May 18, 2015- Three Letters
Hey Family and Friends!!!
This week, I felt like I entered into a time warp. This week probably
went by really slowly because there was so much change. It still was an amazing week!
Monday afternoon, I drove to Chesapeake with Elder Bradshaw
and our zone leaders Elder Brown and Elder Crump. Both Elder Bradshaw and Elder Crump had
completed their missions and were scheduled to go home so we dropped them off
at the mission home. It was weird to think that they would be with their
families in the next day or two. While we were at the mission home, I saw my
first companion, Elder Remund because it was his time to go home too. It was sweet to be able to say goodbye to him
one last time. So now besides the companions I have now, all three of my
previous companions have completed their missions.
I spent the rest of Monday and Tuesday with
my zone leader, Elder Brown. Monday night we went over to the
Rodriguez family home, because they wanted to cook me a birthday dinner. They also
invited a few more families in our ward over. The dinner was delicious and it
was lots of fun spending my birthday with members of our ward.
Tuesday night,
Jorge, a ward member, accompanied us as we taught a
lesson to Torino. It was the best lesson
I've ever been involved in. Jorge and Torino got along really well. We were thrilled to find that Torino had read
up to 2 Nephi 27. I taught the entire
lesson since Elder Brown couldn't speak much Spanish yet. Unfortunately, Torino
has been working lots of hours and as a result we haven't been able to meet
with him much and he hasn't been able to come to church either.
Wednesday,
we drove to Portsmouth so that I could meet up with
Elder Garcia who was coming from his last area in Albertson, North Carolina.
Elder Garcia is a sweet missionary. He was born in Mexico, and he moved to
California with his family when he was eight. His family met the missionaries
when he was twelve and his family got baptized. After talking with each other
for a short time, Elder Garcia and I attended a transfer meeting with President
Baker where all the new missionaries were seated and waiting for their new
companions to come in. There was only one Elder in the crowd that had a Spanish
name tag so it was pretty easy to tell which one would be our new companion. His
name is Elder Edwards and he is from Utah. He's a sweet missionary. Although
his Spanish isn't very good, yet he's been trying really hard to try to speak
during lessons. Elder Garcia and I have been doing our best to encourage and
help Elder Edwards with his Spanish speaking skills. It is crazy to think that I
was in the same situation not too long ago.
Since Elder Garcia and Elder Edwards don't know any of the people
we have been teaching or the area and I since I'm District Leader, I've
basically been doing everything: deciding where we are going to go and who were
are going to teach, what we are going to teach them, taking all the phone
calls, and setting up appointments.
On Saturday, we taught a lesson to a man named Dixon. His air conditioning was very loud. I could hear because I was sitting closest to
Dixon. Elder Edwards sat next to me so
he could hear a little but he didn't really understand anything he heard. Elder
Garcia sat at the end and couldn't hear anything that was being said. As a result, only Dixon and I were talking
with each other for an hour and a half in Spanish. The roles have really switched
this past week from me looking up to Elder Bradshaw because of his command of
the Spanish language to having Elder Edwards looking up to me because he
says I speak really good Spanish.
Have a good week everyone!
Elder Cannon
May 26, 2015
Hey Family
and Friends!!!
I attended a leadership meeting on Thursday and Friday with all the District Leaders,
Zone Leaders, Sister Training Leaders, the two Assistants to the President and President
and Sister Baker in Portsmouth. On Thursday, I left my two companions in Norfolk, and I drove with my Zone Leaders to the
meeting. At the meeting, we skyped with Brother Donaldson, who is the head of
proselyting for the Church Mission Department. He talked about teaching shorter
lessons more times a week. As a mission
we are going to have to change how we teach and began to teach shorter lessons.
I'll be honest, I wasn't really supportive of shortening the lessons, but after
Brother Donaldson demonstrated an example to us in a role-play of a seven-minute
Restoration lesson, I was shocked at how good it was.
Afterwards, two Spanish Zone Leaders from Wilson North Carolina
and I were assigned to proselyte in my area to practice this new technique. As we
were knocking on doors, a Hispanic man was passing by across the street. We asked him if we could share a quick five-minute
lesson with him. He said we could so he
led us over to his porch. We taught him
the Restoration lesson like Brother Donaldson showed us by using the Restoration
pamphlets. It was hard, and since it was our first time actually doing it with
a real life person it took us 25 minutes.
