Week 59

8/26/14

In all, I'm doing quite well. Ok, would you like to know something rather frightening? Yesterday I turned 14th months old as a missionary. That means that I know have very definitively passed my one year mark. Not sure how that happened...

Anyway, not a whole lot to report this week. The miracles have continued. This Sunday we had 10 investigators attending. A major miracle which hasn't happened here in Patzicia for... well, as long as I know. It's like I'm in Escuintla again, but it's a lot cooler, more beautiful, there's corte, etc.

As great as it is to be having success, I've been getting frustrated with myself for not progressing personally as much as I would like. When I was in the CCM and for the first part of my time in the field I progressed an incredible amount spiritually, mentally, emotionally, etc. It feels like lately that progress has slowed quite a bit or perhaps I'm even losing ground in some areas. As I could feel myself progressing at the beginning of my mission I'd imagine how much I would improve by the end of my mission. Now that I'm over halfway done, it seems like I haven't come nearly as far as I expected or would have liked. Yes, I know I should have patience, but man, that's one attribute I've never really had. Today the focus of our district meeting was on patience and it was rather laughable. It seems like that's a rather universal weak point of gringos, or at least in my district. Most of the time was spent by us all ranting about how much we lack patience and how we want to develop it, right now. Patzicia will give your patience a good trial. Maybe I had prayed for patience earlier in my mission and the Lord sent me here so I could develop it.

Also, I tried Oreos for the first time in over a year when I bought some at a tienda the other day (they were somewhat expensive and rather unhealthy, but it came with a sticker for Transformers 4. I'm definitely a sucker for promotional advertising like that.)  Man, I had no idea how much I could miss Oreos. I'm sure there's a bunch of stuff that I've been missing that I've just forgotten about. Swimming, driving, fruit smoothies... The sacrifices we make for the Lord...

Anyway, in all I'm doing quite well. It's been a good week.

Love, Elder Cannon

Week 58

August 19, 2014

This week was a week of MIRACLES! Our biggest miracle was the baptism of José Antonio, a 17 year old young man from El Salvador. Their family had moved into the neighborhood a month ago. Since pretty much everyone in our area of Zarahemla are members, it was pretty special to have a new family of non-members. We started teaching them but it quickly became apparent that the mom and step dad only wanted to contend.

We stopped teaching them but then we had our first miracle. A few weeks later, the son, José, showed up to church. He had become very close to many of the members and they had even provided him with pants, a white shirt, and a tie so that he could come to church looking like a member. The next Wednesday we started teaching just him in the house of a member. It was great to be able to help him change.

He was someone who really needed the gospel of Jesus Christ. His town in El Salvador was filled with violence and it was clear that he had been involved in some bad things as well. He never went to church and was completely unable to pray (even with us helping him, the words just seemed to get stuck in his mouth). However, it was a great blessing to be able to see his transformation, to see how he felt the Spirit for perhaps the first time in his life, how he began to read the book of Mormon and began to experience the joy of repenting. Hearing José pray now is one of my favorite parts of my entire mission. He does is so sincerely.

Anyway, José wanted to get baptized but when he asked his mom for permission she said no. We went and talked with her and still, she said he couldn't do it until he turned 18. Members tried and still nothing...  However, we kept up our faith. We taught him about faith and helped him increase his as well.

Sure enough, the Friday morning before his baptism the miracle happened. Inexplicably, his mom showed up at the house of the member in whose home we had been teaching José and said that he could have her permission. A few minutes later we were calling the zone leaders to get them to make the trip down from Sololá that day to give him a baptismal interview. The length of his interview (1.5 hours) made it clear just how important repentance was to him and just how much he needed to be baptized and be washed clean of all his sins. Both he and his mom were crying during the baptismal service (which was one of the best that I have ever had on my mission).

Another miracle was how much support we had from the members. President Brough said that the most important thing we could do in this area was gain the confidence of members. It is only through them that we can have any success since the people here can be rather... difficult. However, that is a challenge since the members here are rather closed as well. However, we had amazing attendance at the baptismal service. it really was a great blessing to be able to see all of those families whose confidence and love we'd been able to win sitting there in the baptismal service after church instead of going home to eat lunch. I feel like it was a nice little sign from Heavenly Father that, yes, I have made a difference during my time here.

In the district the hermanas are also having a bunch of miracles. This Sunday every companionship had miracles in their retention and with their investigators. We're all excited because at no time in months have so many good things been happening in our areas.

