Tag Archives: Joshua Cordon

A Rebirth For Some and A New Decade For Me

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

Well two more wonderful children of God have entered the waters of baptism!! Kevin and Lori have come a long way since I first met Kevin in a parking lot back in December. I am excited to see what they can make of this wonderful opportunity. A big shout out to Bishop and his wife who were so instrumental in getting us to this point. They opened to their home up to lessons several months ago and that definitely solidified the testimony kevin and lori already had. It is just amazing to see the change that comes into people lives as they begin to accept the gospel!

photo (2)

Thank you to all who helped to make my birthday last week a special one! I was definitely taken care of here in the Hendricks Avenue ward. At the end of the night on Thursday my companion had organized a small surprise gathering of cake and gifts. Some of my favorite people in the ward were there so it was definitely a wonderful moment. Sis. Laskis also fed us that night and gave me another cake haha. There are so many wonderful people here. The Lord definitely gave me a great week seeing as how we had one of my most productive weeks yet! (Matthew 7:11)

All in all it was an incredible week. We started teaching this wonderful young man Alfred again! I taught him a few months back with Elder Hamilton, but he was lacking that real intent so we parted ways. A couple Sundays ago, his Sister (who is an active member) told us that her mom wanted us to go see Alfred again. We went by the next day. As we sat down with him he just got quite and said, “Elders, I am going to be honest with you…” as he paused I braced for what I thought was bad news, he then continued saying, “I really want to change my life now and I just want you teach me whatever I have to do to have what you have.” Talk about music to a missionaries hears! With maybe a little too much enthusiasm we proceeded to unfold before him the truths of the gospel. We have met with him every single day since and each time he has read from the Book of Mormon and taken notes on what he read. Can I just mention how great god is! His power to soften the hearts of people in their time is amazing!

Inspired by my amazing sister Shalese, Elder Frazier and I are going to take a picture everyday of something we are grateful for/makes us happy! It should be good. Perhaps I might share a few with you next week. If you are lucky haha.

Love, Y’all!

Elder Joshua Cordon

The Dawn Of A New Day!

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

I may have shared this already, but I got a fortune cookie once that said, “Relish the transitions in your life, they will happen regardless.” Well I am approaching one of those big transitions of the mission. A new companion. Spending 24/7, with a few exceptions, with the same person for 4 1/2 months can either create a great friendship or quite the opposite. I am lucky it was not the latter of the two. Elder Hamilton is one great missionary!! I feel like part of me is leaving. Indeed he will be missed! I wish him the best of luck as he finishes out the last two transfers of his mission. Fleming Island is blessed by the best to have him coming their way.

My new companion is going to be Elder Frazier, who just so happened to be trained by Elder Newbold just before he trained me. So basically we are brothers. I am excited for this next phase of my missionary experience!

This past Sunday was hands down the best Sunday of my mission so far! We successfully committed several people to come to church that day and most were able to come! Even Steven who said that he had to work that morning was able to get work off early to come!! It was so awesome! I can tell the difference it made on the ward, there was just a contagious excited feeling. In all we were able to share this wonderful experience with Bro & Sis Nesbit, Bro Colney, Steven Bryant, and Daniel. All of them seemed to thoroughly enjoy themselves!! What a blessing it was to have all of them come! The ward just wrapped their arms around every one of them and the love was tangible. They all have baptismal dates on for the coming month and I hope all the pieces come together that will allow them to join the fold.

Something strange that happened last week was that we were asked to do a baptismal interview for the YSA sisters. Not that being asked was strange, but rather the circumstances that surrounded the interview. We were sent to the large campus of UNF and had to somehow find this dorm which proved to be a challenge in and of itself. Upon finally locating the dorm hall we learn that the sisters wont even be there for the interview which is regular protocol. They told us to just wait in the lobby and she will come down to meet us. So here we are on a college campus in a dorm hall just sitting in the lobby waiting for a girl. It didn’t help that we were wearing suits and we appeared to be lost. We also had no idea what this girl looked like, so we just said high to every girl in the lobby– hoping each would react in such a way that let us know if she was who we were looking for. After a few awkward attempts, we decided to just take a seat and act like we knew what we were doing. No sooner had we done so that the awkward tension subsided and a sense of control over this situation returned. In a few short minutes the baptismal candidate arrived that interview commenced.

