Merry Christmas!!!!

Merry Christmas!!!

I hope all of you enjoyed your Holiday! The Holidays are an interesting time for missionaries. Everyone we call just says to get a hold of them after the first of the year. That makes thing hard up until then because missionary work doesn't stop! We don't take a vacation until the January! We are figuring out what we can do until then. 

Christmas Eve was really good. We had a Christmas conference with the Cincinnati stakes. I got roped into doing 3 things for the talent show and 2 other musical numbers. It was a good day, but I was a little anxious because of all the stuff I needed to do. Elder Manning and I did a 12 days of Christmas skit and it was so fun! Elder Manning has never done anything like that. That's what you get when you have a theater kid as you companion. Everyone seemed to really enjoy it. It was a fun day. 

Christmas was fun too! Christmas on Sunday is awesome for a missionary! We went to both sacrament meetings that happen in our building because one of the Elders from the other ward and I did a musical number. I sang in the ward choir and that was really fun. I miss singing in choirs. We then went to Skype home which was fun! Great to talk with my family! And that was about all that happened this week. 

Thank you, 
I love you!!!
Elder Hayden Cannon

Skype on Christmas Day

Elder Cannon and Elder Manning

Referrals!

Hello!!!

This week was a good week. This week felt really long though. It wasn't bad as in it was dragging on, but it did feel long. It was rather interesting. 

On Thursday, we had Mission Leadership Council. I really enjoy those meetings. This meeting was really interesting because there used to be twice as many zone leaders and there were more sister training leaders but because of the zones changing, there were far fewer missionaries there. We had a special guest come, Brother Hemingway, the director of proselyting for the missionary department of the church. It was a really good meeting. Something that was really interesting is that other missionaries and I have noticed is that we will have a meeting like that where there is an emphasis on something and we will treat it as if we have never had access to those principles, even though they have been in Preach My Gospel since 2006. I have found that funny. It was a really good meeting. 

One of the things that Brother Hemingway talked about is asking for referrals. He promised us that if we are to truly ask for referrals from everyone, we would be able to change our finding to baptizing ratio from 33 to 1, to 11 to 1. That is a huge difference! So Elder Manning and I have really been trying to ask for referrals from everyone. The actual asking for referrals hasn't been to fruitful but we still continued to ask. Saturday, we had our ward Christmas Party and while we were there, a member came up to us with his friend as said, "This is Jim, he came to church last week and is interested in learning more." He also came to church yesterday. Heavenly Father has laid out in Preach my Gospel that if we will ask for referrals to teach, we will have many people to teach and Elder Manning and I are just at the beginning a we can't wait to see what else comes. 

Thank you, I love you!!!
Elder Hayden Cannon

One of our new referrals!!

Doubled-in to EastsGate

Hi!!!

Things are going well here in Eastgate! Elder Manning and I were doubled-in here as the zone leaders. That is kinda rare. Usually zone leaders don't get doubled-in. This wasn't even where zone leaders were in the past. It has been interesting. Elder Manning has said that he hasn't prayed so much in his entire mission. 

Elder Manning and I are still trying to get our bearings so we don't quite have much to report. Things have been good and we look forward to the work here. 

Love you!!!
Elder Hayden Cannon 

I'm getting 6 week shafted!

Hello Everyone!!! 

I hope everyone enjoyed their Thanksgiving! Both sets of missionaries in the Dayton ward went to a single sisters for a Thanksgiving meal at lunch time. I ate so much then that for our dinner our, I just laid on the floor. It was really good! We then weren't really sure what to do after we were done eating though. Holidays as a missionary are hard because you really don't want to irritate people when they are with their families. What we thought to do was walk around downtown Dayton and hand out the cards for the Church's Christmas initiative. No one was really on the streets though, they were inside where it was ward and had an abundance of food. It all worked out though. 

I am leaving Dayton and will be going to Eastgate, Ohio. I am kinda bummed I am leaving Dayton. The area is really just starting to take off and both Elder Grass and I are leaving. I feel like the area will be in good hands, though. Someone I came out with is taking over the area and is training a new missionary. He should do a good job. I am going to be with Elder Manning in Eastgate, we are getting doubled in and we will be the zone leaders. Elder Grass told me that him and Elder Manning are practically the same person, so luckily I like Elder Grass! Getting doubled in is going to be interesting. Zone leaders aren't usually doubled in, but now I get to be doubled in with someone who I am not training! This should make things a little bit easier. I can't wait!