Yesterday we got the notice that Elder Gonzalez and I will stay together another change. I'm happy because I can't wait to see what miracles are yet in store for us. In all, I'll be spending at least 6 months, a quarter of my mission, here in Patzicia. Oh, and I'm also happy because in September the corn will be ripe and we'll be eating a ridiculous amount of grilled corn with salt and lime juice.

Love, Elder Cannon

Week 57

8/12/14

We had a good week. The highlight was that we had a baptism! Wohoo! It was the first one in Zaragoza since January. We baptized a 70 year old woman named Ricarda. She was a true miracle. Several weeks ago a member of the branch presidency in Zaragoza mentioned to me that he thought that she might never have been baptized. Later that week we visited her and found out that she had attended church for several years however, her "husband" was actually married with another woman and so, unable to get married, she was unable to be baptized. With time, she stopped attending church. Later her husband died and a few months later she returned to church. That was when we found her. The Lord had prepared her and brought her back in this time to answer our prayers for a progressing investigator. It was great to be able to help her finally make that covenant with the Lord after all these years.

However, the baptism almost didn't happen. Here's a little story of what was going on Sunday night... Ok, so I had prepared everything for her baptismal service. My companion and I were in divisions and he still hadn't arrived in Zaragoza. Members were starting to show up and I was getting pretty worried. It was 5:30 and the baptism was scheduled to start at 5:00. Guatemalan standard time is even worse than Mormon standard time, but still, half an hour late made me start to be afraid. The last 3 baptisms we had planned all had fallen, 2 the day before and one the day of the planned service. Was this going to be number 4?

I went to her house to find her and Ricarda told me that she wouldn't be able to be baptized today. I was super disappointed and asked her why. Satan always works super hard in those last 24 hours before someone's baptism. I've seen him use everything, sickness, family problems, doubts, persecution, etc. There's always opposition. The Adversary is very astute and this time he employed a new tactic.  Ricarda had a very large pig and it turns out that the pig just happened to start giving birth that afternoon. Ricarda said she couldn't leave or the piglets would die. We called some members who knew something about animal husbandry and we all gathered around to help her. It was pretty surreal. There we were, the men all wearing suits and the women wearing nice dresses, standing in the mud, helping a pig give birth, so that an old grandma could go to her baptismal service.

Then, to top it all off, one of the sisters in my district called rather hysterically to tell me that her companion had gotten really sick, was trembling, had a high fever, and couldn't speak and she had no idea what to do to help her. It was not a situation I had ever imagined that I would be in when I filled out my mission papers. However, we were greatly blessed and everything turned out well. The sister later recovered, Ricarda was baptized (still quite dirty from working with the pig), and the pig delivered 7 healthy, cute piglets. I hope she names one of them after me.

A solid week in all.

Love,

Elder Cannon

[Note the missionary on the right shinning a flashlight on the subject ]

Week 56

8/5/2014

Today we had our zone training of the attitude of the mind. It's something that I really struggle with in this area.  It has been especially difficult to remain positive, have high expectations, maintain the confidence that we'll meet our goals, and be happy despite the setbacks. It often seems easier to become somewhat apathetic so that it isn't so disappointing and discouraging when investigators don't progress or come to church. It is also too easy to get stuck in the mode of thinking "Well, here I am passing through a lot of trials. I'll suffer what the Lord wants me to suffer. Look at all my trials. I'm suffering so much." and just consign myself to suffer and not have much success. In doing so I lose he power of faith and the ability to have that positive outlook that is so essential in the mission and in life as I make myself into a martyr. 

I'm still not entire sure how to counteract that outlook as those feelings which come from the subconscious are pretty difficult to eradicate (hmmm, reminds me of the movie Inception where Cob says that the most resilient parasite is a thought. That’s a solid movie). However, I think prayer as well as focusing on the gratitude I have for the many blessings I have received, will go a long way to help. President Markham has also taught that we should think of our missions not as sacrifices but as offerings to the Lord. I really like that perspective a lot more.

A highlight of this week was a lesson we taught on Friday. In many of the towns here there's an organization (which I'm pretty sure is government run) called "Mis Años Dorados." Basically it's a place where old people go during the day to hang out and eat free food. We happened to talk to a woman who worked there and she invited us to come and give a message. We were hesitant but then we ran into her a second time and she promised us free lunch. Needless to say, we jumped at the chance. It ended up being a very strange lesson. My favorite moment was at the end when I said, "We brought a bunch of pamphlets which you can study to learn more about this message. Who here can read?" Only one lady in the very back raised her hand. Also, at the end of the lesson, the lady in charge led all the people listening in a round of applause. Not something that I've ever experienced before in a lesson...

