Clovis, NM---Robbed!!

Hello Friends and Family,

         Not going to lie this week has been very hard and it would appear that this week is going to start out rough!!!

          There have been some very spiritual moments happen as well as many hard difficult times.

       For this whole transfer I have been cleaning up Clovis from missionaries that have been a little less than obedient. When I got here we had almost 10+ investigators and NOBODY was progressing toward baptism, so we have been weeding out the "eternigators". Well, we had been through everyone except one lady and her son. missionaries had been seeing them for about 1 1/2 years pretty consistently. So, in our first lesson I had total intentions of dropping her. However, the spirit WOULDN'T LET ME! So, we set a return apt. and I committed her to read the Book of Mormon every day. She said she would. Well, she canceled that apt. and told us she would be busy the next week so this week we just randomly stopped by (with the intent of dropping her). She let us in. We talked and STILL I COULDN'T DROP HER! So, we set up a church tour (she hadn't ever been). So yesterday she comes to the church. We have a member there. We go to different rooms, talk about different pictures, share some scriptures. It was wonderful! Then stand in the foyer to tell her a little about what she is going to feel and what not. So, we walk in the chapel and have a moment of silence (AND I DIDN'T FEEL ANYTHING AND USUALLY I DO!!!) So I was stressing out thinking, "Oh my goodness, the Spirit isn't here! What is wrong?" Then she starts talking and she shares about a time when she felt the Spirit so strong and that same feeling came back and she has never felt it like that again. So we walk up to the sacrament tables and we talk about how it is like a mini baptism. Then we read to her from Mosiah 18 and when we got to the part, "Then what have you against being baptized?" She just sat down on the bench and just said she just isn't ready yet, and she needed time alone to study.

FINALLY! The Lord truly does work though wonderful ways! Although now isn't her time, and I am not her missionary, the time will come when she will take time to read the Book of Mormon and remember what she felt in that chapel. She will accept the gospel one day!

Another great thing! We have not started teaching a part member family! Jeff in not a member. Jennie is his wife… she is a member. Apparently, in ‘08 Jeff took the lessons but was soooo hard-hearted and hateful, so it just didn't work out. But he started coming to church, so we set an apt. (He is skeptical of Joseph smith) So when we got to The First Vision, before I said it, I said, "Jeff, I want you to put yourself in Joseph Smith’s shoes. You're pretty much there, you’re seeking for the truth, you’re exhausted of going to one church then another church. Imagine this as you." And I started…. AND HE STARTED TO CRY!!!!!!!!!!!! It was soooo amazing! HE HAS A BAP DATE FOR THE 12^TH!!

We are also teaching a hulking black guy, and oh my goodness ,sooooo ready!!!! Sooo ready!!!!! He also has a bap date for the 12^th!!

I am soo happy for general conference! I need some time to be just spiritually “tidal waved” after all this craziness that has happened! The Women’s Broadcast was so great! The only thing was IT WASN'T LONG ENOUGH!!! We had a less- active pick up one of our investigators and THEY ARE NOW THE BEST OF FRIENDS!! IT IS SOOOO GREAT!!!!!!

As for rough things... last night we got a text at 8:40, or so, from a less active we are working with and it was a "goodbye suicide text”. So we rush over there and she is not doing well so we get members over there... Then we leave... Then this morning.... we found out we got robbed... They took my wallet and GPS and Cd's..... so great......... it is a rough life in the Clovis, New Mexico area....

Anyway, chuggin’ along and it will be a great night... :) Pretty sure I just need to sleep for a few days, but that is apostate so I won't :)

Anyway, pray that we will get some information about my drivers license. I don't care if I don't get anything else back, but that is going to be the hardest thing to replace... :/

Love y’all!

Have a great week and great conference!

Sister Dawes

Letter for 3.24.14

Brinne’s Letter for the week of 3.24.14

Eeeeeeeekkkkkkk! Oh my goodness! I am almost at my 7 month mark!! I was thinking about it today. Sister Dunham started training me and Sister Clark when she was at her 7 month mark! AND NOW SHE IS AT HER 14…. TIME FLIES!!!!!!!!!

It is amazing to see where I have come from! To start off, 1 year ago I was a nanny in Virginia! Awesome! Then, Idaho for school, then back to Utah, then Texas, and now in New Mexico!!!!!! How crazy is that! And to come on a mission and not even know why to LOVING MY MISSION!

