Author Archives: shalesecordon9

Progress

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Dear Family and Friends,

Progress, I like progress; it feels nice. I’m sure y’all probably agree with me. Here are some updates on some names that you probably remember.

Trevor: Trevor is really getting back in his groove and then some. He has come to mutual three weeks in a row now and he even came to church on Sunday. His friend Wittney Garçon (He is someone we have been trying to get back into contact with) also came with him on Wednesday and Sunday. We were blessed with some kind members who helped us give them rides so we didn’t have to walk with them there; however, we were willing to do that if necessary. They had a great time and hopefully we can step up the fellowship for them. The youth program here is really small so they are pioneers in many ways.

Michelle: She came to scripture class again and even surprised us by bringing her daughter, Victoria, and her daughters boyfriend, Chandler. Victoria was super engaged and participated a lot in the discussion. We are going through the Book of Mormon chapter by chapter and we were on 1 Nephi 15. The discussion really kicked off when we began teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. Victoria had such a good experience that she came up to us afterward and asked, “can I keep this Book of Mormon?… Here take down my number I am going to have some questions… Alright so how do I read this and where should I start?” It was pretty awesome to see her jump right on board. A couple days later we went to see Michelle at her place and she made us breakfast for dinner. Chandler was there and we got to know him some more. He is about to start school to go be a doctor. The greatest news was that we found out that Victoria wanted to go to church on Sunday. She showed up with Chandler and they had a great experience.

It is good to see some people make those steps that we need to be seeing. We have some others that we are working with but these were the ones who made the most progress this week.

An awesome little miracle happened after a great experience at the hospital on Friday. We went to the hospital to administer to three afflicted members of our congregation. When we parked we realized that we needed $2 in cash to pay the toll, but we both only had our debit cards. We figured we would just not worry about it, and that we could take care of that after the blessings. Two of them were quick in and out visits, but with one lady we stayed and talked for almost 45 minutes. Her cousin was there and it sure was a hoot talking to them. It was nice to help her take her mind off the cancer for a few minutes. She was missing her son especially because the day before she found out she had cancer he was deployed over seas. She asked me to give the blessing and it was a great opportunity for me. During the blessing a very sweet spirit entered to room. She started to cry and said that it really helped and that it made it feel like her son was there. On Sunday she was able to make it to church and thanked us both again for the blessing.

After the visit we got off the elevator on the first floor and tried to figure out where we could go go get some cash. Right then one of the employees said, “Are you lost elders?” We responded with “You must be a member. What Ward are you in?” He told us that he was in the San Jose Ward (Spanish Ward). I had actually met him before when I was serving in Hendricks Ave. He opened up his wallet and he pulled out $2 and said, “It is all I have.” He smiled and then walked away. I looked down at the cash in my hand, just amazed about God blesses us in the most personal ways. That was a really good day!

I love y’all and hope you have a wonderful week!

Elder Joshua Cordon

#LDSConf

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Dear Family and Friends,

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Conference was so very good, they get better every time I see them. I get excited in anticipation for what is going to be said.

There was a couple big points that were touched on throughout the conference in almost every talk. Focus on the foundations of you testimony, and strengthen marriages and families.

Those are things that Satan is always and have always attacked in this world. If he can attack your foundation in Christ then everything else becomes easy. If Satan can destroy the family then he can disrupt the central unit that God has put into place to allow for the best success of his children. God has given us families so that we may see the eternal perspective of the order of Heaven, with Mothers and Fathers and children.

Truth has been restored, but what are we surrounding our lives with? Are we surrounding it with that truth or are we surrounding it with the half truths and even lies of the world. What we focus on is what we will become. So the focus needs to be on the things that we know, things that we dont know or understand should not just be looked in a closet though. Always seek to find more then what we currently have. But with the foundation of what you already have firmly locked into place. We shouldn’t ever let the lack of knowledge or understanding of things disrupt or damage the foundation.

Striving for the DAILY companionship of the Holy Ghost, is what leads to spiritual survival.* Life without this companionship only leads to darkness. He is the access to the celestial light that we need in our lives to change and become like our Heavenly Father.

I am so grateful to be able to receive guidance and direction from Heaven from people who have been invited by a prophet to seek revelation for the world. what a wonderful gift it is.

I am grateful for all of you and love you all. You are always in my prayers.

