December, 2011

Great Mission Trip 


 It’s been a couple of months between newsletters, and we’ve actually been down to see the kids in Mexico twice since then. It’s been such an amazing place to take students so that they can see how fortunate they are and how they can step out and truly serve those who need it most. 


 One of the kids has dealt with some major anger issues, for good reason, and started off being very hard to work with because he would fight with the kids and intentionally say mean things to us and the people with us to see if we would still love him. Over the course of a couple of years, he has progressed so much and was a joy to be around the last time we were there. 


 Sanctuary, the church we planted a few years ago and have since passed on to some other leadership, also came and plans to get involved this year in helping with the kids at the orphanage. It’s exciting to see other people getting involved in something that has been so close to us. 


 The real ministry though, happened around a campfire with the kids because we wanted to have a fun, special night with them. We roasted marshmallows, shot off fireworks and sang English and Spanish songs. It was amazing seeing these kids just have joy as we love them and spend time with them. It’s like going to see family every time we go now. 


Pray for them though, because the older boys have been forced to leave by the Mexican government, one being "R" who had to leave his sister alone. This is something totally out of our hands, and with the constantly changing Mexican laws, there seems to be no reason behind what’s been going on. Please keep them in your prayers. 


 Please Pray for these Students 


I've also been doing some serious counseling downtown, which came right as I was taking a counseling class in that at Golden Gate Seminary. The training has helped so much as some issues from students that I’ve known for a couple years are just coming out. Pray especially for the students who are dealing with family issues, including abuse, because there has been too much of that going on this year.


Two of our long-time student leaders, Ryan and Kelsey , are expecting! We are super excited for them, and I’m getting to walk Ryan through more discipleship where I’m helping prepare him for being a dad. We’re blessed to be able to do pre-baby counseling because babies change so much in a relationship. I’m praying that he is going to be more prepared that I was and we’re taking steps to make sure that happens. 


 Powers Update (by Jamie) 

Support that doesn’t cost a penny… (For AZ only) Instead of paying State Tax to the State, you can donate (for a tax CREDIT) that money to be used for Christian education, specifically to benefit a missionary family. You can bless us tremendously by using some of your owed Arizona State income tax dollars to donate to ACSTO (Arizona Christian School Tuition Organization, Inc.) designated for Dallas Powers at (Please email me for school - jamiempowers@yahoo.com). You will receive a tax credit dollar for dollar against AZ State income tax. Pls. call me or check their website for Q's and A's: http://www.acsto.org/   My parents did this for years as well as friends and family and it is LEGIT. It is a dollar for dollar, you pay it to the State or you can donate it. If you have State tax liability, please consider donating it instead. You have until April 15, 2012 for it to count for 2011 taxes! Thank you for considering!


 God has led us to send our children to Christian school and where He leads, He provides. Thanks to donors for us to ACSTO, Dallas’ kindergarten was paid in full! This school year has been such a blessing for all of us.

   

 Thank You for Your Prayers! Please pray… 
- Bible study leaders 
- Orphans in Mexico 
- Ryan and Kelsey 
- New church! 
- Healing with losing Madison Grace 
- Handling two campuses 
- Us to train our boys up in a Godly way. 
- Our support 
- Sanctuary Church 
- More salvations

October, 2011

Great Retreat with a Diverse Group


I am always amazed at who will pay to go to a tiny city four hours away with people that they have known for a month, in a group whose purpose is to share Jesus. There are so many people opposed to what we do on campus, and that is understandable because our beliefs are in complete contradiction with the University's secular humanism.


But when they come with us, it's really exciting, because they start to realize that all Christians don't match up to their stereotypes and that we may be on to something. One quote from the weekend was from a girl who is wrestling with her sexual orientation. She said, "It's really cool how you guys believe everything in the Bible. I've never really thought of it that way before."


There are the students that we are reaching. She is part of the group and we're going to love her, but not be afraid to share with her.


For worship, we exhausted all of our contacts and Thursday night, the day before we were supposed to leave, we still had no one. The morning we left, God had provided a freshman who was willing to lead for us and it was awesome. We did some campfire worship and gave the students some time to spend one on One time with God, challenging them to surrender.


After the message, the girls met by themselves and each of them took something different that they needed to surrender. The guys connected as well and one freshman stood out as a leader. My nightmare of Ryan and Kelsey graduating is approaching, but as I'm seeing new leadership develop, it is really encouraging. 


Please pray for the students that God was working with on this retreat and for the new students that we are reaching this semester. 





New Bible Study!


We now have two quality Bible studies going at ASU Downtown. Thursday has been operating as a large group and we are starting to bring in guest speakers. The GCU students are coming as part of them and have been helping out. Because both universities have big nursing schools, it's been a natural fit.  


Maria has been doing an excellent job and has made it through James with the students. She has lead Bible studies before, but is now really getting the hang of it and sharing some good insight. We have some students coming to her study that couldn't make it to the other Bible study, like J who has been a great servant and who is planning to be a missionary. 


We've also had a hand in helping a girl start a Bible study who couldn't come to either of ours. We encouraged her to do it , then gave her some material to use and she is planning on coming to our Bible study leader training. 