It has been a great week! Although tough, it has been great. Last week I was trying to study about the atonement, and I was looking for this UNVEIL A MISTORY OF GOD moment, and I didn't get one.  I started to get annoyed and frustrated! So then, I started studying about pride---- yea, bad topic to study. lol! Because then my self-esteem was being targeted by Satan and well, that was really hard! So now I am reading all the general conference talks before GENERAL CONFERENCE IN APRIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YIPPEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My studies have gone really well since I started doing that!!!

Here is an awesome experience we had this week:

We have been working with a lot of less-actives lately :) Like, that is our whole teaching pool! We have been working with one lady named Angela. Angela’s sister is on a Sr. Mission right now and Angela got baptized many years ago. She went less-active… not really sure why. Well, missionaries had been going over there for many months and things were going well. She started coming to church super good! Then, when I got there i quickly discovered that it was a "hang out house" for missionaries.... :( Always so sad when we find those. So sister Scott and I changed that. We asked Angela if we could go over the lessons again to try to help her understand more. She agreed. So last week we taught the restoration and IT WAS AWESOME!!!! As we were teaching she was answering her own questions and learning so much! Then, this week we were going to go teach the Plan of Salvation. (For some reason she wouldn't ever let us pray with her) So to start off our lesson I bluntly asked, "Angela, why don't you ever let us pray with you?" She goes on to tell us how ever since she was a kid she had had these dreams that are like real and they happen. She gave us a few examples of times when her dreams came true. Well, long story short, we didn't try to interpret her dream or give her explanations of why she has dreams, but we were able to teach about Priesthood Blessings and getting blessings of comfort :) This was like at 8:30 at night :) And we were able to help Angela get a blessing that night. I made some phone calls and the men of the ward were able to administer a beautiful blessing. In it God was able to tell her how much he loved her and how he needed her to read and study the scriptures and pray, pray, pray!!!! It was so amazing. Just such a beautiful thing to be apart of!!!!!!!!!!! Then, little did I know, until after that Angela’s latest dream was of her getting a blessing…and with those men that were there! It was really beautiful!

I am just so excited to be able to come home and tell you about all of these experiences because typing them in email just isn't the same! Uou can't even read how much I love her! Or how much I love serving the people of Clovis, New Mexico! It truly is wonderful!

This week Sister Scott and I have done TONS of walking.... like 4 hours a day! And Sister Scott, that little trooper, had been suffering from constant headaches for the past 4 weeks :( (Bad reaction to medication- so we got her off of it last week and now it is cycling out of her body) She just keeps on going. However, we both got Priesthood Blessings yesterday and the Lord told her she needs to take a break and get better! So, if the Lord said it we will be breaking for a little while everyday!!! ha ha ha!

Anyway! We are really searching for the elect… trying to find them!!!!! We are really praying that 3 potentials will have real potential!!!! We have a lesson with one tonight. His name is James. The Elders found him. He is in his 50’s. Apparently, when he was a kid he went to church and he had the most beautiful voice in the world. Then, when he was 16 he stopped going and God took his ability to sing away and now he can't sing. The Elders said while James was saying this, they both had the impression that they needed to promise him that if he would listen to what we had to say, and he did what he needed to do…to come to know this was true, that God would give him his singing voice back!!!!!! So PRAY THAT TONIGHTS LESSON GOES WELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I just love being on a mission! I would love to be able to send a picture of my skin right now! My shoulders are like white as paper, part of my neck is brown, and upper neck is red as a tomato...... yup going to be buying sun screen today!!!!!!!!!! ha ha ha!!!!

I love you all. I love my mission. And I love being a missionary! Have such a great week! I love y'all!

Sister Brinne Dawes

Happy St. Patty's Day 3.17.14

Happy St. Patty’s Day with a “GREEN” package from Mommy and Daddy to me and Sister Scott!!! This is so cute!!

Well, this week I don't have too much to report :)

It has been an amazing week though :)

President was able to come to have interviews. That was really great :) It was amazing to talk to him and tell him how much I have been able to see myself grow! This transfer, in particular! Sister Scott and I have been working so hard. We have been able to help so many less-actives come back to activation!! This week we had a miracle happen:)

Since I got here to New Mexico, the sisters were teaching this family: Joe and Krista.  Joe is a less-active member. He was forced to go to church as a kid and that pushed him away. :(

Krista grew up Catholic. Also forced to go to church, but she wouldn't ever pay attention. So she knows very little about Jesus Christ.