Love,
Elder S Cordon

Conference Answers Questions

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Dear Family and Friends,

This was among one of the most inpiring weeks of my life. The Friday trainee/trainer meeting and then a Saturday and Sunday of general conference answered so many of my questions about life I had to start thinking of new ones while conference was still going to continue to get the most out of it. I am so glad I took the advice and wrote down some questions. One of my favorite talks was Elder Eyring’s during priesthood session. I had asked a question on how to improve my prayers. I got more of an answer than I ever was expecting. I even had a question about college and just my future in general that I really wasn’t anticipating receiving an answer to, but God had other plans.

The week went really well. I will tell you about a few miracle men that we had. The first is this man Jeff. He was a miracle that we had several weeks ago when we had arrived at the apartment about 10 minutes early. Rather than going inside which I have never done. I told elder curran, we are not going home until we have a miracle. We began to walk and hopefully find someone outside. At exactly 9:00 this man yells from his porch, “are y’all missionaries?” And we of course went right over there and said yes. We replied with, “yes we are!” He told us that his dad is Mormon and that he has a lot of questions. We struggled for weeks to meet up with him. This past week we decided to give it one more try. He was home and we had a phenomenal lesson. He really did have a lot of questions. The next day we went back and he had read 50 pages and done tons of research. He said that a lot of people don’t support the church but he feels like this is where he is meant to be. He accepted the invitation to be baptized on the 25th of this month. It was awesome!

Another great thing about this past week began with a challenge presented by elder Kopischke called “priming the pump”. He said that we should go and ask them to pray for us that we could find a family to teach in their home. We decided to try it with the awesome Nhiev family. The very next day after we started it we met Michelle who I mentioned in one of previous letters. This past Monday she joined us at the Nhiev’s for a family home evening and everyone had a great time! Then on Friday we had a lesson with her and her husband Ray. On Saturday they came to the church and watched the afternoon session of general conference with Br and Sis Nhiev. It was awesome to see how quickly everything is coming together when we exercise some faith. God really is just so good! The challenge worked so well we are trying it again with another family. Wish us luck!

Love y’all!
Elder Joshua Cordon

Stepping Stones

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Dear Family & Friends,

Hey well the work is moving a long nicely in Macau and I know that the long term benefits are going to come from the Baby Steps.

A big thing we have been working on these last two weeks is fixing the LA records. They were such a mess when I got here, there was a lot of them stuffed in a drawer and many just all over the place. lots of missing information as well. I am not sure why this is that way.. but we also found a pattern there were a lot of records that just had either 6 or 7 digit phone numbers. Apparently Macau used to have less numbers, so I figured out that if you just put 28 in front of the 6 digits and 6 in front of the seven digit numbers then they work. So its frustrating that a lot of the records got thrown away. Because we have been able to talk to a lot of people and we were able to meet with someone last week. His name is Micheal and he has decent potential for coming back if we stick with him, the branch knows and they will start helping him.

Our finding has been going pretty well. We are talking to a lot of people and we have been getting some good contacts and hopefully some reschedules. We are not holding back teaching on the street but mainly we are looking to reschedule people. A lot of the situations we meet people in are not enough time to teach or the place is too distracting to teach these people how to pray. Right now we only have one Investigator A-Hou who we meet with once a week. But mainly our work is we are trying to find families which definitely is harder but it will produce more lasting results. Overall I know the numbers dont show it but I really feel like we are fulling our purpose out here. We have found quite a few people to turn over, and many others to reschedule.

A cool thing that happened is this last week on saturday we went out morning finding and and it was not going so well but we decided to go to a different place then we planned and we ended being able to contact 2 different families. Both of which we were able to talk to for quite some time. I just really want to build up the primary and youth in the ward.

We have also been meeting with about two members a week ether family or Single RCs. Usually at the church to share the worth of souls and now we are about to start some follow up visits I know they were excited and after talking to some it sounds like its going well. Their has been a few successes from some but they are all women for the sisters. So we will keep working and see if some come our way.

I feel like Elder Chu and I are getting along great. I dont know if I filled you guys back home in on his background yet he is from Hawaii he is full chinese both of his parents are from Hong Kong and the only members in their families. He was raised in america and didn’t speak any chinese before his mission. He also studied at BYU for 2 1/2 semesters before his mission. He has been out for about 5 months in the field. He is the second companion that I have had who is younger than me the other was my trainee is also living with me right now so thats awesome!

Really the work is moving a long and I really hope the work that we do will make a lasting impact on the area.

Mainly the challenges we are facing is getting new investigators Its never been a strong point in my mission since I have not gotten one for quite some time. But i really I can over my weakness and we can do a great work here.

