Power Ministry

POWER MINISTRY 2018 ….. WEEK ONE/DAYTWO
“Find out what that ONE thing is, and do it” (Curly’s Secret to a Successful Life – “City Slickers”)
Greetings from Acuna, … and the Men of Week One; including not only those from California, Idaho, Georgia, and Ohio, but also those from Oregon, Colorado, Texas, South Dakota, Tennessee, Arizona, and Mexico!
An integral component of every Power Trip is the morning worship, devotion and prayer time; which takes place prior to setting out for the Mexican border each morning. This week Pastor Brian Park of Riverside, California is leading us through a study of Faith. Pastor Brian reminded the men of a line from the 1991 movie, “City Slickers”; where Curly, a crusty, weathered and intimidating old Cowboy tells Mitch, one of the city slickers playing cowboy for a week, that the secret to a successful life is to find the ONE Thing and just do it.
While this jewel of wisdom mystified the character, Mitch; Pastor Brian challenged the men to consider that, as followers of Jesus Christ, growing in one’s Faith is the ONE Thing that we must pursue. He called to our minds the story in Mark 4:37-40, where the disciples were exceedingly fearful that the furious storm would swamp their boat, and called to Jesus to save them. Jesus did not say to his disciples, where is your courage … but rather said, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no Faith?” Pastor Brian stated that living by Faith commences when we take ONE Step out of our comfort zone; particularly in serving the Lord.
For many men embarking on a POWER Trip the comfort zone thing can be an issue. Pastor Brian challenged us to face any fears or anxieties about our week along the Texas-Mexico Border (as well as in all aspects of our lives) by praying for the Faith it takes to step out of our comfort zone and live for Jesus!
Much was accomplished during Day Two on the other side of not only the Texas-Mexican Border, but our collective comfort zones, as well. Day Two involved a lot of truss building (the framing that supports the roof of a structure). Much lumber was cut and used to construct the trusses that will be used to add a roof to a cinder block church structure already under construction for Pastor Julio’s Church. Trusses were also constructed to be used to construct a roof for the home of Sister Blanca. The exterior walls were framed and sided, and truss construction was begun for a church being constructed for Pastor Jose Morales. The site of his church is adjacent to a very large complex of apartments constructed by a local factory for its workers …. which appears to be a very ripe mission field for Pastor Morales. Very necessary repair and upkeep work was also done around Faith Mission; which serves as the local command center for POWER Ministry.
Work will continue on the Day Two projects during the first half of Day Three; after which we will hit the road again for a long road trip to McAllen, Texas … and ministry in Reynosa, Mexico.
Signing off from the far back seat of another fifteen passenger van (talk about stepping out of your comfort zone!

POWER MINISTRY 2018 ….. WEEK ONE / DAY ONE
ACTS 1: 8 … But you will receive POWER when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to me in Jerusalem, in all Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
With the above words of Paul, the theme verse of POWER Ministry, reverberating in our hearts, the Week One Men of POWER having gathered from California, Idaho, Georgia and Ohio; embarked on the 18th consecutive year of ministry to the people of Mexico living along the Texas-Mexico border. We have each been called by the Lord to be his witnesses, in this case to the Mexican cities of Acuna, Reynosa, and Matamoros. The Lord’s plan for our week involves sharing the love of Jesus through meeting basic essential life needs for the Mexican people; as well as challenging and growing the faith of the men that have been called to serve this year.
Overall 167 men will be involved in the 2018 POWER Ministry over the next three weeks. At the conclusion of this year’s trips the total number of men having served will reach 900 over the past eighteen years. An astounding total of 7,400,000 pounds of food have been distributed … 85 homes, churches, and other structures have been built … $400,000 has been donated to local missionaries and ministries serving the Mexican people … 120,000 bibles have been distributed …. 120 children’s festivals have been held, reaching hundreds of children and their families each year!
“ON THE ROAD AGAIN, CAN’T WAIT TO GET BACK ON THE ROAD AGAIN”
We invite you to join the Week One Team as we begin our week road trip of witnessing to the Mexican people over a thousand mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border along the Rio Grande River from Acuna to Matamoros. You might want to read these postings in the far back seat of a fifteen passenger van … for hours on end (to get the full experience!).
The Week One Team set out tonight for Faith Mission International in Del Rio, Texas, arriving at approximately 11:00pm., after a travel day that for many began nearly twenty hours ago. Faith Mission is our home base for the first two days as we will cross over the border to begin construction on building projects in the Acuna area. Construction of a church for Pastor Jose Morales, a roof for Pastor Julio’s church, a roof for Sister Blanca’s house, and pouring the slab for Pastor Casio’s classrooms will begin on Friday and Saturday.
STAY TUNED … KEEP YOUR SEAT BELTS FASTENED!!

