Category Archives: Jared

Elder Jared Cordon is serving in the Hong Kong China mission as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

A Good Week

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Dear Family and Friends,

Alright another week down… :). With less teaching this past week it has been a good time to look at who’s next now that Bro Fan is baptized. It has been unusually hard to teach lessons on the street this last week and after almost a week without teaching any I realized I wasn’t relying on the enough on the Lord. So I was a lot more specific in my prayers, and we met and taught a really prepared individual. Then we followed the same pattern for the next day. The same thing happened. I think the Lord wanted to remind me that I can do all I can do, but If I don’t ask Him for help He won’t fill in the rest.

Also this week I had a chance to head on back to Tsin Siu Wai to do an exchange with the other half of the companionship Elder Lam. He is awesome he is from Hong Kong and we knew each other back from the time on the Island. But we had a cool experience together. Last time I was with Elder Groeberg and we had met this less active family it was actually the only time they met this family so Elder Lam never met them, but while we were finding we ended up running into one of the sons, then taught him a good lesson about the Plan of Salvation.

Another cool thing that happened this week is we were eating dinner with our investigator Aaron(who should get baptized soon) and some guy came up and asked us to teach him and while were talking Aaron jumped in and shared a great message about the spirit world. So overall that was just awesome. He is already a missionary.

But hey love you all and hope you have a great week!

Love,

Elder Jared Cordon

Baptism!!

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well, I wasn’t sure if this day was actually going to come. Butterfly Ward no longer has a curse. Those 2 1/2 years are over. It wasn’t by any means the work of me The Lord did it all. Gary starting interacting with missionaries over 30 years ago! It was a great day to see someone so happy to make the change. I haven’t seen someone so ready to change in so long. He was just glowing and kept saying this his new beginning!

It was a little stressful though cause on Saturday we went to confirm that Gary was still ready but, his phone was off the entire day we couldn’t reach him. Then the next morning we had tried to call him again and he wasn’t answering so our ward mission leader sent us to go get him. We went down and we wanted to go to his door but the security guard was being tough, so we tried the intercom. To our pleasant surprise he answered right away and he was actually heading down. He was more than happy to be heading to church. Before this since he is wheel chair bound he has always worn a loose shirt cause he thought it would be weird to wear sweats with a nice shirt, but today he had a white shirt and tie and was completely prepared.

Then to the other stressful part: we had planned for our other investigator Aaron and the sister missionaries investigator to play a violin duet and we had them practice once on Wednesday after that we couldn’t get a hold of him. So we were pretty nervous but thirty minutes before the baptism started they both showed up. MIRCALES!

Interesting enough, even with how stressful the situation seemed I never once really worried. I hard a strong confident feeling the entire time. Which is great cause I was just really happy and relaxed through the whole thing. What a blessing. Then after we celebrated with our recent convert and our investigator at a members house for dinner.

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That’s basically the best part of my week!

Oh and we had a really good Zone conference in the mission office! It was a combined one with the other zone so, it wast great to see some faces I haven’t seen in awhile!

Love you all

Elder Jared Cordon
Tang Jeung Louh

It’s Getting Close

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Dear Family and Friends,

This was a pretty exciting week here in Butterfly Ward. After 2 1/2 years and no baptisms, we got one lined up for this Sunday. Gary passed his baptismal interview with flying colors. With us trying to make sure he is truly ready we had to see him about 2 times a week outside of church. Its just so awesome to see the change made in people when they are truly eager and ready to take that next step into a life of discipleship. I have been blessed to help Gary reach this opportunity for him to make special covenants with God and recieve the wonderful gift of the Holy Ghost! He is wheelchair bound so its gonna be interesting on how we will execute it.

Also this last week Aaron came back into the mix and He also has a baptism for June. But I really love this kid. This week I got him to play his violin for us, he is pretty amazing! We are going to try and get him to play it for Gary’s baptism! We are waiting on a response to that one.

But all is well here in Hong Kong. There is a lot of energy in the mission and we are seeing a lot of success in all the areas, everyone is getting really excited for July for us all to reach our goal!

Hey love you all hope all is well!

Elder Jared Cordon

A Lesson Of The Mission

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Dear Family and Friends,

These last couple of days have been pretty interesting.

I had the opportunity to meet with a pastor from another faith. It was really interesting too because previously we had met him and had scheduled a time but for some reason we never met up and I had not cared too much to see him but then one day Elder Au just had this feeling to go to this village called Lung Gu Taan. Now this man lives there with his family and when we were there I saw his house and didn’t want to bother knocking on his door. He is really nice but he is pretty dedicated to his belief.

