How God Used You:- Mission trips to orphanage in Naco, Mexico
-Bible Studies and discipleship
-Meals and fellowship each week!
-Events for community including free oil changes for people in the domestic abuse shelter on campus as well as for students
-Sanctuary and Christian Challenge students’ eyes are opened to human trafficking.
-Lots of students are being met through ASU events.
-Student leaders are being invested in and trained up.
-We’ve been praying for you.
Made possible by God’s mighty power and your prayers & giving: thank you!
Painting the "Great Room"
Bryan and Derek...ready for work! They got up every morning at 6 AM for breakfast and kept going until after the evening guitar sessions.
An organized shed!
Spring Break Mission Trip: Orphanage in Mexico
“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world,” (James 1:27). We had an amazing time getting to know, spending time with and loving the children in Mexico this Spring Break. In fact, we loved it so much: we’ve already been back!
“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world,” (James 1:27). We had an amazing time getting to know, spending time with and loving the children in Mexico this Spring Break. In fact, we loved it so much: we’ve already been back!
Bryan and I have a heart for orphans; since Dallas was a newborn, the thought of a child not being loved and cared for as Dallas is, moved us. We felt like we were in our element loving these children. Our team was able to take down some food and to
ys, do some construction work and our favorite part: spend time with the children.
On our first trip the students cleaned out and organized a storage shed, painted the girls’ bathroom, the boys’ closets, several other small rooms and the “Great Room,” built some much needed shelves, helped serve food and wash dishes. The children were slow to warm up to us, mostly the older children. They craved attention and physical touch. It broke our hearts when three of the children grabbed six of us (three girls and three boys) and played the “Mommy, Daddy” game. Each of the three picked two of us and called us Mommy and Daddy and pulled us around the playground having us do vario
us things.
The older ones were “won over” by Derek bringing out his guitar each night and playing songs, dancing, etc. This was a very special time together: our favorite time. Instead of us having an agenda for them to follow, it was just a time when they could request songs or dancing games, they sang for us, etc. Although there was a language barrier, I know that they felt the love of Jesus through us. I Peter 1:22 “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart.”
Please pray for these sweet children. Several have adoptive homes, but cannot be adopted because of a lack of documents (birth certificate, etc.)
Identifying with the Children: Madison Grace’s Birthday
The students’ Spring Break fell on Madison’s birthday/one year anniversary of her death. We had planned to have a little service of family and friends at the cemetery to remember her, but felt peace about being in Mexico on the day. I thought it would help if we were serving and loving the children: so we wouldn’t be focused on ourselves.
We didn’t intend to tell the children about our loss, but one of the girls was “Grecia” pronounced: Gracia. I told her about how special her name is to me and why and I showed her Madison’s pictures. She told some of other children and two nights later they asked to see her pictures. It was during the evening (the time Bryan and I loved the most with the children) and in God’s amazing and sweet timing: it was on the exact day Madison was born: March 12th. I tried not to cry, but of course teared up when talking to them about little Madison. They hugged me and said, “pobrecita” (poor thing). Then many of them began sharing their deep loss: my sister, my mother and father, etc. Because of our understanding of loss and pain, we identified with these amazing children in a way we never could have without our broken hearts with the loss of Madison. God used our sweet girl’s life to bond us with some children in need and we fell in love with them and I think it’s mutual :) .
Praise God from Whom All Blessing Flow…
We will be Fifteen weeks along on .comMay7th and we could not be more excited about welcoming the twins into our family in October. Kim is doing well and starting to show. Kim and I were featured on our local Fox news about Madison and our surrogacy process. You can see the video on my blog about Madison: madisongracepowers.blogspot
Powers Update
Dallas LOVED Mexico! He fit right in and had what family in Kentucky would call, “a big time.” He
even picked up some Spanish! He could be heard on the merry-go-round yelling, “Rapido, rapido, rapido!!” Once I walked by and he was yelling, “Alto! Alto! Alto!” (Stop.) I told our two students who were pushing it, “I think Dallas wants to stop.” One replied, “No, he thinks it means faster!” So he’s not fluent yet!
ys, do some construction work and our favorite part: spend time with the children.On our first trip the students cleaned out and organized a storage shed, painted the girls’ bathroom, the boys’ closets, several other small rooms and the “Great Room,” built some much needed shelves, helped serve food and wash dishes. The children were slow to warm up to us, mostly the older children. They craved attention and physical touch. It broke our hearts when three of the children grabbed six of us (three girls and three boys) and played the “Mommy, Daddy” game. Each of the three picked two of us and called us Mommy and Daddy and pulled us around the playground having us do vario
us things.The older ones were “won over” by Derek bringing out his guitar each night and playing songs, dancing, etc. This was a very special time together: our favorite time. Instead of us having an agenda for them to follow, it was just a time when they could request songs or dancing games, they sang for us, etc. Although there was a language barrier, I know that they felt the love of Jesus through us. I Peter 1:22 “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart.”
