Semana dos Milagres (Week of Miracles)

Week #40 

Suffice it to say this week should be recorded as guided by the Hand of the Lord. Deixa-me explicar.

Every mission has what is called a Standard of Excellence. This standard is established by the mission president as an ideal for every companionship. Basically, an area firing on all cylinders should meet this standard. The number of lessons taught, if we had a baptism, how many contacts, how many progressing investigators, everything. If our numbers at the end of the week are good enough, and it's hard to do (exhausting really), it's called Semana de Excelência (Week of Excellence). It means working hard all day, everyday of the week and a lot of help from members. It takes a lot of time.

Our goal this week was Semana de Excêlencia. We thought everything would be fine, but what happened? We lost one day to a Zone Conference and four hours of travel. We lost another afternoon traveling to another area (two hours away) so my companion could do an interview. We spent the night there and returned the next morning just in time for the Zone Leaders to arrive and do and exchange. I went to another area with a greenie  (a brand new missionary) for one part of the afternoon and came back to my area about 7 P.M. 

In short, we lost two-and-a-half days of our week and still had a baptism, two confirmations and uma Semana de Excelência. Milagres? Acho que sim.

Baptism is a very good word and a very good feeling. This week we baptized Jucélia. I think I've talked about her before, but she really is incredible. First, her mother and sister were not ready for baptism, but she decided to go ahead and be baptized herself. Second, while she and her mother were at church, her mother (who is diabetic) started to feel strange (turned out her blood sugar was high) and went home with the second counselor of the branch and his wife. Jucélia continued to worry, but stayed at church and was baptized. 

Now, her mother and sister have an example to follow (they liked the pictures of the baptism) and will be baptized this week. We also may have an opportunity to teach her brother who is in prison and rethinking some things. We still don't know if we can do that, but it should be interesting. I love this family. They even gave me socks for my birthday. 

It's also very possible that I won't get any pictures of Jucélia's baptism. All the photos are on Elder Vieira's camera and it's been doing some weird things lately. 

Other photos.

We spent the day with the ward mission leader and found some really cool places. 

The sandy place is all sand taken from some small lakes that's sold to be used in cement. The lakes are the absolute clearest thing I have every seen. Very clean water. I don't have a good picture of the water.

More pictures coming. 

That's what I've got this week. 

Elder Dickson