October

Thank you for your diligence in praying for us missionaries in Latvia. We do need it!
1. Praise God for the 25 kids that responded when I preached the gospel at camp, pray for them as the camp director and I plan follow up through the winter time.
2. Praise God for blessing Calvary Riga and the new people coming to Bible studies 2-3 times a week. It's exciting that they all have a hunger for the word of God and He is strengthening our faith.
3. For Lena to stay healthy, physically, emotionally, spiritually. For a name for a boy to be born in January.
4. For Brenten to overflow with love for God and God's love for family, church, neighbors, enemies.
5. For Caleb and Lily, language skills with weekly lessons; for them to see Christ in their parents.
Thank you for praying for us. If we can pray for you, leave us a comment. (:
Brenten

End of Summer 2010 Prayer Update

Powers Prayer points september 2010
1. Praise God for blessing the Petrik family's mission trip, they
helped us launch Calvary Chapel Riga.
2. Pray for the thousands of people who received tracts, the hundreds
who heard the gospel preached.
3. Praise God for the dozens who prayed for forgiveness at camp and
the 3 new believers that started coming to church and home fellowship.
4. Pray for Brenten to feed and equip the church well every Sunday and
Thursday.
5. Pray for our family's health as the weather gets cold and Lena is
pregnant.

In Christ,
Brenten Powers
CalvaryLatvia.com

Calvary Latvia - June 2010 update

Blessed in Riga

Last Sunday, we were blessed by great fellowship and heard that the church was blessed by the teaching. You can listen to Bible studies at CalvaryLatvia.com.

Discipleship

Picture: Sergej and Brenten at the cafe where we meet for Inductive Bible Study.

Praise the LORD for bringing Sergej to Calvary Riga. He is a relatively new believer who I am spending extra time with for discipleship. I am really blessed by fellowship with him and seeing how he desires to serve the Lord. He has been enjoying pastor Chuck Smith MP3s in Russian, he consumed a new believers study guide, and now I am teaching him how to study the Bible Inductively. We usually meet Thursdays mornings at a cafe in Riga's central train station. Please pray for him and his family as he seeks the Lords will for work during Latvia's severe economic crisis.

Pray for Calvary Bible Church

We are sensing that this is going to be a GREAT year with great challenges and joys as He has given us the assignment to preach the gospel and form a new church Latvia. We are going to call it "Golgātas Bībeles draudze" which translates to "Calvary Bible Church". If you pray for us monthly, weekly or daily - we thank God for you! This month I would ask you to be praying for three specific things:

1. For our evangelism team: Praise God for sending more laborers from Riga! Pray for boldness to preach one and one and open air, freedom to keep preaching in the train station, conviction on the hearers hearts.
   
2. For the church: Praise God for drawing people to hear the word. Pray for Brenten to passionately preach Christ as we go through Genesis and Exodus, for the hearers to understand and apply the word, for translators to be faithful.
3. For our family: Praise God for the love, joy and peace at home. Pray for a good babysitter so Brenten and Lena can have a regular time to date.
   

Baptism in Ogre river

Baptism in Ogre river, Latvia

Last Sunday, Kaspars was water baptized by pastor Vadim Kovalev and the members of Ogre Evangelical Church came to witness this event with Kaspars' family. It seems that one member was added to the church and another was sent out. At the end of this slide show are pictures of us praying for Anatoly on his last Sunday here before moving to Scotland. I had raised him up to take over worship ministry but it he believes God is opening the door to find work in the West, learn English and serve with a Russian speaking church in Glasgow, Scotland.

God is Always Right On Time

Having just received our last 3 required documents from different sources, this book title came to mind as I raced into the immigration office an hour before our deadline to renew our residence permits: God Is Never Late; He Is Seldom Early; He Is Always Right On Time.

