One last look at San Blas and the beauty of this colorful island. |
Panamaniac
A blog about me serving as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Panama. I have been called for two years, not panamantly.
Last Week
This is the last week of my mission and being on this beautiful island and I spent most of the week just laying in a hammock. Actually, my companion and I have not been feeling our best. He was out most of Friday and slept all day long, which allowed me to take a picture of him in his hammock. On Saturday, it hit me and I was out of it all day. Luckily we did finally find and receive some medicine so we are starting to feel a little bit better and by Sunday we were both getting back up on our feet.
I will be leaving the islands on Saturday, sailing to the mainland and heading in to Panama City. I leave on Saturday because it is the only day that the boats will be heading out this week due to the elections taking place on the islands. In Panama, they have seven political parties and five independent parties. It is really divided and so I don't know who will be elected.
Quick shout out to wish my Grandpa a Happy Birthday! I sure do love you!!!
Primary
Well this week I want to talk a little
bit about the truths of God. Right. Throughout my life, I’ve heard a lot of
different people ask a lot of questions about God, about the gospel, and about
personal opinions.
This week we helped clean a river
clogged up with algae and seaweed that was rotting which was needed for the
community. That was fun as we got in our boots and went to work. It smelled fishier
than then the port in San Francisco where all the seals hangout in combination
to what I would think a sewage treatment plant would smell like. We worked in
shorts and tee-shirts and definitely got too much sun. I only have two pairs of
pants here on the island. I will wear one of pants for a week and then wash it.
But as we went on divisions to different islands, I didn't have the option to
wash my pants last week.
And as I look at it, I tend to
find that there are two sets of real questions. Primary questions and Secondary
questions. The Primary questions include: Does God exist? Does he answer my
prayers? Did Jesus Christ die for me? Was Joseph Smith a prophet? Where do I go
after this world? Etc. Etc. Secondary questions can be as basic as the priesthood
restrictions, the first vision, the translation of the Book of Mormon.
Now a lot of secondary answers
I take to the extreme end of comparison. Its like asking what type of nail, how
thick, how long, what type of metal they used; to hang Jesus on the cross.
While coming to the knowledge of these questions may build upon your testimony,
knowing them by themselves won't give you a testimony of Jesus the Christ as
our Savior. What matters most obviously aren't the nails, but him sacrificing
himself for us on the cross. This is important to know so that we may overcome physical death, repent of our sins, and so that we can all make it back to our Heavenly Father.
We need to know and understand the principles. The points of the doctrine most
basic. We need to have our own personal testimony about them. Porque as it is
said in 3 Nephi 26:
"9 And when they shall have received this, which is expedient that they should have first, to try their faith, and if it shall so be that they shall believe these things then shall the greater things be made manifest unto them.
"9 And when they shall have received this, which is expedient that they should have first, to try their faith, and if it shall so be that they shall believe these things then shall the greater things be made manifest unto them.
10 And if it so be that they will not believe these things, then shall the
greater things be withheld from them, unto their condemnation."
Gaining our foundational testimony will make all other secondary questions become
obsolete. You can tie back any secondary question, back to a primary question.
While some may question the importance of the word of wisdom. The real question
can be turned back to 'Was Joseph Smith a prophet?' If he really was then, that
means he received the revelation, as prophets do, to guide us and give us this
commandment in these modern days. Remember, knowledge is not a bad thing. But
you can't do Algebra before you can even do addition. I encourage all of you to
make sure your foundation is firm.
Also just a
reminder to listen to the impressions of the spirit. You won't have regrets if
you do so.
This week was
tiring from having a slight cold, but I've been working through it. How often do
you get to be a missionary you know? We had a few prayers
answered as we were able to work out a fiasco with the phones as we lost connection here. To contact people we tried using internet or Wi-Fi, but that was not working either. We were finally were able to make contact. We also had a baptism planned but he did not come to church on Sunday. So, we were praying throughout all the sacrament meeting that he
would make it. Then at last, in the last fifteen minutes he showed up and we
baptized him.
A lot of the kids love to collect and play with bottle caps here on the island.
Who knew they were so much fun!
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Divisions
Well you might say that this week was a little crazy, we went on
a paseo to a few of the islands to do divisions.
The first island we visited was Nargana. It’s always nice to
see an old companion again, Elder Nelson, love that guy. Once there, I went on
divisions with Elder Salam and it was good. We ended up having one
service project after the next. We cut down coconuts, brought in tanks of
water, completely destroyed a house and put it back up again in a different
spot. One family gave us a cold coconut to drink because of our hard work. They
are having a lot of success there on that island and they deserve it. It is
nice having missionaries that motivate you to stay focused and motivated doing this great work.
While we were there, we had the chance to visit a family that I love. They have cooked
us dinner every time I have gone over. While we were there, they were all putting
on cosmetic face masks and they invited us to join in. So, three of
us (all except Salavarrieta) put on our very first facial masks. I am going to
try to visit the extended family when I get back home.
Our next island visit was to Irgandi, and that was crazy.
