Week 101 Book of Mormon Musical

Haha this week was pretty awesome. We had a lot of really good things happen for us.

It was announced that the Book of Mormon musical us coming to Brisbane this March 2019. So out of nowhere the adds have popped up. "The Mormons are coming" " the best musical"

We were at a bus stop taking a photos of one of the adds when a lady walked by. I got pretty excited and said, “Hey look. They made a musical about us.” She got a good laugh about it. I thought it was really funny. The Church put a statement that said the Book of Mormon Musical will entertain you for a night but the real Book will entertain you for eternity. So when we door knock we ask if anyone has seen the adds on us all around. It has made it a bit more fun.

While on the note of musicals. In Australia they put on a show called Road Show. Each ward puts on a musical/play type thing. Instead of having the audience move to see the other wards, the actors pack everything up and go to the other chapel and puts on the show there. Hence road show... So we have been inviting all of the people we are seeing to come. I will send some videos! It was the funniest thing ever!! It was really amazing how great they did!! Redland Bay ward by far did the best job. They put in so much practice. We had a fair bit of non members and returning members come. The theme was Life is Beautiful.

This week we tried to solidify Jaco our South African investigator. He always keeps us at the door. The most frustrating part is the questions he asked line up perfect with the lessons we share. He just refused to have us teach them. He only wants us to answer his questions. We tried to bounce back and forth between the questions but finally told him hold up, this would be way better if we taught the full thing. So he invited us back to teach it. The gospel makes sense for him. He just needs a spiritual witness and he would be great!! His biggest question is if God is all powerful why does He let little children get killed and raped. To fully answer that question he has to hear out the whole plan of Salvation. We are slowly getting there with him.

Johannes still has not replied or been home so we are very bummed that we have no clue what he is up to. It could have gone so well. He is in the records though so the next missionary will love meeting him. This is an eternal work. Not just my work.

We have a recent convert who is the only member in his family. We thought it would be good to see him and start a good relationship with the rest of the family. They are not very religious but are very welcoming to us. While we were visiting we saw what looked like air soft guns. Turns out they shoot those little gel balls that you put in water. It stung to get shot but broke on impact. So we had a fun little battle in his back yard. It was pretty fun.

We also became really great friends with a new member that moved from Sydney. His whole life got turned upside down. Everything he owned is gone. He lived a rich life. Ford F-650, super air nautic boat...etc... Now that he has nothing he has everything. His testimony was never very strong but now it is built on a firm foundation. He studies 3-4 hours everyday and has us come over for a lesson or two during the week. He is still looking for a job so he has lots of time. We took him to go see Ben after our lesson with him. They really hit it off. Ben is slowly getting there too. No big steps but now with a friend with the same back ground he should really help.

Just yesterday I started all the departing things. It was pretty sad. I was not looking forward to it. You sign up for two years so I guess I knew the end would come. It just never felt like it would.

Well I am off to the temple today. It should be a great day!!

Love, Elder Cahoon

Week 100 The Weeks Are Flying By

Wow! Far out! The weeks are flying by. I thought that during the last stretch it would be slow going. I think because we have been given phones it has made it so much more interesting.

It was pretty cool, this week we had zone conference and the rest of the mission got their phones. In one of the training's we had a cool prompting come to us. As I said last week we are getting lots of people who are interested but hard to meet with. So we were inspired to have the idea of teaching online. We send a Mormon message video or the Restoration video via text.

It was pretty cool. We came to the chapel so we could download the videos onto our phones and then we prayerfully wrote down a text for each person and sent the video. From all the people we only heard back from one. He was so excited though. His name is Ben. I was really disappointed when we did not hear back from Johannes.

It was fun to hear from Ben though. He was pretty excited to watch the video and said, “Hey come over on Saturday and we can talk about it.” That was pretty cool. I am so pumped. We sent him the talk One more Day. He is a really big thinker. If you ask him who he is he will rely back with who am I really. Deep down. So we thought if we get his mind going on one more day we could swing it over to preparing to meet God!! Saturday is going to be so much fun!!!

It has really been neat to see the Lord hasten his work. It is something I have continually said my whole mission. When he needs something to happen it happens. During our zone conference President McSwain shared with us that Elder Nelson on the mission board emailed him and said he talks about the ABM where ever he goes. I have seen on my mission the Lord’s hand in this work.

On Sunday Izzy came to church but we found out that she leaves to Denmark in one week. That is quick. We brought her up in our ward coordination meeting. This is by far the best ward that has done it on my mission. We all counseled together with the Bishop and thought it could happen. By Tuesday we just did not feel good about it. We don’t want to pressure her or even do something if she is not ready. It has to come from her. We want to respect her family and parents. She has a great family that will take care of her. Who knows maybe in 6 months when she gets back she will want to get baptized. It is just amazing to see though that this is the Lord’s work and he has it covered. We just need to trust in him.