The editorial description: ’GIVE ME PATIENCE, GOD - BUT HURRY!’ When we’re waiting on God to answer prayer, our timing and His timing are rarely the same. Sometimes it seems like God is in a different time zone altogether. We sometimes feel like we picked one of those numbers in the bureau of motor vehicle line and there are 78 others ahead in line.But we need God to wait on us--right away. This book is about trusting God even when it seems He is running late. It’s about God ’s perfect control over the times and events of our lives--and about His perfect power to order those events in a loving and meaningful way. Despite our anxiousness, impatience, and worry,God is faithful to work in our lives at just the right time. He’ll never be late. God’s Never Late is the third book in a popular trilogy including: God Has Never Failed Me. . . But He’s Sure Scared Me to Death a Few Times The Buzzards are Circling, But God’s Not Finished with Me Yet

In answer to prayer, we got everything in on time with no problems. The certified letter from CCMB arrived by mail at 12pm, Lena got back from the US embassy with Caleb's new passport at 4pm and I got a required document from our bank at 5pm. With one more hour before the immigration office closed, the director received our application, checked all our documents and was in an surprisingly better mood than ever before. Perhaps it was the fervent effectual prayers of the righteous (you guys) that availed much, perhaps our desperate cries to the Lord for mercy, perhaps it was a coincidence that Christian radio was playing softly in her office, but mostly I believe it was just God's grace and providence. She said everything was in order and we will return to get our new visas/residency permits on August 14, 2008. Apparently, God is not finished with us here yet. (: Thank you Jesus!

2 saved today

Today, I went out in the center of Ogre to share the gospel with Agnese. She is a good translator with a heart for evangelism who is faithfully serving the Lord. Below is a picture of us on an outreach.

So today we shared the gospel in Ogre with about a dozen different people and two girls received it, turning from sin and putting their faith in Jesus to be saved and begin a Christ-centered life. We prayed that God would lead us to people who were open and give us the words that they need to hear. The two girls are about 16 years old, we walked up to them and introduced ourselves and asked if we could ask them some spiritual questions. They were very open, one didn't believe in God at first and the other believed He exists but didn't know who He is. I can't explain it here exactly as it came out earlier but we shared how God created man good but the problem is that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23) but that Jesus came to reconcile us to God by taking the punishment for our sins on the cross (Ephesians 2:16) and He rose from the dead so that God could freely give eternal life to all who believe. We also shared what it means to become a Christian and about the Christ-centered life that begins when the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in born again believers. After sharing the gospel, we asked, "Do you believe Jesus died for your sins and rose from the dead? They said "yes" Then I asked them, is there was anything keeping you from receiving Jesus as Lord and Savior? No. Do you want to repent and pray now? Yes. So we sat down at a park bench and I shared an example prayer that I could lead them in or they could pray in their own words. They wanted to repeat the prayer after me, so we prayed together. Then I asked if they understood everything they prayed and they said yes. Good. Then I encouraged them to go to a good Bible teaching church in order to grow. I gave them my contact info and told them about our church in Ikskile and they said that they would go Sunday. We rejoiced and said goodbye. So praise the Lord and please keep our new sisters, Jolanta and Sintija in your prayers.



Also praise the Lord for Ieva, our new Latvian teacher and one of our translators, and her sister (above photo) who have been coming to Sunday services and are being blessed by the simple verse by verse studies through the Bible. May the Lord keep these services "real" and deepen our fellowship with these sisters.

Prayers for July 2008

Praise God for answering our prayers last month: saving many youth at camp, meeting financial needs, Caleb is signed up for Latvian kindergarten, our new Latvian teacher, our 8th wedding anniversary...

Please pray for

1. The teens from youth camp to continue in God's grace, opportunities to disciple them
2. For smaller kids and parents to be reached at next Vacation Bible School in Ogre July 21-25
3. The process of renewing our residency permits, for all documents to be ready by July 14
4. For Sunday and Wednesday Studies in Ikskile, that the Lord would build up the saints
5. Mitch, Dennis and Frank coming to serve, evangelize and encourage August 5-18

Turning to Jesus

Here are two guys I witnessed to in Riga one Thursday night. They were walking by my and I asked, "Can I ask you some questions?" They said, "About what?" and I said "About eternity" Then they said, "Sure, let's go sit at a park bench" After sharing the gospel with them, one of them, named Roma, was ready to turn to Jesus, and wanted me to lead him in a prayer of repentance, he didn't want to forget it so he wrote it down on a map he had with him. I was so excited that he was ready to turn from sin and trust the Lord to save him and set him free from his addictions. Here is a video from that night...





Yesterday I got back from a youth camp where I helped with worship leading and a couple Bible studies. Wednesday night about 20 kids came forward to receive Christ. I was able to connect with a few and encourage them. I hope to continue influencing three who live in Ogre, one in Ikskile and four in Jaunjelgava. Pray for those who were sincere about following Christ, that they would continue to become disciples and overcome worldly influences in their lives after camp.