God is working on my heart. After our debriefing meeting at the Travel Lodge in San Antonio, I said my good byes, hopped into the van with a few others for the short ride to the airport, and then found myself all alone for several hours waiting for my flight. I had not come as part of a contingent from a church as a lot of others had done. I had mentioned to Dave Coryell that I was thinking of writing one last blog after the debrief meeting, and he had suggested that I do it at the airport. So what did I do at the airport? Not the blog. I spent time looking at pretty women, reading the local newspaper to catch up on current events, then more people watching.
Like I said, God was working on my heart, but I didn’t know it yet. On the plane, my ears popped going up to cruising altitude, due to the cold that probably one third of us contracted during the trip. That wasn’t so bad. What was bad was when the plane descended back to earth, my ears started hurting, then stayed plugged up for a long time. My wife picked me up at the airport, and I was reintroduced to LA traffic. It took us about an hour to get away from LAX to the freeway because of some road work and traffic leaving the airport. We decided to not fight the freeway traffic, and motored to a Denny’s for dinner. She had to keep telling me not to yell at her across the table (my ears were still plugged).
After an uneventful long drive on the 405 (still bumper to bumper at 8 pm), we made it back home. It was good to catch up with her on the goings on, plus my experiences on the trip. Just as we were pulling off the freeway, my mother called me. She had been worried about me on the trip, what with all the political nonsense going on. I reassured her that we had no problems, and that actually I was seeing more clearly now one of the purposes of our trip was to be ambassadors bringing peace during these troubled times.
Did I mention that God was working on my heart? Taking a nice hot shower, I crawled into my own bed. My wife asked me if I wanted any cough drops. I told her that my throat didn’t bother me. In fact, I had not had a problem with coughing the entire trip. Just a really sore throat that kept me at the hotel on the day that I enjoy the most- the festival for the kids. They had it at Alianza Christiana Church the third week, and if it was anything like last year, there were thousands of kids whooping it up, with POWER guys doing all sorts of games where the kids would win prizes like soccer balls, basket balls, cotton candy, and other fun stuff. It is always my favorite time. But I digress.
At 2 am in the morning, I woke up and had to cough. I got up and got a cough drop and tried laying back in bed. My throat still tickled, and I got back up and took another cough drop, then laid back down again. Suddenly I realized what was going on. God wanted me to get up and do the blog. So at 3 am, I got dressed, and went to my office (another bedroom in the house). The first thing that I decided to do was look up a scripture that I had tried to find all week. It is from II Corinthians, and says “yes, we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves but in God who raises the dead”. A simple verse, but it has a lot of meaning for me. I did not have the sentence of death, but I was trusting too much in myself. That is another story.
What I really want to relate to you is something that Mario shared, and tugged at my heart. The Mexican people are really nervous about what is going to happen with all the political talk going on. He said that we don’t realize the impact that we are having during our trips to Mexico. It is pretty hard to miss the caravans of big white vans with POWER signs on them driving around town, building churches and houses, and spending time with Bible College students and kids at churches and orphanages. That was a huge encouragement to me, as I didn’t feel that I had accomplished much this trip. But thinking back, there was one of the ladies who was serving breakfast to us at the hotel in McAllen who came up to me early one morning, and asked me to pray for her 19 year old niece, who was going to be reunited with her mother after 16 years. Another man at Alianza Church asked me to pray for a friend of his who needed encouragement in his ministry. These requests will be added to my praise and prayer lists. Prayer works miracles, and through POWER Ministries, we are giving hope to people along the Rio Grande River Valley.
Well, my alarm just went off at 5 am. It is time for me to get ready for work.
Doug