Moral of the above story and the lesson for you all this week, always act like you know what you are doing even if you don’t.

Love, Ya’ll!

Elder Joshua Cordon

Mandarin Zone Elders

Those with a second tie around their necks are the Elders being transferred.

My Companion and I

Elder Hamilton and I

Plan Ahead, Enjoy The Moment, and Count Your Blessings

Posted on by
1

Dear Family and Friends,

I am not sure if I mentioned this already, but I have come to learn a thing or two about myself on my mission. Big shock right? One thing i have learned is that i like action. If i spend three hours in a meeting and I don’t leave feeling like I have just received instructions of how to put into action and realize the very goals we have discussed, then i feel like time has been wasted. Luckily for me though, when i spent 11ish hours in meetings this past week, I do feel that much of the time was used wisely, and that is was productive.

Nevertheless, the time that wasn’t used wisely combined with several weeks and months of thought I’ve put into goal setting and planning has caused me to give a training on it this week in Zone Meeting. Time is too short and too precious to waste it with action-less-chit-chat. On the contrary to not talk through things at all could be highly detrimental for it would open the door the premature and inappropriate action. As in all things in life a balance is required. I feel like that is how we have worked here in the Hendricks area over the past few months, we have accomplished much with a proper balance of talk and action. Hopefully, my much study and pondering, coupled with inspiration from the spirit will lead me to be able to say a few wise words on the subject tomorrow, I guess we will see.

Anyhow back to reality. So one interesting thing that happened this past week was a move that we took part in. We found out about Thursday we had to help a lady in our ward move from one apartment to another. At first we thought we were just being asked to be part of moving crew they had already assembled, But then we realized that we were the moving crew. Personally, I am flattered by the fact that they thought we had the energy, stamina, and means to do the entire project ourselves. They must really think very highly of us. As tempting as that sounded, we decided to take the selfless route and share this blessed opportunity with others, and thank goodness we did, for the load ended up being a full U-Haul truck, and two truck-beds worth of furniture boxes and odds-n-ends. While i say that in partial jest much good came from including others in this service opportunity. Our fully assembled amateur moving team was a motley crew at best, it included us, the senior missionary couple (Elder and Sister Andrew), our burly elders quorum president, Solomon (our recent convert who was one of the lost boys of Sudan), and Johnny (our Cambodian brother, also a recent convert). It got done in a timely manner, we had a great time, and all reported that they appreciated the much-needed boost in spirit that comes from losing yourself in the service of others. In the end, a seemingly overwhelming task resulted in a blessing in disguise.

Another crazy thing that happened Saturday was that when we came by Solomon’s to pick him up for the service project the whole parking lot and courtyard outside his apartment were taped off with police line. Inside the line were 6 squad cars, more than a dozen officers, and several men carrying what appeared to be M-16s. Luckily Solomon was fine and he said that the police had been their since 10 o’clock the previous evening. According to him, somebody died. It is just a hunch, but I am suspecting foul play, that is just me though, so take it with a grain of salt. In most cases including the move I unwisely failed to capture the moment in a photograph. I need to be better at that.

We managed this past week after hurdling many obstacles to find me a bike to ride and a bike hitch for our car, so we were able to hit the pavement and do some good street contacting, it was definitely a major blessing for we had much success in those few hours of biking.

So, everything is going great with the many families that we are teaching. Lily is still on track to be baptized by the end of the month, she also wants to go on a mission! Wahoo! She will be a great missionary. The Conseillants are great like always, and they even came to church on Sunday. We finally were able to have a lesson with Kevin and Lori in their home which is about 2 1/2 months in the making, but was totally worth it. We got Daniel (the son of Br. Fonseca who was baptized 2 years ago) to finally set a date for baptism? We had him pick the number, so April 20th it is. And then their are just so many others who are coming out of the wood work to hear this wonderful message. God has truly blessed us with a plate as full as the one I ate yesterday at dinner, and both are delicious to the taste. And the weather has been beautiful which is another big plus.

Count your many blessings this week and you will be singing as the days go by! (“Count Your Blessings,” LDS Hymn book #241)

Love Ya’ll!!

Elder Joshua Cordon

“An unseen power will aid me and you”… Electricity or WiFi anyone?!