Love,

Elder Jared Cordon

People, Quotes, and Family

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Dear Family and Friends,

Hello Everyone! So this last week was a good one. We finally got some good lessons with a few people and it definitely was a week that allowed us to see who we really have as a solid base in our teaching pool. Lets begin with Davie. He is really coming along we saw him last week and had a good lesson that really just involved reading 3 Nephi 11 and testifying of Christ. It was a great experience because until that point he just couldn’t bring himself to read it on his own, but to be able to just sit and read a chapter with him really helped to alleviate that fear. After hearing it out he said something similar to, “you know, it sounds like true scripture.”  He is making steady progress. Hopefully we can get him to join us for the bbq and broadcast priesthood session of general conference at the church this Saturday.

Another wonderful soul that came into the picture last week was a character named Stew. We met him at a bus stop. He was sitting there with no intention of getting on the bus but just because it was something to do. We learned that he had found out that he arrived in
Jacksonville only a week prior and he had come from Oregon. He is here with the intentions to get a restart on life. Before our first conversation was over he knew that he was meant to meet us and learn what we teach. Over the subsequent days we taught him three more lessons and have made some good progress with him. We have already set
him up to start attending different classes and things are looking bright for his future.

The other awesome brother we are working with is a high school student named Trevor. The previous missionaries taught him and made some good success. When we first got here we struggled to connect with him. But during the week before last and last we were able to break down some walls and really connect with him. He committed to work towards being baptized in May and he is excited. We couldn’t find him a ride so we
made the hour/ride walk with him last week to the church so he could go to young mens. He brought his skateboard and we had our bikes so we took it easy and talked all the way there. He ended up having a great time and wants to come every week now.

So that is how the work is going. We had a couple of instances while tracting where people mocked our beliefs and told us we were teaching false doctrines. It was interesting. I got to boldly tell them what we believed and then we left. I always ponder on those experience during the following days because I feel there is much to be learned from
those encounters. As I did I realized a trend in both cases: both times the major insults came after I bore my testimony. Three quotes come to mind, I don’t know the sources for two but they are still great:

“You know you have lost an argument once you get angry.” Unknown Author

“Anger is the reaction you have when you don’t know how to react.” Unknown Author

“Anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intention of throwing it at someone, you are the one who gets burned.” Buddha

Taking all those into consideration I realized that while all three of those men acted childish by the time we walked away we were the victor in all cases because we never got angry while they did. Now I do have to admit that I was frustrated as I pondered on the fact that people would embrace and express those particular views about our church, but luckily it was not in the moment. A lesson I learned is that you can’t convince someone of spiritual truth, that is The Holy Spirit’s job. Another lesson I learned was if you simply bear your testimony of what you know to be true their reaction will quickly tell you whether or not they are ready for more. If they do not receive the truth you have shared so far then they definitely won’t receive anymore, so there is no point in sharing more.

The same is true with all cases in life. If either party in a conversation isn’t ready, then stop the conversation. Their is no point to share anymore because clearly what has been shared so far won’t work. Now, this doesn’t always mean you have to walk away –though that is a great option– you can apologize, you can change the subject, and you can even just give them a hug. Sometimes that last one isn’t a good idea depending on the tension level. Either way a person who is angry is a fool and will do foolish things. And as the Lord put it, “…fools mock, but they shall mourn…” (Ether 12:26)

I am sure none of you struggle with anger but I felt like mentioning it. I love y’all!

Elder Joshua Cordon

P.S. I have a challenge for all of you. The church on Friday released a new video to celebrate Easter. It is super good. You can find it at HeLives.Mormon.org.  So here is the thing. All the full time missionaries in the church off of Facebook for the time being, that
means the responsibility falls on the members shoulders to spread this message all over Facebook. So here is the challenge: will each of you share his video with 5 of your friends before Easter? It can be in person or in a message. I promise that as you do you will feel the true spirit of the Easter weekend enter into your heart, and your love and appreciation for the resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ, will burn within your soul. I know that to be true because it has worked for me. Good luck!

 

#BecauseHeLives

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Dear Family and Friends,

I just got to my new area this week. Lots of exciting things happening we are teaching a lot of people and with Easter coming up we are able to talk to so many people about the true meaning of Easter. Jesus Christ Lives, and because He lives we can to. He gave us the best gift that was ever given, the Atonement and an empty tomb.  The empty tomb is such a very important part of the process. All of the suffering in the Garden, all of the whippings, all of the hatred from the people, the betrayal, and His death would have just been another story had it not been that He was the Son Of God and was called to rise again. 

