Strike the Match

Hey Fam,

This week was quite the success actually! We have been preparing physically, mentally, spiritually, and emotionally for our 100 hour week this upcoming week. It is actually Sunday night right now because we won't have time to have a pday in order to reach 100 hours of work in 1 week. Anyway, here are some of the highlights from last week!

First of all, I got to go on exchanges with Elder Gamege Don. He is from Sri Lanka! He is honestly one of the funniest people I have ever gotten to work with in my mission! Hahaha his English and Tagalog are both still a little hard for him, but he just says whatever he wants😂 Wala siyang pakialam talaga! We had a super fun day together in one of our super poor areas.

The DelaCruz family is so awesome! This week we were going to their house and the youngest girl Princess was hiding outside and scared us😂 I gave them twisty colored pencils and they have been using them every night:):) Our best lesson this week was about the tree of life! We got the Dad super excited when we told him he was the Lehi of their family and that it was his responsibility to help them all come taste the fruit! The mom was hesitant to come to church because she is shy, but when we got to stake conference Bro Niño had fulfilled his Father responsibility and brought all of them to church! I was sooooo happy to see there waiting for us to get there! They were like 40 mins early hahaha that is not a normal Filipino thing to do! #FilipinoTime We ended up having 9 investigators at stake conference which was super awesome!

We have an investigator named David Subang that is getting close to his baptism on October 5th. He is 22 and actually works in downtown Manila for a branch of Google! Haha it is so awesome because he always talks about the NBA! He always gives us updates to which how his 2K team is coming along hahaha. It's like teaching an American teenager... except in Tagalog:) Anyway, he is kind of dating one of our RMs in our ward, and he said he is going to invite her to our next lesson! It happens to be the day that we are planning on sharing the Law of Chastity with him! Hahahah it will be a super funny lesson:)

Anyway, I'm going to bed so I don't die this week:) I'm going to see how well my mind can control my body this week as we are working 100 hours in the heat. It is going to be a memorable experience whether it turns out good or bad;) Love you guys!!

-Elder Reber

Now that is on giant pile of shoes!!

Elder Gamege Don

Graden told us he saw the ugliest dog ever but this is just plain sad-yikes

"I hope they come share with me someday"

Wuzzzup fam,

This week was super cool! I want to give you guys a quick update on the DelaCruz family that I talked about last week. Honestly, every missionary hears that there are people prepared in their area that they need to go out and find. I can honestly say that this family could be just that. Elder Richards and I can get punted all day, but the second we walk into this house everything just flows perfectly. We truly follow the spirit when we teach them and it has been so awesome! We taught them twice since my last email to your guys. The first time, Bro Niño started tearing up when I told him it was time for the closing prayer. He told us how he just wanted us to stay longer because his kids are so happy when we are there. Unfortunately, it was curfew and we had to leave. The next lesson we came and were about to know on the door, but the kids swung it open before we could knock! They had the BOMs ready and all the chairs in a circle:) We extended a baptism date to them for October and they all accepted it! Bro Niño tried to tell us it wasn't safe to go out in the rain because he wanted us to stay longer again hahaha. They are so cute!

We met another lady named Luz this week. She is in her 50's and is legit the nicest little lady ever. When we knocked on her door at around 8:15 pm, she was super surprised. She told us to come in and asked us how we found her house. I explained to her that we were knocking on doors in her area and that we felt prompted to knock at hers. She told us that she had seen us walking around in other areas and even pretty close to her house. She wanted to talk to us, but never thought she would have the chance to hear our message. She told us straight up "I would always look out my window and say, wow I hope they come share with me someday." Anyway, obviously we were a little surprised at the things she was saying. It seemed like I was practice teaching with a trainee because she was asking all the perfect questions that we have instant answers to. We taught a powerful lesson and look forward to following her up this week:)

I am not sure if I will be able to send an email next week because my companion and I are planning on attempting a 100 hour week. In order to achieve that goal, we won't have any time on Pday to write an email, but I will maybe try to type one on Saturday night or something haha. Anyway, keep me in your prayers so we can have the strength to achieve this goal and really find those that God is preparing. I love you all, and I love my mission!

-Elder Reber

Playing basketball, moving elders and haircuts were on the list for this Pday

Graden found a new friend in a jeepney he was riding in

Prayer on his phone :)

This week was awesome! We had 5 new investigators show up to church for their first times. Three of those five were from the DelaCruz family. They are progressing super well still! They are always cleaning up their house and running to grab their Book Of Mormons when we knock haha! John Larry, their 12 year old boy, had typed out a prayer on his phone in case we called on him. His Dad ended up picking him to say the prayer so he just read it haha it was awesome:)

We had our zone conference last week. I gave a workshop all about member referrals. I related it to Matt 4:18-19 how we need to become fishers of men. I gave a few different ways that they can get member referrals, but my overall point was that we shouldn't just fish the referrals out of the members. Instead, we should be making lessons that build the members into fisherman. We have to pull their testimony out of them through asking questions in order to help them realize how strong their testimony is. Then you give them a BOM and tell them to share that same testimony with a friend. It went well, President said that we need to start charging entrance fees for zone conferences because the advice from the leaders is being so well presented haha. I still am not the best at presenting or giving talks, but I hope to keep improving!

