This week!‏

Hey Family!


So this week was good! A few things out of the ordinary - Zone Conference on tuesday! Always something I look forward to, and this one was great. It´s the last one with Pres and Sister Myrrha! I can´t believe it, but they leave June 30 (my one year mark!) They showed us a picture of the new president and his wife and told us a little bit about them - they´re from the same place as the president now, Belo Horizonte. They´re also young, I think even a little younger, and he´s worked for years with the church educational system, institute and stuff. So they seem really awesome! The Ribeiros. They get here July 1! So we´ll see how that goes! But the conference was amazing, we learned a lot, discussed a lot, and even got the flu vaccine!


Which turned out to have some adverse consequences....I´m pretty sure it actually gave me the flu! No, I don´t even know if that´s possible, and I don´t have the flu because I haven´t had a fever. But after the vaccine I definitely haven´t been normal:P But it´s ok, I´m totally fine, no worries, just some sneezy/coughiness. But on Friday Sister Witmer got sick (food poisoning type) so we stayed home all day. That was kind of hard, I had kind of forgotten what it´s like not to be busy! But it was nice to rest a little as I wasn´t feeling great either.


But as for the work we did get done this week, it was good. Kind of a downer on Wednesday when Tiago called and cancelled his appointment for that night, and then wouldn´t re-schedule. Just said, "Oh, I´ll just call you another time...." which basically means he doesn´t want any more. But we´re not giving up on him! We´re going to pass by another day and surprise him, talk a little bit and find out why he´s giving up. It´s so strange, he was SO excited. The enemy really works on people when they start getting on the right path.


So we started working in a really interesting neighborhood, where we found a ton of inactive members! I don´t know how, we had never met or heard of any of them, but we were just knocking doors and at 3 houses the people said they were already members but hadn´t been in a long time. One, Ricardo, found us in the street! We were walking past us and he said, "Sister!" in this wistful, kind of sad way. So we started talking and asked if he had already known missionaries, and he said he was baptized 20 years ago after being taught by sisters! He said he´d been inactive 15 years but wanted to come back so badly. There must have been some kind of confusion, because he said the bishop in that era had told him not to come to church anymore, which is impossible. He must have misunderstood. But anyway, we invited him to a family night that very night, and he came! It was great. He said he´d come Sunday, but didn´t...but we´ll get him to come next week. He´s really great, really humble, such a good person.


But that´s kind of it for this week - we´re still doing all we can to get the members on our side so the ward can really grow. It´s going, slowly, but going! I know everything will turn out fine, because we´re doing our best. I´m so glad to be here, even in the hard times, because I´m learning things I would never learn anywhere else, that will change my future for eternity. I´m so grateful for this opportunity. Thank you all so much for helping me get here. I know this is the work of the Lord, and I know that if we´re humble and faithful we can be instruments in His hands to bring about His great work. The time is flying by, and I´m trying to take advantage of it while it´s still here! I love you all and can´t wait to hear more from you. Have an amazing week!


Til next tme!
Sister Madsen