It was a super sweet lesson and it was definitely a sign from God to us
that this is how he wants us to teach lessons now.
Following the lesson, we drove down to my companionship’s
apartment and slept for the night. With
all five of us in the apartment, it was pretty cramped. We woke up on Friday and drove back to
Portsmouth where we met to skype with Elder Donaldson again. Elder Donaldson
said that he's been looking for a mission on the East coast to show all the
other missions in the world that this is how we should teach lessons and that he
has decided to pick our mission. He told us that as we adapt to this new
teaching method, we are going to see tons of miracles and be able to help more
people come unto Christ because we are sharing, short and powerful statements
with people multiple times a week. Elder Baker is really supportive of this new
teaching style, so in the next couple months all missionaries in this mission
are going to learn how to teach like this.
On Saturday, there was a birthday party at a member's house. We were
invited to come over for dinner. I didn't bother to ask the hosting family if
there was peanuts in the food since all of the times that I had asked them in
the past they had told me “No.” In addition, the food didn't look like it had
peanuts in it; it was just potatoes, and rice, in a sauce. Within a couple of minutes
of eating, I started feeling really, really sick. At first I thought that all of
the hot sauce I had put on my food was the culprit, so I didn't think further
about it. But then, I just felt much more sick so I had to leave and lay down in
our car. Elder Garcia and Elder Edwards asked the members if the food had
peanuts in it, which the members told them it did. So they rushed back outside
and told me, they quickly gave me a blessing, and then they rushed me to the Hospital
Emergency room. There was a long wait but they luckily they were able to get me
back in a room within a couple of minutes. The entire time I was holding my Epipen
in case I started to have trouble breathing but nothing like that ever happened.
I just got blessed, I guess, although I did get super nauseous and sick. They
put in an IV and put a bunch of Benadryl and nausea medicine into me. We ended
up not getting back to our apartment that night until 10:30 p.m., but I ended
up being just fine. I'm just going to ask everyone every time before we eat
now, even when I've asked them a hundred times before.
On Sunday, it was really cool because 5 investigators came to church
with us. Hermana Sabillion, her husband Cesar, and then Lani and her two kids
came. Lani’s husband, Martin didn’t come
because he was off playing soccer. We are working really hard with Lani and Hermana
Sabillon. They are so close to accepting a date to be baptized!
June 1, 2015
Hey Family and Friends,
What
an amazing week to finish off Miracle May!!! We taught a lot of lessons this
weekend with about half of them we were able to have members in the lessons with
us. We also set three people with a baptismal date.
On Wednesday,
we taught Ruben, who is from Mexico City. His wife and father in law are less
active members. We set him with a baptismal date for June 20.
On
Sunday, all five Spanish missionaries that are assigned to the branch had to
teach a lesson in the combined Priesthood and Relief Society class. Each of us
were given 8 minutes to talk on an assigned topic.
After
church we had a sweet first lesson with Ramon from the Dominican Republic.
Following that lesson, we taught a lesson to Jaime from Honduras and we set him
with a baptismal date for July 11. The catch with Jamie is finding the
time to be be able to teach him because he is always super busy with work.
We are really hoping that we'll be able to see him more than once every few
months like it has been in the past.
I
think the biggest miracle of the week though was with Lani. We visited with her
on Sunday night because we haven't heard from her for a couple of days. We
talked to her for a couple minutes about how they had been doing and then she
said, "Guys, I've been thinking a lot the past couple days...and I want to
be baptized. What do I need to do to be baptized?" We talked to her and then
we set her with a date for June 20!!! We are going to have to
work with her a lot to make that date, but she definitely can make it!
Something
that really stuck out to me was when we were talking to Jaime and he told us
that he knew the Book of Mormon was true. We asked him how he knew it was true
and he said; “I know it’s true because every time I open the book and begin to
read it, I feel really good inside.” I just want echo what he said and let you all
know that I know the book of Mormon is true, too. Every time I open it and
begin reading I just feel something down deep in me that is telling me it’s
true. I have no doubt that this is the true church and that through Jesus
Christ and his atoning sacrifice, all of us can make it back to our loving Heavenly
Father.
I
hope everyone has a great week!!!
Love,
Elder Cannon
Saying goodbye to Elder Bradshaw and Elder Remund
New companions Elder Garcia and Elder Edwards
My Birthday dinner at the Rodriguez home