Our time there was kinda of a bust until we were leaving then we saw this man and his family pull up in there car. So we spoke for a second and he was super nice and wanted to meet back up. It struck us at this point that maybe that’s why we needed to go to Lung Gu Taan. So that time was last Friday. When we first met him he had posed the question how can someone read the gospel of John–he said its his favorite book–and be led to believe in our church then he told us to study it. Well this is pretty funny cause his name is John Johnson. But I added that to my study and man I never been more convinced that someone with the gift of the spirit can led to believe more deeply that this gospel the Church of Jesus Christ teaches is true. Now I knew that he wouldn’t put that question to us unless he had a reason someone couldn’t.

Well we met up because I felt this is what the spirit was telling us to do. Well we didn’t really discuss the Gospel of John, I just had to defend my faith against the pride of the world. This meeting was interesting it provided me greater insight on the war of words this world is facing. In this meeting you had two people sitting on one side of the table who had gained their testimony of Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit in reverent prayer, while on the other side you had someone who gained his testimony from years and years of study starting from a degree in religion and then throughout his paid career.

I now understand why we needed to meet with this man, I know that all the words the world can throw at you have no effect compared to the quiet whispers of the Holy Spirit in prayer. This has been a great reminder of the kind of missionary and teacher I should be, I can never convert anybody that power is the responsibility and calling of the Holy Spirit. I must not forget who the real teacher is. The people of Hong Kong deserve a foundation of stone not sand.

I love you all and wish you the best.

Elder Jared Cordon

Don’t Forget Him!

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Dear Family and Friends,

When you do work on a Monday and your mind thinks its P-day weird things start happening everybody in the district has been a little goofy and District meeting yesterday might have been the funniest district meeting I have had. Yet we all learned some great lessons. I did the training and nothing really went according to plan, but it ended up teaching some very valuable unplanned lessons about power statements which we took to use yesterday.

Yesterday was interesting and its also funny how the Lord does little things to remind us who is really in charge. When we first started looking for people to share the gospel with after district meeting, I am not sure why, but the constant no’s were getting at me more than normal. I started having all these thoughts come through my mind;

“Is this message really true nobody wants to hear it.”

Or

“Man why I am even trying these people just don’t get it.”

So it was pretty sad the thoughts going through my mind after doing that for a while and still not having success me and Elder Au said a prayer, rethought our approach and found one kid, who we taught and set up an appointment to come and teach him more. So that was cool. Then that evening after dinner, similar thoughts started haunting my mind, but I tried to shrug it off and keep looking for the people I was suppose to find. The Lord put three amazing people in our path 2 of which are new investigators. The lesson I learned is how quickly I forget the Lord sometimes but He doesn’t forget us, He picks us up when we are weak. We had 3 new investigators the same day I was thinking of quitting. That’s about the same amount of new investigators I had in my entire time in my first area. The Lord is pouring out a lot of blessings here in the Butterfly Ward and if all goes right we should have 3 baptisms in June with a few more for July!

Much Love
Elder Jared Cordon

Keep On Keepin’ On

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well A great week with my new companion and new district. I have seen a lot of blessings this week. We have one investigator who is really just taking off and progressing great! He should be baptized this next month. He was a former investigator a while ago and he reached out to us and we have been so blessed to teach him.

I got to really know our ward mission leaders family a lot better! I love that family! It is so nice to be able to sit at dinner with them and I can hold a great conversation about whatever in chinese! So much fun we got to eat with them yesterday while teaching a less active!

Also had an excellent young mens and young womens activity where we had an investigator and less active. I was worried that the games we planned would not be fun but man it was a blast! Kids are the same wherever you live!

This last week our ward mission leader came out with such a great energizing plan. Its a 21 day plan where all the members will be fasting and also making special commitments for the 21 days. Last time we did something like this was a 40 day fast and at the end the Butterfly ward saw a baptism after a 2 year drought. He has got a lot of faith and once we peace this all together I know its going to be big. It will start June 1st.

I have learned a great deal about faith from a lot of these members and seen the real importance and need to be acting as well as talking. Butterfly ward should be taking off here soon.

I love you all and hope all is well

Elder Jared Cordon

PS: Big buddha was really cool! I will send some pictures later on

Some Old Friends

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well this last week we saw a lot of change in the District and Zone. It was a pretty crazy moves call! I can say I was pretty surprised and also very excited about my new companion. His Name is Elder Au, he is a native from Sha Tin. He is super awesome I knew him before on the Island and told him when I left Cause Way Bay: “Hey you following me out to Butterfly next move”. Well that came true. Its so nice to have someone whose is fluent in the language. Even in the last couple of days my language has improved a lot. We have done some awesome things so far.

This last Saturday we went less active finding. We found a guy who hasn’t been in contact with the missionaries for over two years. So we knocked on his door and the parents where pretty mean and he wasn’t there so when we were heading back to the elevator, right when the doors where about to close, we saw him walk by and remembered him from the picture. So we jumped out after him and waited for a second in the hallway for him to come back. So we ended up stopping and chatting with him for a while, teaching a lesson and rescheduling another lesson with him. That was good timing! I know God puts us missionaries where we need to be, we also found out he can’t let his parents know we are meeting with him or they will disown him. So its perfect we met him outside of his house.

