Tag Archives: LDS

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

Be Bold, Be Obedient

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Dear Family and Friends, 

It was great this week and the first full one with my New Elder Wong. We have been tearing it up and being very bold. We had a couple of lessons this week which were really really blunt and they were needed. The sad thing is all the people we have been working with have all become very lazy and dependent on us. The problem with the world and especially Asian school systems is they don’t want people to think for themselves they just want them to take what they are told and believe it. Since this also is primarily what must churches do too, they thrive here, but as for the Church of Jesus Christ we want people to have their own experiences and testimonies and to go and search truth for themselves. The quest for Happiness and the quest for Self Mastery are one in the same. God wants up to be the best us and to start improving now and keep improving. I have said this before and I will say it again happiness is not a state that is a achieved but it is the way we live our lives! 

We have done well about applying the counsel given to us by an Apostle of the Lord and we are seeing great blessings coming from it and we should be seeing some big things happening here in the coming weeks. A lot of companionship’s have been seeing miracles pouring in. We never know what the lords timing will be when he wants to bestow blessings, usually right after being tempted by Satan to not be obedient, but always be worthy that way your timing and the lords timing will always be the same. 


I love you all and hope you have a wonderful week. 

Elder Jared Cordon 

Children of God

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Dear family and friends,

This week was an incredible week! The best part about it though was without a doubt the weekend. This is considering the fact that we had a powerful mission changing meeting on Monday, and that I got to go to the temple in Orlando on Thursday.

The best part about this week was that on Saturday at 5:00 Aniya, Cheyenne, and Marquez were all baptized. It was one of the sweetest baptismal services I have ever been part of. The turnout was great and the spirit was strong. I would like to just take a minute to tell all of you about the three beautiful children we entered into a covenant with their Heavenly Father.

Aniya:
I have been working with Aniya since the first week I got to the area. We never ceased to be amazed at how impressive she was. She was only 11 years old when we first started teaching her and she had a stronger and more doctrinal sound grasp on the gospel than many adults. She carried herself with eloquence and she stood up for what she knew was right among her peers. When she entered young women’s her talents were only magnified. Just a few weeks ago she taught the Family Home Evening lesson to a group of adult converts and she lead the conversation with grace and everyone felt edified.

Cheyenne:
While we were working to the lay the ground work for Aniya so that she could get baptized suddenly after New Years Cheyenne came into the picture. Cheyenne is Aniya’s younger sister. We started the lessons over with her to help her have a good foundation of the gospel and of other restored truths. After a few weeks of working with her we finally saw the light at the end of the tunnel and looked like their dad who was baptized 4 years ago last Friday was able to finally get things lined up for them to be baptized as well. Cheyenne in just a few short weeks has shown immense growth and an increasing level of maturity. By the time the baptism came around she was bearing a strong testimony in the Book of Mormon and in the truthfulness of the church.

Marquez:
We venturing into new neighborhoods about 5 months ago when we saw a dirt road that was off to the side that lead to some distant homes. There are not very many dirt roads in our area so it peaked our curiosity so we went walking down to find some people to share the gospel with. The first house we came to was the home of Ms. Betty, Marquez’ grandmother. We would visit Ms. Betty from time to time and about a month after we started visiting her we became acquainted with Marquez when we helped him get the Christmas lights out of storage for his grandmother. After talking for a bit I told Marquez about scouts on Wednesday night and asked if he would like to come and join the group. He seemed really excited by the idea. He came the next Wednesday and well the rest is history.

This final weekend was a battle to get everyone ready for the baptism, but miracles abounded and right prevailed. Aniya and Cheyenne’s father was able to baptize them, and one of Marquez’ young men’s leaders who has been a great example to him was able to baptize him. While they were all changing, Elder Jorgensen and I were able to stand in front of a large crowd of members and non members and the teach the message of the restoration while wearing our baptismal whites with the font as the backdrop. It was very powerful and probably the best setting I have been afforded to preach the gospel. I never thought that I would be able to say that I had done that. As we taught I felt the spirit speak very powerfully to my the heart that this message is indeed true and I hope that a similar witness was born to the those who sat in the congregation.

On Sunday in order for Aniya and Cheyenne to be confirmed by their farther he was sustained by the congregation to be an elder and then I conferred upon him the Melchizedek priesthood, and ordained him to be an elder. Right after that he stood up and confirmed his daughters by that priesthood. Then I was blessed to confirm Marquez. It was an amazing weekend! I am so grateful to my Heavenly Father that I have been able to be part of the 3 incredible lives. I also found out that I am getting transferred to another part of Jacksonville this week Wednesday so it was a wonderful finished to an life changing experience while I served in the mandarin 2nd ward. I am excited for the amazing adventure ahead.

