BEND — Jake Martin, the brother of a Bend teenager missing in Brazil, teared up on Wednesday after calling his 17-year-old sister a sensitive person who “does not have a vindictive bone in her body.’’

Reading a statement at a news conference up the road from the family home, Martin thanked three members of Oregon’s congressional delegation for helping his parents secure visas so they could fly to Brazil to be closer to the search for his sister by Brazilian authorities and the FBI.

At the conclusion of his statement, Martin looked into the television cameras and said: “Mykensie, if you are out there, if you are listening, please, please get a hold of us.’’

Mykensie Martin has been in Brazil since July as an exchange student.

Brazilian officials say the Bend high school student was last seen hitchhiking Sunday to a Mormon Church function in Brasilia, the capital of the South American nation.

“We’re preparing for the worst and hoping for the best,’’ the teen’s father, Steve Martin, told The Bulletin newspaper of Bend before flying to Brazil with his wife, Stephanie.

“We just feel we need to get down there because we can’t effectively communicate from here and we need to be there to find out anything we can,’’ he said.

Friends and family were gathered at the family’s home in Bend, hoping for some word from authorities in Brazil, where it appeared the girl had taken a bus 38 miles from her host family’s home in the city of Carmo do Paranaiba in Mina Gerais state to attend church in Patos de Minas.

Instead of returning home, she changed her ticket to travel 150 miles to Unai, where she was seen on the side of a highway trying to hitchhike to Brasilia to attend a church function because she did not have enough money for the bus.

Jake Martin said it’s not like his sister to take off without checking in with her family. He added that his sister “loves her host parents, and we know they are very upset and worried.’’

Mykensie had last been in contact with her family in Bend on Saturday, when they received an e-mail saying she was getting ready to take guitar lessons and joining a gym, said sister-in-law Ashley Martin.

“She sounded like she was doing great, she sounded very upbeat,’’ Ashley Martin said by telephone from Bend.

Born in the Portland area, Ashley grew up in Sandy on the flanks of Mount Hood. Three years ago her family moved to Bend, a former timber and ranching town that has turned into one of the fastest-growing areas of Oregon.

Her father owns a home construction company and her mother is a nurse.

She is the youngest of four children. Brother Jake, 24, is a partner in the family construction company; brother Cody, 22, studies chemical engineering at Brigham Young University in Utah, and sister Mykle, 18, is studying nursing there, said Ashley Martin.

At Summit High School, Mykensie played on the tennis team, and ran cross country and track, while posting a grade point average of better than 3.7, said Principal Lynn Baker. As the student body community service representative, she organized the blood drive and holiday canned food donations to the local food bank.

“Mykensie is the kind of student that makes a high school run: positive, outgoing, willing to pitch in to any job that’s given her,’’ he said. “She’s a very mature young lady, very self-sufficient and she’s just the kind of person you want representing your high school.’’

She is one of about 30 exchange students sponsored by local Rotary clubs this year, Baker added.

Jake Martin told The Bulletin that his sister wanted to go to Argentina, where he had been on a two-year church mission, but due to the political unrest there he suggested Brazil.

Lineu Cardoso, the father of Mykensie’s host family in Carmo do Paranaiba, Brazil, said in a telephone interview that she arrived speaking no Portuguese but was conversational by the time she disappeared. He added that she appeared to be homesick, crying in her bedroom and occasionally at school during the first few weeks, but seemed to be adapting to life in a town with far fewer activities than she was used to at home.

With her long, wavy light-brown hair and blue eyes, family friend Michael Emery could imagine Mykensie riding in a covered wagon across the country to start a new life.

“The first time you see her she hugs people,’’ Emery said. “She has an amazing amount of maturity and wisdom beyond her years.

“She was very excited about the country. She went to a lake and went swimming. She just was visually absorbing everything around her. She really felt close to and enjoyed her host parents.

“She thought it was a great adventure,’’ Emery said.