Week 35

hellllllo family!!!

i'm glad to hear that still my family is alive and kicking! this week passed by really fast, i dont really know why, but it did! we are running out of investigators which is a problem... right now we are having a difficult time meeting new people, so we are working alot with members less active. we already reactivated one (ribamar)! he has gone to church the last two months now and has a calling, i gave him a tie to remember me :) he is so fun to talk to, i attached a picture of him. some exciting news is that i will make 8 months in the mission tomorrow and my birthday is sunday!! crazy crazy crazy... also, this week i will start doing divisions with other elders in their area to help them with their work and to make sure they are working! 

me and ribamar

me and elder bastos in our hammocks :)

monday- we ate lunch at a less active members house (narcélio). we have already worked with him for 3 months and never have been able to get him to church again. BUT, this sunday he went! he finally went and loved  it! he was so happy to be there with us :) we went to the chapel to play ping-pong with some of the youth who are approaching the age of elders! we are helping encourage them to go on a mission. rosángela resurrected and will start working again in irmã alzira´s house! we also discovered she has a boy friend....

tuesday-i gave a training this week on the training that i recieved in teresina. i made my mashed potatoes that my mom sent me, and they were oh so delicious:) i gave ribamar a tie and also bought a box of chocolates for irmã dorinha! she is pretty much my mother away from home, she is always giving me food - it was her birthday so i decided to do something for her!

the bird that pooped on my shirt, again....

me and a little kid on my buddies motorcycle :)

wednesday-today was interesting... we never taught an official lesson throughout the entire day, but we helped alot of people. we helped a member family clear some doubts about the church, hung out with a less active youth, and we went to visit bruno (recent convert) with some friends of the church. also, a bird pooped on my shirt...

thursday-we entered charles´ house! this was a very big moment! we have never been able to enter his house because of his parents, but we did it! we also planned a family night (for tomorrow) some members and investigators who have non member boyfriends/spouses. we will teach about family! we also had fish for lunch. it was the first time i have had fish here on the mission. i learned two things very quickly: i am very thankful for boneless fish in the US and fish has no flavor here or was prepared poorly, but it was fun!

charles (investigator), mateus (member), me, and Bruno (less active)

somebody had a hamster! its been a long time since i've held a hamster...

friday-we were able to find emanuel home after a while and he told us AGAIN that he wanted to stay with the JW´s, but we talked once again :) we talked about the importance of reading and praying about the book of mormon and he wanted us to come back again the next day.

saturday-we passed by narcélio to encourage him to go to church and he actually went this time! he was so happy to be there (i attached a photo of him and his son). we taught emanuel and he wanted to go to church with us but something came up and he had to travel with his mom. 

sunday-charles and narcélio went to church! at night we passed by the houses of the people who didnt go to church and also scored some ice cream at the house of a member  

me and elder albuquerque with narcélio and his son

oreos and peanut butter! thanks for the peanut butter mom!

thanks for all the love and support and stay tuned to hear about the following week! i will try to pass as many exciting experiences as i can so i can send them to you :) 

love,

-Elder Lambert

Week 34

hello my dearst friends and family!

this week was quite an adventure that i am excited to report about. one of the exciting things was that we recieved letters! letters are normally exciting, but when you can only recieve them once every 6 weeks, it gets pretty crazy... i recieved lots of letters from my dearest family :) i also got a letter from elder paxman and discovered that he is a zone leader!!! also, one letter from elder howell! its so fun writing to my buddies in portuguese and finding out how they are doing. one letter that i recieved was both sad and exciting. it was sad because it was the first letter my SISTER sent to me, but exciting because i got to hear from her finally! thanks nat... i had no time to write letters in return, but hopefully i can get a few in the mail next week. being the district leader is going well, but it is a big responsibility. i dont have a ton more things to do, but i just have to make sure to always be a good example and work really hard (which is good). its fun working closer with the zone leaders and the giant meeting that i got to go to during the week. thanks for the updates about BYU and all the adventures! it sounds like you guys are keeping busy and working hard. 

i was able to take lots of pictures, here are the first two.

the chaple in Teresina

a photo with some of the people i traveled with!

me and elder barros!!

 everyone eating lunch at the leadership meeting

monday-this night we passed by the peoples houses who didnt go to church

tuesday-we had another district meeting and got to meet elder ribeiro (new to the district). this week i gave a training and practice on moroni´s promise and how to present it. after the reunion, i went to the giant bus stop to meet up with the zone leaders to travel to Teresina! we left at about 2:30 and arrived at 8:30. i talked to elder Deaver on the bus (from california) and it was so much fun. he is a giant in my district that i get along with really well. after we arrived, we took a ton of busses and arrived at a mission house in the zone Teresina Horto. there was a ton of people there, so some slept on the ground, and nobody had a fan :( i slept from 3-5...

me, elder murray, and elder deaver

our district!