Well, I missed all of Saturday, as I came down with a nasty sore throat, and stayed at the hotel in McAllen all day. The rest of the group did a construction project in the morning, then helped with the festival at Alianza Church in the afternoon. The festival is one of my favorite things to do, so I was not happy. Instead, I walked half a mile to a pharmacy, bought some Nyquil, walked back to the hotel, and crashed for 7 hours in the hotel room. One good thing that happened was I had lunch with Bob Smith, who also was staying at the hotel due to symptoms from a dog bite the day before he left California.
Today I was feeling a little better. I also discovered that a bunch of other guys had come down with a bug. So today, we piled into the vans, drove across the border, and went to Bruce & Paula Hepburn’s place for devotions. They had laid concrete on the outside area under the canopy, and built solid wooden benches, which we shared with a another group from Illinois for worship songs and a message from Dave Barnes. Bruce has now built 200 houses in the colonia, and ran piped water the entire length (5 miles). We brought a bunch of boxes of Bibles for him to pass out in his ministry.
Then it was on to Alianza Church, where they had prepared lunch for us, and had a translator sitting at each table for us. They were all from their youth group, and spoke very good English. Afterwards, we went to their large dome sanctuary to participate in their regular worship service. We all did our best to sing along with them in Spanish, and several of our members gave testimonies, then our own Pat Schmelling gave the message. It was a very powerful and moving service.
The border crossing back to the USA took 45 minutes today. After that it was a 5 hour drive back to San Antonio to the hotel there, where we arrived at 10:30 pm.
Doug

After a short night at iStay Hotel in McAllen, we had breakfast and met for our 7 am devotion in one of their conference rooms. Jay & John led us in worship songs, then Dave talked about Phil. 2:3-4 again. Today he shared about King David, how he was a sinner like the rest of us, but that he repented from his sin, and magnified the Lord through his psalms of praise. I was one of the men chosen by Brian to pray this morning, which was another first for me. As was standard, we prayed for the activities of the day, our families back home, and the missionaries. Then it was on to Magdiel Bible College in Matamoros, Mexico, which is about one hour south, across the border from Brownsville, Texas. POWER has been going there since 2001, and is one of the major sponsors of the school. We broke up into groups to spend time with students from each of the 3 grades levels. We got out of our comfort zones (language barrier) to interact with them, breaking up into groups that competed for points with some silly games. After passing out new tote bags to all of them, we shared a meal in the large cafeteria with them, and raised some more money for them by auctioning off a few of the College’s t shirts. A check was presented to the graduating class of students, then it was a time of soccer, and breaking up into small groups to share pictures and hang out with them. It was the largest group of students that I have seen in my 4 years with POWER, and they had a lot of enthusiasm and love of the Lord!
After saying our goodbyes, we piled into the vans for the border crossing back to the USA, and then back to the iStay Hotel in McAllen. Dinner tonight was at the Golden Corral, where several of the missionaries that we support shared a meal with us.
-Doug

I am sort of winging it tonight, as it is 11:45 pm, and we just arrived at our hotel in McAllen, Texas, after a 6 hour drive from Del Rio. It was a good day, starting out as usual with singing, a devotion, and prayers before we headed out across the border. Jay, one of our members who lives in Laredo, Texas led us in singing, then Dave Barnes continued his devotion on Phil. 2:3-4. He emphasized that it is important for men to have understanding and be willing to take correction. When we got our van assignments, I was excited, because for the first time I got to drive one of the vans. We drove to the outskirts of Acuna, Mexico, where we were helping a new pastor build his church & house. While on the way, Mario (the pastor from Reynosa) shared that there are about 100 US factories in Acuna. I knew that Reynosa had a bunch of them, but did not realize there were very many in Acuna. We passed by many identical housing units that had obviously been built for the factory workers.
I got to paint today. When we left at noon, both buildings were substantially complete, and we prayed with the pastor for his church and it’s impact on the community. I guess that I passed my driving test, as I heard no complaints from the leadership, other than to tell me to drive faster on the way back to lunch (which I ignored, as I was driving on a street with a lot of pedestrians, taco stands, and store fronts, and traffic coming out from side streets). During the meeting afterwards back at Faith Missions, we discovered that the church that I had helped at yesterday had a dedication, including ribbon cutting ceremony, that numerous members of the congregation participated in, along with the POWER members who worked there today. It was a very moving event that brought tears to many.
After taking up a collection for Pat & Sandra to help them with their move to South Dakota, we loaded up the vans again, and took to the highways for McAllen, stopping in Laredo for dinner. Tomorrow we get to drive to the Bible College across the border from Brownsville, Texas. Signing off for now.
-Doug

