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.

Things are happening!!! -Jared

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Dear Family and Friends,

This was a great week for our companionship! A bad week as far as numbers are concerned but for everything else its awesome. The ward had given a referal the other week of a family. Well we have done our best with this opportunity. The daughter and her friend have been coming to English class and they have had such a great time that when we asked the mom to come to church that she could not refuse when the two girls were jumping up and down with excitement. So she came with the two girls sadly the husband didnt come but we will keep working on him. They ended up staying the whole time and had a really great experience! Also there is a opportunity down the road for another family through this girls friend.

Families have been a really big focus for the mission and especially the zone! this Last week we had a great zone training meeting and we all made a commitment to give a little time at night to additional prayer for families. Also yesterday I made a specific fast that we could find families. Well my prayers were defiantly answered we found more families yesterday than we have my whole time here. The Lord does not dictate our desires but when they allign with his he is sure to let us know.

Also cool little blip is that we will be reinstating the split tags very soon. Its been a long standing tradition in Hong Kong tell early last year to have split english and cantonese on the same tag. With the great diversity here there is a constant need for both. Well the church has finally reaproved that and we will be recieving those tags any day now. I can send a picture. Its cool cause we are the only mission in the world with dual language tags.

Well everyone I am so greatful for the prayers and the support and Happy New Year!

Love Elder Jared Cordon

It’s been awhile! -Jared

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Dear Family and Friends,

Sorry for the laps of writing the last couple weeks the Holidays have been crazy here! And its only about to get worse with chinese new year around the corner! But the Lord has been sending a lot of blessing our way, we have been able to have some pretty amazing experiences!

Our wonderful investigator! Well he was moving along but we keep feeling stumped, Elder Howell and I decided to turn it to the Lord as always and we felt prompted to switch up our member present to a very unlikely canidate and well it turned out to be exactly what we needed. He was able to be the right amount of help of being able to put our words in the right kind of way, and help us analize the real need our investigator has. Also the ward gave a great refferal of a family that lives pretty close to us. They came to the ward Christmas party(which was a blast) and also english class while bringing a friend family too… so a pretty great christmas present from the Lord.

Speaking of english class Elder Howell had a great Idea to mix it up and we mad a christmas themed one about different Christmas carols and their vocabulary. Super Fun! We have have been able to have a pretty amazing holiday!

This week we also learned a great deal about stepping out of our comfort zone and we have been talking to people we normally would not have and we have seen some great miracles from it. We had our best finding day yet this week with four golden street lessons–of course they are outside of our area–but hey I dont care if I teach them just as long as they come!

So its been amazing and I love all those who read this I hope you all have a happy New Year!

Love Elder Cordon

A Message of Thanks

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Hello Family and Friends,

Hey sorry the missed email last week! We had a bit of a mix up! Well the work has been hard and it has been slow. But we are always seeing new miracles! One thing I would like to tell you about thats special to Hong Kong members. Its All the helpers that come from south east asia.

I have had the priviledge in being able to bless the sacrament for the saturday branch and to be able to be a witness for a baptism. These branches being almost entirely women are from tuesday to sunday. These sisters will leave there families to come to Hong Kong and become domestic helpers. They only have one day a week off and they dont decide when. So they will help them by having meetings all week. I have never felt a greater spirit in a sacrament meeting than in the one with these sisters, they truly have humbled themselves before god and he has worked many miracles in all there lives. Many of these sisters have seen greater challenges than most would ever hope to endure but through it I have seen some the most amazing members. Although there time off is very little every week and they give most of their day to church You will still find them going out to parks and inviting others to come to church or by standing on the street trying to talk to people. If all the members in the church were to have this kind of love or faith, how great would be the harvest of souls, and the growth in the kingdom of god. So I just want to give a shout out to them and their amazing faith and encourage all to learn from their example and follow the words of our prophet in remembering what kind of a gift our Lord would want for his brithday.

I love you All!

Elder Jared Cordon

Well a Pretty Crazy Week of Gratitude -Jared

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Dear Family and Friends,

I am so grateful for this opportunity, I am grateful for my companion, I am grateful I have had so many blessings in learning this language, I am grateful for the blessed Causeway Bay ward, Amazing food and Amazing missionaries, My amazing Mom!

I could go on forever! I now realize how grateful I am for hot water, flushing toilets, kitchen sinks that drain, and gas in the stove. Haha the Lord decided to remind us of all the simple blessings we have every day. Our whole street flooded! A huge pipe burst and the water was coming out like a giezer all night long! I will send pictures next week.

I had a cool experience Yesterday, Elder Howell and I had both felt the prompting to go to this park (its one that has never been successful before). So we went about as planned and went through the whole park with no success. Well we finally get to the very last part of it and we see two little kids playing with a lady watching them.

We said hi and she said hi back in english and then went back to the kids, so we assumed she was a helper at work and went on our way. As we were leaving one of the kids called her mommy. Well I didnt think much of it, and me and Elder Howell went to the next area as we had planned.