He gave us an empty tomb, so that our graves would have no hold on us. Everyone person that has every lived will rise again. The question is what are we going to do with that gift that has been given to us. Are we going to waste are time here on this earth or are we going to work towards the life that we can have. This life does end, We All Will Die, but the life hereafter does not end and that is the life that we need to be preparing for. 

General Conference is Coming. This weekend We All have the privilege of listening to the man that are called of God to lead this church, but they are not just the leaders for our church alone. They are called of God to be the Prophets for the world. They receive revelation from God for what the world needs to hear and do to prepare for the coming of Jesus Christ. So Everyone needs to watch it. Invite those that you know to join in this wonderful event. So that we can hear what God wants to tell us. 
I know that this church is true. I know that we have a prophet on the earth today and I know Jesus Christ Lives.
 
Love you all so much.
 
Elder S Cordon.

Good Start

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Dear Family and Friends, 

Well what a wonderful first full week in Macau! I really like it here the people are nice and from what we can see pretty receptive we were able to meet a lot of people and help a lot start having interest to be taught now while all may not be being taught by us they are still coming unto to Christ. But what goes around comes around because we were also able to meet a young man that the other Elders found. 

We were able to meet with our investigator A-Hou and find out why he has not come to church for two weeks also why he stopped reading and praying. Now we have re-motivated him and he has started reading again and he came to church yesterday. Sadly his fellow-shipper has not come for two weeks who is also a recent convert so that’s another thing we are going to try and fix this week. Also we met with another Investigator who is the one we still need to turn over. Brother Mak, he is the man who was going to be baptized then last second found out he couldn’t because of the Elders not realizing where he lived. But I think this is really for the best because after meeting with him there is a lot he didn’t understand, for example he thought he could just go get baptized in another church, but the best reason for waiting is now he is working to get a new job and applied to have Sundays off. So we are praying really hard that he can have that blessing and then start to be able to attend the other branch. We wanted to turn him over but he said until he figures out his job situation he doesn’t want to meet the other Elders.  

We now have some decent Less Active work. Yesterday a man walked into church with his family, he was active 10 years ago when he got baptized, after talking to him I found out that he came back because he realizes that his kids are growing up really fast and need the gospel. So after talking to the sisters we are going to work on helping him get back and active then once we get going with him then we can help the sisters to start teaching his wife. We feel like its best for us to work together on this one. We also had another LA man walk into church and he wants us to meet him so we will see what we can do. We also met with another Less Active who has a desire to come back we are just working to build his faith so he can make it happen. 

We also were able to meet with a few members to share the Worth of Souls project that the Sister Training leaders and the Zone leaders came up with, its mainly with visiting members and helping them understand some ways they can do missionary work and then working to get a name. It went really well this week we will be following up with the families hoping to be receiving some names. they were all very receptive and want to share the gospel it might just take a few follow ups to really see some big results. We also had a young mens biking activity which went well we had 1 Recent Convert 1 Investigator and 1 Less Active. The activity went well and the young men enjoyed themselves that helped a lot in getting our investigator to church yesterday.

We have some other things we are working on with the Branch, one is a big street display coming up in April they want the whole ward involved. It will have some games and information about what the church offers. It will have primary kids singing songs and a lot of other stuff hopefully it really goes well. I know its really getting pushed by the Branch members which is awesome because the main target is families and they can find them a lot better than we can! 

Here are some pictures.

Love you all!
​

Elder Jared Cordon 

     

The Work Moves On

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Dear Family and Friends, 

This week was a riveting roller coaster ride of emotion. Everyday was very eventful! A couple of highlights can be really help you see where I am coming from.

On Tuesday we were biking to a few potentials and street contacting on the way when I saw a girl headed my direction. She was carrying a red gas can and was clearly headed to the gas station behind me. I approached her and asked if she needed any help, and if her car ran out of gas. She said that she would be alright and that she lived around the corner and was just getting gas for the lawn mower. I moved the conversation to the gospel. Noticing that she had her hands full, literally, I suggested that we come back another time and share our message with her. She, to our surprise, told us to go and visit her mom right then and that she would be willing to listen. 

Happily acting on that suggestion we rode right to her moms house and knocked on the door. Right when she answered she invited us right in and started to pick up a few things to make room for us on her couch. Turns out she was a Mormon when she was a young teenager but went inactive many years ago. We had an awesome conversation and she agreed to come to scripture class the next night. Along with this woman, Michelle, we found a bunch of people in the area that we talked to and got return appointment with. 