Our first full day on the Mexico border area. I started out early, waking to a few others rousing up at 5:30 am, and saw Pat Schmeling starting to cook bacon in the kitchen. He was in there by himself, and seemed kind of lonely. I had not yet helped out any in the kitchen in my previous years, as there was always a group of guys who were very dedicated. I asked him how I could help, and he immediately put me to breaking eggs into a pot. Another POWER helper showed up, and I could sense that Pat perked up. As others showed up to help, I left, wanting to get my bag of tools ready for the day. Little did I know that I would be assigned to the food crew for the morning, which was also new for me. More about that later.
After breakfast, we had singing and devotion at 7 am. One of the songs brought back good memories for me of a dear friend who loved to play guitar and lead singing at a small men’s group in Temecula. It was a song that he loved to sing. His name was Best Gonzales, and he went to be with the Lord early (and unexpectedly). However, I know that he was smiling down on our group singing ‘his song’ today. Dave Barnes shared a devotion on Phil. 2:3-4, talking about being honorable men and witnesses for the Lord. He recently has struggled through a worksite discrimination lawsuit, and he told of how he has been working through it with the Lord’s help.
After praying for the day’s projects, families back home, missionaries, and world leaders, we got our van assignments. The food crew that I was on took a trip to the local supermarket, bought the food for lunch, then came back to the Faith kitchen to prepare it. After a LOT of slicing and dicing peppers & onions for the bratwurst that would be barbecued later, then chopping a LOT of fruit for fruit cups for the guys, we hopped into the 2 vans, with all the food, and drove across the border to one of the project sites. A barbecue had already been set up, and we proceeded to hook up the propane and cook the bratwurst links. All the other vans showed up at 1 pm, and we served lunch for them along with several nationals who had helped out as translators on the Joy Tour. The young pastor, his wife & 5 little children shared with us their story. He had been a student at a college in Texas on spring break, and took a wrong turn while coming down to Mexico to party. He ended up a church, where he met his wife, and as the saying goes, the rest is history.
After lunch, I got to go with another van out to another project, where we were building a church building for another young pastor. I got the opportunity to install the door knobs and dead bolt on the church doors. It was somewhat of a challenge, as for once I discovered POWER did not have the tool needed to finish the job. We had to scramble, and the pastor drove with a POWER van driver to a hardware store to buy a drill bit. I also got to work with a POWER member from Texas that I had never met, and quickly realized that although I thought that I could do the job on my own, he was a big help. The rest of our crew painted the complete siding on the church, and got the last of the metal roofing in place.
These are real people that we are helping, who are doing the Lord’s work here in Mexico. I also found out today that Pat Schmelling & his wife Sandra were the ones who searched out for the ones who truly needed the help, and then turned the projects over to POWER to complete. In our night meeting back at Faith after dinner, Al Uhler, the founder of Faith Mission, gave a talk, and told us that on Feb. 6, Pat & Sandra will be leaving Faith to step out in faith in South Dakota. That will leave a huge hole at Faith Mission, and we need to lift up Al (who is 80 years old), who will take over management at Faith (again) until another couple are called to minister here. But as he shared with us, he has never stopped believing in God, and knows that He has a plan. When he first showed up here at Faith 55 years ago, he had $25 in his wallet, and 4 flat tires. That is all for now. More to follow tomorrow.  
Doug