Well the spirit spoke to Elder Howell because he felt very prompted to go back and talk to her, thinking heavily on the kids comment when we were leaving. So we went back and talked to her and she happen to be Japanese and that conversation turned out to be an amazing experience. We didn’t get a new investigator but that was the first she has ever heard of our Church and really even Jesus Christ. She may not have been ready at that moment but I got no doubt she will be later. It was a simple testimony to me that we need to listen to spiritual promptings and especially in this work. If my companion gets a prompting and I have not then I just have to trust him!

How you all have a wonderful week!

Love Elder Cordon

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I’m lovin it!! -Jared

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Hello Family and Friends,

This was a fast but very amazing week!

Our 1 investigator is starting to see the difference in his life after he started meeting us and is showing a lot more desire to accept our message. He said you and your companion are always so happy! I believe its because of your faith. I want that. Well he will get it, he knows he needs to give some things up and thats the first step.

We also added another number to the list of invetigators another old man who we met in the park taught a lesson, then again the next day, and brought him to church and I think he is really liking it. So we got two underway and if we can meet with four other very awesome people we had taught last week then we can be seeing some real growth.

A big lesson I learned this last week is the true need to have the spirit in all you do, the teaching, the finding, the studying and especially the planning. This last week at one of our nightly plannings we were pretty lazy about where we should go and kinda just picked. Well the next day we really felt the effects of that. We had a couple experiences and just really were not feeling the spirit and we didnt know what was wrong. Well we prayed to have the spirit and kept working but that didn’t seem to work. So finally we decided that maybe we should go where The Lord wants us to go. So we prayed, looked at the map book, and went to a new spot we both felt good about.

Well we then ended up having two very good street lessons to people who really needed it and we should hopefully be seeing them again this week. It taught me a lot about really and truly relying on the lord in all that we do!

I have a quick thought for you all.

You become what you think about.

Read Mosiah 4:30

“to a great extent we accomplish what we think about. Your life is influenced more by your own thoughts than anything else. How could a person possibly become what he is not thinking? Nor is any thought when persistantly entertained, too small to have its effect. The divinity that shaped our ends is indeed in ourselves” Spencer W. kimball

“A mans’ character is the complete some of all his thoughts, you can know a man soley on what he thinks about, when he doesn’t have to think.” Can’t remember

Just a good reminder to keep your thoughts on what’s most important in life!

Love you all!

Elder Jared Cordon

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It’s About the Little Things -Jared

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This was another fun exciting week! We had our trio for a couple days and and now we got a sweet Bundeih (means a local missionary). Its a great benefit to helping me with the language.

Well I would like to share a quote that a great man told to me recently:

“At least I can walk, at least I can pray, at least I can learn.” -Jay Riding

Thats a great way to remember all the little blessings The Lord gives me in my life to act on my own agency everyday. Every week I can walk more, I can pray better, and I have to the ability to see more of what the Lord wants me to learn. Remember the little things and they surely will become great things.

The work in Hong Kong is progressing we are meeting amazing people everyday who are all being brought just a little closer to Christ. We also got another progressing investigator who during our lessons starting recalling how often the lord has reach out to him to accept this message in his life. He recalled after hardships he had met Elders and before a great miracle in his life he had met Elders, and now when he realized life wasn’t what he wanted he met some more Elders. The Lord does this work in his own way and his own time. Just keep walking praying and learning.

Elder Cordon

Trio!!!! -Jared

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Well Another week in Hong Kong! Never really predictable! For instence yesterday I entered a tripanionship! With the now Lone Leader. His name is Elder Parker and he Is from LA. He is an awesome missionary. We have already been serving in the same area but now instead of 4 elders there is just 3. I will let you all know how that goes!

I have a cool story I would like to share: last week me and my companion were going over the Plan of Salvation lesson and we were figuring out what we needed to work on, and we decided on Adam and Eve. Why is it important were it fits in and how to say it. Well later that night during finding we had a guy ask us a very specific question. Why do we have to suffer and get kicked out of gods pressence because of Adam and if god loves us why did he let that happen? Well its a good thing the Lord prepared us, because we have a new investigator. haha

I know If we are worthy and we are doing all that we can the Lord will direct all of our actions. We may not realize until after or just not at all. As Ether 12 tells us, “Ye recieve no witness until after the trial of you faith”. Thats how the spirit works and its an amazing thing I am figuring out more and more every day!

This week was the first week we have gotten someone to church since I have been here. Our awesome old investigator and a less active came! It was such a great experience! The Elders qurom accepted them both with very loving arms! I know the best way to get the members involved is to bring people to church, because it gets the excited, believing and motivated! The work is truly progressing!

Love everyone

Elder Jared Cordon

Here It Goes Again- Jared

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Dear everyone!