Posted on by
Reply

Dear family and friends,

Things got pretty exciting this last week when I was able to receive
my iPad mini. These things are awesome! It is definitely a huge bonus
to serving here in Jacksonville, Florida. To answer any questions,
these are not full functioning iPad. The church has modified them a
bit to upgrade security and so that there are no any games or anything
on them. We have access to all the churches apps and Google translate,
Skype, and Facebook, but that is about as much as we get. It is also
all we really need. There’s so much information in gospel Library
alone, has everything you could possibly imagine as far as missionary
work is concerned. I’m excited to see how I can use this to grow the
work in this area.

A cool miracle from this last week shows how we used the iPad in a
creative way that opened doors we wouldn’t have had otherwise. Last
Sunday when contacting in an apartment complex we met a man from
Albania. He couldn’t speak any English, so we gave him a pass along
card and wished him a good day. As I was walking away I just found
myself wishing that I could just speak to him because he seemed like
such a wonderful man. The next day we went to pick up some French
copies of the book of Mormon from outside of the mission office that
sister roads left for us when in the stack we found an Albanian copy
of the book of Mormon. We asked her why it was there and she said it
was an accident. I immediately thought of the man that we the day
before and I felt that this was no coincidence. We didn’t exactly know
where he lived, but we went to the same complex and said a mighty
prayer and began wondering hoping to find him. We knocked on a few
doors and did a regular approach and then asked if they knew any
Albanian people in the area. We were continually sent down several
dead end leads. However, we felt the spirit was with us,guiding us. As
we walked we felt that we should talk to some young man we saw sitting
at a picnic table. After having a short conversation with him and
giving him a Book of Mormon, we started to make our way back to the
car. Right then we saw the same Albanian man that before walking into
his apartment. We ran after him and knocked on the door just after it
shut. He opened it and as he saw us a big smile came across his face
and he invited us in. We held out the book of Mormon like we are
giving him a gift. He took it and you could tell from his facial
expressions and body language that he was very grateful that we had
given it to him. After using the translation book of Albanian to
English on his table to communicate we set up a return appointment for
Sunday at 5 o’clock. We did this keeping in mind we would have our
iPads by then and that they had a translation app. After receiving the
iPads be translated a listen into Albanian. Yesterday we went to his
house and we held out the lesson we had translated and pictures that
went along with it. While we could not communicate to know how he felt
we could see he understood very well. We agreed to teaching English on
Saturday if he came to the church so we can use the Wi-Fi. One amazing
gift is iPad!

Check out my new iPad mini

Check out my new iPad mini

Josh 2

Josh 3
I hope you liked the story. I’m very happy here and I love my mission.
I know this gospel is true, I know God is part of this work, and I
know that if we do what he asks we can have the spirit as a guide. I
love this gospel so much! Have a wonderful week!

Love ya’ll!

Elder Joshua Cordon

Short and Sweet!! -Joshua

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

This past week was definitely an interesting one. While it felt a little like Christmas, it just wasn’t the same. Maybe the fact that we were wearing short sleeves for a lot of last week and well we just taught everyday. All in all there is still nothing better than serving the Lord.

Seeing as how I don’t really have any interesting stories for you at the moment I will just talk about a few things that have been on my mind. It seems to be that I have really come to understand what it means when it says that faith, hope, charity, and an eye single to the glory of god qualify you for the work. If a missionary can only master those few points EVERYTHING else would fall into place. I find myself lately feeling that those are the only things that I want to study or even think about. When I measure myself in those categories against what I could become I feel very motivated to improve. As we were considering some of the things that we could train on in Zone Meeting this week we realized that it all comes down to the fundamentals. Kinda like what coach Vince Lombardi would teach. And the fundamentals are what I have mentioned above. I am probably just rambling, but that is just what has been on my mind this week. Sorry for the short letter but that is all I got.

Love Ya’ll!! Happy New Year!!

Elder Joshua Cordon

Also checkout his blog post for a wonderful perspective on New Years goal setting. arippleoflight.blogspot.com

Another week into the rest of my life.

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

So this past week was a good one. It definitely kept me on my toes as each day presented some unique experience. I would have it no other way though!

I did my first exchange as a zone leader with a district leader, and though I am sure it should have been the other way I learned a bunch on that exchange. Elder Feliz is such a terrific missionary. He has been out a lot longer, and is very humble. He is a convert from the Dominican Republic, and he one of best missionaries in the mission. One thing that I learned from him that I really appreciated was his selflessness. He is a YSA missionary which means he works with all the young single adults in his area. Nevertheless, during our exchange he still talked to everybody regardless of their age or relationship status. We ended up finding a family and a single guy that were both very interested, but he immediately handed them over to the missionaries who are supposed to teach them without even flinching. (I say that example because it is proving to be the exception rather than the rule) All in all it was a great experience for me.