During one of our dinner appointments we had eaten and just started talking. Not about bad things but just talking. We were having a great time and it was not until we stated to share our message that while we were talking the Spirit was not there. About half way through the message of the Restoration the room just went silent. We were trying to teach it in under five minutes. The timer was about to go off but the Mum stopped it. At the end of the lesson we asked why. She did not want the Spirit to leave if we got interrupted. Boy it was a strong Spirit. President McSwain always tells us maybe the most important lesson you will teach that day is our dinner apt lesson. Today that was the case.

We had another fun dinner where after we taught we challenged the two older kids to teach a five minute restoration lesson. That was so fun!! They did a great job and we challenged them to share it with a friend. It really is amazing how great the Spirit is in our lives. God truly does love us to give us His Spirit.

We have the funnest YSA parents in our ward. Bro & Sister Green. Every two weeks they throw a YSA fast breaker and invite us to come. It is so popular and all the YSA active, returning members, and at times non members come. Sister Green is the funnest!! She tells us go and talk and mingle with everyone. That is why we invite you to these. For reals she is like everyone's Mum. While I was talking to one of the YSA he wanted to follow me on Facebook. My front cover is of me wake boarding. I thought it was a pretty good picture but then Sister Green came over and said mine is better. We both thought she was joking but sure enough she was twice as high. It was so funny!!

This is just the best work on the whole earth. It is sad that it is coming to an end but I have done so much and been so blessed. I love the Lord so much.

I hope everyone has a great week.

Love,
Elder Cahoon

Week 99 Try Not to Say I

I really really enjoyed this week. It was a great week of learning and growing!!

To start out I have my new phone. I may have jumped the gun for Facebook. When Australia first got phones for the missions one mission gave everybody there phones and nobody baptized that month.

So when the time came for our mission they released them in stages. The leaders first, with restrictions. So we have a smart dumb phone. Every month we will get more. The last one will be Facebook. So right now we have a really awesome phone to show videos and to text and call. Plus we have all the missionary tools to help us, like the area book, LDS tools, and Gospel Library. I have seen a huge difference just this week using it. I still feel like I should not have one or ever be on it. Two years of not having one does that to you. So it is taking some time to get used to it. It was fun at church pulling it out. Some people were really mad and thought how did these elders get smart phones. My whole mission I have said the Lord is hastening his work. Well this was a big step to that hastening!! It is amazing!! Our area book tells us who the closest investigator is to us. Back ups are so easy now!! All we have to do is look at a map and see who lives around us. We do have to put in all the names but with time we will get it.

This week I also tried not to say the word "I" rather us, we, him...etc. It was really hard and Elder Olson kept a tally for me. Sometimes it just slips out. One of the days I said 22 and Elder Olson had 35. It is a word that is hard not to use but really helps you see the importance of others. There is a youth song that goes "it’s not about you... it’s about those who are searching for the truth... it’s not about you..." We listened to that a lot this week.

When I first got to this area we had one investigator. Well after lots of door knocking and following up we have a teaching pool big enough to swim in!! The last two weeks have been really great for getting people to teach. On that note, Johannes got a new job and could not meet us. So we stopped by his house one day just to catch up and say hi. He is still keen but getting very busy with work and life. It will be interesting to see what happens.

There are so many other people that will be great long term. I am at a point now where I know the work I am doing now I will never see the outcome. It is a tough thought to think that all this work I am doing I will never see it through. Nevertheless I still want to work hard so the next guy has a great time!! This is not my work, it’s the Lords work!! So yeah I may not see it but the Lord will see it. They are His children.

We have one person that I ask you all to keep in your prayers. Izzy. She is Bishop’s daughter’s best friend. Over the last two weeks she has been going to early morning seminary and also came to church twice. After church this Sunday we taught her a lesson on prayer. She knows all the lessons because her Mum joined the church 3 years ago. The father loves the people at church but does not like organized religion. During our lesson on prayer she was in tears. The spirit really hit her hard.

Well the only bummer about this is she is moving to Denmark for 6 months at the end of the month. Bishop’s daughter really wants to see her baptized before she leaves but the big stumbling block will be Dad. Please pray that his heart will be softened. I love this work so so much!!

This email was all over the place. I love being a missionary so much!! It is the great time of life. I hope everyone has missionary opportunities this week.

Love,

Elder Cahoon

Week 98 This is the greatest work in the world!!

