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.

That’s the news I have been waiting for!!!

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Hello Family and Friends,

Another successful week! With the news of my older brother whom has made the decision to serve a mission and received his call to the Washington Kennewick Mission. I could not be a happier person! He is such an example I am striving to get all our investigators to feel the way he does.

This last week we were able to make some great progress with 2 our investigators Tommy and Gary. The lessons we teach to people seem to always end to the same scripture. Moroni 10:3-5 its ether with commitment or a recommitting to follow this charge. Spiritual things can only be obtained through spiritual means. Such as math needs to be learned from studying math and history, history; Things of the spirit are reserved to be taught only by the spirit. Its been a new goal of mine to make sure every lesson is a spiritual teaching ground, not when how can we word it better to persuade them, but how can we help them feel the spirit. 
We also ended the week with two new investigators on saturday who have great potential and are scheduled for next saturday. They are both tough and have a tendency to bible bash. since I have been here the 3 investigators we have picked up have all been ones with strong christian backgrounds and will usually attend church, my bible knowledge is good and could hold in any debate but thats exactly what I am working to avoid. So their is the new challenge.
We also had Andrew come to church his dad could not come cause he had to work, but he had a great experience. It was awesome to see him come all dressed up and we didn’t even tell him. It really stuck out to me the difference that made with how and the men in the ward treated him they just came flocking they all asked us if he was golden. It really showed me if we want the ward to treat our investigators like they have real potential getting them to dress up for church is a great way to do it. 
Love you all have a wonderful week!
 
Elder Cordon

True!

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Well an exciting week this last week! The biggest being the amount of new investigators we got! We have a good teaching pool hoping to turn it into a great baptismal font soon. There has been a lot of sowing going on in Hong Kong for some time due to the amazing work of missionaries. I feel so blessed to be in an area were I have the opportunity to now to reap of their labors.

This last week we had stake conference. Elder Randy Funk who spoke in priesthood session, presided over the whole event as well as president Hawks on the stand. Due to the fact that they are stressing member missionary work so strongly. They have plans to have to new stakes by the end of the year. So that means that we need trustable priestholders to fill those spots. Member accountability here is unreal. God is making it clear that he does not only want sunday members. The plans an actions they are setting up and excuting have been making a world of a difference here.

Its so interesting that in a culture where there is by no means a christian background that the members are so amazing. When you can sit in a beautiful brand new chapel that has the overflow opened to the stage by the basketball court. It helps remind that the message and the saints are the same everywhere in the world. Its because they have all come to the very same conlcusion. That Christ lives, and he undoubtably leads this church. This church is consistent because it is lead of God not by the ideas and concepts and differing opinions of men. This church is true.

Love you all.

Elder Cordon
Tang Jeung Louh (chinese ping yam)

That’s a First!!

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Dear Family and Friends:

Well its has been a good 3 days since we last talked! My last P-Day was awesome. We got to go the Beautiful Hong Kong temple! The peace of the temple is a special thing. Even when your a full time missionary you still feel a stronger spirit there than outside of it. After wards we woke up to real life by heading to Mong Kok, to help Elder Siebach his dying suit. Suits are something that hong kong does very well.

We had a crazy few days after that cause the next day we had zone training where the zone leaders and sister training leaders (which is weird they are both in my district again like in my last area, I think president is keeping a close eye on me haha) announced a new mission goal. Since it is the 65th anniversary of Hong Kong we have a goal as a mission to have 65 baptisms in the month on july(which is the official month) This is a large number for the mission since last month we had 26 baptisms, and about a 170 last year. But President feels this is truly revelation. So we went to work making sure our area does our part. Me and Elder Falk have plans to have a few baptisms before and another in July.

On Saturday, met our investigator Gary(fan hing daih) who we proceeded to set my first baptismal date of my mission. He is first one we have for the this companionship and his date is may 11th so good birthday present for me and Elder Falk.

We have seen a lot of miracles happening here, thanks to the help of such a great ward coordinator and members. In both less active work and new investigators the lord is blessing us with opportunities that havent been around for awhile.

Love you all

Elder Cordon

Elder Holland

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Dear Family and Friends,

Alright an exciting week and a Half!

Well as usual Elder Holland had some amazing things to say! That was for sure an all day even cause we were coming from forever away! We road a bus and got a sweet view of all of Hong Kong. His main focus in his lesson was for the first 45 min express his love to us, then ended by really hitting on the fact that God Speaks.

He was making it clear that our investigators need to believe in revelation. If they don’t then nothing else matters. Also he made an interesting connection to 1 nephi 1 and joseph smith. Lehi and Joseph have very similar stories. It started with a desire to know then lots of pondering, prayer, vision, diving beings, a book, revelation from the book, teach from that book, then every tries to kill him. A very interesting connection.

