Letter 8/19/13

Dear Family,
This week has been a fantastic week.  If I make 1/2 page of this I will be happy!

In D&C 61:3, the Lord reveals to the prophet a commandment for His elders to slow down and serve those "perishing in unbelief".  AS I stated in my email, we, as a zone, exceeded grossly over our mile limitations.  A plan was needed to find people to teach, talk to everyone and stay as low as possible on our miles.  Once night as Elder Ewell and I were discussing the needs of this matter, humour was needed to induce revelation.  A Brian Regan joke was tossed between us as we discussed the topic at hand; and thus the idea of "Walkie & Talkie" was born.

As we laughed and joked we realized that this simple answer was the solution to the call to "need not move swiftly".  Elder Ewell and I decided to wash the car of the companionship who had gone the lowest % of miles by a certain date and give them a trophy of a "Walkie-Talkie'.  The success was incredible to see as we saw the numbers for every key indicator sky-rocket while the miles stayed low!

I know this isn't too interesting, but I thought it was intriguing to note that revelation often needs humour!

Love you all!
Love, Elder Rex Hamblin

Email 8/26/13

Happy Anniversary! Would you be mad at me if I told you that I completely forgot? If you will be mad, then I remembered, and if you won't then it never crossed my mind. Sorry! I hope that you had fun! It is also good to hear that the Elks did good, they are still my favorite team, and probably will be forever. And if Rat is running like me, he will have to work on his running style, because mine was terrible! I am sure that he did very well and that he hit people and sent them home crying...now that is NOT like me! I can hear the sounds of football start to fire up and I wish that I could go out there and be with them, but I am content on where I am at right now.

There were many highlights of this past week, but I think that the Elder Holland conference that we had topped them all. It was amazing, but I think that they will have to replace the pulpit! We had the opportunity to shake hands with him before that missionary conference started, and you could feel him look right into your soul. Then as he spake, he told us that the 12 used to interview every missionary personally, but with 75,000 missionaries that is nearly impossible. He then proceeded to tell us that the hand-shake and the look in the eyes was a quick 3 second interview and that he literally was looking directly into your very life! I have always joked about things like that, but he confirmed and said that it was true! It was a very comforting experience to have two hours with an Apostle and have him almost personally answer every question that you have. It was an amazing experience and one that I will never forget.

Elder Holland was there for the Rainier Stake Conference, however they were using the Longview Stake Center because the Rainier Stake does not have the facilities to hold such a conference. It just so happens to be that the Stake Center is in our area, and has the only baptismal font in the stake, and the Longview 1st ward Elders had a baptism the same day that Elder Holland was here. That too was nearly impossible to coordinate, but it was quite the experience. Unfortunately Elder Holland couldn't make the baptism, but we could still hear him giving the leadership conference. He was...energetic. It was a fun day.

Love you all!

Love,

Elder Rex Hamblin

Email 8/19/13

Well this week was a doosy, and I am sure that I didn't spell that nearly close to what it should be. We went up to Mt. St. Helen's last P-day, and being true to form, I completely forgot my camera! I really don't mean to not take pictures....I just never seem to have my camera on me when a good pictorial opportunity comes. Sorry about that, but Mt. St. Helen's was pretty cool...

My companion, Elder Ewell was sick on Wednesday last week, the day we were to go to Astoria (a small coastal town which major attraction is the Gooney house) which is a good hour and a half drive from Longview. He had a bad case of the flu and looked worse than...well he just looked terrible! I felt as if I should have done more, but there was nothing that I could do. Elder Ewell is a champion trooper, though. We missed the District Meeting in Long Beach, but we still went on splits with the Astoria Elders. He barely made the car ride down before his stomach decided to get some fresh air on the outside of his feeble body. He stayed with one of the Elders while I took the other one out, and then half way through the day we swapped. We headed back down that night and Elder Ewell felt a little better. I know that this wasn't the greatest story that you wanted to hear, but I just wanted everyone to know that I have probably the great companion right now. He is a champ.

The other night Elder Ewell and I were out walking around when we saw a lady in her yard tending to her five dogs. I almost passed her by, but Elder Ewell made sure that we went and talked with her. She was in her mid-60's and was delighted that someone had come to talk to her about religion. She is a very stout Messianic Jew with a R-LDS backround. She knew much about the Book of Mormon and the message that the "other Mormons" share. She was simply interested in talking about god, family, and her dogs. As the conversation moved on, Elder Ewell and I realized that we must get on our way and asked if we could return. She declined, and continued the conversation. I realized that I had not bore my testimony to her. Elder Ewell and I went on to bare our testimony to her "line by line." She still did not accept an immediate return appointment, but her heart did soften. It was amazing to see what a simple testimony can do.