Another wonderful experience was that we found this awesome Haitian family. They are both very intelligent and they have an incredible desire to learn. We had our return appointment lesson with them last night and it went really well. They had a bunch of questions from when they read the Book of Mormon, and they are excited to learn a lot more about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Their names are Gabon and Emmanuela. I am looking forward to our lesson with them tomorrow.

All in all it was a great week. I feel like I have so many wonderful experiences everyday that I would never be able to talk about all of them, but when it comes to writing this email it seems that a lot of it escapes me haha so well that is it for this week!

I love ya’ll! Merry Christmas!

Elder Joshua Cordon

From Biking in the Boonies to Combing the City Blocks -Joshua

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

So this last week mixed a lot of things up for me. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but needless to say I haven’t been disappointed at all. Saying goodbye to everybody last week was hard, but change is always for the better. I get the wonderful pleasure of serving with one of the best Elders in the whole mission Elder Hamilton. He has been out a whole year longer than me and I am looking forward to the many lessons that he will undoubtedly teach me. We get along great which is perfect because we have too much on our plates to be worried about resolving petty arguments.

Being a Zone Leader isn’t as taxing on my time as much as I thought it would be, which is wonderful because we got to spend a lot of our time over the past couple of days in the act of finding. As a result, the Lord pored out blessing from on high and we found 4 new families to teach in only a matter of a few days. There is a lot of great work to do in this area and I am more than ready to hit the pavement to get things rolling. I am grateful for the work that has already been done here because I get the blessed opportunity of seeing one of our investigators get baptized this weekend. His name is Solomon and he is from Sudan. He is very humble and very excited to get baptized this weekend. He was inviting a bunch of people at church yesterday to his baptism.

Some of the good changes that I have experienced this week include: upgraded from crappy apartment to super nice one, upgraded from biking to car, upgraded from no gym to a gym every other day, upgraded from trailer park/ ghetto tracting to tracting in tons of apartment complexes. Those are just a few, but I appreciate every one of them. Luckily for me one of the fears I had was not realized which was that we would not be fed on Thanksgiving because we got fed twice.

I have big hopes here. There is a lot to do and we need to grow our teaching pool a lot more, but I have no doubt that as we labor diligently the Lord will bless us. He has been doing that my whole mission. We truly have a Father in Heaven who knows each and every one of us personally. My testimony of that has grown so immensely since the start of my mission. Another aspect of my testimony that has grown is that of the power that can be felt from reading the Book of Mormon. Every time I read it, I feel like I am getting a big hug from God, and Boy does that feel good!

Have a wonderful week! I love ya’ll!

Love,

Elder Joshua Cordon

Big News and Big Changes!! – Joshua

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

So I got a little teaser last Monday about whether or not I would be leaving and it didn’t come as expected. I thought that we were going to get a call from the Mission President asking Elder Barcala if he would be willing to train a new missionary, but instead he asked to speak to me. The fact that he wanted to speak to me was a shocker enough, but then he asked me to be a Zone Leader. I almost fainted. I was so stunned I almost forgot to reply to the President and tell him that I accepted. After he asked me all he heard on the other line was a……. wo…………………… o uh ya I would be honored President. I hope my reaction gave him a good laugh. He also told me right then I would be getting transferred which was nice to know because it gave me time to say goodbye to all my wonderful friends that I now have here in Lake City.

It truly has been a great adventure serving here in Deep Creek and I have met some truly amazing people that have made a lasting positive impact. The ward as become a family to me and I have no doubt that I have met some of my friends that I knew in the the pre-mortal existence. I wish everyone here the best and I plan to return after my mission and see them all again. The beauty of this world of technology is that it is very easy to keep in touch with people. Gotta love Facebook 🙂

As far as the next chapter of my mission, it will be spent in the beautiful and nice area of Mandarin, Jacksonville. It is a great area that not only has the Assistants to the President in it, but also the Mission Home. Looks like I get the blessing of seeing President and Sis. Craig more regularly. I also get the wonderful privilege of serving with Elder Hamilton. I have heard great things about him and I am looking forward our adventures together. Fun fact about him is that I worked with his older brother in college and he told me to look for him when I got here. He was hoping that he would train me, well he gets to be my Zone Leader Trainer haha.