On Wednesday we had a solid day lined up with several member present lessons, service, and the scripture class. Everything cancelled except the service. So after a fun service project which included a great lunch where the main dish was crab. We spent the rest of the day knocking doors. It was a long day. We found a few solid potentials though so it definitely wasn’t all for not.

For rest of the week everything went very well! We were very busy and we found many elect souls! The Montcrief family we met while they were sitting in their garage just enjoying the good weather. We approached them with the intent of talking about families. That beautiful family of 6 then accepted a return appointment.

The other was Rusty. When we knocked on his door he came out to talk to us and about an hour latter we had taught the whole restoration lesson and he readily accepted the Book of Mormon telling us that Mormons were the only religion in America that was the “real deal.” We are excited to see where he goes in the next little while.

Finding new souls is basically been our focus over the past several weeks. Hopefully now we can change the focus to helping all these
wonderful souls along their new life-changing journeys.

I had to write quick this week because I was taking care of other things, but I hope y’all have a great week.

Love, 

Elder Joshua Cordon

Temple Blessings

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Dear Family and Friends, 

This was such a wonderful week.  This week two wonderful families were able to attend the temple.  They had such a wonderful experience.  They loved the feeling of the spirit that is at the temple. I reported that it was like a warmth in their chest that was accompanied with love and joy.  That is the fruit of the spirit.  It was so wonderful to be able to hear their reporting back. I love the temple so much I have such a testimony of the spirit that is truly there.  


We also were able to have a ward activity in preparation for Easter, the true meaning.  It was interesting to kinda notice how much goes into Christmas for the birth of the savior, but the same excitement is not around Easter for the Atonement of the Savior and his resurrection.  I am so very grateful for the sacrifice that was made for us to be able to live with our Heavenly Father again. I know that Jesus Christ Lives, and that he will come again. I know that he died and suffered for each one of us so that we dont have to.
So transfers…….. I am getting transferred to Hermiston OR.

I am very excited for the new adventure and so very happy that I am leaving this area feeling that I have done what I was supposed to do. I Love Wenatchee and I have already been praying for love for Hermiston and the people that I will serve. Charity is key to developing love for anyone or anything.  

The church is running a video and campaign for people to spread the True Meaning of Easter. The video is called “Because He Lives” and will be up and running by March 28th. Find it, Watch it, and Share it.  It will be on many sources of media so it wont be hard to find. Spread Easter to Everyone. 

Love you all so much 

Elder S Cordon
   

Elder Cordon with the Bishop’s Family

1 Word…. MACAU! 

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Dear Family and Friends, 

Well a lot of stuff went down last week we got a referral and it turned out to be Elder Wongs mom’s cousin and well she recognized him right away and it turns out she is a lost sheep from about 20 years back. She was anti’d by her family really bad and then went less active then fell off the radar and after having an amazing visit with her, she referred us to a bunch of others and I was very happy but even more than me elder wong is very happy because these are all his family! So we got the go from President Hawks and started working on them! 
Well last night we had to head to Wanchai to do our turn at this welcome center thing the church is trying here (its like a visiting center). Well right when we were wrapping up we went and got some dinner and then we get a call from the zone leaders saying Elder Wong will be leaving to Macau!! This is crazy we have only been together 3 weeks and something must have happened because its only our companionship and the Macau companionship that are affected. I was pretty happy for Elder Wong but he was not to happy because we just found all his family and he is really the key to it all working out. Well we forgot something at the church so we had to head back and as we walked down some stairs we ran into President and Sister Hawks just before they walked into the Elevator so we talked for a minute then I informed them that Elder Wong got the news and President asked him how he was feeling about it. Well Elder Wong was not gonna say he was not happy but you could tell he wasn’t too pleased to be leaving. 
Well we scheduled an appointment with his aunt so he could get a goodbye before he headed out and so hopefully I could get to know her better. Well when we were talking with her. We got a call from President and he asked what we were doing and we said we were in a lesson so he said okay I will call you back but when I call you don’t answer the phone (a little weird). Well he called and elder wong answered the phone anyway then president said I thought I told you not to answer the phone, but I am glad you did because I had the right companionship but the wrong Elder, Elder Cordon will be packing his bags. 
We’ll it was Ironic because when Elder wong was talking to president I was talking to his aunt telling her how I would love to switch Elder Wong places then he hangs up comes and grabs my shoulder and says well thats what just happened. I was very very surprised because I thought I had no hope in going to macau. Only the Uk and Locals get to go there, but sure enough I am going so it won’t be for more than 2 months but its happening! 

Well love you all! 
Elder Jared Cordon