Rollercoaster Week

So. This week sure has had a lot of ups and downs. I'm really trying to find the balance between giving all my heart, might, mind, and strength but still not running faster than I have strength. This week I've erred on both sides. I've learned that if I give too much the Lord gives me an experience to humble me and make me slow down (aka I hurt my ankle playing soccer on P-day and had to stay in the next day :( ). and I've learned that I get physically ill when I don't give everything I have, (aka I got real sick this week after I decided to try to pace myself more). I wonder if that makes sense to you guys or not, it sound kind of different in writing. Anyway, the Lord is always there for us, and He always gives us experiences that we need in order to grow. He is so patient with us when we make mistakes. No matter how many mistakes we make, as long as we always come back and try to do a little better every day, He will work with us. That's what I've learned this week.

In other news, we had two investigators accept baptismal dates! One is for Esmeralda, we've been teaching her and her family since I got here, and she's getting baptized on May 11! We're working really hard to help her feel prepared for that day. She comes from a part member/less active family, and her family has come to church the past two weeks, and her dad is preparing to receive the Melchezidek priesthood! And he is going to baptize her! Such a huge miracle. We've been working with their family for so long. I am so excited for them.

The other baptismal date is for Rogelio! I'm so excited for him! We found him my very first day in the mission, and it has been amazing to see him progress. The changes in him are so evident. It's like night and day. I know he's one of the reasons I needed to be in this mission. He is moving to Santa Maria this weekend, so we won't actually be the missionaries who baptize him. The missionaries over there are about to get one golden referral! I'm just so excited for him to make this step in his life. He's grown so much in faith.

This is a picture of me about to eat some delicious helote. Basically it's corn on the cob with mayo, parmesan

cheese, and chile. It is sooo good! There's a lady in the neighborhood we're in, which is basically a mini-Mexico, and she pushes her cart around and honks her horn kind of like an ice cream man, and you go buy helote from her for 2 dollars. We pass her all the time, one of these days she'll accept the gospel haha.

Les quiero mucho! Cuidense!
Hermana Cannon

It's a great day to be a missionary!

Hello hello!

This has been such a great week. We taught 15 lessons! And so many of the lessons went so well. Man, I wish I could tell you about every single one. For the sake of time I will tell you about two.

We met this woman, Arlene, 2 weeks ago and she seemed really interested, but then she stopped returning our calls. We went back to her house the other night and she wasn't home, but her dad, Angle, invited us in and let us teach him. He had lots of questions and it was going really well. Then Arlene walked in! We ended up getting to teach the whole restoration to both of them, and wow. I have never in my mission felt the spirit testify so powerfully through me as it did during that lesson. My body was almost shaking. It was crazy, I've never had an experience like that before that was so incredibly powerful. That's why it's so important to be exactly obedient and to humble ourselves, so when the Lord calls on us, when He knows there is someone who needs to hear His message powerfully, He is able to use us. I'm really excited for these two.

And we had such a breakthrough lesson with Rogelio last night! He just hasn't been committed at all lately and we were questioning whether we should continue to teach him. But again, the spirit taught this amazing lesson to him through our mouths. It is such an amazing experience when the spirit tells you exactly what you need to say to change someone's heart. Hna. Spittler and I have been so unified this week. It was so cool because the spirit taught the whole lesson and just took turns of whose mouth it came out of.

These experiences and many others happened only after a trial of our faith. We may not have known it's what we signed up for, but in coming on a mission we have agreed to go through the refiner's fire so that we can be effective instruments in the Lord's hands. The Lord stretches us and helps us to grow, and it can be painful. But if we remain faithful and let Him shape us, He will always bless us with miracles. The answer to get through trials, that refining fire, is to be obedient and have faith. If we let it, incredible blessings and growth can always come through our trials. I am so grateful to the Lord for shaping me and helping me to be the missionary He needs me to be. I would be so unsuccessful as a missionary if I tried to do it my way. The only way we will ever have success is by consistently humbling ourselves before the Lord. He tells us in Ether 12:27 that as we come to Him, He will show us our weaknesses. That means when we see our weaknesses, it's a good thing! It is no reason to get discouraged. When our weaknesses are evident it is time to thank the Lord for helping us to see them. And then, if we choose, He will help those weak things become strong.

I want to quote my awesome, dedicated district leader, Elder Johnson. He said in district meeting this last week: We are not here to say, "I am a missionary." We are here to help others be able to say, "I am a member of the only true church of Jesus Christ. I can be with my family forever." That is our only goal while out here. We are the Lord's servants. We are here doing His great and marvelous work, which is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. Everything we do as missionaries is to help Him in His work, and His work is only for our benefit. Every blessing He gives us is only to help others. Dedicating myself to the Lord and this work is the best decision I have ever made. It is an honor to be a part of this, whether times are hard or whether everything is going well.

I love you all so much. I am so grateful for you. Thank you for your continual support. I am the person I am today in large part from your incredible examples. Thank you for helping me get here.