 

wednesday-we woke up at 5 to start the small journey to the chapel. i love traveling on the public busses becasue it is always such an adventure! i was seriously squished between a lady and a young woman this time which was kind of awkward... it was really funny though because elder deaver was bent in half the whole ride. we arrived at the church at about 7:30 to eat a small breakfast and get started! it was so fun seeing all the people who i already knew, and i met alot of new friends! its really fun talking to all the missionaries who have lots of time in the mission. all the trainings were really good and based on the area book and meetings. i love recieving trainings and participating in the leadership of the mission. afterwards, we recieved a ton of supplies to haul arround and bring back to our house. we crammed 6 people in a taxi with a ton of boxes and letters and such, it was really fun. we left to come home at about 9:45 at night. i was super excited to read my letters on the bus, but my light didnt work :(

a big chunk of the leadership

our house!

thursday- we got back to sobral at 3:30 and the house at about 4:30 in the morning. i slept at the zone leaders house because it was closer. we had another night of just 2 hours of sleep because we woke up at 6:30 to work! the other elders in my house came to get me and we had to carry all the suppplies to our house. carrying the huge boxes of books of mormon is very unpleasant. we tried to teach emanuel at night, but he was sleeping, BUT irmã alzirã called us and wanted to give us dinner :)

friday-today was difficult because i woke up with diarreah and a cold :( but hey, this is normal here. we went to emanuel´s house and he said that he decided again to be baptized with the JW´s, but we talked again and he is open to recieve us again! i also started a book of miracles! everyday in the misison i will record a miracle in a separate book. i looked through my journal and picked out miralces of all the days that have passed. 

saturday- all of our plans fell through sadly, and emanuel wasnt in the house... we also journeyed far away to visit a less active YW, but she was busy. but, we had a great lesson with a less active youth named bruno and he said he would go to church again this sunday, and he did!

sunday- we didnt have many people go to church, but bruno went! i love my ward so much :) one sister named irmã lidiane found out my birthday was arriving and gave me a soccer jersey and a chocolate bar! at night we had a really good meeting with the ward missionaries and i hope everything will go as planned.

also! i recieved two packages from my mom for my birthday, but sadly i couldnt wait :) i already opened them and was very pleased with all the food! i am saving the stuff that was wrapped separately and will open those on my birthday. thanks mom!

i love you all and keep you in my thoughts and prayers! thanks for the support and prayers! 

-Elder Lambert

Week 33

hello my dearest family/friends!

so the news about the transfer! we discovered monday night. i will stay here and also i will stay with elder albuquerque! we already stayed 3 months together, but i guess the president wants more. he also finished his 12 weeks of training so he is a normal missionary now and i was called as the DISTRICT LEADER! i'm pretty excited because i get to do some pretty cool things now :) i get to interview people for baptism and also i will travel to Teresina tomorrow! i was super surprised when i found out :) we were also pretty proud at the end of the week because we were able to arrange a small dinner for ourselves every night in the houses of members/less actives/investigators :) 

monday-we had a very crucial lesson with charles he stopped progressing and we explained very clearly that he is denying the answer that he received about this church. we also explained that we have done everything that we can and now he has to do his part if he wants his life to change. he opened up and said that his parents are the problem and is showing lots of hope. we will plan a family night or something with his family. we also figured out that Rosángela stopped showing up for work at irmã alzira´s house and that she stole some things...

tuesday-i had my first district meeting as the district leader! it was fun conducting everything and giving the training. i taught about how to begin teaching and related it to when aaron was teaching king lamoni's father. the zone leaders really liked it :) i have a feeling that i will run out of ideas really fast though. elder bastos arrived to be companions with elder black, i really like him. we showed up at emanuel´s house and he said that he decided to stay with the JW´s, but we taught a lesson to him that he really liked and he asked us to come back saturday :) we did a family night with an active family in the house of a less active family. it was really fun.

wednesday-sadly, lots of plans fell through, but that's kinda normal. we taught a less active youth about the importance of the church for his future and he said he returned, and he did! we also planned a family night in alzira´s house friday.

thursday-we taught fellipe which was just so-so, but we met his mom who is super cool. we will start teaching her too. we passed by another less active family to help them with some problems.