A few nights ago I also had a very interesting experience. I really like working with less-active members. Sometimes they're really less active and you can tell that the Spirit has "ceased fighting with them" as the scripture says. However, a few days ago I talked with a less-active woman who had become more spiritually hardened than I had ever before experienced in my mission. The experience impacted me and left me thinking for the rest of the night. I had never felt a spirit as hard as her's. The Spirit had so completely withdrawn from her. I felt sad for her but especially sad from her children who couldn't have the same blessing that I had in growing up in the Gospel in a spiritually strong family.

To end, I finally found my calling as a missionary, how I will serve and develop love for the people: baking. I've been making a ton of cookies and carrying them around in my backpack to dish out to members and investigators. It's pretty great.

In all, despite all the trials, I am grateful to be here in Patzicia. I'm grateful to be able to serve my district, difficult as it is, and I'm grateful for this chance I have to show the Lord that I love Him. It really is wonderful to be a missionary.

Love, Elder Cannon

Week 55

July 28, 2014

Ishka igh. That's the closest I can get to ¨good afternoon¨ in Kaqchikel. Hmmm, let's see, what do we have this week...

We struggled yet again with attendance this Sunday. I was pretty discouraging but the Lord blessed us and a couple less active members we had been working with came to church. One is a returned sister missionary and owns a bar. Yeah that's kind of awkward...

So, I really love corte. Have I mentioned that yet? I'm starting to get pretty good at distinguishing how expensive cortes are and where they're from. It's really quite interesting. We're here in Sololá again and man, I really need to get a picture of the corte here. It might just be my favorite.

Last night I came pretty close to shaking off the dust of my feet as we taught the first lesson to a woman as we were knocking on doors. For me it's one thing when people just flat out reject us. That’s fine, they're just not prepared. Hopefully in the future. However, what really tries my patience and charity is when someone just doesn't want to understand. This lady just kept saying that we ¨trust in a man¨ aka Joseph Smith. No matter how long we spent explaining how there's no difference between him and other prophets like Moses, she just would listen. It's kind of frustrating because I really feel like I'm not improving in the charity department despite the fact that that's something that's rather crucial really. I do feel like I've developed a lot of love for many of the people we teach. It will be sad to leave this area as there are a lot of people like that here. One of those people, a grandpa named Antonio, might have just fallen back into his old addiction of drinking. Pretty disappointing. Really, alcohol is so terrible. It makes me grateful that we have modern day prophets to warn us about that stuff.

Last Wednesday we had organized an activity to have in the church with all the members and investigators. It was going to be pretty cool. We had a bunch of prophet related games to play. My favorite was a brain bowl like game where we would read progressively easier clues about a prophet and the teams would have to answer who the prophet was before the other team. I had done several similar activities in Escuintla with great success but no one really showed up to this one, just a couple of members from the most pilas families in the ward. Kind of disappointing but the good thing is that we god to take a bunch of tostadas and horchata home. I'm not sure why tostadas are so much better here than in the US. They're thicker and go quite well with black beans and cheese.

Ok, not sure why, but I ended up with a lot of extra time today and I can't really think of anything else to say, so I'll include a picture of me modeling some corte, just so that you guys can get the idea. 

Ok, well, love you all. Keep up that good missionary work. 

Elder Cannon

Week 54

July 22, 2014

Wow, it's already late July. That’s rather frightening. Another fast month... moving on...

In the 3+ months that I've been in this area, it's been relatively free of the crazy weather phenomena that I experienced in Villa Canales during my first two changes. Actually, I take it back; the fog here can be pretty incredible. Anyway, a few days ago I was able to check another thing off my bucket list. We had just entered a house and began to teach when it began to rain. We were starting to teach about the Great Apostasy when the rain suddenly became deafening. Seriously, the roof was made of lamina (I think it's like corrugated steel in English) which only added to the effect. We lost any ability to communicate and ran to the door to see what was happening. It turns out that there was a freak hail storm, not the normal small almost snow like hail that we get in Medford, but real "this could do some damage" hail. It was pretty exciting. The pieces of hail were often larger than marbles. Literally. I wish I could have gotten a picture as proof. It looked like popcorn popping as they bounced of the lamina roofs. One hit me in the wrist and it actually hurt a fair amount. I could have gathered up some of the hail and I would have been able to use it as ice cubes. The sad part was that it damaged the corn pretty badly, but I think in the long run it should be fine. 

Ok, side note, one of the hermanas in my district just shouted out how one of her friends who is on a mission just wrote to tell her that she just baptized a conjoined twin, as in, just one of the two. The other wants nothing to do with the church.  That's a pretty great story but I'd like to see a picture before I fully believe it.