Anyway, my next story deserves a little back round. Our zone is probably the biggest in the mission and all the areas are gargantuan and need many miles. The missionaries have taken some liberty to using many miles and often forget the limit to their miles. This overflows the zones allotted miles, and we take the brute force for it. Elder Ewell and I were trying to think of a way to help the missionaries stay low on miles while they continue to find, teach, and baptize. This will probably be the topic of my letter so I think that you will all have to wait. Sorry about that, but if I didn't, I wouldn't know what to write about! I am not that good at reviewing the week, but I know that I have learned much. I love you all and hope that the week continues to be great!

Love,

Elder Hamblin

Letters 8/05/13 and 8/12/13

Dear Family, Well, being true to my character, I once again promise a short letter chalk full of nonsensical whims of my imagination. Just to let you know, I did start this letter Monday, but have been super busy and now it is our lunch hour on Thursday. I still haven't forgotten all of you, even though it may seem like it; Life is too often in the way of the important "things" This past week has been full of everything, moving, meetings, and mini-missionaries. We moved living quarters, which took a day longer than we anticipated. We expected to be all done on our P-Day (Monday of last week), but we didn't finish until Wednesday morning @ 1:30 AM. We had to finish early because we had a mini-missionary coming to our apartment at 8:00 AM, and we had NOTHING organized. Our missionary was amazing. He is a local priest from elsewhere in the stake who came out proslyting with us for 2 days. We were able to introduce him to the world of walking and talking to everyone. At first he was shy, but we witnessed a miracle in the watching of his confidence grow. We were sad to part ways. But Friday did come. On Friday we had the WVM 1st Mission Leader Council (MLC). For the first time I was able to see the other, more "realistic" side of President Taylor, and it was amazing. That sounded bad...let me put it this way. I think I realized for the first time how powerful of a leader President Taylor is. As he fills his role as a Mission President, it reminded me of the type of leader Christ was and is. Strong, confident and loving. Well, love you all! Lunch is over. Love, Elder Hamblin 8/12/13 Dear Family, I apologize now for the bad handwriting, we are currently driving up to Mt. St. Helens...yes it is in our Zone. We haven't been able to coordinate rides previously, and today only 4 of us are headed to this magnificent site. No one else wanted to head up with us, so we alone sit in a member's van. I have seen many magnificent places, but this one is looking to be one of the better ones. This experience has been here the whole summer, but we have never been here to experience it. It is a little bit like life. Anyway, Elder Ewell and I have been working hard to build up the area and help the members open up and share the gospel. We are seeing some of the fruits of our efforts, but for the most part we are seeing the seeds planted by some other disciple's labors. When we contact people, the first reaction comes from past experiences with members or missionaries, whether good or bad, we take what they already know to be true and try to add to it. Often times they try to reject what we say, but we can see the truth settle deep within them. One such experience pops into my mind from the week gone. When I was in Woodland we received a call from a member referring us to member in the Longview 3rd Ward (my current ward). we sent the referral off and went about our work. When I came to this area, the lady who was referred by the Woodland member was one of the few investigators we had; we have been meeting with her since. Little progress has been shown since we began meeting with her, which was a worry to both Elder Ewell and myself. as we sat pondering what to do, we scanned over her teaching record in our weekly planning session. A teaching record simply shows what we taught, how it was received and the commitments we have extended, plus the ones that they have kept. We have taught many of the principles and all of it was accepted very well, but the commitments were not being kept. As we poured over the record, nothing in particular stood out. Over and over again we questioned what we need to do to help her progress in the Gospel. We looked at the commitments, we have extended (a practice I personally need to improve on). A particular commitment rested firmly in our minds; "Introduce family and friends to the missionaries". We had talked with this lady about her husband, and she said that he was an Atheist. We decided to at least ask her if she thought it would be a good idea to introduce him to us. the next time we met with her after we decided to ask her, she came to us and told us that she wanted her husband to meet with us! What an answer to our prayers! When we met with him he said it was about time to meet with us and come to know God in his life. He had secretly began believing in God and wanted to know who he is. Never have we seen his wife so excited about the Gospel, it is a miracle to see what the Gospel does in our lives when we involve our families. The process is still slow, but they are both progressing very well. Love you all! Love, Elder Rex Hamblin

Email 8/12/13

I can't believe that the school year is already underway! Do you know what that means? I have been out for almost a year now! That is crazy! It is good to hear from you all and I can not wait to hear how everything went.

Hey Rat, how did 2-a-days go? I am always interested to hear how the hardest 2 weeks of the season are, even though those are the ones that you end-up missing the least...or the most. You know I have never been able to make up my mind on whether or not I liked 2-a-days. They really were great for helping me grow, but they were a killer for trying to do just about anything else, like work. But in the end, I still think that it was football that prepared me most for my mission. I am not going to say that I prepared perfectly, in fact I probably prepared the farthest from it, but the things that I learned from this wonderful sport help me in my everyday life and will continue to help me in the days to come.

