The Last Letter

Area: Udon
Companion: Elder Terry

Hey Guys!

Well this is it I am now on my last full week as a missionary and this will be my last letter home. Next week my P-Day will be moved to Wednesday to accommodate for exit interviews and last day to roam Bangkok. Then two days later I will be boarding a plane that will take me home to you. It still hasn’t sunk in that I really have to go home, it seems so strange that all of this has to come to an end. I like what President Uchtdorf said about it  " There seems to be something inside of us that resists endings." There certainly is something inside of me that is resisting this ending. It's hard to remember not being a missionary. I feel like it is what I have always done. I'm excited to be reunited with all of you again and I got some excellent guidance from conference on what I can do to continue on the progress that I have made out here and continue to bring the gospel to both the living and the dead. We had a sweet companionship study on that this week, we have been talking about how the worst part of going home is going to be no more baptisms and then Elder Terry studied in D&C about baptisms for the dead! We got way excited, we had kinda forgotten about that wonderful work, and we realized that we could go to our newly built temples in both Calgary and Brigham City and baptize for hours every week!!! We were pretty stoked!
We had a great week in the work! We have a lot of fun inviting and this past week we got like 4 or 5 off the invite and then they brought along another 5 people whether that was their friends or siblings. It was so awesome we got such good referrals from our new investigators this week! We are going to have 2 baptisms this week and we are setting up the 27th to have a ton! Right now we have like 13 daters for that Sunday! There is one 15 year-old girl whose name is Faang who is so awesome! Her friend Mai brought her along last Saturday and she has been at the church every day since we met her! She is way solid and is already way tight with the members and her parents have no problem with her getting bapped. She is so getting baptized!
Conference was absolutely incredible the testimonies of Elder Holland and Elder packer were amazing. Elder Scott's talk answered a lot of questions as did President Uchtdorf's. I loved the priesthood session it was so good! Other favourites included Elder Zwick, Elder Nelson, Elder Cook and Elder Ridd! Best Quote goes to Elder Aidukaitis "One should not roam through garbage." hehe I also thought of Mum when Elder Holland said that "Hate is an ugly word."
Songkran is going to be way crazy fun today playing with all of the awesome members here we got a little wet yesterday but today is going to be out of control! Khonthai just go nuts on songkran! SOO FUN!!
I Love you guys so much!
Elder Cahoon 

เอ็ลเดอร์คาฮูน

Elder Cahoon - Thailand Bangkok Mission

Gift was baptized, Last MLC, Incredible Faith!Gift! (More pictures in a parking lot!)

Area: Udon
Companion: Elder Terry
April 6, 2014

Hey Guys!

Gift got baptized on Saturday that was awesome. This week was also our last MLC down in Bangkok it was way good it always is. I love learning from Pres and Sis Senior! They have so much knowledge and are always so inspiring. After as a reward for helping the mission get 218 baptisms they took us all out for dinner at this Japanese buffet it was way tasty! We did the trainings in Udon and Nong Khai and we did a switch-off up there in Nong Khai and we found them a new dater that was way solid found him at the supermarket at 3 made an appointment for 3 hours later he came liked it so much that he stayed for the Book of Mormon reading class for an hour after that! Tomorrow we will be going out to Sagon Nakon for that last time and do the training and a mini switch-off. It’s an 8 hour round trip in a non-air conditioned bus that is pretty filthy so we are kinda glad that this will be the last trip! 

Today we are going to be going and eating with Jack and then were going to go pick up the shirts and suits that we have been cutting and I will be getting a navy one cut. Way stoked for General Conference this weekend and then next P-Day we are playing Songkran!!! That is going to be crazy fun! It’s supposed to be way big here in Udon.

There was a man baptized yesterday He was Muslim. And after he was baptized he bore his testimony. It was incredible he bore powerful testimony of our Savior and what the Gospel and the Plan of Salvation meant to him and finished by explaining that it’s very dangerous for Muslims to become Christian but that he was unafraid of death and that it didn’t matter what others did to him they could not separate him from his faith in and love for the Savior! It was wow! Such incredible faith!

Love You!

Elder Cahoon

Little extra note:
I happened to be online when Elder Cahoon was and shared the news about Elder Khanakham being called as an Area Authority. He wrote back to me:  That was the coolest news ever about Pres Khanakham! I'm pretty sure he's the very first Thai General Authority ever! He is so amazing! I really got to know him while I was serving in Roi-Et and he was finishing his mission with his wife, they are both so inspiring and are sooo solid in the Gospel! That is a huge step for the church here in Thailand!

Gift! - More pictures in a parking lot! (haha I told him the only pictures I have of Udon are of the Church parking lot! thus the name of the photo)

I wanted to cry and rip my hair out and jump for joy all at the same time

Area: Udon
Companion: Elder Terry
March 30, 2014

Hey Family!

Guess What?! This month we had 212 baptisms! It was a record for all of the missions in the entire Asia area! (Japan and Korea are the North Asia Area and the Philippines is their own thing too) In the past 3 months we have baptized as many people as we did in the entire year of 2012, my first year in Thailand! 