We have really been blesses this last week and a half we have been meeting a lot of prepared people and are really building up a lot of investigators, now the tricking part getting them to accept a baptismal date. So hopefully by next time I write I can send the good news.

We had a cool little miracle this week apart from the many others this one was very clear. We were finding and had been doing pretty good but nothing special, then we only had thirty minutes left, so we stopped and said a quick prayer asking to meet a prepared person. Well right after we stood up there was a guy standing there who was smiling at us and was more than happy to see us. we sat down taught him a great lesson and will see him again on saturday.

Also here is personal idea. Read Mosiah 23-24. You can see the necessary trials and growth the lord wanted for his saints, it also gives an interesting perspective on why we might have trials and how the lord is helping.

Love you All

Elder Cordon

Elder Holland!!! – Jared

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well this week has been pretty Great! Some of the Highlights are that Elder Holland was in Hong Kong last night and he did a fireside to all the members, sadly he is in my old chapel and I had to watch it from our stake center. But its okay I will be seeing him tomorrow. He is so powerful and he gave a wonder talk on how we are all pioneers. Also how amazing this dispensation is. Its the first time we are commanded not to run from Babylon and establish Zion or Jerusalem, But to face Babylon and conquer it with a promise that we can not fail. He also gave a good warning using Jesus’ own words. That God will come back and people will surround him saying they are his people but he will say he never knew them. God will recognize his church, but whether or not he recognizes each member is up to us. I pray he will recognize me.

Another thing that happened was this week did my first service project in awhile. At this place called crossroads its a place that takes donations and sends them to Africa! I got to work with bunch of Somalians! Very cool!

We had a district find and before they had this stage set up in the town center, this one kid was doing all these tricks with a Chinese yo yo. Well later in the day we saw him again! He preformed for us and he has a whole bunch a sick magic tricks, He also has really bad turrets so its awesome to see him develop talents that don’t conflict. Best part is got his number and plan on meeting with him again. I can see it now I’m a Magician, I have turrets, I’m A Mormon.

One of our investigators is in a wheel chair due to an injury, yesterday he told us how, let me share. He said he was seeing a doctor for some depression but he gave him bad drugs that messed with him and pushed him to suicide. He ended up jumping off of 19 story building, the next thing he knows he is hanging across the power cables for a light rail train, so he pushes himself off and falls and hits his head on the rail. So he has this huge bump on his head, and is stuck in the wheel chair, but somehow this man is alive and only ended up damaging his back breaking his leg and he didn’t get brain damage. A pretty crazy miracle , that was in 1997.

Well I got Elder Holland tomorrow that I will tell you about the middle of next week. I got temple coming up.

Love you all
Elder Cordon

Here is a picture from our apartment window, And me with Elder Chan rocking the little and big ties!

Elder Cordon & Elder Chen rocking the ties

Elder Cordon & Elder Chen rocking the ties

View from our apartment window!

View from our apartment window!

Woo Deep Ward- Jared

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Woo Deep!!

Well off to the New Territories. This is not by any surprise actually its what I was hoping to get. I got an amazing start in the Wanchai and now I got the Hong Kong shock out of my system and am really looking to step up my efforts every day. This New area is in Tuen Mun and I am in the Butterfly Ward or in Chinese Woo Deep! I have an awesome new companion Elder Falk and he is from East Salt Lake. Actually He is the first 18 year old in Hong Kong. My apartment is awesome I have Elder Siebach, Elder Chan, and Elder Falk. We also all have May birthdays. Its exciting work here in the Tuen Mun area. There is 700,000 people living here. Its also been over 2 1/2 years since the Woo Deep ward has seen a baptism. So we are eager to change things and after the first couple of days under wraps that is looking more and more possible everyday. Elder Falk has been doing some awesome work before I got here and we are not looking to slow down so I will keep you posted. Also I will send a picture of the awesome view from Chelsea Heights, our awesome apartment. In the boonies of Hong Kong we still live on the 31st floor.

Love you all

Elder Cordon
Elder Cordon and his new companion

Causeway Bay!!!… that’s my ward!

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Dear leihdeih(you all),

Well one more week down! This was great minus the water heater, for the shower, being broken… But hey I had a lot faster showers which gave me more time to get ready in the morning!

Things have really been picking up. We have a baptismal date with another shortly on the way and some others with potential. Its been a fight in this area but I feel like it has really been picking up nicely!

There is a really cool thing that our mission does! Its called My Conversion Story Fireside. Its when all the missionaries who are going home at the end of each transfer pick one of their recent converts who tell their conversion story! It was a great tool we used for our investigator who was trying to receive a witness and was wondering how it might come!