Thank you for everything! Especially your prayers, they really do work.
I love you!!!
Elder Hayden Cannon

We met an awesome family!!!

Howdy!!!

Things have gone super well this week. Last Sunday, we got a referral from President Welch, which is kind of a rare occurrence. It was from another mission president in Guam who has a sister missionary there whose family lives in Dayton. She wanted us to go visit them. We did and they are an awesome Micronesian family! We met Channell and her mom who are both members. Channell has a fiance, 3 kids, and a nephew who live with her who are all not members. We had some awesome lessons with them and it was great! All of them came to church!!! It was our first time having investigators at church for the entire transfer. It was great! We are really excited to work with them.

I had a thought that I liked during studies the other day. The atonement is meant to save us from both physical and spiritual death. If we are supposed to be saved from those "deaths" then our purpose is to live, both physically and spiritually. The Doctrine of Christ is the instructions to be spiritually alive and to thrive. Heavenly Father wants us to return to Him, but we are to live the Doctrine of Christ to be able to achieve our eternal potential. I love this gospel and the eternal nature of it. There is a quote that I would like to share about this. 

"The great beauty of the gospel of Jesus Christ is the reality of eternal progression we are not only allowed to change for the better but also encouraged, and even commanded, to continue in the pursuit of improvement and, ultimately, perfection."
     -Jean B. Bingham

This is how we spiritually thrive!

Thank you for all that you are doing! I love you!
Elder Hayden Cannon

'Twas My Birthday

Hello!!! Things are going well here in Dayton!

This week was a little slow, but some great things happened. Something that I just found out is that an investigator that I found in Fort Wayne and worked with quite a bit, just got baptized!!! I am so happy about that! Also, Joyce who Elder Lilly and I baptized got to go to the temple!!! That is so awesome to see people that I worked with progress in the gospel, even if I wasn't there for all of it.  

Something that I have learned and continue to learn is that people in the Midwest like to talk! We met these investigators on Saturday and one of them would start talking over us, then the other would start talking over her and they were both asking questions, both of which we were then supposed to answer. It was a struggle teaching them. We are still going to be teaching them later this week. It should be fun. 

My birthday was pretty fun. It was a pretty regular day as a missionary. We did have zone meeting though and it was the first one that I have been a zone leader for. I enjoyed it. I really like giving trainings.  

There was an analogy that Elder Grass used in a lesson that I had never heard before that I really liked. If you are out in the wilderness and your two options are to drink out of a pool of stagnant water or a flowing stream, which do you drink from? You drink from the flowing stream because the movement acts like a filter and cleans the water. A stagnant pool only builds up bacteria that will make you sick. Our spirits are the same way. We must keep moving and progressing spiritually in order to remain clean. When we stop taking the step we know that we should to keep moving towards our Heavenly Father and to stay spiritually alive, we start to grow spiritual bacteria that will eventually cause us great harm. I really liked that and I wanted to share it with you. 

Thank you! I love you!

Elder Hayden Cannon 

Elder Cannon and his companion Elder Grass

My first Mission Leadership Council!!!

Howdy!!!

This week was pretty good! Elder Grass and I are doing some great work here. We are getting along well and we are teaching in unity! We spend a lot of our time laughing at each other! Very good things. We were able to find 5 new investigators this week and most of them were media referrals. Media referrals are really nice because it is someone that has said, "Missionaries, come over!!!" Sometimes they aren't quite as enthusiastic about us showing up at their door, but it is usually a good way to find new investigators. 

On Friday, Elder Grass and I went to Mission Leadership Council. It was awesome! I was so excited to go and see all the other Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders. Those are a really good group of missionaries. I was able to receive a lot of good revelation that we can then take to our zones and help them to know where the mission is going and how it is getting there. We weren't able to do any proselyting that day because the meeting was in Cincinnati, but we were still really excited because we got 4 media referrals while we were there. But when we looked at them on the computer, they were all for the other Elders in Dayton... That was a bummer. 

On Saturday I was able to go on an exchange in Greenville! That was really cool! It was interesting to visit an area that have served in before. It was especially nice because I was able to see people that I wasn't able to say goodbye to because I was emergency transferred out of Greenville. I was really happy to be there. 

Whelp, that makes up my week. 

Thank you!!! Love you!!!

Elder Hayden Cannon