We had 2 baptisms yesterday, which was awesome, but so disappointing because it was supposed to be 5. One brother passed his interviews and got work off so he could be baptized and keep the Sabbath day but then didn’t show up and we couldn't get a hold of him all day. Another we taught him almost everything on Saturday and committed him to pray to know if it was true and repent. He came to church passed his interview during Sunday School and then left to go vote and then never came back. The third passed her interview on Saturday but had to do her last shift of work made it to sacrament meeting and then had to go back to finish her shift and then work made her go overtime! The two that got baptized went and voted in the morning and then came back from out of town to get to church on time then during Sunday school we taught them for only the 3rd time and finished all the lessons they both passed their interviews and were baptized just 8 days after meeting us on the street in front of 7-11! MIRACLESS! Definitely the craziest day of my entire mission I wanted to cry and rip my hair out and jump for joy all at the same time I didn’t even know what to think! We will get those other 3 this week plus another lady who we have been teaching for 2 weeks and she finally came to church she is way solid and finally got work off! I don’t remember if I told you or not but me and Elder Terry have a goal to baptize 14 more people before we go home which will put me at 30 converts in Udon and him at 40 converts on his mission! We pray for it in every single prayer it’s going to happen for sure!

More about Elder Terry I have not laughed this hard my entire mission! We have been crying multiple times we were laughing so hard. One time it was in front of 7-11 and the khon thais were so confused hahaha Lately we have been talking in east indian accents and making up songs about Elder Burke the greenie just like while we are on bikes and stuff its hilarious! We have to find some ways of laughing otherwise we would just cry and be way stressed out! 

I am cutting a black suit right now its gonna be sick and it was really inexpensive I bought the fabric and swung a deal with the tailor and so total it’s like 2400 baht like 80 bucks I think I might get another one! As far as other clothes I think it will honestly be just as good shopping at Ross or TJ anything here that is good is the exact same price! That and I don’t know what the fashions are like anymore haha 

It is so hot here we invite like all afternoon we are getting pretty dark! We had one day we went for like 8 hours! It’s the stuff of legends we are having a lot of fun with it and it really is working you just gotta stick it!

On Saturday night we remembered that the font was broken and the water was still there from the week before so us and a bunch of the members did a bucket brigade to get it all out! It was way funny!

Love

Elder Cahoon

555

Baptism! Praew and Jelfie

With God All things are Possible

Area: Udon
Companion: Elder Terry
March 23, 2014

Hey Guys!

We had a great week! Our area recovered from last week and we had 8 investigators at church yesterday! We are going to be back to baptism this week and we are both way excited about God blessed us so much this past week we had 10 new investigators 4 of which were people who brought their friend to come learn too. The weather has also been way nice this week really nice breezes and overcast with a bit of rain and we have really been enjoying the break from the heat!

Zone Conference was soo good! Honestly probably the best zone conference I have been to! Which is nice seeing as how it is also my last. They had us, Elder Terry and I and Elder Saedan bear our cobbing testimonies and it was kinda weird, it didn’t really hit you until you stood up and then it’s like yep this is it. President started by sharing pictures and experiences from his mission and explaining just how much his mission meant to him. A quote that I really liked was "All the good things in my life the successes are from God I don’t take any of the credit but the failures are all mine" He explained that what we do on our missions will have such a far reaching influence on the rest of our life. How we serve each day can determine in a large part our future, our career, our wife, our family, our faith. The topic of Zone conference was With God All things are Possible and Becoming. It was really inspiring Sis Senior shared on raising and exceeding expectations. We as the zone leaders set up a sweet lunch it was Vietnamese food called Nam Nueang it was so good and then because we had lots of money left we went and bought 6 cakes at Dairy Queen, kinda funny we went in and we were like we want to buy cake how many they asked? All of them! haha and we did! Also we had a welcome new announcement The music rule in the mission changed from just Motab to now we can listen to any hymn sung by any artist! We have been really enjoying that Elder Burke has 2 albums of these guys called Lower Lights and they do indie kinda folky hymns they are way dece you should check them out! 

We are really having a lot of fun with inviting this past week. Last week we were getting so frustrated by all of the silly excuses Thai people give you. But now we are having a lot of fun with it. 

It’s really sad about Abbie

Love

Elder Cahoon

It was a hard week... but next week...

Area: Udon
Companion: Elder Terry
March 16, 2014

Hey Guys!

So first there were some questions that you guys had. cob is actually จบ and it means to complete it is what everyone calls finishing your mission they ask when do you cob ( it’s probably pronounced a lot like Job in the bible) haha Ben I could count to a trillion! But I have never tried before haha Sounds like Provincials was way awesome thanks for the long email Kenny Congrats on getting the player of the game! Mum that video was way goofy it was a brother who works at the church offices in Bangkok he filmed us at like 6 in the morning after we had been on the bus for 9 hours and we had got in at 4 in the morning and we were just like uhhhh! haha That’s cool that Callin and Meaghan are moving up that’s way sad to hear about Abbie. That’s awesome about Liz and Jake too! I will definitely pray for them! 

As far as the homecoming and the work stuff goes. I don’t think that I will take the whole meeting like maybe 20-25 mins or something. I don’t really know I have never thought of that. And I don’t really want to haha Brother Bos getting trunky on me. For work as in all things I trust your judgement. 

This week was really hard. I have never worked so hard in a week and got so little. We invited all week and had many people committed to come to church 20+. None of them came to church. That hasn't happened in months. Because no one came we have no daters and no progessors and we didn’t get balanced. It was really hard. Yesterday we were both just so drained I didn't know what else to do. We hit rock bottom. It was tough but we picked ourselves last night had some good laughs and we are ready and raring to hit it again at the end of the day. The zone only had 3 baptisms this past week but when we hit our goal this week we will hit our zone goal for the month with a week to spare!

Love,

Elder Cahoon

I Gave Myself a Haircut!

Sagon Nakon Switch-off

Pictures at the Baptism

Funny Members

Brother âµé§