Hermana Cannon

Busy Week!

Hey there!

 

So this week has been crazy. As you know we had exchanges and general conference at the end of last week. Then we had a sister's conference on Tuesday that lasted all day, then we had interviews with President and a training on Friday that lasted half the day. Lots of spiritual nourishment this week! I'm still trying to absorb it all. I've never been surrounded by so much spiritual awesomeness all the time. It's incredible, but it's a lot to take in. It kind of wears you out sometimes haha. I loved everything we got to do this week, but my favorite was probably the interviews/training. The AP's and zone leaders talked to us about the 5 areas of focus for our mission, which we recite all the time and strive to always apply. This is how it goes, "In the Great California Ventura Mission, we are Preach My Gospel Missionaries, we baptize, we obey with exactness, we seek to be trusted more than loved, and we teach with power and authority." They each talked about one area of focus - it was awesome. Each one is so central to our purpose as missionaries. I love learning about how we can become the missionaries the Lord needs us to be. While we were learning about that President Castro pulled us out one by one for interviews. That man is so inspired. As he was talking to me I had this overwhelming feeling of the truth that this really is the Lord's work. This is not President Castro's mission. He is a person just like I am, and he has stewardship over me. He is a man called of God and he runs this mission the Lord's way. I am amazed at how well he knows me personally and knows what he needs to say to help me be a better missionary. He definitely has the gift of discernment. I've just learned so much this week of how I want to be better. It's exciting! And slightly overwhelming at times. But I just need to keep reminding myself that God doesn't expect perfection, but He does expect our best. I know if I give Him everything I have, He will take care of the rest. I love being a missionary!

 

It was also busy because we've had a TON of appointments! We had 6 appointments every day for 3 days in a row. It was awesome! I love getting to teach. Knocking doors and declaring to people is great too, but I love teaching lessons.

 

Also, there was a moment of truth the other day. I got on the scale and learned that I have gained 9 pounds of faith, testimony, and tortillas. NINE! That's never happened in my life. These wonderful Mexican people are very generous with their food haha. Next goal: learn to refuse food without offending. Wish me luck!

 

We have this investigator named Adolfo (I think I've mentioned him before), and he is quitting his job so he can come to church with us on Sundays! What an example of faith. It's so inspiring when you see people make these leaps of faith. We have many other investigators who's progression towards baptism and lasting conversion is halted because they can't make those commitments. But if they can't commit, maybe they're just not ready yet. We just have to be supportive, loving, and bold as we strive to help people change their lives. This work is definitely different than anything I've ever done or will do! The work of saving souls. It's definitely the Lord's work. It's a wonderful opportunity to get to be His hands.

 

I love you all!

Hermana Cannon

General Conference

Hello!

 

I love you guys and I hope you've all had an amazing week! Mine has been just grand. We've had tons of miracles! I feel very humbled and honored that the Lord his trusting us with His children and putting them in our path to hear His word. We're working hard to be worthy of that trust and to help his children progress in their lives and in this gospel.

 

We had exchanges again this week and I got to go with Hna. Coleman who is AWESOME! Man, we were on fire together! It was so cool. That was the most unified I've ever felt teaching with someone. We exercised a lot of faith that day, were both really positive, and super diligent. We had given all of our appointments to the other sisters so we didn't have a single appointment planned. So we went to knock doors, and we ending up getting to teach 7 lessons and we found 7 new investigators all in one day! It was incredible! She said that'd never happened to her in her mission. Such a great miracle.

 

So I had kind of a crazy lesson this week. We were teaching this sweet old woman named Neli. We were teaching her the plan of salvation. She agreed with everything and accepted it readily like she was already doing it. I didn't want to beat around the bush and I knew if we weren't clear then and there it would just end up wasting time until we finally got to the point. So with as much gentleness I could muster I explained to her that if she wants to go to the celestial kingdom, she needs to get baptized again. She was really confused and we referred back to the restoration pamphlets about how you need to have the authority of Jesus Christ to baptize. She said, "Are you saying that the church I go to doesn't have the authority of Jesus Christ?" And as kindly and gently as I could I had to tell her yes, that's what we are saying. She told us to get out immediately and this would be the last time she'd open her door to us. She wants to finish her life in peace and we've come into her home and upset her. I apologized for offending her, and I testified that God loves her and has sent us to her door. We are not here to disturb her peace, but we want her to know that God loves her and has a plan for her and her family, and he wants her to know the truth. We continued to talk and she calmed down. I asked if there is anything we could do for her before we go to repair what we'd done? And she said we hadn't done anything. She said we will always be welcomed into her home and she thanked us for bringing her God's word. The spirit returned and we closed with a prayer. It was super intense! I felt bad at first about upsetting this sweet old lady, but then I realized that Alma and Lehi and everyone in the Book of Mormon probably upset a few people too. We need to say it with love and kindness, but we need to be bold in declaring the truth. Sometimes Heavenly Father has to upset our lives if we're not quite on the right path.

