Tag Archives: Ward Members

Awesome Less Active Finding

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Dear Family & Friends,

Well it has not been to long since we were last on. But some good stuff has happened between now and then. We were able to get our plans put together for zone training, it will be good we are focusing a lot on teaching skills borrowing heavily from what you taught at zone conference.

We have also been able to use our time to be able to complete some assignments from the ward. Its good we have a good relationship with them and they are constantly thinking of new ideas. One big the ward is working on is utilizing the RM’s because we have about 15 of them, so the idea is to put them in a committee and have them prepare missionary focused activities.

Still getting better everyday, one thing we have been trying to focus on more as a companionship is something from the China Dedicatory Prayer, which is: Making the proper appeal to the Chinese mindset. In the prayer he prays that missionaries will be able to understand the Chinese people more and the way they think. we have been trying to work on showing even more love and interest in these people so we can truly understand their concerns and be able to teach how they think. Its not an easy task but its one we are praying about and trying to apply in our teaching and finding.

Elder Williams really has been teaching me so much. Maybe he hasn’t had the opportunity to train someone who just got out of the MTC but he is training me. One of the biggest things he has awoken inside me is finding. Although people might say that TST is a hard Finding area I think its great! Elder Williams doesn’t teach as much with words as he does with actions though, which is why i think I am learning so much from him.

Our investigators are moving along well, We had two with dates come to church, one being Bro Mak. He is doing really well and very receptive, we moved his date back a week so we can make sure he can have time to apply the commandments well in his life, but he seems to be doing awesome. Emily is still pretty new but she came as well, church was not too good because she was so tired so hopefully she can have a good experience next time. The ward actually invited her to a singles activity without us even knowing so thats cool. She is getting to know the members well from the beginning. Frankie also came to church and he is making great progress he is doing well at getting to know the ward members so hopefully he can make some great friends.

A crazy story that just happened this last week is we were LA finding and we met this man who was really old, first his wife answered and then she let us in and woke him up he came out of the room sat down and was quiet while we talked to the wife for a few minutes then he started talking. He said (in chinese) Joseph Smith is a prophet of God and this the true church, then he went on to tell us how he had a vision of joseph smith having the first vision before he met the missionaries then when the missionaries shared the first vision with him he knew it was true. Then he also told us how he fights with people who anti the church, because everyone thinks we are a wicked church so he goes around helps people know that we aren’t. He also fell off a 28 story building and lived and, he also prophecied Gordon B Hinckley’s death. I love LA finding.

Love you all have a great week.

Elder Jared Cordon

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Improvement and Progression – Josh

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Dear family and friends,

So, it was the first preparation day since Christmas that there wasn’t any sunshine. It’s amazing what kind of difference weather makes on attitude. It is not that am not happy but I’m a little more relaxed when it’s dark and gloomy outside. We are going to take advantage of all the rain though and play some sports out in the mud. This should be a lot of fun!

Fun thing that happened last week was that the day of transfers I knew that my old ward mission leader and his wife would be driving the missionaries from the ward to the transfer building. So I arranged ahead of time for us to meet up and get some lunch while they’re here in town. It was great to see them again and hear about how Deepcreek is doing. It reaffirmed the fact that I really want to go back and visit that Ward shortly after my mission. I definitely have a lot of good friends there.

My mission trainee Elder Barcala got transferred here to Jacksonville, and he is serving in the area next to mine. However, it is across the river and it is not in my zone. I don’t know how often I’ll see him but I am happy that he was finally able to train, something he was really looking forward to doing.

While most of the missionaries in my zone stayed put we did however get a new district leader and new sister training leaders in the zone. In order to get the district leaders up to speed with the vision that Elder Hamilton and I have established we got lunch at chipotle with the district leaders. There’s something really nice about having a meeting outside over lunch. It just really makes things feel official, yet relaxed. I feel like there will be a lot of good things happening here in this in the next couple months.

We have been trying to get our companionship more integrated with the ward. After initiating some game plans we came up with to strengthen our relationship with the bishop and with ward members it feels like things are really starting to change. After having nobody sign up for dinner to feed us the first two months of February we filled our calendar for this week on Sunday. We also lined up several service projects throughout the week for the ward members. Some of the advice that we got from the stake presidents meeting we had on Sunday was to befriend ward members so that they could trust us with their friends.

We had already decided to initiate that idea so it was good to see that as we follow the spirit or vision was aligned with there’s just in time for us to see results the very week they suggested it. I hope that by the time I leave here missionaries will be begging to come to this area knowing the members will help them in all aspects of the work.

I guess one thing I never expected a mission would teach me is that of problem-solving and creativity skills. Truly you cannot just go through the work every day doing the same thing. You will have little success and you won’t be very happy. However, when you do your best to come up with good ideas and good ways to create change things really do improve, a lesson and A skill I hope to apply to everything I do for the rest my life. As Winston Churchill put it “to improve is to change to be perfect is to change often.”

More importantly, I have learned that true change comes from centering our lives on Jesus Christ and making an attempt to be more like Him. Not only is He the perfect example of how we should live, but He is also the way that we change. It was His atoning sacrifice that gives us that ability. What a blessing it is to be able to partake of that blessing each and every day! I Love my Savior Jesus Christ, and I know He loves every single one of us.
How can you change this week to improve your life?

Love,
Elder Joshua Cordon