this week. I saw some members from my last area this week so that was a surprise :) Also got a pic with some random peeps on the road. I love you all! Have a good week! Especially to my pops who will be having a birthday on Wednesday! So you all better let him know about that. Love you dad! 

Love 

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth

Hi peeps of the world!

I hope all of you had a good week just like we had. It was a hot and sweaty and sometimes rainy week here in Tondo. Too bad when it rains it gets EVEN HOTTER sayang... Pero we had a good week! Lots of good people who seem to be progressing at this point in our area. I am really happy to see where things are going in the area. I think that we still can always do better! President Ostler said that our mission is pushing the limits of missionary work. So imagine this if there were no members in our areas, it was just the missionaries Pres. Ostler said that we are doing the best that we can possibly do in that scenario. We can do even better if we really involve the members. So that is what we are pushing for in our areas. I'm not going to lie, every area has its struggles that I have been in. Palawan was extremely primitive, Las Pinas was like Utah in its progression. Tondo has a TON of potential. The missionaries have worked hard here but some things that have happened have slowed some progression. Last night we met with Bishop Altre about what we need to do as a ward. I guess that the whole Manila stake is at its lowest point in a few years when it comes to missionary work. So we discussed it with bishop about what we need to do. The 4 of us as missionaries are doing the best we can, its time to push the members. So this Sunday, the 4 of us will all be speaking. Bishop said that between the 4 of us we will be discussing some topics that each of us can take to speak about. The 4 topics we came down to were: sustaining leaders, magnifying your calling, VT/HT, and member missionary work/fellowshippng. I have chosen to talk about magnifying your calling. Its a problem that I think a lot of us have. The members here need some kind of a wake up call. Or I think we all do. So I will be the last speaker this coming weekend. I actually don't mind speaking. Its not even that hard anymore. So I look forward to that. Also the missionaries will be singing prelude music. Bishop wants this to be a missionary week where we can kind of wake up some of the members. Should be a good week! Also in two weeks we will be teaching the combined RS and EQ lesson focusing on missionary work. So should be good.

This week I got some good news! If anybody remembers Melh-Jean Recones from Las Pinas she was our investigator. She got baptized this last week! So yeah that was something good to hear :) bout time she made it to the waters. So that was cool. Within the next two weeks we are looking at a baptism! Sister Eugene Mae will hopefully be baptized. We just have to finish the lessons with her and her interview will be this Saturday! So we look forward to that. Also the Manuel family is doing really well! Brother Alvin wants to be baptized so badly. Today they are supposed to go and get their marriage license for that. So hopefully in the next few weeks we can marry and baptize them! That would be so special :) So good things are happening! The other family we have been teaching is doing well in some ways in other ways they are struggling a little bit. Brother Raffy is reading the BOM and is on page 39! So that is pretty cool. They are struggling a little bit with committing and actually following through on appointments. So we keep pressing forward!I have pics of them so ya'll can see. We also have another girl named Lovely that we are teaching. I think she has a crush on my companion so we will have to see what happens when she transfers. That's about it for investigators. Some of our LA are so difficult. We are doing our best with them. They still have their free agency. So we do our best. 

Overall the week was good. Something funny happened this week. So the new president in the Philippines made gambling illegal so we were walking in one of  our more sketchy areas and then they saw us and all booked it away from us! Ha! They thought we were police. Pretty dang funny. I love that. Also we bought a cake the words we put on it are "Sebastian ❤'s Cibuco" thats the first name of Elder Lopez and then his companion. Just a joke  it was definitely a mango marshmallow so that was cool. I also bought a SICK star wars shirt so all ya'll can be jealous. I also don't know who the storm trooper is on it... So just bare with me. I love you all!

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth

Weekly Update

Good morning to all my lovely peeps. I hope all ya'll had a really good week! We did. We had a really good week. We are having lots of good success. Things are really starting to come together. We had 8 investigators at sacrament yesterday! That is a record for my mission. Some of them were the same, but we had some new ones who we taught on Saturday that ended up going to church with us on Sunday. So that was good to see some good success this week in terms of church. 

This week was a little trying in terms of some people, but really rewarding in terms of others. Sister Eugene Mae is still progressing really really well! She is really developing that desire to be baptized and kind of give purpose to her life. She is a really quiet, shy person, but she is really starting to open up to us. She jokes and stuff which is a sign of her starting to open up a little more to us. Also it helps her with wanting to ask questions and talk about some potential concerns. We are sure she will be baptized, we just have to get through the lessons and it can happen. She is at church every single week and is really just absorbing all we teach. We are doing our  best to teach her, but she is understanding more even if she isn't the best at Tagalog. Its been a blessing teaching her! She is from Mindanao here in the Philippines, specifically in a place called Zamboanga. Its in the deep south here in the country and in her area it is mostly Muslim. The "group" in her area consists of 4 missionaries and 2 members, so if she ever goes back to the province she will be a "pioneer" in the area. So that's a really cool thought. She is reading the Book of Mormon and from what I have been told she leads family prayer sometimes. So that is so so awesome! The Manuel family is doing well too. We are so close to getting them married, brother Alvin is just having a hard time getting days off so he can go with his wife to get the marriage license and all that. So its so close! But they are doing well. Also, the 3 new people that went to church were taught only once and then they came to church. If any of you remember the photos I sent home of the drunk guy last week, the girl sitting next to me in the yellow came to church kasama ng sister nya and her friend. I think the girl in the yellow has a crush on Elder Langi, so we will see how that pans out and see if she is actually interested. They had to leave early from church because of work, so that is another concern of theirs. We are working on that though.

Overall this week was good. The "golden family' that we found were busy all week long... That was super frustrating. One of the times we went over there and brother R had started to drink. He wasn't too drunk at that point, he was still all there for us to at least talk to him. We still aren't able to really teach him if he is even a little bit under the influence. So we scheduled to go back the next day. He said he would cook for us, so after the chicken feet extravaganza last week, I was a little nervous. Anyways, when we were talking to him at that point I was excited because he is reading the Book of Mormon! He is on page 11 and  has things marked that he likes. So that's really really awesome and a huge blessing! Sometimes its hard to get people just to pick the book up! He is 100% willing to read, even if he is hard to teach with his family, reading the Book of Mormon is the best thing he can be doing. So we keep trying and praying for him to give us some time to teach, 

I'm trying to think of a funny experience that we had this week... Hmmm. maybe wala haha. We are just working hard. Elder Langi ordered 48 bottles of Mountain Dew for the apartment hahah. Because here in the Philippines when you drink out of a glass bottle, you return the bottle and then the company returns it so they can refill the bottles, so yeah. He bought 2 cases of 24 bottles. Now, I am already super fat so I'm keeping it to 1 a day don't worry 

I have been reading the New Testament and it is INCREDIBLE. Now, we know how important the Book of Mormon is for our church. But I also encourage you all to read the New Testament! The life of our Savior Jesus Christ is contained in it. I have learned so much about myself and following his perfect example is what we are all striving to do in our lives. I love you all, and I love being a missionary here in the Philippines. 

Love you all!

PS i kind of got like no pics this week... 

-- 

Elder Lambert

Philippines, Manila Mission, Earth