Love and Laughter

¡Hola familia y amigos!

First off me and Hermana Greer get along great! We are always laughing and both have a lot of goals to get the work moving along which is awesome! Laughter is seriously the cure for anything, if you´re frustrated or down in anyway just laugh! But it has definitely made a difference and it is continually strengthening our relationship! One funny thing is the public transportation here. There is one thing called an eclovia (I have literally no idea how to spell this word) but it´s basically kind of like the trax in Utah, but 5 billion people use it. So when you want to get on you basically are crammed up against everyone else and have literally no space to even take a step in either direction and you´re all moving with the car and so people are falling on top of people and when me and Hermana Greer had to get on it, we were basically dying of laughing. It was quite the experience and I realized that in that moment I could have been annoyed about how crowed it was or found how humorous it was that we were falling on top of each other. And laughing about things are always a better option! So my advice just laugh!

One huge blessing from the Lord this week is that we were able to find and contact two families, which added 12 investigators to our teaching pool! It definitely was a huge blessing and hopefully we can do all we can through the spirit and our willingness to work hard to teach these people and help them to accept the gospel and recieve all the blessings that it has! And the fact that is families is awesome! Because families help each other to progress and families stay so much stronger in the gospel, because they have a good support system!

One big lesson I learned this week is the importance of loving everyone that you are teaching, whether it be the first lesson with this person or the tenth lesson. Because when you love them the spirit is so much stronger in the lesson and you are able to be guided more by the spirit to know what to say to help these people exactly for their specific needs! This trait is definitely a gift from God and something that doesn´t come with no effort, so I am working and focusing day to day to just love everyone I come into contact with, and basically everyone in Ecuador so that I have a desire to talk to everyone and to teach everyone.

I love you all and thank you for your prayers and your love!

Love, Hermana Cordon

"Fear Not, I am with Thee"

¡Hola familia y amigos!

Yesterday a great thing happened 2 less-actives, that we have been meeting with since my first week, showed up to church! It was there first time since I´ve been here and it was such a great feeling seeing them come into church and to see how much they enjoyed the meetings and the change I saw in them! It was truly a blessing from the Lord helping them to have a desire to attend church and to receive the blessings from learning more about the gospel and feeling the spirit! Also one of our investigators finally came to church and was excited to be there! He is 11 and his parents are recent converts, and he hasn´t really been super interested and we have been trying to increase his desire and we finally were able to reach him and to help him understand why the gospel is important for him! It was honestly so great to see all of them come to church. The Lord truly gave us that blessing on helping us help these people and help them understand the importance of attending church! 

The Lord is truly blessing us with great opportunities to meet people and to teach them, we contacted 4 new people this week that are interested and want to learn more! Hopefully they stay interested and that we have the opportunity to see them progress and accept this gospel into their lives. I truly want everyone to accept this gospel, because through this gospel we recieve more strength and through this gospel we can truly be happy. 

Just remember that when life gets hard to fear not, because the Lord is with you when you are obedient to him. So do what you can in times of trials to bring your life in alliance with Christ and to continually recognize his hand in your life through your trial, because He does not and will not leave you alone when you are focused on Him. 

Love you all!

Hermana Cordon

2 Months

¡Hola!

 Well like the subject says, yesterday marked 2 months since I left for the mission field. And boy has it been a crazy 2 months full of experiences that have made me learn about myself, God, and this gospel. But along with realizing 2 months are already done, is realizing the time I have left. I started with only 18 months and that means that in all reality I don´t have that much time here. And so I need to give everything I got for these next 16 months completely to the work and the Lord. I have a wonderful blessing to be here in Ecuador to preach the gospel and to give my all to this gospel and to the people here. And I need to work harder and be more focused to do all I can with these next 16 months.

 We didn´t get to meet with many of our investigators this week, because they have all been really busy with work and being out of town. But one was able to attend church this sunday, Santiago, and he seemed to really enjoy it and had some really good questions in the gospel principles class. He has been reading the Book of Mormon and is really interested, we get to teach him again for the 3rd time tonight so it will be cool to see what he thought of church and finally get to teach him the Plan of Salvation.

 But since we didn´t meet with many investigators we did a lot of walking around and knocking doors and trying to share our message, but just like any other missionary could tell you, this method isn´t very effective. We really need to get the members more involved and being led to people through them. If you are struggling to find a way you can help at home with mission work, I encourage you all to pray and ask for a missionary opportunity. And then LOOK for the opportunity to come about. If you ask you shall recieve, you just may miss it if you aren´t focusing on it. Do all you can now and at all times to continually help move God´s work forward. You don´t need a nametag to share the gospel :)

 But we have also had the opportunity to meet with members this week so that they can get to know us. And that is a great treat. The members here are so loving and so kind and all want to help, we just need to guide them on how they can help us. :)

 Love you all and I hope you are all having fabulous weeks! What blessing did the Lord give you this week?