Joe contacted the Sisters because they have 2 little boys and Joe wanted Krista to kind of get a background of what he grew up with. So the Sisters started coming over. In the beginning Joe wouldn't participate at all because he didn't want to sway Krista. They were always dragging their feet when it came to coming to church.

Missionaries never extended a baptismal date because Krista and Joe aren't married. But this week we were at a lesson and it was not going anywhere so I prayed to let Heavenly Father speak through me and say what He needed to say. Well, the next thing I knew I was extending a baptismal date to someone who can't get baptized... and that made a world of difference! Joe has been participating in lessons sooooooo much! He’s doing so many amazing things to help Krista. They talk about the church all the time in a good way, and yesterday THEY CAME TO CHURCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YEA!!!!! THEY TALKED TO BISHOP AND WILL DISCUSS MARRAIGE WITH HIM SOON!!!!!!!!!! WE ARE SO EXCITED!

The Lord really does work through us if we let Him. This truly is His work and His glory. He just needs us to step aside and be willing to let Him work through us!

I haven't much time, so have a great week!

Sister Dawes

Brinne's Letter 3.10.14 Clovis, NM

Hello Friends and Family,

Well, it has been such a great… Hard week.

This week we (Sister Scott and I) found out that we are here to pick up the broken pieces of Clovis North. Sadly, we have had less than obedient missionaries here in the past, and they didn't contribute much to helping this place grow. They left us with a very large teaching pool. However.... NONE of them were progressing. They were just houses missionaries could go to and just "visit."

Monday started off the "Hard" week :)

After P-day we went to a members home who is not doing well at all. (She got up in church in testimony meeting and claimed she was attempting killing herself.) So, that’s no good. Well, that was quite eventful! We ended up having the cops and EMS there…. And they took her to the hospital... We were hoping she would go to Roswell to get medication and fixed, but wow... it was eventful!

Then, on Tuesday we had the hardest lesson of my mission yet. My companion is so great! Throughout her mission the Lord has been helping her learn about herself and she has grown so much. She is a more quiet person and often isn't too bold, but this week we had an "Eternigator" that we had to either drop or get her progressing. (This was a very spiritual lesson for me to learn). In the morning during planning for the lesson Sister Scott and I had no idea what she needed. So we prayed and prayed together and separate, and we came up with the conclusion that she NEEDED to pray out loud with us or else she wouldn't get the answer, and if you'll remember ( I think I mentioned it last email) that I almost got us kicked out of her house because I invited her to pray and kind of pushed to see if she would do it. So, I was scared. I told Sister Scott, “You’re going to have to be the one to invite her to pray.” There is no way I will be able to do it. So all morning we role played how we can approach the situation and how Sister Scott can go into inviting her to pray. We knew what we had planned is what our investigator needed. We went to our "member presents" home and told her what her purpose of being there was and that it would be VERY likely that we get kicked out again, but we were praying our investigator would pray. We get to our investigator’s house and I started out by telling her our experience of the morning and how we were going to read some scriptures. Then Sister Scott just took the lesson away and told her how much she loved her and why we do what we do as missionaries and just testified and she concluded it with, "At the end of our lesson Sister Dawes isn't going to pray, I'm not going to pray, and Sister Fulton (member) isn't going to pray. We will invite you to pray. If you choose to say “no” we will leave without a prayer." And WOW!!!  The spirit was strong. We read the chapter we picked with her and then at the end of the lesson invited our member to pray. She declined and I was filled with the spirit to be extremely bold. I told her, "If you choose not to pray at this time with us here you will not get your answer for quite a few Years. If you choose to pray now you WILL get your answer. But we won't make you pray." Sadly, we left without a prayer and with one less investigator. It broke our hearts to know that the Lord would have answered her prayer if she would have put forth the faith to try. I know the power of prayer. I have had so many experiences with the Holy Ghost on my mission that I can not deny his power and the power of prayer. I know the Lord answers prayers and the He is waiting for us to ask. I know this investigator would have gotten her answer if she would have asked. I don't know why she needed to do it with us there, but I know she will not be receiving any answer about the truthfulness of this gospel for quite a while. Sister Scott was so amazing. I am so proud of her. She did something she didn't think she could do. She is going to be a changed missionary after this transfer.