Thank you for all the love and support you have shown me and I hope that you know how much I love and appreciate every single one of you.

I love y’all!

Elder Joshua Cordon

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Let Him Lead

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Dear Family and Friends,

Well it certainly was a great week. It was a temple week and we had a baptism. Which also made the week a very busy, and spirit filled week. The temple is such a wonderful place to to be able to be bless to go on my mission is such a wonderful gift. The only other place outside of temples that I have been able to feel the spirit as strong is at the sacred grove. The difference is that temples are dedicated homes to the Lord, and we are given promises and blessings and light and knowledge in the temples when we seek for it. What a great blessing for the mission to be able to receive light and knowledge for the areas that we are in.

Had a really cool experience this week with getting a haircut and taking the time to talk to her about the Plan of Salvation. There are some many moments in our lives that we have peoples attention that we can share simple and small truths about the gospel. The question is are we taking advantage of them all. It was a lesson to me of how easy it was to take advantage of the time that I had while she was cutting my hair to direct the conversation to the gospel.

Come to find out that her mom has recently passed away and she has been doing A LOT of researching into afterlife and what is really waiting for us. I was then easily able to share with her the wonderful truth that we know about the life to come. I also was able to share with her how we know this because we have prophets and God still talks to the world through them so that we know of these wonderful truths.
When are truly willing to take advantage of every moment that is given to share truths of the gospel and build up His children. Then He will be willing and able to guide even the plans you make and the steps you take to give you the moments to build his kingdom and his children. The willingness to give him everything is the price, and the reward is more then could ever be dreamed about.

Life becomes so easy when everything is guided by Him. So that is the question are we letting Him guide us everyday?

I Love You All
Thank you for everything that you have done in my life.

Elder S Cordon

Special Witnesses of Jesus Christ

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Dear Family & Friends,

Well this was to say the least an extremely eventful week with moves calls more food than what is healthy and 6(+1 soon to be) Special witnesses of the our Lord Jesus Christ came to visit us and share their testimonies with us.

Starting from the top, moves calls: Well we basically new a lot was going to happen but then every single companionship in the zone changed so it was pretty big. Little Malaysian Wong moved to Ngau Tau Kok and my new Companion Canada Wong moved here to Aberdeen (I have to distinguish the Wongs because there is 3 of them here in the mission). I will miss my old Wong and am excited for the new Wong. We actually entered the MTC together so its pretty awesome to serve with him as two seasoned missionaries. We have already gotten off to a great start because he has an amazing way of connecting with these people way better than any of my Chinese companions he is very loud and very talkative and a very good finder. Also the very stereotypical Chinese nerd who loves gaming and science. I love him.

Because of Elder Wong leaving and Elder Wong coming our members and investigators were shedding tears and excited to welcome a new missionary. Because of that we ended up having a lot of meal appointments and man I feel like its gonna take awhile to get that all down! The best was one day we went to this Thai restaurant for lunch with 2 people and again for dinner with another person. Man and it was delicious!

But the crowing event of course was to be able to have a special visit and hear from An Apostle Elder Ballard, The senior president of the seventy President Rasband (again), The Presiding Bishop of the church Bishop Stevenson; Plus the Asia area presidency Elder Gong, Elder Wong, and Elder Funk; not to mention the soon to be seventy President Hawks. So 7 powerful men and we got the chance to hear from them two days in a row. Once by ourselves and the other with our investigators and members. Truly truly amazing, they ended up talking for over 2 1/2 hours and we were very much uplifted. Its amazing because as a mission we are very obedient so it was good because then we could hear about other things and this time was teaching skills. Which to cover a big part was in the first words spoken by Elder Ballard “we are all a little bit too shy” and another quote he shared from an experience with him and Legrand Richards, Legrand Richards saying “you know what the problem with this church is? we don’t have any more preachers” they gave us the call to be the best and be bold. I could go own with everything that was shared but it was moving and the Kwok family loved his message the second day were we got to see him apply all that he told us. All of them are very powerful and man I am so blessed because this is my 4th visit from a general authority not counting the MTC.

All of this excitement is happening at the right time to get me motivated. I am entering the 4th quarter of my mission and I have worked hard but its time to look where I have been lacking and step up my game!

I love you all have a great week!

Elder Jared Cordon

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Here is a dinner appointment at our bishops house with our investigator Eric and my new comp.

 

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Here is a dinner appointment at our bishops house with our investigator Eric and my new comp.