friday-today was the independance day of brasil! i was a little disappointed because nothing exciting happened. not much goes on here in sobral :) lunch was super super good and i ate about 100 pounds of meat :) it was so delicious. at night we passed by alzira´s to do a family night that she really liked. when i got home, i read a book that my mom made for me last year. for a year she wrote down something good that i did that day for every single day! 364 things! i read all of it and i love it so much. its really funny becasue at the end it mentioned how in about another year id be on the mission, and here i am!

saturday-we had an awesome lesson with emanuel. he was shocked that we walked all the way from our house just to teach him. we watched the film of the restoration and he really liked it. it cleared up alot of questions that he had and he felt the spirit while watching. we set a baptism date with him for the 29th, 1 day before my birthday! after we left, he chased us down and tried to give us R$5 to take a taxi back to our house. we didnt accept, but he is super cool :) we visited some more less active people in our ward. pretty much all of brasil is baptized, but nobody is active...

sunday-we brought emanuel to church again and he loved it. he said that he was reading the book of mormon and feels that its true! his parents seperated and left the church when he was 7, so he doesnt remember anything, but we sang ´i am a child of god´ in the sacrament meeting and he got really excited because he remembered the song :)

monday-we cleaned the whole house agian which was great and i dont think we will do anything very exciting for the rest of the day... 

i love you all and i will keep you updated on my adventures! i hope you have a great week! :)

-Elder Lambert

Week 32

hello my family!

this week was a very interesting week and i will explain why. we will also find out about transfers today!!! this should be very interesting! it sounds again like the president is a little slow so we might find out tomorrow... i'm dying to know! i love transfers :) also, i met someone named Pedro Lima (in the other ward) and he said that he served with Brian Briggs! that was kind of fun and interesting! his name on the mission was elder lima. 

monday-we went to teach bruno and his mom ended up giving us a bunch of food, so that was really good :) pretty much thats all that happened!

tuesday-we woke up and discovered that elder G Silva was being transfered to teresina to be the secretary of finances! he packed up fast and had to leave. he was transfered a week early because the secretaries have to receive a week of training with the old secretary. because he left, it meant that we got to stay in a trio! it was really fun actually working with elder black, but the problem was that we had to switch areas and lunches everyday and it just got really confusing. our numbers were pretty low this week because our area only got worked three days! seminary had lots of people which was good; charles, lucas, and fellipe went. after we taught a quick lesson with charles, but sadly he stopped progressing :(

wednesday-we worked in elder blacks area and we walked a ton! everything was falling through and his investigators live really far apart. the lessons that we did get to teach were good though! we were able to mark a baptismal date with a guy who has already recieved 22 sets of missionaries! it wa amazing that everyone has their time and after 22 companionships the spirit touched his heart and he accepted!

thursday-we worked elder blacks area again today. we went to a super rich doctors house and he bought pizza and coke for us! it is super amazing if somebody buys a pizza for you because they are R$25. its ridiculously expensive...  i also made a fantastic dinner with sausage, hamburger, onions, peppers, and many other things. i am becoming quite inventive :) ALSO, i recieved a call from elder iverson!! it was sooo cool! he finished his misison and was visiting some places with his dad here in brasil. he passed sobral and used the LZ´s phone! i was so happy to talk to him and he was so happy to be returning home :)

friday-we worked in my area and some of our plans fell, but it was still an alright day. at night, our ward had a BBQ and invited us :) the food was amazing!

saturday-we waited to recieve a call from someone in our ward to do a service project in his house, but sadly he never called. the guy in elder blacks area passed the baptismal interview and will be baptized the next saturday! sadly, our meal before the fast was really little :( something very crazy happened at night. we were teaching a family and watching the video of the restoration and someone in the street started shooting at somebody. there were a bunch of gunshots and a guy passed the house with a handgun in his hand. it was really interesting because the family was just locked in watching the video. they loved it and the spirit was way strong with them. 

sunday-only 2 investigators came to church. we had meetings all throughout the night and i taught a lesson to the young women on how to conduct music. it was really funny and interesting. its a hard thing to explain in portuguese...  as we were leaving the church, a big soccer game had ended and people were going nuts. a bunch of police chased down someone and later they were looking for something close to the church. they ended up finding a handgun outside the gates of the church! this was another interesting thing...

monday-we are just waiting to hear about transfers! i hope we will find out soon!

i love you all, and i hope the week was splendid for everyone! if you dont have anything to do, write me a card for my birthday! :) i keep all my friends and family in my prayers!

-Elder Lambert

my district + Bruno (a young man in the ward)