Tuesday: We all gathered at the hotel in San Antonio late in the afternoon, after our various plane trips from a bunch of states. This is my fourth trip. I look forward to it every year. I have moved to another city since I first started coming with the Temecula group, but still wouldn’t want to miss it. I have to admit that I failed miserably in studying my Rosetta Stone language lesson this year, but am hoping that this week will inspire me to attack it again.
There are 75 men on the trip this week, including 11 that have been here since the first week (or earlier). We all piled into the 13 passenger vans, and drove across town to Chopsticks, which is an incredible smorgasbord of all kinds of Chinese dishes. We all ate too much. I noticed that sitting at the table next to our group was the lead pastor from the big church in Reynosa & his brother. I have never seen him on the trip before. That is a big deal! It is a huge church which we also stop at during our travels. We always have a construction project there, and also join them in their Sunday service. He obviously thinks highly enough of POWER that he took a week off from his busy schedule to join us. He ended up in our van, so I am already off on a good start on my language training.
On the 3+ hour trip to Faith Mission, Dave Barnes led our van in sharing a little about ourselves, and our experiences with the group. Then we had a prayer time for the shared needs. Before we knew it, we had arrived at the border & Faith Missions.
After figuring out our bunk assignments, the leaders called us all to a meeting in the cafeteria. Brian Nelson shared the Bible verse for this year, which is Philippians 2:3-4. “Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves; Do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for the interests of others.” Pat Schmeling with Faith Missions (yes, he is also a part of our group) asked for help early in the morning with the breakfast preparation, which he starts at 6 am. Brian reminded us of the basic rules while we are here (clean up after yourselves, watch your language, help each other out, and a few more). Bob Krull explained instructions for the vans, caravan driving, gps, and an explanation about crossing the border (which we do twice every day). Bobby Biber came up and explained that every night he would be leading a prayer meeting, and welcomed one and all to come.
Then Ray Hahn outlined the construction projects that we will be doing this week. There will be 3 locations in Acuna (across the border from Faith Missions in Del Rio), including church additions and pastor housing. Most of what we will be doing is finish work, as the framing as already been done in the first two weeks. Then in Reynosa, there will be two different churches we will work on. This is about a day’s travel down the border from Acuna, and will happen later this week, along with our activities with the big church, Joy tours, and hopefully Refugio International Orphanage, where I sponsor one of the boys during the year.
After further instructions by Larry Johnson, Brian & Marty Read passed out the 3 year jackets to Wayne Holt, Dick & Eric Middlestead, Phil Yates, John Nielson & David Burkett. Thereupon, everybody was dismissed to various activities, including the prayer group, van preparation, etc., and here I am typing up this blog. My gosh, it is just about midnight. I will sign off until tomorrow night.
-Doug Blois

Our last day began with not enough sleep. The van group cleaned all the vans to prepare them for Group 3 then they went out to eat. My roommate didn’t get into his bed till 5AM. After breakfast we formed a rectangle of chairs to share our personal highlights. For many it was the singing, others it was the daily devotions with messages that touched our lives. The father son power team members lives were connected in deep ways and their experience brought many of us to tears. Highlights also included the presence of missionaries and Mexican Nationals which added greatly, the festival, the interactions with children, the prison visits, building work and so much more. One common experience was our fellowship. First timers got to know 65 new brothers in Christ. Those who were returning deepened their bonds of faith.
We concluded with a communion service partaking in groups of 12 and praying for each other. Through the morning men began to leave mostly for the airport for flights taking them home to several different states. We were reminded and asked prayer for those who would be staying for group 3 which begins later today with a larger group. We were given 6 raffle tickets for the March 8th drawing which along with the golf tournament is Power’s major funding for the ongoing border miniseries.
There were lots of hugs and expressions of gratitude. Now we pray for group 3 and all the lives God is touching through Power Ministry.
Chris Nettles

This was our last full day since we are heading to San Antonio late today. We made an early departure at 7 AM for the Border Mission in Hidalgo. The director greeted us along with the one of the pastors of a church we will be working on. He told about their work then we heard our final message which centered on living with a mission helping us to not slip into bad choices. The singing was again super thanks to Luke. We were blessed this week with music.
I joined several others to go to prison to the women’s side. It took a while to get in but it was a good visit seeing where they lived. We took Bibles and led a witness of singing and personal sharing. There were several mothers with small children 6 months to 3 years old. I sat with the women and children. It was a granpa/papa time. We’re were asked to pray and give blessings/healing to them too. Some accepted Christ and prayers continued delaying our departure.
On the way back to the van I was called back to the heavily armed guards who had checked our passports at the prison gate. They asked me to give them God’s blessing and to pray for them. I put my hands on both of them and prayed aloud. They may not have understood English but God understood.
Then we all joined for lunch at Big Heart Orphanage for fantastic tacos. In the afternoon the men in our van built rafters. Other groups took some orphans to get pizza, another group took food to the homeless in Reynosa in alleys and under bridges. A group worked on the roof at Rigo Ramirez Church. We worked till 5:30 then headed back to Hidalgo before departure for San Antonio. We stopped in Kingsville eating country fried steak at Big House Burgers. Then we headed back on the road toward San Antonio hoping to be there by 12:30 AM.
I thank Dave Coryell for asking me to share my experiences as a first year participant. It was a bit overwhelming but I found a place and new friends in Christ, it was easy.
Chris Nettles