Sister Madalyn Jones: Transferencias

Olá todos!!

This week was a good, bittersweet week!

It started off a normal week of a lot of work and door knocking. Then on Friday when we were doing our weekly planning we got the phone call. The phone call that said we have to update our area book and prepare the area for a whitewash!!! It was a total shock because we thought for sure that at least one of us would stay in Mafra, but nope! We are both leaving!!

It was a really bittersweet feeling to get this call. I love Mafra so much and it will always have a special place in my heart. This is where I learned how to be a missionary, and speak Portuguese. Also really bittersweet because I don’t want to leave all the special people and our investigators here, but I know that the next missionaries here will do a good job and keep up with them (we wrote really detailed lists on how to care for our people here). But it was also a good feeling because there were a lot of rumors about Mafra closing and I was really scared of this. It’s a hard area, and its way tiny, but it can’t close!!!!

Also i highly doubt I will fit everything into my suitcases. Why did I bring so many things?? I understand right now how annoying things are. Also pray that I can survive with my 2 suitcases all alone haha.

Then we had to wait until Sunday night to receive our call about where we are going!! I am going to Seixal to serve in Seixal 1C with Sister Truman. I am pretty excited to be serving with sister Truman! I don’t know her but she is good friends with Shelby Brown and so Shelby told me about her, and she only have 2 more transfers than me so we followed each other on Instagram for a few weeks before she left. It should be good. I am really curious to see what Seixal is like. I think its kinda isolated from other areas, but probably cant be worse than how isolated Mafra is but we will see! I am scared, but also ready for a change!!

The good thing about our whitewash call is that we had time to pass by all of our people here and say a proper goodbye. I will miss all of them!! We prepared Felyphe (how Felipe really spells his name, I don’t know what his mom was thinking) for the next sisters, and promised that he has to stay strong with the word of wisdom and we will stay strong with our sacrifices also! (He is giving up smoking so I am giving up ice (all the people that know me well know how hard that is for me) and sister Conrad is giving up sugar). We also promised to try our hardest to be present at his baptism on the 28th!

We visited Duan, Juiliano, Sophia, and Icaro and said bye also. They have such a special place in my heart. It was the first family I knew in Mafra, and on my first night when I didn’t understand anything! We also said bye to Isabel and Candida (who cried.. love her so much).

There are so many special people here in Mafra that I am going to miss so much, and I already cant wait until I can maybe see them one day in the future. They really have changed my mission and my life.

But now I am excited to go to Seixal and work hard there! I know there are people prepared there for the gospel!!

Give missionaries references!!! Member Missionary work is so much better than just missionary work!! It makes ALL the difference!!

Love you all and hope you all have a great week! I know Heavenly Father has a plan for all of us!!

Sister Jones