Poison Frogs and the Cartel

Can we say how much we miss this kid?! One of the things that we love about Jake the most is that he has always made every day an adventure. We miss hearing his daily report each night about all the crazy things that happened during his day.

He's always been this way! Every new experience and every new opportunity look like an adventure through his eyes. Even though we get the feeling that things have been a little hard and scary these last few weeks, he still seems to find the excitement and adventure in it all.

Hey! I love you all and thanks for the emails.Here's what happened this week even though its not much!

I'm attaching the pictures of Leandro my first baptism.

We think this is a pretty big deal! Even though he thinks he didn't do much this week.

Monday not much happened, we found out this week that the God Parents of Lexmmy were involved in either drugs, or with this group of people that smuggle people into the states illegally. If you don't pay them, they kill you. His God Parents were drug out of there house, tortured by cutting their fingers off, beat very brutally and then shot in the head. They leave behind a 2 year old daughter and a 8 month old son. Shocking and sad.

We also found out that there are some small colonies outside of Tapana that speak other Indian dialects as well as Spanish. They are the Cartel essentially. There is about 5 different places like this around us, and it's crazy to think about. But don't worry, i'm safe.

I know that I have the power of the Lord.  I know that I walk in his footsteps and do the same things that Christ did while he was on the earth. So, i'll just call an angel to protect us if we get into trouble ;) I kid, but I really do have that much faith in the power of the Lord and the work that I am doing. 

Anyway, Tuesday nada happened. I have been writing in my journal though.

Wednesday, we had bacon cheeseburgers at Rosa Arouras house, the rich member, because she loves me and asked what my favorite food was. Elders Beardsly, Nickerel and Reyes were super happy that I asked for burgers! ;)

Thursday nothing again, really, and Friday nothing again. except the girl we just baptized, Valentina, she gets mad every time we come by to visit her sister now so IDK whats up with that. Also, Lucero, her sister, is doing better. I think we will be able to baptize her this next week. We found out her God Mother doesn't want her to get baptized, so that has been holding her back., Her god mother is Catholic, but doesn't even practice. She never goes to church, but doesn't want Lucero to go to the Mormon church. She seems like a hypocrite! I guess she just had a miscarriage about a month ago, and she was 5 months pregnant. So, were going to teach the God Mother about eternal families. We hope that helps.

I've been studying the crap out of my Book of Mormon! I'm making what I call, "The Omnipotent BOM" It has every note from the BOM made easier books that I got from grandpa as well as notes from Jesus the Christ and notes from elder Beardsly's BOM. I've added notes from some other good church books as well. 

It's awesome.

Anyway, Saturday nothing happened again. We just worked. Sunday we taught the Sunday school class for the teenagers, SUPER FUNNY!!

No more scorpions to report this week, because it has been raining a ton! But, I've almost caught an iguana a couple of times, and this week I'M GONNA GET HIM!! He hangs out in all the same places so its easy gonna be EASY!

The other night, it was raining, and we were inside doing our planning, and we saw a frog in the road! So I ran out into the rain, and caught him! It turns out, he had bright yellow stripes and a blue belly, not your normal frog. I think it was probably poisonous. I guess it's a good thing I didn't eat him ;) I haven't felt sick, so I think i'm OK.

Well, the whole poison frog thing got me thinking, and talking with Elder Beardsly. So, we know if we die in the mission field, doing to the Lord's work, we gain the Kingdom of God. Unless of course, we're being stupid and doing dumb things. So I wondered, does that count as stupid?

I can just see me up in Heaven, and some guy is like "Hey" and i'm like "Hey. How'd you die?" and he's like "oh I was murdered, what about you?" an i'm like Oh...umm.... well I touched a frog...... pretty dumb way to die" ;)

Hopefully this coming week will be more interesting, and I will have more to report.

Thanks for all you do, and I love you all very much! Thank you for the prayers and the support! I feel them.

If you all have time, you should read chap 22 of 2 Nephi. I'ts awesome and short. Love you all and be safe and have a great week!!!

Para siempre dios este con vos!

Love,

Jake (Elder Dansie)