 

#CUTENESS

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Dear Family and Friends,

We have a wonderful girl getting baptized this weekend; she is turning 12 the day before her baptism and, she says that it is going to be the best birthday ever. YAY! The Holy Spirit can teach to any age and any education. He doesnt teach our minds He teaches our souls and that is where the real learning happens. That is why it is so important to have the spirit with us when we teach cause He is the one that is doing the teaching that they need to receive a conformation of the truth of the message.

We also have another baptism next week. The work is moving forward and it is awesome to see all the miracles. I have come to learn that the difference in having miracles every day and not is all in the details. God is constantly reaching His hand into our life and if we arent trying to see it we wont. The great thing is the more we see them the more that happen. Attitude of Gratitude

I love you all so much thank you for your support and prayers.

Elder Steven Cordon

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Puppies!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Prayer of Faith!

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Dear Family and Friends,

Wow!!! Wow!!! Missions are so amazing!! There is literally not a week that goes by where something amazing doesn’t happen.

Amazing things that happened this week:

Mission Conference

The first year of my mission I had 2 mission conferences. However, we have had 1 every month for the past 4 months. Along with 1 other 2 months before that. So, it has been awesome!!

This time we were visited by Elder Zwick of the first quorum of the Seventy, who I will say is one of the manliest men I have ever had the pleasure of meeting, and Br. Hemingway who is assigned to the Missionary Department of the Church and is the Director of the proselyting division for the whole world. When I shook Br. Hemingway’s hand he said with a pleasant surprise, “Oh, I remember you. How are you doing?” I had met him a little over a year ago when he came to introduce iPads to the mission. He was the Mission President in Rochester, New York when we first moved there, and knows the Tuttle Family fairly well.

President and Sister Craig where with these fine brethren for several days in Salt Lake City at a special Mission Presidents conference that included the 28 Facebook/iPad missions. We were the first mission to receive training and instruction from what was discussed at that conference. Basically, we are entering the next major stage of testing for iPads and Facebook proselyting. The biggest changes come in the fact that we will receive brand-new iPads next week and there will be a Facebook restart that will result in us going offline of Facebook for a while. We also received training materials produced by the church that are finally standardizing the training of iPads and Facebook, something that we have been begging for for a while. On top of all of that we received powerful trainings on Personal Conversion, and Will-Power. All of it was very inspiring. But anyway, enough of that, it is probably not nearly as exciting for you as it is for me. And if it is exciting for you, then think how excited I am!

Prayers of faith=Miracles

There were several instances this past week that we incredible miracles as a result of a prayer, but there is one that I would like to highlight. On Saturday, it was beautiful weather but it was slower day for some reason. We tried everything I had ever been taught to do and nothing worked. Luckily we had a dinner appointment with two of my favorite people that I had to look forward to. One was a less active and that was the first lesson we were able to teach all day. After dinner we tried to knock some doors, hoping to get some success from those efforts, but after striking out we stopped at the nearby gas station for a bathroom break. While I was waiting for my companion, I saw these two kids at a table. After striking up conversation we were able to teach him the whole first lesson and give him a book of mormon which he agreed to read. Things started to look up.

Still we had about an hour left of the night. Elder Jorgensen suggested that we go and see a man who had not been home for our appointment earlier that day. Considering how far away he was it seemed like an illogical decision, but we both agreed that it felt right so away we went. I remember thinking about the nice peace I had felt on the way there that was a nice contrast to the frustration and anxiety I had experienced earlier. Once we got there we knocked on his doors with hearts full of faith only to find that nobody was home.

I knew at that moment that we were there for someone else. Unsure of what to do next and how to find this person that we were meant to find we knelt down in the grass in front of an apartment building. It was 8:35 roughly we knew that time was not a luxury. After Elder Jorgensen offered a mighty prayer we started knocking. Nobody answered the first two doors and as we turned to head to the stairs we saw a woman, her daughter, and their two dogs walking in the parking lot. We used the dogs as an ice breaker before bringing up the gospel. Before we could even get to it though, she asked us what we were there doing. We told her who we were and asked if we could share our message with her. At this point her little girl Aryah while tugging on her jacket said “Mommy, can we hear their message.” It wasn’t very difficult for her to say yes after that.

We proceeded to teach them the whole first lesson and they loved every bit of it. She told us that they were looking for a church that would prick their heart with the spirit. She even said that because they had just moved there that they were still looking for a church. At the moment they are attending a Brazillian church and because the service is in Portuguese they have to wear headsets with the translation. She started to express concern about the idea of having a prophet today but after we showed her a video of Thomas S. Monson, she said that she knew that he was a prophet the moment she saw him. All of us departed that night feeling very grateful that the lord had caused our paths to cross that night. Jackie and Aryah probably don’t even realize how incredible the journey they just started really is.