After that hardship we went out biking to morning find, and we came upon a man. He wasn't interested, but there was this little boy biking around and he stopped to hear what we were saying, and when we said goodbye to this man he said "MY MOM IS HOME." (We were caught of guard :) We said, “Well, will you take us to her?” He did. The mom came out and talked to us. She told us she had lost faith in Jesus Christ because a family member had committed suicide a year ago. And we told her we had a message special for her that will bless her. We were supposed to see her yesterday, but she wasn't home, so we will keep trying. But I know after our trials the Lord sends us miracles, and I really hope she is our miracle. :)

The Elders also in our ward gave us a solid, solid referral :) Well, actually, a family of like 8 people!!!!! 2 of the kids came to church yesterday and oh my goodness--- they are so ready :) We went over and we were able to talk with the mom. (The elders had never met her) and she told us she wants to listen as well :) The Lord really does bless his servants that work hard, and Sister Scott and I are working HARD! We have a meeting with them Thursday at 7 pm!

I testify that this is the Lords church and he is leading and guiding Sister Scott and I. On Friday Sister Scott and I were trying a bunch of Less- actives that nobody knows anything about. One particular house was empty, so something we have been taught to do is knock 5 houses to the left, 5 to the right, and 5 across. So we did. We went to the left (nobody was interested) 5 in front (no interest) then 4th door over-- a family answered and told us they had just been in Utah and they had been on temple square. They didn't have much time, so we will be going back shortly. Then 2 doors from them we found more less active members that we are going to try to bring back!

Yesterday, we went and saw a less active/part member family. We found out that this house was a hang out home for missionaries, and they went over there and taught fluff...(as Sis Scott would call it). Well, yesterday for the first time in 1 1/2 years we, because we did our calling, were able to hit the bottom of the iceberg. And we are going to help them overcome their trials and help them understand the atonement!

THE CHURCH IS SO TRUE AND IT TRULY DOES BLESS LIVES :)

I am so grateful I get to be a missionary, and I am grateful that I have chosen to be an obedient missionary. Blessings are poured out upon obedient missionaries, and I am just now seeing the real definition of missionary work and it is great :) So great :)

Have such a great week I love you all :

Clovis, NM 3.3.14

* Ron Jones, I met your high school prom date!!! (I can't remember her name but I met her!)

**Started the week of with a BANG here in Clovis! Nearly got us kicked out of an investigators home.... I was being a little pushy in the fact of, "Hey, you've been meeting with the missionaries for a very long time (you’re an “eternigator”) and you feel you aren't getting any answers.. You've never prayed out loud... so let’s do this thing......." *** I didn't say it like that**** and she basically said, "In 5 minutes y’all are going to be leaving (look at my clock-- about right) not because your time is up, but because I am going to ask you to leave..." Good ending.. We changed the subject... and she still came to church.

*** And on Friday I was greeted by Clovis by catching the Famous "Clovis Crud."  I hope to be able to send home a lovely picture of my living space from the past 4 days... Today is the first day I have felt pretty well... I have hardly eaten anything.... mostly toast...... and well toast... and that’s about it.. and Gatorade.

**** I don’t know where my time has gone, but I had some amazing scriptural insight that I wanted to share with everyone, but now I don't have enough time, so I’ll just send pictures home today and I’ll write my insight in a letter and have mom type it up and put in on the blog. (And will you send it to me so I can send it to my friends!!! It was from Alma 17!!! I LOVE THE SCRIPTURES!!!!

***** OH SUPER COOL THING--- ON THURSDAY SISTER SCOTT AND I GOT 18 MORNING FINDS!!!! NEW RECORD for me...!! This transfer is going to be amazing. It's going to push me out of my comfort zone. From what I have heard Sister Scott is more reserved and quiet (I've seen that). From my past companionships we have been about equal in craziness so it's easy to just relax and let you companion take over... However, that's not going to be happening this transfer.... Anyway, I am going to grow so much  from Sister Scott! I just know it and I hope I can help her as well!!

ANYWAY, I'LL SEND SOME PICTURES!!

I LOVE YALL!!