Powers Update


Dallas still loves Kindergarten. He became a "Spark" in Awanas at our church and he loves that! I (Jamie) get to teach a few of the Council times and Dallas and I are very excited about that.


The "Little Boys" are also in Awanas. They are Puggles! The two year old class is sooooo cute! It's so much fun getting to hear more and more words and understanding from them. They are SO excited when they say a word and we understand. Dallas enjoys teaching them new words and is still the most amazing, kind, patient, loving and attentive big brother  that we could have asked for. He genuinely enjoys them and being around them.


We are venturing out more to museums, the zoo, libraries, parks, etc. The little guys aren't just wild 18 month olds running around! They know that they have to obey, they just want to see how soon and how often! SO they try to run off every once in a while, but for the most part, they're more portable(!), which is MORE FUN! But please pray for patience for Bryan and me as we are training up the TWO's! They are so precious...and so mischievous! 

At the zoo:

I was shocked when I went into the twins' room and saw this empty crib!

Then I looked over at the other crib and saw this:

Thank you for your prayers! 
Please pray:


-Maria, our new Bible study leader
-Ryan and Kelsey
-New church!
-Handling two campuses
-Kids in Mexico
-Healing with losing our Madison Grace
-Us to train our boys up in a Godly way
-Our financial support
-Sanctuary Church
-More salvations

September, 2011

How are my donations used in Christian Challenge?

- You are creating a position in ministry that would not be there without you.

- You become part of a team that reaches students for Christ who are not being reached by a typical church.

- You allow there to be light on a spiritually dark campus of 15,000 students.

What type of donations are the most helpful?

- A regular monthly donation helps provide a consistent salary for this huge ministry task.

- One prompted by God. He is the Provider, and He does so through His people.

- One which you want to see make a difference all over

Strategy for success!

If you were praying with us for Grand Canyon University and its role as a strategy to reach all the college students in Metro Phoenix, thank you because God has answered our prayer!

We have formed a partnership with GCU and we’re requesting ten students who will act as Christian Challenge interns! These students will be serving across the Valley on various campuses. Three Christian Challenge staffers (including myself) are serving multiple campuses.

The goal is for these students to serve Christian Challenge for the four (or five) years that they are students while we train them to lead Bible studies, disciple other students, evangelize and lead missions. They then will have had such a positive experience that they will want to step into a staff role with Christian Challenge and help reach the dozens of other college campuses with absolutely no evangelical presence on them.

As the campus and program grows, we will soon have a pool of people with experience and a heart for college students to choose from to reach the campuses that our staff of seven doesn’t have a chance to reach yet.

This has been such an answer to prayer and makes the goal of reaching the 350,000 college students in Metro Phoenix that much closer to happening.

Please pray for us as we serve at two campuses. We are still very much involved at ASU Downtown, where some great things are happening. We have a new Bible study leader stepping up this year, and we’re very excited to see how her life experience and personality color the Bible study.

We are also taking more people to Mexico to visit the kids at the orphanage that we love so much. We just got back from there with some students who had gone before and were missing them too. We’re taking more students down in October.

Helping a church get started!

Planting Sanctuary Church taught us the pressures and difficulties of getting the initial group together and every step along the way as the church plant grow. This problem is multiplied when you are doing an urban church plant in downtown Phoenix.

There is a church planter moving just a couple miles from our campus and we met and hit it off instantly. We were finishing each other sentences on what we felt with our experiences with church planting, we both drive impractical 4x4s that we love and we have become friends already.

Since we have a strong group downtown already, we are going to help him get started. He’s going to lead some Bible studies downtown for our group and in a partnership with him we will help evangelize downtown Phoenix as his home church network grows.

Powers Update

Our “Big Boy,” Dallas started Kindergarten and he loves it! It’s hard to believe that he’ll be gone so long each day for so many years! We miss him! But he loves being a big kid. J

The “Little Boys” are growing so fast. This month they will turn TWO! Our little men have given us a “run for our money” the last couple of months, with DESTRUCTION!!! They found new ways to destroy their room after every nap. We had to turn their dresser around (the knobs towards the wall) because they climb on it (using the “child-locked” drawers to get up!). While up there, they threw their CD player onto the floor and ripped the antenna completely off of it. They broke the straps that kept their closet doors shut, and the next ones we bought. Then when Bryan drilled some straps into the wall, the pushed the closet off of its rails into the closet. They pulled down an over-the-door shoe rack SO hard…that it broke the hinges of the door! That is to just name a few! Thank God they are gorgeous, hilarious, SWEET little guys and are a gift from God…because all of that could get pretty irritating!

How God Used You;

We could not do this ministry without our team:

§ A new campus!

§ Great trip to Mexico!

§ New Bible study leader!

Thank You for Your Prayers!

Please pray…

§ Maria, our new Bible study leader

§ Ryan and Kelsey

§ New church!

§ Healing with losing Madison Grace

§ Handling two campuses

§ Kids in Mexico

§ Us to train our boys up in a Godly way.

§ Our support

§ Sanctuary Church

§ More salvations

How can we pray for you?