We were sharing with a the Gonzaga family this week. They are active members that we want to fellowship the DelaCruz family. I was messing around with their 6 year old daughter, telling her jokes and just making her and her 8 year old brother laugh. The little girls started laughing so hard at one point that she threw up all over her mom!! Hahaha it was so funny!

I got to go to the temple this morning! I was in charge of getting our zone a shuttle bus to drive to manila. But last night at 10pm our member cancelled on us and said his driver had a different job he needed to finish. So I ended up staying up til 11:30 figuring out how we were going to get all 18 of us to the temple. After I figured out a way, we woke up at 2:30am and started getting ready to leave. Basically the story here is that I am super tired rn so I'll talk to you all next week:)

But my temple experience was powerful, I encourage you all to find time to get to the temple this week! Love you guys!!

-Elder Reber

This man that works security at the temple told Graden he knew another Elder Reber. When Gray pulled out a picture of his brother Parker he couldn't believe there were two Elder Rebers that were able to serve in the Philippines.  

Graden took a pic in front of this while he was in the MTC. Fun to have an updated version a year later:)

Graden has taken favorite pics and added them to his planner. That boy misses great friends and the mountains,

He was so excited to call on his temple Pday. Look how happy he was to be there! Love the enthusiasm. 

Youth Temple Trip

Kamusta Fam,

"Someone is sitting in the shade today, because someone else planted the tree a long time ago."

I read this quote this week and loved it. We have been working extremely hard in our area lately and haven't quite been seeing the success that we would expect. The last 2 weeks we only had a few people come to church, while other Elders in our zone aren't the most obedient yet they are getting 14 inv every week! Haha that is how every missionary feels at some point of his mission though. I am just glad with the progress we are helping in the future! No efforts are wasted in the Lord's work!

This week we actually did start to see the blessings in our area though. We met the DelaCruz family, which is a fam of 7! They didn't come to church this week because they had a funeral, but they did start reading the BOM! That is pretty rare to see someone read the BOM the first week you find them so we are super excited to keep teaching them! I have a secret handshake with the youngest girl and boy and they think it is so dope! Little do they know that Elder Reber was a genius 4 transfers ago and made 2 handshakes... one for little girls, and one for little boys:) Hahaha they all love it because they think it is specific for them, and it kind of is, but it helps me remember all of my "secret" handshakes;)

I had some of the best payment a missionary can ever receive this week! Last Friday, all of the youth had a temple trip in our ward. I got to see pictures of 5 of my recent converts standing in front of the temple together! Wow, what a rewarding moment for me:):) On Sunday one of them bore his testimony, 2 of them blessed the sacrament, and 1 of them was passing the sacrament. It is so fun to see the change in their lives. One of them almost committed suicide the week before we met him, and now he is blessing the sacrament weekly, has a calling, and wants to work with us whenever there is no school. I love my mission!

Alright... now for the funny story of the week. So I made a promise to myself at the beginning of my mission that whenever I see someone wearing a Utah Jazz jersey I would go and talk to them. So a couple nights ago, we were walking to an appointment and I saw a guy wearing a Jazz jersey on the other side of the street. So we went and talked to him. But about 10 seconds into it a crazy, mental, drunk 75 year old toothless nanay came up and started kissing Elder Richards hand! He was like ahhhhh okay maybe it is just cultural for her. Then she kissed mine as I was pulling it away she sniped it down and planted a wet one with her beautiful gummy smile hahaha. I just kinda scooted away and kept talking to my homie in a Jazz jersey. But the nanay turned and hugged Elder Richards before he could get away! She started dancing and kissing his name tag "PAPA JESUS DADDY." Her eyes were like rolling around like crazy... Don't do drugs kids. Anyway Elder Richards stiffed armed her away with an Plan of Salvation pamphlet and ran away as she started making out with the pamphlet hahaha. I was like "uhhhhh dapat kaming umalis." I went after Elder Richards and he was just dying laughing, just in aww of what had just happened. Then I said "What. in. the. hell. just happened?" hahahaha it was the first time I have ever sworn on the mission... but I repented, and it says that in the scriptures anyway sooo;) Hahaha idk it was a funny night though. Elder Richards was like "Geez she should at least buy me a meal before that." 

Anyway this week was super fun! We are gonna work miracles in this companionship. Stay tuned...

Namimiss ko kayo! Ingat po kayo palagi:)

-Elder Reber

Elder Richards -Looks like the perfect fit for Gray :)

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