Anyway, lots of Great things have happened hear that I will will praise the Lord forever for being able to experience. I definitely feel as if I have come here for a reason. But now that I am getting sent somewhere else I am embracing the wonderful advice I got in a fortune cookie once, it said, “Relish the transitions in your life, they will happen regardless.”

I love ya’ll! Have a great week!

Love,
Elder Joshua Cordon

20131127-065419.jpg

20131127-065427.jpg

20131127-065437.jpg

20131127-065447.jpg

Do I Stay or Do I Go?? -Joshua

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

So this is the first transfer where I am actually completely uncertain as to whether I will stay here in the wonderful land of Lake City, or if I will go. I am personally okay with either option. If I stay I would probably be able to baptize my favorite investigators, seeing has how they are ripe for baptism here soon, but also I would welcome a change seeing as how this is the only place I have been thus far. I will get a teaser tonight if Elder Barcala gets a training call or not.

This last week was a fairly good week though. There are two highlights that I wish to mention.

The first is the surprising cold that hit us last Wednesday. Believe it or not, we had to bust out the gloves, coats, and scarfs in Florida haha. I was kinda looking forward to wearing my pea-coat the so I was happy. My companion on the other hand did not bring any cold weather clothing thinking that all of Florida was like Miami all the time haha. Luckily a merciful sister in the ward took us to the store and bought him a very nice coat, and some gloves and scarfs for the two of us. It definitely made biking around a lot better.

The other event was our Zone Conference. I thought we were suppose to rotate between Gainesville and here for Zone conference but seeing as how 3 in a row were in Gainesville that doesn’t seem to be the case. I don’t mind it though. We had to get flu shots while we were there and I think it made me a little sick, but it won’t stop me. The Zone Conference was great and I heard a lot of inspiring words. I just feel like this mission is one big family!

Something that I loved from my personal studies this past week was all the talk about how God will empower us with strength to overcome our weaknesses as we are obedient. That came from the talk that Elder Richard G. Scott gave in the latest general conference. SO GOOD! I would encourage all of you to read it 🙂

Have a wonderful week!

Love Ya’ll,

Elder Joshua Cordon

20131119-085728.jpg

20131119-085739.jpg

Service Helps! And So Does Chili :) – Joshua

Posted on by
Reply

Dear Family and Friends,

I had many great experiences this past week. This first one I wanted to mention is about a less-active sister in our ward. We went by her house two weeks ago and at the end of the lesson we asked if we could have some more of her amazing cooking. She loves to cook (and we knew that) so she readily accepted. The result was DELICIOUS! Southern cooking is a hoot! (that means it is really good in southernese) I have come to find that one of my favorite southern dishes though is creamed corn, and acres peas. It is probably on the healthier side of the southern cuisine, which is good for a guy who eats as much as I do. (After my performance at a members home on Thursday I have received several comments haha.) Also the dinner gave us a good chance to invite her to church and talk some gospel with her.

On Wednesday I had an exchange with Elder Lake from Price Creek. During our trade-off with another member in our ward we found ourselves stuck in a pickle after striking out on all my plans. While praying silently for some direction I felt that we should visit the Greens. Upon arriving it seemed like their daughter was going to chase us off, but I stood my ground and insisted on doing some service for them. Once they realized that we were serious, they accepted. We proceeded to till and rake their garden for the next hour. The result was a gift bag of microwave meals and frozen deer leg, dirty hands, and softened hearts. They asked if we could come back Saturday and help finish the project. After that service project we part of the family according to their 38 year old daughter Michelle. They experienced some real hard ship two nights ago with the passing of their grandson/nephew though so if you could keep them in your prayers that would be great.

Lastly, we had some awesome success with the Fall Festival this past week. By the grace of God we were able to get Nick there are Camekco(who brought her sister). They both had a great time as we enjoyed some great conversation with great people, while eating great chili. Seeing things come together so well is such a great feeling!

All in all it was a terrific week and I hope it was for the rest of ya’ll!

Have a great week and don’t forget to pray. One simple prayer opened the doorway to some great service and new friends!

Love ya’ll!

Elder Joshua Cordon