Well carrying Moroni was great last week but declaring the Truth of the Everlasting Gospel is a bit better!!

After 23 months a one week Elder Johnson and myself were finally united!! Elder Johnson came on a trade off to my area. He was with me and Elder Hansen in the MTC all those days ago. Well it was our time to shine and really smash the work. I was so excited and started to plan for a perfect day!! I wrote down every person we could possibly see. Well by 2:00 pm we had seen everybody and nothing great had happened.

So we started to knock doors. Now we had 3 hours to knock. We thought if we ran from door to door we could talk to more people. So we ran!! People thought we were crazy but we were full of the Spirit. People could also tell that!! We had great conversations with some great people. I have found that the Lord usually blesses us after we have put in hard work.

Well as we ran to one of the last doors we met Johannes Kaese. Oh my goodness this is the Lords work!! We could not have even accomplished what happened without divine help!! We started off pretty normal at the door. Hello how are you...Etc. He told us he knows a Mormon and I asked who. Well it turns out he knows a young man from my ward who just got back form his mission four weeks ago!! Brody Manler. Johannes spoke about what a great example Brody was and it opened it up for us to sit down and teach with him. The best was to explain the lesson we taught is by saying it was a lesson just for him. It was not very set up where we said God is our Heavenly Father...Joseph Smith is a prophet...We touched all the points but while having the purest conversation with him.

It went along the lines of we said, “If God gave you pure truth what would you do with it?" he gave a great response about acting on it. Then we asked what if you knew God gave you truth but bad things started happening and your friends made fun of you...? Would you still act on it? Boom silence for a long while. But at the end of it he said he would act on it. "Well we are here sent to you from God to say what he wants said and do what he wants done. To do the very thing He would do if He were here. To teach what He would teach. What you are holding in your hand (The Book of Mormon) is truth. God wants you to have it and act on it." I have never said anything like that before. It was 100% from God!! Johannes had the greatest insight and questions and what I would call real intent. It was amazing!! We taught with the authority and power of God and Johannes felt that. He shared with us what he has been going through. Eight weeks ago he took drugs that he has never taken before and when he woke up he told God he was going to change. Well for the last eight weeks God has been preparing him!! He has been sober for eight weeks and has wanted to reach out to God.

He said the closing prayer and it was the most sincere prayer I have ever heard!! He prayed like he has prayed a million times before. At the end of it he said, “It is funny that you showed up today. I was not even planning on being home. I was going out with mates to the Sunshine Coast but then I got a feeling that I should stay home.” We got to testify that it was God preparing him to meet with us today!! I am telling you Johannes is my favorite guy!! If we left at that moment I would have been happy. During his prayer the Spirit said invite him to be baptized!! Far out I love when the spirit speaks to you and you are bold and follow it!! He accepted the date of August 25!!

Elder Johnson and I leaped for joy!!!! We had the best day ever!! We called Brody and told him and he is so excited to help and bring his friend into the fold!! I am telling you this is Gods work!! When you are obedient and work hard he blesses you with things you can’t even think of!! 

When we spoke about him in ward council and our correlation meeting everyone one was so excited and willing to help!! We had so many other great things happen on that trade off! To much to write in here!!

The biggest thing that I want to ask of you is to pray for Johannes. Satan is going to be working really really hard on him so I ask that you pray for him!! Thank you so so much!!

This work is the greatest work to be apart of and tomorrow it is going to take a big jump. My mission is getting smart phones. We have been getting trained on how to use them in this work and how to have them be our servants rather than our master. Boy I am really really excited!! So if you see me on Facebook I am not home yet. I am being an obedient elder!!

Yesterday we had district meeting and I made a whole bunch of cardboard smart phones. I told the district that we got our phones a day early. When I said that everyone was so excited and then I pulled out the cardboard ones and everyone was so mad but started to laugh so hard!! It was so funny!!

Well I love everyone so so much!! This is the greatest work in the world!! I hope you all have a great week!!

Love, 

Elder Cahoon

Week 97 I Got to Carry Moroni

Geez it is amazing how you can have a great week and then in your eyes the worst week in the world!! I hate the feeling that I am not accomplishing anything...

Last week we got to see some great people and work heaps with the ward. This week we got to door knock for ages with no success. It is not the way to do mission work but when you have to fill up the whole day with things to do you have to do it.

Door after door, rejection after rejection. I think we had 3 people say we could come back. Ok wait there were some good people. One of them was Jaco. He is from South Africa and brought his family over for safety. He grew up Christian but has a hard time believing that God is real because of how the world is and how bad South Africa is.