June prayer requests

Dear prayer team,
Thank you for those who prayed at CCMB's missions meeting. Lily seems to be feeling better now.
Please continue to pray for our church planting mission in Ikskile, Latvia.

• For at least 1 person to be saved and added to the church in this month
• That Brenten would be used at a youth camp for teens from troubled families June 23-30th
• For Caleb to make some friends this summer and begin speaking Latvian with them.
• For Lena to keep learning the language, for confirmation if Ieva is to be our new teacher.
• For the preparation of evangelists coming from Monterey for a mission trip in August.
  

May Prayers and Praise 08

PRAISES:

God answered prayer for sufficient funds the last 2 months, for reduced rent for the next 6 months, for healing of our colds, for warm spring weather, for encouragement and hope to press on.

PRAYER REQUESTS:

1. Please pray for Brenten as he is sharing the gospel on the streets more now that it is warm, that God's word would go out and change lives,
2. for Lena that she wouldn't have headaches (she had migraines for 2 days)
3. for relationships with Latvians and Russians to be loving
4. for our ministries in Ikskile and Ogre to be a edifying and effective
5. for our walks with God; that we'd live by faith as He leads us into our second year in Latvia.

Prayer Letter

Dear friends, family and praying Christians,

I am writing to ask you to pray for us because we are stepping out in faith to a new city where God is leading us to evangelize and plant a church. I am still teaching the Russian speaking church in Ogre, but we also desire to reach the Latvian speaking city of Ikšķile with God's word. Easter Sunday (March 23) we will be having an evangelistic event in Ikskile, Latvia at the Ikšķile culture center that seats 180 people. Our Bible study group is inviting the whole city to come hear the gospel and a concert. We also have reserved this venue the following Sunday to begin church services for new believers. Will you pray for us, please?

March Prayer Requests

1. CHURCH - Pray that God would speak through me on our Resurrection day outreach, to save souls and to add them to the church.
2. FINANCES - needs are increasing and support has been decreasing. Pray that we will have enough to cover all our needs and expanding ministries.
3. HEALTH - Lena, Caleb, Lily and I all have colds or coughs. Pray for us to be healed soon by God's grace.
4. LANGUAGES - our Latvian teacher may be getting another job soon, pray for God's will concerning our progress in speaking in Latvian and Russian.
5. MISSIONS - God is calling Dennis and Frank to Latvia in August for a short evangelistic trip.. Pray for others considering joining the team to have clear calling this month.

Financial support (checks or credit card forms ) can be delivered to:

Calvary Chapel Monterey Bay
3001 Monterey-Salinas Hwy
Monterey, CA 93940

*make checks payable to "Calvary Chapel" but attach a separate note saying "for the Powers Latvia mission"

Thank you for your faithful prayers and support!

Brenten and Lena Powers
Missionaries in Latvia
www.calvarylatvia.com

A Happy Birthday

Today is my 31st Birthday and it was a very happy one. First thing in the morning, FedEx delivered a package with pictures and DVD of friends from back home. I was happy to see their(your) happy faces again. In the middle of the day, the kids and I enjoyed the Zoo in Riga while Lena prepared the food for our evening party. Tonight we had 17 people over, all believers from five different churches in Ogre whom I am acquainted with. After dinner, I shared my testimony of repentance and how the Lord has changed my life so that He is the center and reason I live rather than myself. Then I sang "Create in me a clean heart O God" and encouraged everyone to be faithful to the Lord. I tried to share this quote (below) but I forgot exactly how it want, so I googled it and here it is for you my blog readers:

"Give me the love that leads the way, The faith that nothing can dismay, The hope no disappointments tire, The passion that will burn like fire, Let me not sink to be a clod: Make me Thy fuel, Flame of God." - Amy Carmichael

So after an active day, I am tired but in a good way, not burnt out but consumed with zeal for the Lord and blessed to pour out to my family and friends the love He pours out in my heart by the Holy Spirit. I am thankful for the abundant and eternal life Jesus has given me. I love my friends and family back in California - it is a sacrifice to be so far away, but Jesus if faithful to grant new friends and spiritual family members in this life and for eternity, so it's worth it.

Mark 10:28-30 Peter began to say to Him, "Behold, we have left everything and followed You." 29 Jesus said, "Truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms, for My sake and for the gospel's sake, 30 but that he will receive a hundred times as much now in the present age, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and farms, along with persecutions; and in the age to come, eternal life.