I had an interesting experience this week. My companion and I were having a first visit with a member and her nonmember husband. For various reasons it was an extra important visit and I was really trying to do all I could to teach the best I could. Halfway through the lesson I thought "wow, I'm really teaching this lesson well. I'm asking good questions, the investigator is giving me exactly the answers I want, I'm making good comparisons, etc. So why isn't this lesson going better?" Then the Spirit gave me chicote and I realized that I was being pretty prideful and that all my well-practiced rhetorical strategies really weren't helping at all. What I was lacking was the Spirit. It was pretty cool as I stopped teaching rather pridefully and instead just humbly testified. The Spirit immediately came back. A little bit later the husband asked a somewhat contentious question and I launched into the answer with all the scriptures I had learned to prove my point and the Spirit withdrew. Then I realized what I was doing, quickly repented, and started to teach more simply and it came back again. It was a very clear lesson of trusting in the Spirit and not in our own abilities.

As far as our area goes, we're still fighting with setbacks and disappointments. I really want to give a good example to my district, showing them that we can have success here and getting them excited to have that success for themselves, but it just doesn't seem to be happening. I think that the faith of our district might be a little low, at the very least our expectations are. It's hard to fight that discouragement but I trust that we're doing what the Lord wants us to even though we're not perfect,..

Week 53

July 15

Well, despite what the zone leaders told us 8 days ago, we did end up having changes. I'm really not sure what was going on with changes, but it was a fairly embarrassing change meeting for President Markham to witness. There were so many mistakes as Elder Oseguera, one of the assistants, was reading the changes during the meeting, that at the end he gave up and said ¨ok, who still doesn't have a companion?¨  Two elders stood up and he said ¨ok, you're now companions.¨ It was a little ridiculous, but hopefully everyone got where revelation said they were supposed to be. Anyway, I stayed here in Patzy and my new companion is Elder Gonzales, from  Honduras, the 4th ¨catratcho¨ (Honduran) that I've had. He's pretty cool and is actually a convert of less than 3 years. He got baptized, waited a year, and then left on a mission. 

This week we've had discouraging setbacks yet again. For the third time in two months, we've had a fecha fija (an investigator who is all set to be baptized on a specific date) fall.  Jorge, the most recent, is that super tranquilo investigator who was all ready to be baptized. He passed his interview and everything. Then, his job changed and he had to work far away every Sunday and he said that he doesn't want to be baptized and make a covenant he can't keep so he's decided to wait. I have no idea why it's been so hard lately. I've never struggled so much getting investigators to come to church, progress, and be baptized as in this area. And to top it all off, the members are requiring a lot more patience and charity than normal. Frankly, sometimes I wish I could just call down fire from heaven to burn up the city. Then I remember why I'm here and try to not want to condemn people. Ha-ha, this area really is something... Thank goodness for ice cream. When charity and patience fail, ice cream is always there to make me feel better.

Speaking of blessings and trials, I read Elder Bednar's talk on tithing from General Conference in November 2013. I really like the part where he says that sometimes instead of receiving what we ask for, the Lord blesses us with need. He uses the example of how the Stripling Warriors didn't receive more troops or weapons; they were blessed with peace, faith, and confidence. I feel like that happens a lot as missionaries. We're often praying for specific blessings (for example, that Jorge is baptized this Sunday), but the Lord blesses us with an eternal perspective, or with patience, or with the assurance that we did our best to help that person. And of course, I'd see that ice cream is a pretty solid blessing for which I will not be ungrateful. Can't forget about that.

Yesterday I became surprisingly baggy as I made some snicker doodles during some spare time we had on P-day. It really didn't matter to me that I lacked baking soda, cream of tartar, and vanilla, it was a pretty great experience. It was my first time eating cookie dough in over a year, my first time in over a year smelling cookies baking in the (toaster) oven, and my first time in over a year eating warm cookies. That's also fairly therapeutic. Wow I miss cookies.

Hmmm, not really sure what else to write... All I can really think of is food. There are lots of lime trees here. In November it'll be the time to harvest corn on the cob corn (corn to make tortillas doesn't come until later). Apparently during the month there's so much corn that everyone's making grilled corn on the cob, atoles de elote (a hot corn drink), desserts, bread, etc. Tamales here are different than in the US. They're wrapped in banana leaves and are more like pudding than the dry one in the US. What we call tamales are known here as ¨chuchitos¨ or little dogs. Tortillas are really great. Guatemalan tortillas really are superior to all others.

Ok, I think it's time for lunch now. Love you all!

Elder Cannon