We have seen an abundant supply of miracles in such a short time together I thought I would share a little one.

Also speaking of friends, an even older friend an american in my district also in my apartment is Elder Connor Townsend we played football together back in the little league days. He is an awesome missionary and its gonna be fun living with him!

Love you all

Elder Jared Cordon
(Tang Jeung Louh)

Tang is my chinese last name and jeung louh means elder.

“That He Lives”

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Do the Butterfly!!!

Following an amazing 5 sessions of general conference, we were also blessed to witness a baptism in the Butterfly ward. The first baptism in 2 1/2 years!!

IMG_0752[1]It actually caught us off guard this last week when we got a call and the mandarin sisters asked Elder Falk to baptize a Mandarin girl he had found just before I got here. We had seen her at church a few times but we had no Idea it would be this soon. It was not our baptism but it was a ward baptism!

For our investigator Gary, well he is moving along Fantastically. He was having some hard times after last week when he received is baptism commitment, he was feeling baptism is to fast. After bumping heads a little with our ward mission leader over what to teach him we came to a fantastic compromise and taught him an awesome lesson and the spirit was very strong. We helped him overcome some big concerns then recommitted him to his date of May 11th. After conference he smiling definitely feeling the spirit. He will get there.

Other than the part where it was nice to see all the missionaries in the zone and get to spend all day in AC. Conference is sadly something that I know I took for granted before my mission. Now that I have a more clear understanding of our Apostles and Prophets role in Gods majestic plan, I am much more in tune with the spirit. General Conference is a true feasting upon the words.

This time though from the unknowing eye you wouldn’t think the Our Leaders shared any crazy revelation that would shake the world. BUT THEY DID!! The words they shared, if truly taken to heart and followed with exactness, would shake the world. We would see such an outpouring of Gods blessing, we then might be worthy enough to form Zion. Cause its the quality of Gods saints which is preventing us. The words they shared get down the core problem of every single sorrow our world faces. People ask “if God is real why does bad things happen”, well He just gave us the cure so lets take it.

Lets all become the disciple we are destined to be. Lets the Shake the World.

Love you all

Preach out

Elder Cordon
Tang Jeung Louh

April Showers!!

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well April showers! We have been seeing plenty of rain this week! It defiantly makes it harder to street find when it is raining. But hey then if they do stop that makes it all that much better.

The best part of the rain was our service this week at Crossroads foundation. It was raining until we got there, then it stopped just in time to help them with there drainage system cause the building kept flooding. We were able to get all the work done just in time for it start raining right away! We got soaked!! Haha we had to track through a river to put the stuff away.

This week was fun though we had zone training. We were able to hear the good news that the numbers really show that everyone in the mission really wants this 65 baptisms to happen. So we heard great news talked about how we could do better then headed off for Zone 24S (When everyone in the zone swaps companions). I got the chance to head to Tin Sui Wai. Where there is not a building under 30 stories haha just tall tall tall apartment buildings. My companion was in my MTC group so it was great chance to work with him and see how others are doing that are at my same time level. We defiantly have been learning different things but both equally important as we found when we taught we had great unity! He is awesome missionary and he taught me some great things.

Then I came back to my area to have some great success this last Sunday by having a father and a daughter we invited to come to church came. That had a great experience so that’s good.

Looking forward to watching conference this next week, you are all lucky to have seen it already…
 
Well, love you all, have a great week.
 
Elder Cordon

When the weather outside is frightful!

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well we have been getting lots of rain and beautiful display of lightning, so it keeps the work interesting for sure. WE started the week off right with Monday evening having a lot of success right out with two great street contacts. 1 of which is victor lau. The next couple of days were very slow with little to no success, and we had a lot of people lined up to teach this week it seemed really likely we were going to be hitting our goals but then it seemed like every option just kinda fell out. We got to teach Gary (he has the Baptismal date) and he continues to progress everytime and he has also committed to getting to church every week, which has keep the last two weeks. Even though our other options fell through we were also able to pick up two new prospects. So there is Victor we met on monday that was a really short contact but we met him yesterday at the church with his daughter and they have committed to coming to church next week. Also we happened to find another man in a wheel chair who loves america, Peter Lo, Him and Gary could be good friends. We met him two days in a row. We actually had seen him 3 times before the fist lesson he has a motor chair and he would always cruise past us and say something like: “Happy Hunting for Converts” haha. Well we finally got him to stop on the fourth occasion and looks like he might be one of those converts. Although a lot of options fell through in the that time we were able to find these other two I feel really blessed.

Love you all back home

Elder Cordon