Long story short he invited us back. If you never follow up you might as well never have met them. We followed up and he was home. Question after question. So we told him about the 5 lessons we teach and how they will answer all his questions in an orderly way. At the end he can make the decision for himself. He really liked that. So we taught the restoration to him. It was great and answered a lot of his questions. The Spirit was really strong and he agreed with all that was said. The only hard part will be to get him to believe in God. Because of his Christian upbringing he said the message made sense. The key will just to get him to read the Book of Mormon. He is great!! I love when people open up and talk to us about what they think and believe. It is amazing how the Light of Christ works with the Holy Ghost to testify of all the truth!

Knocking and knocking and knocking. One day you get blessed. For as we say here for every door you knock a person gets baptized in South America. haha

Despite it being a rough week we still had great things happen for us. I was just feeling a bit alone. I have been worn out. It is tough leading an area that you don’t really know. Things are getting there though.

Like I said last week we really started getting to know the members and work with them. The YSA leaders for our ward area super keen to help so we met with them and talked about our activity night. BTW we are doing it again tonight because it was so good last week. Anyway the YSA leaders (the Greens) were having a pot luck dinner with all the YSA at their house. We were invited and really got to know more of the YSA. The better part was there were heaps of less active YSA that we really hit it off with! I was ecstatic.

On Sunday we had a lot of those YSA there!! Plus some ones that come but are struggling. The even better part was we got asked to teach the YSA class on faith. Geez I really love to teach and while teaching the class I had the thought, hey maybe you should be a teacher. It was pretty fun. It was not the only teaching I was doing on Sunday. I got to give a talk and teach sharing time.

Over time on my mission I have really grown to love to talk and teach. I hated it back home and was always so scared. It has been so fun to do on my mission though.

We had transfers this last week. I got to see Elder Winter & Pugsley. They have now gone home. I looked up to them for so long. It is crazy!! While we were saying our goodbyes a member from my last ward was at the temple too. He was fixing some stuff up. His job is to keep the temple going. Well a few months ago I sent home a picture of Moroni and me. Well at transfers Moroni was getting transferred too. So Bro. Odwyer called me over and asked if I could gather a few of my mates and help him. I got all my comps still on the mission. Elder Winter, Choi, Beranibwebwe, and then Elder Top, Tenny, and Olson. We had to put on some special white gloves and then carefully pick up Moroni and put him into his shipping box!! It was the coolest thing ever!! I got to carry Moroni! It was such a unique opportunity.

I am so excited for my last transfer. Things are going strong. I am going to give it my all. It is crazy that it is coming to an end. There is so much to do. I love my mission so much!!

Have a great week. 

Love, 

Elder Cahoon

Week 96 I Am Like Abanidi

Haha I love my mission so much right now! Sorry for all the spelling mistakes in this email. The spell check is not working and I am typing fast!!

A few weeks ago when Chad Hymas visited our mission he spoke to the leaders and said, “Here is how you will "Make a Movement."” Those words really hit me and I have been trying to do that ever since.

The crazy part is I only have so long left so I am trying to do all I can to make it happen. In one of my studies this week I just loved what I found. Everywhere I go I say we are going to make a movement. We are still trying to figure out exactly how but we have the ball rolling. I found in the scriptures King Noah said "But behold, it came to pass that the king, having discovered a movement among the people, sent his servant to watch them..." I found that scripture and just loved it. How did Alma make that movement? He baptized 450 souls and people took notice. How did he do it?

It starts out way before him with Abanidi. Abanidi stood up all by himself and taught the wicked king and priest. Abanidi was different, he was not afraid to stand alone. He was doing something grand. The best part comes when Alma stands up for him. That is what made the movement. Abanidi was great but Alma was just as great to stand up. He did it different. He went and did the opposite of what every one else was doing.

That is the key for us. I am like Abanidi. (hopefully I do not get burned at the end of my mission) but I am standing up for what is right and true. Now I have to find my Alma to stand up with me. His name is Hayden. He is a 17 year old young man in the ward. We really hit it off with him. One day he took us out to lunch and that is where we yoked.

We now have him and he is eager to work with us. He texts us when he can come out to help. With one keen follower more will come. It is never easy to join a lone nut who is doing something but if there is two or even three it gets a lot easier and less risky to join and help. I hope everyone gets what I am saying.

This week we told Hayden we would be playing basketball at the chapel at 2:00 to 3:00. He was welcome to come and bring any friends. Well he brought two less active friends who we have been struggling to meet with. After a fun game with them we just talked like normal guys. We played at the chapel but it was nothing grand. That was our hour of missionary work with them. It was way better than knocking on doors for one hour.