I do want to point out, though, that our sacrifice is not worthy of comparing with the glory that shall be revealed, especially since "we have left everything" does NOT mean we can NOT keep in touch with far-away friends via the Internet (Skype, Google talk, facebook, blogger, calvary.com etc. HINT HINT, KEEP IN TOUCH) Only in our generation could missionaries get instant messages from the other side of the world for free.

Praise and Prayer for January

1. Answer to prayer: God has opened doors to start a Bible study in the city of Ikskile, there is a group that has been praying for a church and it seems like God is confirming the vision to plant a Calvary Chapel with them.
2. Pray for a smooth transition in 2008 from assisting Ogre's Evangelical Russian church to the new church plant in Ikskile (if this is indeed God's will and timing).
3. Pray for safe driving from city to city in the winter time (Latvia has the 2nd most deadly roads in Europe)
4. Pray that our van would continue to operate well in freezing conditions (we couldn't open the doors today).
5. Continue to pray for the formation of a team from CCMB to help us in evangelism and church planting in the summer or fall.

Word for the New Year

As the clock struck midnight and the fireworks blasted in the new year, I was in the city of Ikskile with Dainis (a youth pastor) and his youth group seeking first the kingdom of God. After the fireworks faded, we prayed and waited to hear God's still small voice (1 Kings 19:11-12). The Holy Spirit spoke to us through the scriptures he gave us, then we encouraged one another with these words. Here are some of the verses God gave us:

• Psalm 91
• Jeremiah 29:11
• John 1:8
  
• John 14:16-17
  
• Acts 1:8
  
• Romans 8:1-4
• 2 Peter 1:3
  

These scriptures seemed to have common themes and gave each of us vision for 2008. For me, Acts 1:8 was a confirmation that I am called to be testify of Jesus Christ in this region, and that He will give me the power to fulfill this calling. So may the Spirit of God continue to work through the Word of God in the hearts of the people of God this year!

Pray for Ikšķile

Wednesday night I went to a prayer meeting in Ikskile, Latvia with Dainis, his wife (Liena) and her mom who built this sanctuary attached to her house. She has been praying for 10 years for a church to be formed in Ikskile and in faith remodeled her green house into a sanctuary that can seat 40 people. Ikskile is a growing city of 7,000 people, situated in the Ogre region, only 28 kilometers from Riga, the capitol of Latvia. Ikskile is the oldest city in Latvia and is the first place that Christianity reached over 800 years ago. Today the only evangelical church is the Lutherin church and the Catholics are building a women's monastery.

Those at the meeting attend a Latvian speaking church in Ogre on Sundays but all agree that their city needs a church that teaches the Word of God. I will share more later about the meeting and these believers, but for now I can say that the Lord seems to be opening a door in this city for us to start a Bible study there in the near future.

Sunday Services

We had a full service (about 45 people) at the Russian church at 10 am and I taught from Romans 5:12-21. It was a difficult passage to teach in Russian but they everyone was gracious and said they understood in spite of my many grammatical mistakes and bad pronunciation of the long unusual words in the text. Where mistakes abound, grace abounds much more and I am growing through the whole process - hopefully others are truly growing in their faith too.

Our evening home fellowship went very well, 4 people came this time, praise the Lord. This was a great opportunity to share our vision for church planting from Acts 2:42, Ephesians 4:11ff, 1Peter 2:2, and other verses. I taught in Russian and we had a good time praising the Lord in English. Next time I hope to be prepared to sing in Latvian too.

November Thanksgiving and Prayer

Here is an update for the missions prayer teams:

1. Thank God for providing a minivan that enables us to go preach the gospel in other cities. Pray for the people in Ogre, Cesis and Riga who received tracts and heard the gospel, that God would open their minds and hearts to respond.
2. Thank God for the excitement of understandng more and more in both Latvian and Russian languages. Brenten is now teaching Sunday morning without a traslator. Continue to pray for a translator but pray even more that we will become fluent in both languages - this is vital for everything we do.
3. Thank God for the gifts from CCMB which came early for Christmas but just in time for the cold season (it started snowing today!) We are blessed to be warm, well fed and our ears filled with the sounds of new praise and worship CD's. God is so gracious!
4. Thank God for working here and giving us hope that He is going to do much more than we can ask or imagine! (Eph 3:20) Pray as the Spirit leads you for Latvia.

"Continue earnestly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving; meanwhile praying also for us, that God would open to us a door for the word, to speak the mystery of Christ, for which I am also in chains, that I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak." (Colossians 4:2-4)