Legendary Missionary: Put off Emergency Transfer for 4 Days

Hey family and friends, 

Boy do I got a lot to say...maybe the subject of the message shows a little bit of that. This week was absolutely insane. 

So the beginning of the week we were prepping Mauro for baptism, and he was completely ready. He didn´t have a single problem, and our new ward mission leader came to every single lesson we had with him. It was awesome! 

Wednesday the need for cardigans arose. We barely slept it was so cold. And it literally just dropped. From like 30 degrees celcius to about 15 overnight. And now we are cold. Although  during the day it really isn´t too bad with the sun. But cardigans are necessary a lot of the time. 

Well, we told ya´ll that we were staying in Balneario and we told all of our investigators and less actives too. We weren´t lying. 

Thursday morning we were getting ready to leave, like 11 in the morning. And the phone started ringing, I was in the middle of brushing my teeth and Sister ogle was in the bathroom. And it was president. I ran and spit everything out as I answered the phone. President asked where we were and if we were both listening, which is never a good sign. Then he said he had a challenge for us. He said that we were going to be emergency transferred. He asked if we accepted. I didn´t understand that we were going together until like two minutes later. He said there was a sister who got sick and had to go home, and we needed to be companions with the sister who was still here on the mission. He wanted us to leave on Friday. Almost in tears we told him that we had a baptism marked for Saturday and the interview marked for Friday and HE LET US STAY!!!!!! THAT was LITERALLY the biggest miracle of this week. But the rest of the next four days was a lot of tears as we had to go back and tell everyone that we were in deed leaving. It was awful. 

I cannot even begin to explain how much I learned and grew in Balneario. I am so grateful for the time that I got to spend there. It was amazing. And I sure hope that one day I can go back and finish up some of the work I started there. 

Well, MAURO WAS BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY!!!!! IT WAS AMAZING!!!! I have never seen anyone with such a big smile on their face as they came out of the font. He was so happy and the Spirit was so strong. There was so much that should have happened that the baptism shouldn´t have been possible, but Heavenly Father gave us a lot of miracles and EVERYTHING worked out. We got to sing "Lord, I Would Follow Thee" in  English, Spanish, and Portuguese and it was amazing. I was almost in tears. holy cow. It´s been a really emotional week. 

Mauro!!!

Well, we put off an emergency transfer for 4 days and so now everyone in the escritorio (mission office) knows who we are....but we couldn´t put it off any longer. And so today we traveled to Floripa, and yes, there were more tears saying goodbye to the sweet sisters that have been through so much with us, and then we got our new companion. We will be a trio. Sister Ogle, Sister Branco, and I. Sister Branco is Brazilian, and is super sweet. We are really excited now that we are here, and we think that it will be good. And we are in an area close to Floripa called Fazenda do Max, in the city of São José. It´s a lot smaller than what we are used to...so we´ll see how it goes.

Headed to Floripa!

Our District for a week

Saying Goodbye to our Apartment

But it has been really hard, and if it isn´t too much to ask a few prayers our way would be much appreciated. 

Matt. 14:28-30. keep your gaze fixed on the Lord. The second we let it drop to the world, we fall, But the Savior is there and he will catch us. Just like happened with Peter. 

Love you all! 

Have a great week! 

Sister Wilkins