I have another crazy week! The living situation with the 6 in the apartment has been a bit crazy but also fun, plus apparently Americans can develop a Hong Kong allergy haha. Don’t worry I was able to beat the system and find a cure. Its issues with wearing contacts and the bad air here. So all the missionaries have just resorted to wearing glasses, well given my eye situation I can’t wear glasses so after being blind for 2 days I was able to find the cure which was in these eye drops! Hooray I can see and the work can move forward.

This week we were able to get our first member present with our investigator, since he is 84 we got a man in the ward who is about the same age. They were best friends from the start, I love listening these 2 old Cantonese guys chat back and forth. I had no Idea what they were saying but I feel like it was helping haha. Also we have been blessed this week in being able to find a lot of Chinese men we could teach lessons to! It was great and we have a couple new investigators scheduled! I love being able to enjoy the fruit of my labors and not having to pass them off that was so hard! But this last week we were able to have dinner with a part member family and they have 2 little twin girls! Her story is amazing!

When she was married she found out she could not have children and that was something that was hard for her, but when she met the missionaries and started receiving lessons she was able to meet President Anderson and he told her she would have kids, well sure enough after she was baptized it wasn’t much longer until she was pregnant with twins!

This gospel is amazing and I love the change it has been able to make in families here and the lives it has truly blessed.

I love you all

Elder Cordon

Wow that was fast!! – Jared

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Hello Family and Friends,

This might have been one of the fastest weeks I have ever had. Probably because it was just so good! A couple of firsts this week, we got our first investigator. We also will be seeing him again tonight. He is 84 and we can comprehend what he is saying! That is a miracle in itself! Also I taught my first street lesson yesterday in all Cantonese! The gift of tongues is real! Normally I just let my trainer do all the talking! I also went to a normal sacrament meeting this week, which was amazing because it has been 4 weeks since I have been able to take the sacrament. It was quite an amazing experience the spirit I felt to be able to feel the gift of the atonement and know that all those mistakes I have made I can be forgiven of!

The ward here is small but they are amazing! They are blessed to be one of the only wards with 6 missionaries! 2 Sisters and 4 Elders, President would love to see this ward grow enough to have to split!

This is the first week we have been able to have street lessons with people we will actually be able to teach! So far it’s been a lot of girls and non-Cantonese speakers. But we have taught 5 to Chinese men. That’s a miracle because this city is so crazy and everyone is so busy! So to get that kind of time from the men was pretty amazing! Our secret is to get over the lack of confidence and stop and asking people for the chance to teach them and just do it. When you’re really assumptive and assertive in a polite and kind way it really works. We were tired of people saying no, truth is they don’t realize what they are saying no to, so don’t give them the option.

I realize how much of missionary work is truly the work! You have to try your best to be the best missionary you can be and that is having the faith to talk to people and the diligence to grow. We have been struggling with boldness so this last week we really focused on it! For these Chinese men you got to be very confident and bold, something I struggle with in Cantonese because I am really insecure about the language. Yesterday though something hit me and we stopped in the middle of evening studies and went out and I was talking to as many people as I could and that’s what lead to the street lesson that I gave. The Lord is amazing. He can even help me speak Cantonese.

I love everyone and hope all is well! Thanks for all the support!

Elder Jared Cordon

Week 2 Down! -Jared

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Wow what a week!

So this week wasn’t any different, but I can say I did enjoy it a lot better! There is a great thing to understand you may not change your circumstances but you can change you attitude so thats exaclty what I did. Also I guess our mission is soley responsible for China its technically our mission. So I am in the biggest and most populated mission. A great work that is going on here is that the members in China are doing a great job of spreading the gospel so they convert their friends get them to start following all the commandments and once a month we get large groups of chinese that come stay at the mission home which has like a small hotel on it). They spend a whole day meeting with the mandarin elders and sisters recieving all the missionary lessons and then recieving baptism by the close of the day, then we send them back to China as newly set apart member missionaries! What a wonderful work. China is open just more in the way that the qurom of the twelve has been pushing missionary work, and thats threw the members.

Being in Wanchie is hard because this area has the most non Chinese populase so we have been doing a lot of turn overs. Its hard turning people over because you build that trust and you want to help them all the way down the path. I know this work is guided by the Lord so if I am called to find and only find so be it. We find a lot of people from Indonesia, Malaysia, Indonesia, and Napal. They come here to Hong Kong to be hired as Helpers, for all the extremely rich people here. For example yesterday I saw 5 ferraris,6 aston martins, a rediculous amount of porsches and such! These are special people that come from these countries they are very accepting. I know i was sent here to help bring the Hong Kong people unto Christ and I will work and work until I do. The potential they all have can really be seen in the wonderful ward I am serving in. All the members are so kind and so Happy and I know that all the upset work beaten people I see once use to be sons and daughters of god and if they could only understand a particle of the joy they could feel from the gospel they would come running.

Well everyone I will keep you updated on the how the work is and I will be sure to put a picture up next week!

Just know that salvation wasn’t easy for the Savior, but the joy he recieved was greater than we could imagine!

Love Elder Cordon