Anyway, now that I made myself "trunky," how are the rest of you doing? What is Ship up to these days? When are you expecting Kale's call to come? What other questions can I ask?... I did hear that Devon finally got to go to Peru, which is fantastic. It still is not Washington or Oregon though. He will have an amazing time there because of the man (no mun intended) he is.

I just thought that I should let you know that I have the best companion ever, Elder Ewell. He is quite the amazing fellow and has a burning testimony of the gospel, I think that it puts all others to shame. He just simply has a kind heart and a deep and abiding desire to serve others in any way possible. It has been a great two weeks with him. We have been working really hard here in the Longview III Ward. Did I tell you that Elder Babers previously served here? Everyone loves him and he has set the bar very high for the missionaries to reach. There have been times that we have walked down the street and been stopped by someone who Elder Babers has talked with just so they can see if they can talk with him again. Not only that but I think that just about every member here is absolutely in love with Elder Babers and wishes that we could be transferred so he could come back and serve there again. It is too bad that he is in the other mission now, because he seems to be a very good guy.

Well, I think that is it for the week...I can't think of anything as of right now. Love you!

Email 8/05/12

Dear Mother and all else who read this e-mail,

This past week has been crazy and fun! We got kicked out of our place (finally) and moved into our new apartment. Sorry to say that I am not suffering in-grown toe-nails or have to worry about a new language or even about all the parasites and worms. No, the only thing that I really have to worry about is making sure that we keep our place clean and do our best to preach the gospel. I am absolutely positive that I have been sent to the most blessed place in the entire world where me only goal is to preach the gospel. This has been an amazing experience! Anyway, now that you all know that Washington/Oregon is the place to be I will continue on with the rest of my e-mail.

We spent all day Monday and Tuesday moving, and didn't get finished until 1:30 Wednesday morning. We could have left it all for the morning, but our mission did a mini-mission for the young men within our mission, and we had one coming Wednesday at 8 AM! So my new companion Elder Ewell and myself found it expedient that we finish putting everything in the right order before he got there. We had a blast with our mini-missionary! Many of our appointments fell through over the course of the two days that we spent with him, so we did a ton of walking. He didn't tell us until the end of the last day that he had a blister from the first day and it was killing him to walk on it. Shows you how observant we are! But he was a trooper and stuck it through to the end.

Friday we had the WVM's first Mission Leadership Council, where we set a standard of excellence and talk much on the subject of policies. It was a good time because I got to see many of my former companions there, and it is always good to reconnect with them. We have been so busy, that we have completely forgot to be productive! Well, I think that is all for now. Love you all.

Love,

Elder Hamblin

P.S. Thanks for sending me the bag, can't wait to use it!

Letter 7/29/13

Dear Family,
As the time continues to pass, many things have been learned about the thoughts of the people.  Stories unknown wait to be told as we go from door to door talking to people.  The people of Longview unthoughtfully wait  and want to share something with someone; they want to be heard.  As they express themselves to complete strangers, they testify to Gospel principles and the Doctrines of Salvation.  Yet they are "kept from the truth because they know not where to find it"  As we testify of the truths they "know' Satan takes hold of their hearts and they react to our testimonies and rebuttal our support.  Aren't people funny?

We are currently in a predicament.  The other day we recieved a phone call from the sisters that cover my former area.  Woodland 2nd ward.  They taught a lady who was referred to them by a member in their ward;  the only problem is that she lives in our ward.  Elated, we contacted the woman and set an appointment up for later in the week. 

As we went to the appointment, we invited a member who was heavy in the days and late in the years.  he shared more than a few experiences that were not correlated with our current subject (which just happened to be the Plan of Salvation).  On the contrary, he is very loving and kind so he was our choice for a fellowshipper.  Any how, I thought we had a good lesson and we tried to set up a return appointment.  We were unable to, but she said that she would be in contact with us...

A day or two went by before we recieved a phone call from the man who referred the lady to the sisters.  He told us that she enjoyed the lesson but preferred to be taught y the sisters.  Now nothing is wrong with that, but the sisters are in Woodland, 30 minutes away.  We are trying to get everything figured out, but for the meantime, we will pass her off to the sisters.

Sorry for the random story, but I couldn't think of anything else to say.  Oh yeah, I guess it would be good to note that I recieved a new companion, Elder Ewell.  He is an amazing missionary that I came out with, and we are very excited to get the work started.  Today is his first day, and he can't unpack because we are moving!  We are moving to an apartment complex just up the road.  But we are excited.  Well, I think thats all.  Love you!

Love,
Elder Rex Hamblin