Week #79- Biking to Our Lessons and Week #80- A New Investigator

Week #79- Biking to Our Lessons

February 1, 2016

Hey Family and Friends,

Well, this week we were on bikes the entire week. We ran out of our monthly mileage allotment, 1,220 a month, and so we borrowed bikes from the English elders. It made teaching a little difficult since most of the Hispanic population live outside of Greenville, so we just biked out there. It got pretty cold at night while we were biking, and we biked a bit in the rain but I got some really good exercise. 

We had a really good lesson with Freddy, the brother of one of the Hispanic members in our branch. We are working with David and Gloria, a married couple from El Salvador. I'm hoping that they will invite us over for dinner and cook us some papusas! We are also teaching Alvaro from Guerrero, Mexico. Alvaro just barely crossed the border a few months ago and so he has some crazy stories of his trip. We taught him for the second time yesterday. He said that what we shared with him the first time we came over has caught his attention and he'd like to come to church next week.

We held a Family Home Evening with the Hispanic members of our ward at the church on Wednesday. We taught a short lesson about the Family Proclamation and then we ate some tostadas.

I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Cannon

Biking at night

Week #80- A New Investigator

February 8, 2016

Dear Family and Friends,

It was supposed to snow a lot this week but it all just ended turning into sleet and some freezing rain. We had some appointments that fell through last night, so we ended up knocking on doors in the rain during the Super Bowl.  

One investigator family that we are teaching from El Salvador told us this week that they want to try to cook us some papusas within the next few weeks. Yes!!! I love papusas!

We got a referral from the English elders in our ward for a woman from Costa Rica. I called her and introduced myself and then she asked me if we were the church that did baptisms for the dead. I don’t think I've had someone ask me that question right off the bat so it caught me a little off guard but I told her yes. We had a very interesting lesson with her a few days ago. She told us that she doesn't want to change her religion but I think she's a little curious about our church. She wants us to come back later this week.

I want everyone to know that I know that this is the one and only Church of Jesus Christ. Even though a mission is hard sometimes, I am so grateful for the chance I have to be a missionary and be a representative of my Savior, Jesus Christ. I know he suffered for our sins, and died for us and I know he lives.

I hope everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Cannon

  

 

Snow

A tractor out in the country

Week #78- Focusing Our Work

January 25, 2016

Hey Family and Friends

It's been freezing here in North Carolina! The temperature has been in the upper 20's and lower 30's during the day! And no matter how many layers we put on, the cold just cuts right through. It also rained a few days ago while it was in the upper 20's, so I'm not too sure why it didn't turn to snow. We ended up having to change our battery, because our car battery died, in the cold, freezing rain. It snowed on Saturday but it wasn't snowing hard enough to stick to the ground.

         I've also been sick all week long. This cold has been passed around through our entire district and I'm one of the last ones to get it. I was hoping that I had gotten away without being sick, especially after being sick during Christmas last year.  Even though I’ve been sick, we have still been up and about all day like we normally are and I'm starting to feel better now.

         We are really trying to target our work with the Spanish members to develop more trust with them. We have had about four Hispanic men attend Priesthood meeting every week so we have started to translate the Priesthood lesson into Spanish as well. We ate with all 4 active Hispanic families within three days this week. We are also working with Brother Rodriguez and his brother. His brother came to church on Sunday and we have a scheduled appointment with them this Thursday.

         I know my letter is kind of short this week but I want to finish it with my testimony about God. He is not some foreign object or statue that we pray to or worship nor does He sleep. He is our Father, and He knows us even better than we know ourselves. You can talk to Him, and He will talk to you. He will answer your questions and give you comfort. I know that He lives, and I am so thankful for all that He has blessed me with. I know that He talks through his prophet, Thomas S. Monson.  I'm also so thankful for an earthly father and mother that have taught me the gospel and helped me become the person that I am.

I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love,

Elder Cannon

Week #77- Finding Rosia

January 18, 2016

Dear Family and Friends,

I'm staying in Greenville with Elder Claridge! This will be my fifth transfer here and this is the first time I'm actually going to be able to finish the training of one of my sons. 

Unfortunately, we had to drop many of our investigators because we have lost contact with them over the holidays. However, we are also finding some solid new people to teach. 

We met Rosia down in the town of Grifton a while ago but we never visited her because we couldn't locate her address. Sometime last week, I was calling through a potential sheet and talked to Alfonso. He told me that he had moved recently but that we could teach him and his family sometime in the next few weeks. When we were on exchanges with the Zone Leaders this past week we visited Alfonzo.  It turns out that Rosia is her Alfonzo’s wife. They are super cool and they said they would come to church next week. We also talked to their neighbor. It ends up that he has had an interest in coming to our church for a while.  He hadn't attended because he had heard that all our services are in English and so he didn't think that there were any other Hispanics who attended. We told him how we have a few Hispanic families that come every week and that we translate the meetings for them.  He told us that he would come to church next Sunday. We also gave him a Book of Mormon and he said that he'd read it.

We were on bikes for most of this week. Our car finally got approval to go to the shop and get repaired.  Elder Dickerson and I were involved in a car accident a few months ago. Biking has made missionary work kind of hard since most of the Hispanics citizens live outside of the city center.  Although most of the people that we teach are far away and we couldn’t get to them, we were still able to find some more people to teach in the city. Greenville has no sidewalks so we just had to bike in the street.  When you get out towards the countryside there is only 1 lane.  We are forced to bike on a one-foot-wide narrow shoulder.  It is pretty scary to ride at night with cars driving past us going 60 miles per hour. We had to bike on our exchanges with the Zone Leaders, too. I felt prompted that we needed to bike to an investigator's home so that we could give her a Book of Mormon. We have only taught her once because our past two appointments have fallen through. We biked out the 6 miles out to her home in the dark when the weather was just barely above freezing at 35 degrees. We gave her the Book of Mormon and she said that she would read it.  So yeah, biking this past week was pretty fun and it was a good workout. 

Hope everyone has a good week!

Love, 

Elder Cannon

This is my mode of transportation while our car is in the repair shop.

                                  Bowling with Elders in my District on a Preparation day

Bowling