The key is to work effectively. You can work all day to cut grass with scissors but you can also work hard all day and cut with a law mower. I am super excited for where things are going in our ward. Hadyen is now texting us saying we should go visit this friend and see this person. We are hoping tonight we get more youth and YSA involved. After institute we will be having a classic Cahoon games night with the name game and fun like that!! We will have all the YSA and Hayden is bringing his friends again.

Our Bishop and WML also told us in our correlation meeting that the key to get work done here by being in the members home. We need to visit them and get to know them. So this week would visit members and talk with them but we would also find through our own efforts door knocking. We are slowly starting to see the success come. It may take a few weeks to get it rolling but once it does it will roll forever. The next elder after me is going to love this area!!

We have a man named Kane who has autism but is very functional. He is very slow but very fun. He got baptized about 3 months ago and got called to be a ward missionary. He has been begging us to take him door knocking. The only problem is he does not function super well. We thought ok we can door knock his street with him and he will last a few minutes. Two hours later we finished three to four streets and he got two potentials. I was so shocked and it made it so so fun!!

It is crazy how great it is to really work with the members. My mission president told me in these last few week to really refine my missionary skills. Now I am not perfect, far from it. But it has been amazing to see so many missionaries go through the motion and never grow. I have struggled with it. You get caught up in other things and never reach your full potential or never fully yoke with the members. We have a great bishop who is really helping us see that!!

One funny dinner appointment we had this week was a FHE with the Davidsons. They were holding a newly wed dinner. So when we got there there were three new weds. Boy we were out of place. We could not follow any of the conversations because we were not married. It was really funny. We had a great time and had lots of laughs but just felt so out of place. It was awesome!!

I had a great week and saw so much success. Life is so great and I hope everyone has a great week.

Love,
Elder Cahoon

Week 95 Karol's Baptisim

Wow I say it week after week, "What an amazing week!!"

I want to start off by saying it is such a blessing to be on a mission. This week was a great reminder of that!!

If you remember from my last area there was a lady named Karol. She was working through some things that she needed to overcome but with the help of a good mission president and a helpful bishop, I got a call a few weeks ago from Karol. She said she has set a date and would like me to come and baptize her if possible. It was amazing!! Elder Tewes really worked with her but when some one is really ready they do things for themselves. Since the first day we met her she strives to keep what we taught her!!

As we were taking the photos you could tell that she was really really nervous. She really wanted to be there and be doing what she was about to do but she was scared. We got down into the water together and everything went smoothly. She went under and when she came out she was beaming!! We both just stood there for a good while just taking in the Spirit. She looked over at me and said I feel so much peace!! She was just smiling so big. I love baptisms because it is the perfect Spirit for the convert!! They get a strong witness that what they are doing is right. Karol recognized that and loved it!!

It was great to see Elder Tewes, Elder Biranibwebwe got transferred though. Oh well.

Chad Hymas was still here for last half of the week and taught us so much!! I was so grateful for all he shared with us. He taught about how to be powerful leaders and how to make movements that will last a life time. I really took that to heart and want to apply it for the last little bit.

From our inspiring moment with Chad our Mission President challenged us to set 44+ people of baptismal date on Saturday. We ended the day with 55. It was a really big miracle that the Lord blessed us with. President McSwain then had a big conference call that night and said some remarkable words. He said, “You may get the impression that dodgy missionaries have more baptisms. Let me tell you that their baptisms were only baptized because the Lord needed them, not because they received light and knowledge from you. You fail at the thing you were called to do. The obedient missionaries baptize converts who receive light and knowledge from you because you were fulfilling your calling.”

Those words really made an impact on me.

There is one other story I would like to share. We were with a young man who is preparing to go on a mission. We did not know what we were going to do with him for that hour. He felt impressed to call Ulania and see if she was free. Long story short she ditched her friends to meet us at MacDonalds. I testify that it was an inspired visit from the Lord!! She was so amazing. We had a great chat but it ended with her asking for a blessing and expressing desire to come back to church. She is going to institute tonight. (the teacher is real trash) (I am teaching) haha. Words cannot describe how amazing it was to visit with her. It is why I came on a mission. Tonight at institute I am sharing about becoming an instrument in the hands of God!! That is what happened while we visited her.

While we were there we didn’t know who shouted us food. It was such a surprise and we talked to everyone in the store trying to find the person to thank them.

I want to quickly testify that it is such a blessing to serve a mission. It is not a sacrifice. Everything we have, we have because of Him. It is not a sacrifice to bring his children back. I testily that He lives and it is His work!!

Love, Elder Cahoon