We had plans to go to Playon Chico and then the following day take a big canoe
down to Irgandi. Since the water was pretty calm, we asked the chauffeur if he
could take us directly there. Irgandi is a pueblo built on the coast so it
does not have a port. We arrived in our panga and normally you organize someone
from the pueblo to come meet you out in the ocean and take you back in with a
canoe. We did not have time to organize some one to make a last minute pickup for us, so we
pulled up to an old coral reef and jumped out of the boat onto the reef and hiked
in the rest of the way. It was super nice of them to being willing to drop us off.
The island Irgandi, consists of almost forty houses. Thirteen of
them are traditional cooking houses and you can walk the diameter of the pueblo in
under a minute. Actually, it is no bigger than just about as far as you can throw a rock and that’s
it. One might say its small, but it feels like everyone is just one big
extended family. Even if some of the people don't want to talk to you, they are
still at island activities and will serve you food with a smile.
Irigandi, is a fun and beautiful island. They are in the mountains,
and actually have running water which they tap from a river. And, since they are
so close to the river, the water flows out warm. This is one of the few areas
in the mission where you can actually take a warm shower. However, they have no
bathroom. There happens to be one public bathroom for the entire island which
is for the teachers but it has a lock. Conveniently, they have not realized yet
that we have a key that works which also happens to be our house key. That
being said at the same time any teacher could just use their bathroom key to
break into our house. I think that you could just use a pair of kindergarten scissors
to literally get in. As for everyone else, they just use the beach.
I went on divisions with Elder Hanks Irizarry, and we finally
got everything sorted out. Its official, we are 8th cousins! I know... with the
same last name, you'd think we'd be closer. Q'Sopa Mopri. Anyways that was
really cool to after 18 months of wondering about this mission and finally figuring
that out. Shoutout to Elder Hanks, we an ukubir sabdued ai. He's really such a
good missionary and being creative with his new role as Branch President. He's
making sure everything is running smoothly, learning Dule Gaya, making sure
that everyone has callings, surveying the pueblo what time works more
conveniently in order to have more people at church, and just staying positive
upbeat and diligent as he makes his circles around the island. It’s really
motivating to see someone magnifying their calling to the fullest.
Elder Hanks Irizarry in front. Sign that shows the cost of items with money or if you paid with coconuts. |
I think that Irgandi was probably my favorite island as of yet. Then we went on divisions with Playon Chico. Ukupseni.
That was great they actually have an old sign hanging up there which was cool.
I went on divisions with Elder Randal which was really nice and I realized during
our divisions that I was relying too much on my own experience rather than the
spirit. So, I will try harder to rely more on the Lord which I’m working on.
As I visited the islands, I explained what we need to do to
avoid hitting that mental wall here on the island, because all missionaries
here in San Blas hit that at some point. All of us have said or thought,
"I've talked to literally everyone." I explained that he just needed
to keep being positive. To have a positive mental white wash every morning
before you leave and just keep doing exactly what you're doing. It’s hard to
try to motivate or teach missionaries when President only sends me the best
missionaries. And so, you literally just end up talking about common problems
every missionary has.
Fun new Dule Gaya word of the day. “Chit”- which means, 'Don't
Bother Me'.
From Jake's cousin Megan, currently serving in Colon:
So many of you (especially those of you who read Jake's blog)
have heard a little bit about the Kuna culture. They're an indigenous tribe
from the San Blas islands that have managed to maintain the great majority of
their cultural roots and customs. Many families have begun to move inland, and
depending on how many generations live in Panama depends on how familiar they
are with the culture. We have this really cool family full of first and second
generational Kunas that we've been trying to reactivate. The dad was baptized
in San Blas, and then as he got older and got married, converted his wife and
taught his kids. He grew up with missionaries in San Blas and the Book of
Mormon, and he told us about some cool connections he and an Elder made nearly
2 decades ago.
We were talking about the
islands, and I mentioned that my cousin has been out there and he asked how
it's going with the language. I said I think it's been going okay but one of
the last emails I read talked about how he and his companion got invited to a
tribal council of elders (not the missionary kind) and didn't understand
anything. He laughed his head off and explained it's because the tribe elders
use a lot of ancient, outdated words that even the normal population of native
Kunas don't understand. He then explained to us that the tribal council
meetings were originally more like church/religious councils but now they're
more political.
He also has some very
intriguing theories on how Book of Mormon stories became warped and are now
legends passed down from generation to generation. In Kuna culture there is a
legend about a man named Ibeorgun (some say a prophet, some say God) clothed in
white that descended from the heavens and taught them the Kuna culture. They
word "Ibeorgun" has now been associated and attached to the meaning
"God" and now it is normally viewed as the ancient, outdated version
of the word "God." When Christianity was brought to the islands they
adopted the words "Pab Dumat" and "Pabmachi" which are
"God" and "Jesus", and many people have blended together
the character "Ibeorgun" with "Pabdumat" instead of
"Pabmachi", or Jesus. According to legend, Ibeorgun taught the people
how to make "chicha fuerte", an alcoholic drink all the Kunas are
addicted to. It's this member's theory that "chicha fuerte" is a
distorted ideal recipe that came from the institution of the sacrament, and now
it's become a highly addictive party drink, that comes with it the tradition of
bring one closer to God.
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