Sister Madrid....Hermana Nydegger....Called To Serve: LAST TRANSFER…This is not a dream!

Monday…October 27th, 2014

Dearest family,

As I come to the end of my mission life really seems like a blur!

SO MUCH FOR A NATIVE COMPANION..I got my last transfer call and was sad at the fact that I will never be getting a native companion! But I am SO happy to stay in Vigo and to be able to end this mission in one of my favorite places in the world. It still just doesn't click ANYTHING at all about going home. I feel like I will be going home but then that I will be just flying RIGHT back out. I feel like I will in deed be a missionary for the rest of my life! I feel at peace but I also feel just so deeply sad at moments. I am going to miss the mission so much, family!! Well my new companion will be Hermana Bennett…Hermana Christian trained her like right after I left Tenerife so I am excited to just be able to talk for days about Los Cristianos! Speaking of which, I found that M. (this colombian boy Hermana Phillips and I worked with.. remember?) got baptized! what a great feeling that I have for him and his family. It may have been a year later, but I just glad he finally got baptized. We worked so much with him and his mom who was less active. Anyways Hermana Bennett should be great! R. is going to freak out probably when I tell her! I am excited!

This past transfer has been great and has just FLOWN by. Holy cow it just scares me how fast these next ones will fly! My whole mission every transfer pretty much has been faster than the previous.. and if that continues.. I will be home in literally 2 seconds. I am going to miss Hermana Braithwaite so much! I learned so much from her. She is truly an incredible missionary. I still can't even believe that she is going home! She and Hermana money! It is so weird because I feel like I am pretty much part of their group! I guess it means I am going home soon.

Saturday night after saying goodbye to her it just made me reflect sooo much on this LAST transfer and it really made me think that I want to do ALL that I can and just leave every last drop of me in the mission field and magnify my calling even to the very grain. I want and I need to get all that I can out of this incredible and MIRACLE mission.

This past week I got a letter from a friend that was a direct answer. And I have been pondering so much about it this whole week. It has been hitting me hard all week.

3 Ne 8:1-"He truly did many miracles in the name of Jesus; and there was not any man who could do a miracle in the name of Jesus save he were cleansed every WHIT from his iniquity."

WOW! I cannot to any miracle unless I be completely cleaned of every sin even to the little particle. That hit me HARD. It hit me hard because it allowed me to feel and it allowed me to recognized the 100 ways my past life, and current life in the mission that I need to improve. It hit me like TO my very heart. I hit me because I know and I have known that I need to be repenting more earnestly and sincerely and diligently and harder of my sins. I have been working so hard and giving my all and NOW I am working so much harder to be 100% completely through and through clean! I am pouring my heart more and more to the Lord! I want to FEEL CLEAN. Clean and pure like J. right after being baptized. I have recognized my so many mistakes that I have made and I am praying to know if there is any thing more that I need to repent of. Every day we sin without knowing and a lot of the time when we do know. I just want to completely purge myself of any particles of sin from before and during the mission. I want to be as pure and clean that I can be. To be able to answer all of the questions in Alma 5 and to be able to say that I did my best! I am not perfect. Complete perfection is not achieved in this life. But Complete PROGRESSION is. We can be clean, completely clean. We can literally hear and literally feel the Lord telling us, GO thy way and sin no more. and I the Lord will remember then no more. I know there is so much I lack and sometimes I feel that it is all I see, but I am here to humble myself to the Lord and be that worthy vessel in which He can work His miracles.

I Love the Lord. I love the mission. I love repentance and how we truly can feel 100% CLEAN. I am working towards it and I know that It is what I need to do! I am truly FEELING more God directed in my life. And it is overwhelming! How beautiful is it that we can be cleaned from every little whit of sin. Anyone can feel it thanks to the atonement. It is a lesson that I have been learned and it is taking me along time to learn! The cool thing thought is that our Heavenly Father is so patient with us and he knows our hearts and he knows we try.

I think about Alma's cry when he said, "And now, my brethren, I wish from the inmost part of my heart, yea, with great anxiety even unto pain, that ye would hearken unto my words, and cast off your sins, ands, NOT procrastinate the day of your repentance." It just hit me so hard this week thinking about repentance! As missionaries we have the authority to call people who are under our stewardship to repentance (I love it haha) but how often to I call MYSELF to MY repentance? The scriptures countless times has profets that PLEAD to us from the innermost part of their hearts that we repent. Every one of us sins in one way or another and repentance is crucial part of life! Not only that is is the BEST thing we have thanks to a loving Saviour who loves us so much. How often to we call ourselves to repentance?? for it is the true only way and it's the HAPPY way!

Well, I hope you didn't fall asleep in my preaching! It is just something that means a lot to me and is deep in my heart. Please forgive me for anything thing I have done that has every been against the will of the Lord. I love you all so much. It would mean and help me a lot if you could pray for me and help me know in what areas I need to improve in these last 6 weeks! What I need to change and was I need to do.

We as people are always changing! May we take time to think prayerfully and consider the ways we need to change and the sins, even the smallest, that we need to fix with our Lord.

Random side not.. FUNNIEST sunday ever yesterday with J. She shows up in the cute dress Hermana Braithwaite gave her and with just a TON of makeup on. Haha it was so cute! Everyone was so happy to see her. The best part about this whole thing though was the fact that she physically could NOT stay awake during the sacrament meeting including the hymns! We giggled the whole time and was probably the most irreverent sacrament meeting of my life hahaha. We did everything to keep her awake and she just couldn't no matter what we did. At one point we gave her mints and paper to draw on which just resulted in DROOL and lots of it. She was so tired she couldn't even finish her sentences before her head falling down into a deep sleep. She looked over to us and was like, Tengo verguenza! and then CRASH her head fell. Haha! Poor thing. We decided to tell her to just go home, there was no way she would make it all 3 hours. We were slightly worried if she would make it home safely as we watched her slowly walk away. Gotta love Julia!

Dad I loved what you said, sometimes we do focus on the ENDURING to the end. We need to endure it to the end and ENJOY the end

Con mucho amor,

WHOOPS! Here are some of the best pictures that I meant to send of J. last week..