We also had a huge meeting with all the ward and stake leaders in the surrounding area about how the members and the missionaries can work together better. It was really good for both of us. We have been able to see the the success of one ward with less actives. The secret is really with the members on less actives we missionaries may have got them there but they will only stay if the ward will make an effort. Less actives are a huge problem here. One ward took the initiative with the members and they have about 20 LA’s at church a week and that’s a constant number even with them becoming and staying active again.

I also learned a great deal of importance about commandments. Never be scared of the commandments this church has, their no better way to know if Joseph Smith was a prophet then to partake of his fruits, like the Book of Mormon, or the word of wisdom. If you follow the words of wisdom and you receive one of the specific promised blessing of that commandment then there is a witness that Joseph Smith was a prophet.

John 7: 17 “If any man will do his will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself.”

We used this with our investigator and it went great!

Also at the End of the Month Elder Holland will be coming so that should be awesome!

Love,
Elder Jared Cordon

Happy Chinese New Year

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well this was a pretty awesome week! We had the Chinese New Year which meant Deep Clean. Its the day when we all spend the entire day cleaning every crack and corner of the appartment! It looks so good now! Also to finish that day we watched the fireworks over the bay! Pretty Amazing.

Earlier in the week I also had the chance to do my first exchange but this one was the entire Zone mixing and matching. I got to have Elder McEwan who was in my MTC group. So we were both very new and also very blessed. We had to make a random trip to the airport even with all the delays we still managed to get a new investigator in my area which never happens! BABY POWER!

Also many other blessing came Elder Howells and my way this week although everyone is busy over Chinese New Year we were able to meet a few families and found a couple of guys who also live in our area. We felt prompted to go to this area we had never been and frankly we didn’t know what it was we just walked under the freeway and down this path to this beautiful bay side dog park! Way cool we ended up finding two people and teaching streets lesson, they both live in our area. So Cool!

Also today we got to go to Stanley its on the ocean side of Hong Kong Island and it had some amazing views. We decided to spend our P-Day with the ward for a great chinese BBQ!

I love you all have a great week!

Elder Cordon

Another Great Week! -Jared

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well its been another interesting week with things just getting more interesting this week. First to start the week off right I did my first hike in Hong Kong and that was pretty unreal!! also the card reader for my card is not working so pictures will be sent promptly. But we have decided to drop our fist investigator. He is a nice old 83 year old man but when he says he can promise he won’t commit adultery, well then we must rethink how well our efforts have been working. So this week we will be meeting one last time, unless of course he decides to read the Book of Mormon and has a desire to learn and accept then of course we will teach him again.

But with him going down our other new investigator is on the climb and he will be receiving a baptismal date after new years for sure! Things get hard around new years cause everyone has work off and a lot of people go to mainland and a lot of tourist come here. So it will be interesting but after the short delay in the work we will be able to pick right back up.

On other news we have found way to successfully contact families which has a very large challenge so far. What you need is to have a family you know in a park then you play with them and all the other parents see how nice we are and then want to talk to us! It worked yesterday when we went to a park and found a father and daughter we had taught twice and then after playing with them earned the ears of there friends, So if all goes well we will have our first full family lesson this next week! I will keep you updated!

Well things are moving here everyone is having a lot of success recently. The lord has been leading us to his prepared people!

I love you all Have a great week and Happy New Year!

Elder Cordon

Temple Work- Jared

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Dear Family and Friends,

This was another great couple of weeks! We really have been blessed this last week was temple day so that moved and shrunk my p-day. Which I am not complaining cause I got to go to the temple it jsut took away from me emailing you all.

These last 2 weeks we only had 3 days where we did not teach a lesson. So things are really picking up for us. We have 3 solid investigators now. One pretty new, the other should have a confirmed baptism date by the end of the week and the other is our 82 yeard old eternigator(he will come around as soon as he realizes God is better than horse racing). Things are really looking good. Its been a hard road opening up a new companionship for your first area, but by golly we have done it. Also a young man we found sitting on a park bench my first month got baptised yesterday. He is a Mandarin so we didn’t get to teach him, but man we sure found him! So I kinda count that as my first baptism haha.

We have learned a vital lesson that our president was tryin to teach us. Which is when you focus your priorities in order(the number 1 being the most important thing and 3 being the least important) you can recieve them all. As far as finding goes families are the 1 and then you have young people then old people. We have made it a big focus of ours to really shoot for those families. Its a principle that we tried and well it absolutly works. We have been finding a lot of families these last couple of weeks, also a lot of young people, and then of cours the poe poes and the soak soaks. When you align your priorities with the lord he absoluty makes them possible.

I know the lord loves us and I have seen miracles in peoples lives, this church isn’t just a christian church. Its the Church of Jesus Chirst where he leads it as surely as he lead it when he established during his minitstry. Its not where we learn about Christ, its where become like him and truly know him.

Love, Elder Jared Cordon