 Love, Hermana Cordon

How are you looking at life?

I realized this week in a big way, that my attitude and my outlook are what can make or break me. Being in a completely new country, with a different culture and a different language is hard, and it's hard having a companion that doesn't speak the same language as me. But though it is hard it is not impossible, nor is it horrible. I realized to make a day better or brighter I need to make it better or brighter. I need to focus only on the good and how the Lord has been blessing me, and through that outlook I can make it so much more better and brighter. Once I started doing that and focusing on how I can make each day better, I found myself happier and more easily able to participate in a lesson with our investigators. I was more easily able to accomplish the things the Lord needed me to accomplish by having a positive outlook and moving forward with faith. As many people reminded me this week, the Lord doesn't give anyone a trial they cannot overcome. So the lesson I want you all to learn is to change your outlook and to see the good rather than the bad. And focus on the people around you that you can help rather than focusing on yourself.

We have started teaching 2 new investigators. One is Santiago who has seen missionaries several times before and his girlfriend accepted the gospel and was baptized a while ago, but he never could accept the message that the missionaries were giving him. His girlfriend told us though after the first lesson, that there was a different spirit in this lesson then she has felt before and that we were actually able to help Santiago feel the spirit and to recognize something different about the same message he has heard several times before. Which to me was a huge blessing because the Lord was reminding me that I needed to be here and that I was taking part in helping someone understand the truth.

The other new investigator is Martin, who lives with less-actives and is not a member. He accepted the offer to sit down and listen to our message, and I doubt he had any idea what to expect. And through the lesson he had lots of questions and was intrigued the whole time through. It was awesome to see someones interest piqued on a message that they had never heard before. He has been keeping commitments and is excited to learn more everytime we set a new date for another lesson. I am excited to see where they gospel is going to take these two investigators.

This work is true, the Lord is amazing and I have been blessed beyond belief in my short time here in Ecuador and I can only imagine how the Lord is going to bless me more in the months to come. I love the people here and I love the opportunity to share the gospel with all of them. I am grateful for trials and learning experiences, because it makes you a better person and brings you closer to the Lord. The scriptures can bring so much comfort if you truly seek comfort from them. 

Love you all and thank you for the prayers and support!
Love, Hermana Cordon

¡QUITO!

I officially made it to Quito! The city is absolutely beautiful and I already love it! It was weird, the second I was off the plane, I felt right at home. It didn´t feel unfamiliar and I know that´s because I am supposed to be here! My mission president Presidente and Hermana Christensen are really nice and they came and picked us up from the airport. It was a very warm and friendly welcome which immediately made me feel loved. 

I find out tomorrow who my companion is and where I will be serving, which I am so excited about, and slightly nervous because of my limited spanish ability, but with trust in God I will learn all that I need to. 

Love, Hermana Cordon

Final Days in the CCM

¡Hola!

Well first off the fact that I can say I am down to 4 days left in the CCM does not feel right. These last couple of weeks have flown by and I am more than excited to be finally getting to Ecuador and the real life of a missionary!

This week has been a really interesting change to the normality, for the ccm, of the first 4 weeks! I have a latina companion and a Latin district so A LOT more Spanish and a lot more guessing of what people are saying to me and what exactly is going on! :) My companion is Hermana Willson, she is from Argentina, but she also speaks really good English! It´s way nice, because I´ve actually been able to get to know her and to have real conversations with her, but at the same time she has helped me a lot with my Spanish and specifically my pronunciation. My goal is to not sound like a gringa when I finally actually am conversational in Spanish! :) My district is me and my companion Hermana Brimhall and her companion and 6 Latino elders. The Elders have been a lot of fun and always make sure to remind me and Hermana Brimhall that we shouldn´t be speaking English :) They are all really helpful as well making sure we know what´s going on and trying to slow down when we cannot understand them. It´s been really nice and I´ve truly enjoyed getting to know all of them, as well as I can with the tiny bit of Spanish that I know! I definitely have learned a lot more Spanish this last week and half and it´s been really helpful, but I am definitely more then ready to get out of the monotony of my schedule here!

Today was my last temple trip for the next 17 months, but I am very grateful I had the opportunity to attend the Colombia temple 6 times while I was here! One of the highlights of this last week was the bus ride back today. For the full 45 minute ride back to the CCM the whole bus was singing hymns the whole time. In spanish of course, but it was so much fun! It´s weird how the littlest things can put a smile on my face and make something so fun! It truly is the Lord blessing me to enjoy the small things and to enjoy the ride along with all the hard work that accompanies mission work. 