 

Okay here's another story. So my 2nd week in the mission Hna. Anderson and I were out for a run and started talking to this guy on the street named Raul. I walked with him while my companion ran and he seemed really interested in coming to our church. Unfortunately neither of us had a pen and paper, but he said he walks to work at that same time in the morning so we could see him the next day. But we never saw him again, so that was a bummer. (Since then I always carry a mormon.org with our names and number on it while we run). But saturday night at the gas station we ran into him again! We'd gotten lost so we wouldn't normally have been there at that moment, but there's a reason for everything! He was a little drunk, and he said he really needed our help. He said he needs to get his life back in order. He needs God now more than ever and is ready to make the choice to follow Him, but he needs someone to help him. I told him that's exactly what we're here for. We gave him a pamphlet and exchanged contact info. And we referred him to the elders cause he lives in their area. So that was another great miracle! I'm so glad we were able to find him again. He's ready to let the gospel change his life.

 

Roger told us this week that he's not ready to be a Mormon yet. He told us his reasons and we will work to resolve his concerns. It was really sad at first, we kinda felt like we were getting broken up with haha. But we love him so much and believe that it will happen for him one day. My companion just barely met him, but she said he's the most prepared and most truly converted investigator she's seen in her mission. I believe it. He really is so incredible. We're going to continue working with him though and try to resolve his concerns. Just like Elder Scott said yesterday, there's a time and a season for everything. We will see what happens, and we will be here to give him the support he needs even if he's not ready for the complete change yet.

 

Speaking of conference - woot! It was super cool. It's really different watching it as a missionary. At first I thought there'd be a lot that wouldn't apply to me. But there's was a ton that did, and the stuff that didn't like marriage and all that definitely applied to our investigators. I loved everything they said about strengthening families, definitely a message our investigators need. Also it was cool how there was a ton on obedience, because that's what we've been focusing on lately as sisters in this mission. We honestly have a really obedient mission, it's great. How did you all like conference? Hope you loved it and that it helped you in your lives.

 

In other news, they just notified us that they're making a worldwide mission change of having some sister leadership! The position is going to be called Sister Training Leaders. They will still proselyte and they'll be similar to a district leader but for the sister missionaries. I think it's great to see all these changes that are helping further the work!

Amanda with Hermana Coleman

Amanda with her second companion

Happy Easter!

Hey hey hey!

Okay so apparently today is Cesar Chavez day, whatever that is. So the whole city is closed, so we didn't get to email at the library today. We were able to ask a member to open the family history center for us, but we've just got a little time.

Okay! So. I got my new companion this week! She's great. We're super different but definitely compatible. Our strengths and weaknesses really balance each other out. We're really learning a lot from each other. She's from Texas and has 6 months in the mish. She has a lot of doctrinal knowledge and is a great listener. We really help spark ideas in each other. It's fun because we help each other be a lot more creative. I love that we don't do the same thing every day, we're really trying a lot of different things. It's been really fun!

For example, yesterday we went around sharing an Easter message with people. We read part of the Living Christ to people and then talked about how we believe in a living Christ who leads and directs his church today. It was a great way to lead into the restoration. Really successful and spiritual day! I love Easter.

Okay, awesome miracle on Saturday. We met Adolfo last week and haven't been able to get in touch with him. Yesterday we didn't even have him planned to visit, but we felt like we should swing by. And he happened to be home and we got to teach him the restoration! It went so well. He understood everything and had lots of great questions. Then before we even brought it up he said he wanted to come to church with us. We were like great! And we asked if he wanted to come have a tour at the church right then. (Thank you Wade for the great idea! We did it the way you said!) He said to give him 15 min to get ready. So we ran back to the car and frantically started calling members to try to get someone to come with us (rule, and a good idea). We called 8 people and nobody was picking up. Then we said a prayer and thanked God for the wonderful lesson we just taught, for sending us to Adolfo. We told him that we have faith he can do all things, and asked that he provide a member to come with us. The next person we called answered and said she could come right then. So we picked her up and went back to Adolfo's house, and he'd put on normal church clothes! That was so cool because our investigators don't normally dress like that even on Sundays. I thought it was so sweet that he already has that reverence for being in the house of the Lord. We had the tour and it went so so well. It was amazing. He absorbed everything and asked very intelligent questions. The spirit definitely testified as we taught him about the sacrament, priesthood authority, baptism, prayer, the Book of Mormon, etc. I'm really excited to see him progress.

We've got some zone goals we're working on. Our zone leaders told us this cool thing about if you want to walk on water you have to get out of the boat. So we're working on both personal and companion goals on what we can do to get out of the boat. Awesome.

I'm so excited for general conference!!!!!!!! It's an amazing thing to know we have living prophets who lead and guide us. I love learning more about the word of God. He gives us everything we need in this life if we ask and knock in faith.

I love you all so much and am praying for you. I hope you had a great Easter!

Hermana Cannon