Week of Miracles

Olá! 

Well, this week was super long but it was absolutely incredible!!! Sister George and I get along super duper well and she is just super great! Love her so much! She is from Layton.

Me and Sister George

Our first day as comps, Tuesday was absolutely crazy. We had two lunches because we couldn´t get a hold of the Irmã in the ward the night before and she called us after we had eaten and asked where we were. That sure was an adventure! 

Wednesday we had 5 LESSONS!!! Just in that day. That NEVER happens!!! It was crazy!!! We were so tired at the end of the day, but really that has been every day this week. We are doing so much work and the amount of concentration we are both putting into lessons and even just conversations is more than we have ever had to do before, because we used to just rely on our companion who was fluent in Portuguese and now we don´t have that, but I am super glad because it is stretching us and we are learning a lot. 

Honestly, we are receiving a ton of Heavenly help. From the first moment we went to that lunch we knew we were receiving help. The Portuguese we are speaking is better than we were able to speak last week and we have been able to explain everything we needed to so far. We have been able to teach evey lesson well and none of this is because of us. It is all thanks to our Heavenly Father. He is so mindful of us and our needs and I know that I wouldn´t be able to do any of this without Him. 

I am also amazed at how much I am feeling the Spirit. The way I have felt the Spirit on my mission is totally different than the way I felt it before. It has been very difficult for me to recognize it and I was having a hard time with this. But I have felt the Spirit so strongly in my life this week. I have felt him there in our lessons and I know that He is helping me and guiding our work. I am getting better at recognizing him, his promptings, and then following them. I am so grateful for the Spirit. Without him, our work as missionaries cannot go forward, we will not get anywhere without him. 

This Friday was pretty cool. We had district meeting. Elder Reis and Elder Gomes made a treasure hunt for us to find breakfast. They had clues and they had told us that we needed to rely on the Spirit and that we might find a teaching opportunity. Well, our church is in the middle of a bunch of houses. Our last clue said we had to knock on a door. So I tried knocking on the church door, yup, that did nothing for us. We had to cross the street and we knew that was the door we needed to knock on, but we were all struggling to get up the courage to go knock on this door and ask some random person if she had our breakfast. Finally we knocked, no one answered. I knocked louder and a sweet little old lady came to the door. We left a pass-along card with her and then she asked if there was something else we wanted from her. Sister Ribeiro asked if two young men happened to leave something with her for us. She laughed, invited us in and gave us the food. We laughed with her for a few minutes because the whole time she had been watching us out the window. The Elders recorded the video too. It was pretty funny. But really I learned quite a bit from that experience. We have to have the courage to talk to people because we never know who is going to be prepared for something we have or prepared to help us find others or prepared to serve in the church! But it all starts with our courage. 

With President and Sister Silva after a long day or working

Friday night we had a dinner with President that one of the Irmãos in the ward prepared. Member couples invited nonmember couples and President talked about how families are important and read from The Family: A Proclamation to the World. It was super awesome. We have some new potential investigators. And the mayor of Tubarão was there. So that was pretty cool! 

This Sunday, we didn´t have any of our investigators at church! Half the ward was gone too! It was so weird and pretty sad!

Well, as for investigators. 

Mari didn´t even make an effort to stop drinking coffee. She doesn´t have a desire to yet, so we are going to be praying for that desire to manifest itself. We started teaching her the commandments and we taught her about Keeping the Sabbath Day holy. It went really well! But then she wasn´t at church. Luis, her husband was, but he said she had some really bad head pain so she stayed home. 

Vera is becoming very depressed because of her situation with the divorce. She nearly talked our ears off for an hour. I flat out told her that she wouldn´t be as depressed if she would come to church and try to make some friends. She hasn´t been to church in a month now. And we even called her Saturday night and she wasn´t there Sunday. I am getting to a point where I really don´t know how I can help her any more and it is devastating. All I want is for her to come to church, but we don´t have a car, we can´t pick her up and drive her, so it´s hard because all we can do is invite her and ask the members to give her a ride. 

Well, Christmas decorations are up!!! IN THE WHOLE CITY!!! IT IS GORGEOUS!!! We were walking down the main road, hardly any cars or people were out and then the Christmas lights just suddenly turned on. It was gorgeous!!! I am SOOOO Excited for Christmas!!!! But it is getting extremely hot here. It was at 31 degrees Celcius yesterday which is pretty cool for the week and that doesn´t factor in the ridiculous amount of humidity we experience. So, it doesn´t completely click in my head that it´s getting really close to Christmas. 

But, with all the sun we walk in, I am more tan than I have ever been. It is super great! Blessings of the mission! haha. 

Well, I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving and that sometime this week you can take 10-15 minutes and just offer a heartfelt prayer of gratitude to your Father in Heaven because He has given us everything. Don´t ask for anything, just express your gratitude to Him. 

I am super grateful for all of you and for the marvelous opportunity I have to serve a mission! I wouldn´t trade it for anything. 

Love you all! 

Sister Wilkins