I want to bare my solemn witness that God hears every single one of our prayers. I know that he loves us and that he will provide us with miracles as we rely with faith.

I love y’all!

Elder Joshua Cordon

Red Rockets!!

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Dear Family and Friends,

Chinese New Year was a wonderful, wonderful experience here in Aberdeen. Last Year I remember the work really slowing down when the New Year rolled around but this year it was different, it did not seem to have any effect whatsoever other than the positive ones. We decided since everyone would be in their homes why not test our luck with knocking doors! What came of it was the greatest success I have ever seen from knocking doors. We ended up teaching a total of 3 lessons between 3 visits heading over there. 2 were to Chinese people one was to a Philipina who helped us understand that her employer (who was not home any time we visited) had actually been taught previously by missionaries and has a book of mormon. The two Chinese people were from the same family. From two different visits to the same house. We also met another man and his daughter which after talking to them for awhile earned their trust and he wants to bring his daughter to english class, we also ran into him later on the bus and he was happy to see us again. I have always love knocking doors because it takes me back to my summer sales experience before my mission. But the Chinese new year seemed to definitely work in favor of our plan because most people were home.

We also had the chance to meet with the Kwok family before they headed to mainland to visit some family and we focused on the importance of daily scripture study. We have previously committed them this was mainly just a follow up lesson. She has a really big desire to accept the gospel and we are trying our best to help her in teaching her kids, we will continue teaching the whole family of course but we have been really trying to help her understand that she needs to lead the way for her kids. It was funny she knew we had suitcases and she did not have enough for her and her kids so begged us to use ours, so right now I have one suitcase in mainland china!

A member gave us some radish cakes to give out to less actives and investigators and it was a huge help! It gave us a simple excuse to be able to meet up with a few. For example one is a recent Convert Helen who has not come to church in 3 weeks it was an easy way to meet with her to do our part, but mainly the ward has been very good about staying up on all the recent converts right now. It give me great peace if we were to help someone be baptized that the ward would take care of them.

The ward is doing great we are still waiting on the ward mission plan, but they have got some other plans they are executing. They are starting a rotating family home evening once a month on Sunday night at the church. Several families will plan and organize it and we can simple bring investigators so we will do our best to support their plans. Its something they came up with to create unity in the ward and provide ways to consistently have something we can bring investigators too.

RED POCKETS!! During chinese New year they have a tradition that those who are married will give red pockets to those who are not. Mainly just family and friends. Its basically a red envelope with some cool designs on it and it has money inside! Chinese people love money! yesterday I got quite a bit. I got $380.00 in red pocket money!

I love you all and Happy Lunar New Year!

The year of the Lamb or Goat (I kinda like the idea of lamb better because of its significance to Christ)

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Keep on Running

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Dear Family and Friends,

This past week was a wild one for sure. We had zone conferences, which considering the fact that they were 9 hour meetings it made for a long but a very fun week! The meetings we jam packed with great training’s on maintaining a balanced work, the atonement, public speaking skills, and then the training that we gave on finding people to teach. It is great to see all the missionaries that I was able to see all the missionaries that I have served around. This week we had a couple of miracles, but one in particular I would like to mention.

We were on our way to a dinner appointment and when we walked up to the apartment that the members lived in, it looked like the lights were off so, I doubted myself and thought that I must be at the wrong
building. So, we started running so we wouldn’t be late to one of the other buildings. We ran through one cluster of buildings and I still didn’t feel like that was it, so we ran over to another cluster of
buildings and as we got there we saw a dog running in the side walk, so we stopped so it wouldn’t follow us. We made some small talk with the owner until she grabbed her dog and then we were about the run off
to get to our dinner, but then I felt that I should at least see if she would be interested in hearing our message.

So I stopped and said, “We share a wonderful message about our Savior Jesus Christ that has blessed our own lives, could we share that with you?” Surprisingly she replied with, “Ya sure come on over and share
it with me.” 20 minutes later we had taught her about he Book of Mormon and learned that she is about to graduate law school, and she is engaged and plans to be married after she graduates. Even though she is active in the Methodist church she was excited to learn more and said we could come back. She is very elect.

Seeing as how we were then very late to our appointment we checked the address on the church app and realized that it was the first place we had gone to. Thank goodness we kept running though.

I love y’all!

Elder Joshua Cordon