Well the next time that I will be emailing home, I will be in the field. I am so excited for Ecuador and for the ride ahead that the Lord has planned for me! Just remember to look forward always, but take life one day at a time, because if you don´t you´ll miss everything going on around you!

A simple reminder for you all from one of my devotionals this last week "Be grateful for the mercifulness of God." and "You need to cause things to happen, you don´t just let them happen."-If you have a goal in mind take it and make a plan and do all you can to make sure you accomplish it. It´s only going to be accomplished if you put in the work. 

Love you all!!
Hermana Cordon

P.S The first picture is me and my new companion and the second is my new district!

Skip Frustration and Go to Work

Learning a language is hard work, and my brain gets so overloaded with Spanish everyday, that I don´t even know what`s going on by the end of the day.. haha :) But at least I get little english breaks here, whereas in the field it will probably be entirely Spanish all the time, until I have a companion that speaks English. But I am honestly looking forward to when I am forced to speak Spanish all the time, because I definitely will learn a lot quicker when I don`t have a fallback option. I definitely found myself getting frustrated this week with spanish and not really being able to understand it, but I just have to remember that learning a language takes time. Hopefully this week will be brighter and I will remember that I just need to work hard and to not give up on myself or the Lord. 

Well, not much has happened since the last time I emailed, except that every latin missionary left this morning and we are getting a whole new group tomorrow. I am definitely going to miss all the Latina Hermana`s though, because they are all so sweet, but I am sure the next ones will probably be just as awesome! Oh and 9 more norte Hermana`s are coming in this week, which will be fun helping them to adjust to life at the CCM!

On Sunday my MTC President shared a really cool devotional with the Norte missionaries in our english meetings. It was by Elder Bednard to missionaries a couple of years ago. But the main message of it was that you need to know the doctrine before you can understand the principles or apply the applications. So basically, you need to understand the doctrine of the atonement, before you can truly understand what repentance is, and once you understand both of those you can actually understand how to repent. I thought it was a really good reminder about how we just skip to the applications and not really explain the doctrine of why. It was a good thing to hear as a missionary, to remind me of what I really need to be teaching investigators. If you understand the doctrine, then you have a real desire to actually follow the principles. 

Well this week my district switches rooms and instructors and basically it will be spanish in every class the whole time, except to tell us what a word means if we don´t know it. It will be interesting, but it will increase my spanish learning so I´m excited! And it also means only 2 more weeks with my current companion, because the final 2 weeks I`m with a latina companion, so I`m gonna enjoy these last 2 weeks with someone that is struggling with spanish just as much as I am!

I hope everyone is having a great week and thanks for all the support and prayers! Love you all!

Love, Hermana Cordon

First week is DONE!

¡Hola!

The MTC is hard work, learning Spanish is hard work, and focusing when you´re tired is hard work. Though most things about the MTC is hard work, I´ve enjoyed it! My district is a lot of fun, it´s all Norte´s (North Americans) and all of us are always laughing about how we don´t understand anything, it makes the frustration of not learning spanish not so bad when there are other´s struggling with you! :)

My favorite day this week was sunday, because besides sacrament meeting and relief society all my meetings were in ENGLISH :) We were able to go in depth in doctrinal subjects and we combined with the other Norte district and got to have really good conversations. It was a good reminder why I am on a mission and why I want to share the gospel, because I just love the Gospel so much! Especially when I can understand what they are talking about. haha :)

I can definitely feel the Lord´s hand in my time here, because I understand more than I probably should being here for only and week, and I can remember a lot more words that I only learned once or twice. It´s wonderful. The Lord truly is remarkable and I truly love this Gospel!

Oh I got to go to the Colombia, Bogota temple today and that was cool! I truly love going to the temple and I´m gonna miss being able to go once I get to the mission field. But, I am doing a different kind of temple work :) 

Thank you for all the love and prayers! Have a great week!

Amor, Hermana Cordon

P.S. this picture is me and my district

I Made It!

Leaving from the Salt Lake Airport Tuesday Morning

Well I made it to the CCM (Columbia Missionary Training Center) safe and sound! 

I got to travel with my entire district from Atlanta to Colombia, which was really cool! My companion is Hermana Brimhall and I get to live in the same room with the other american sisters also! There are only 5 american sisters in the entire MTC which will be a lot of fun, we are all becoming friends already! And there are two elders in our district as well and all but 2 people in our district are going to the Ecuador, Quito mission. 

I officially have my nametag now and it´s crazy!

Hermana Cordon