Please pray for these sweet children. Several have adoptive homes, but cannot be adopted because of a lack of documents (birth certificate, etc.)
Identifying with the Children: Madison Grace’s Birthday
The students’ Spring Break fell on Madison’s birthday/one year anniversary of her death. We had planned to have a little service of family and friends at the cemetery to remember her, but felt peace about being in Mexico on the day. I thought it would help if we were serving and loving the children: so we wouldn’t be focused on ourselves.
We didn’t intend to tell the children about our loss, but one of the girls was “Grecia” pronounced: Gracia. I told her about how special her name is to me and why and I showed her Madison’s pictures. She told some of other children and two nights later they asked to see her pictures. It was during the evening (the time Bryan and I loved the most with the children) and in God’s amazing and sweet timing: it was on the exact day Madison was born: March 12th. I tried not to cry, but of course teared up when talking to them about little Madison. They hugged me and said, “pobrecita” (poor thing). Then many of them began sharing their deep loss: my sister, my mother and father, etc. Because of our understanding of loss and pain, we identified with these amazing children in a way we never could have without our broken hearts with the loss of Madison. God used our sweet girl’s life to bond us with some children in need and we fell in love with them and I think it’s mutual :) .
Praise God from Whom All Blessing Flow…
We will be Fifteen weeks along on .comMay7th and we could not be more excited about welcoming the twins into our family in October. Kim is doing well and starting to show. Kim and I were featured on our local Fox news about Madison and our surrogacy process. You can see the video on my blog about Madison: madisongracepowers.blogspot
Powers Update
Dallas LOVED Mexico! He fit right in and had what family in Kentucky would call, “a big time.” He
even picked up some Spanish! He could be heard on the merry-go-round yelling, “Rapido, rapido, rapido!!” Once I walked by and he was yelling, “Alto! Alto! Alto!” (Stop.) I told our two students who were pushing it, “I think Dallas wants to stop.” One replied, “No, he thinks it means faster!” So he’s not fluent yet! Two days before our 2nd trip there, I asked him, “You want to go see our friends in Mexico again?” He immediately pushed his chair away from the table, got up, and said, “Yeah, let’s go!”
Thank You for Your Prayers!
Please pray…
-PRAISE Mexico Mission Trips!
- Kim as she’s pregnant!
-Children in Mexico: their Spiritual walks, Christian families to adopt them and documents to be worked out.
-Healing with losing Madison Grace
-Our support
-PRAISE – Sanctuary’s amazing student leaders
-That students, especially unchurched/unsaved will continue to be drawn to CC & Sanctuary
-Prayer and PRAISE: In-vitro and surrogacy: we’re expecting!
-PRAISE: New church plant
-16 have accepted Christ
- C., G., S., J. & M. to accept Christ
- Sharing the Gospel on campus
Please pray…
-PRAISE Mexico Mission Trips!
- Kim as she’s pregnant!
-Children in Mexico: their Spiritual walks, Christian families to adopt them and documents to be worked out.
-Healing with losing Madison Grace
-Our support
-PRAISE – Sanctuary’s amazing student leaders
-That students, especially unchurched/unsaved will continue to be drawn to CC & Sanctuary
-Prayer and PRAISE: In-vitro and surrogacy: we’re expecting!
-PRAISE: New church plant
-16 have accepted Christ
- C., G., S., J. & M. to accept Christ
- Sharing the Gospel on campus
1 comment:
Dallas is a linguistic genius at his age you know. It's so cool to hear him pick up some Spanish.
I LOVED the part when Dallas was ready to go back to Mexico right now. "Yeah, let's go!" haha! He may be a world traveler one day. ;)
Love you guys.
Sam
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