Border Crossings

Friday, February 3, 2012

Border Crossings

Here's what it looked like crossing the border into USA from Juarez, Mexico this morning. Had about a twenty minute wait as both the US Citizen line on the left and the Mexican Citizen line on the right inched their way forward toward the US Border Customs building.

I've crossed the border into El Paso again early this morning after waiting in a slow moving line on the bridge. After about a half an hour my place in line finally made it into the border crossing inspection building and I was asked once again like they always do; "What was your purpose for visiting Mexico?" to which I replay, "I was visiting a children's home and a pastor and his family." To which they reply, "what are you bringing into USA?" To which I reply, "not much, my computer, camera and some library material."

Depending on which agent I get to stand in front of the conversation usually ends here and I'm given back my passport and given permission to keep walking in the direction of "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Once in a while though the questioning persists until they get it out of me that I am a missionary here on business for the Lord. That ends the conversation and they let me pass. For some reason they have nothing more to say after they here those words.

Rev. Paul Johansson teaching the Book of Romans via 10 week bi-lingual video teaching course that we have been hosting here at Pastor Julio's church in Juarez, Mexico

Well, it's off to Mac Donalds for a sausage Mac muffin and then to the Post Office. Tonight is class #9 of the bi-lingual video teaching series on the Book of Romans I am hosting at Pastor Julio's church in Juarez. I have a few hours here in El Paso before crossing back over for that.

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On The Southern Border of El Paso/Juarez November 8, 2023

Today is November 8, 2023 and I am living on both sides of the USA/Mexico border. I maintain rented apartments on both the American and the Mexican sides of the border and travel by car between my two places of residence each week. Depending on what is on my schedule for the week I am either in El Paso, Texas or Juarez, Mexico. When I am on the USA side I attend my home church called Harvest Christian Center. As time goes on I will resume posting about what i am involved with and doing here these days.

September in Paris, France - 2018

I am currently in Paris, France where I have been since September 4, 2018. My plan was to spend a month here enjoying the sights and sounds of Paris and a small town called Auvers Sur Oise where I rented a small studio apartment for the month of September. This small town is famous for a resident it had over a hundred years ago. His name was Vincent Van Gogh. For the last 70 days of his life he lived, painted and died here. And now tourists from all over the world come to visit. It is a quiet and picturesque town with a lot of old world charm in the country away from big city Paris. I have been enjoying my time which has included visiting the world famous Eiffel Tower. But soon I will be back to continue the work I have been doing in Juarez, Mexico. Stay tuned. I will be adding to this blog as the Mission to Juarez, Mexico continues.

October 2017-June, 2018 Mission to Juarez, Mexico - Completed

Mission to Juarez - October 11, 2016 - June 29 2017 Completed

Previous Mexico Mission Completed!

On Tuesday morning September 30, 2014 I boarded a US Airways airliner bound for Philadelphia and then on to Los Angeles, Ca.

From there I took a Metro-Link Commuter Train for an hour and a half ride to attend a 4 day conference at the Rock Church, home base of ISOM Ministries. The key note speaker for this event was none other that Dr. Reinhard Bonnke world famous Evangelist.

My time in California and this event has been a real blessing and has provided all the encouragement that I was looking for to continue what was begun on the previous mission to Juarez, MX as we started and ran Instituto Biblico Juarez for two Trimesters of study.

The conference has now concluded and today I will begin my journey of returning to Los Angeles and board another train, an AmTrak bound for El Paso, TX.

Thank you for your prayers as we head back to Juarez.

September, 2013 - May 20, 2014 Mission To Juarez Completed

My latest mission to Juarez is now history. I have once again successfully gone down to Juarez and returned again to my hometown of Buffalo, NY.

This latest mission lasted for 8 months, my longest mission to Juarez, Mexico to date.

This was the first mission to Mexico in the 15 years that I have gone there in which I had my own personal vehicle at my disposal.

In Buffalo God blessed me with a gift of a 2001 Nissan Xterra and I drove to El Paso and then Juarez from my home in Buffalo.

It was a long trip but with several stops along the way in key cities where I have friends and where I spoke in their churches I was able to make the trip with no problems.

I will continue talking about what happened during this latest mission to Juarez on this blog and continue to fill you in on what God was able to do through someone who said, "here am I Lord...send me." So stay tuned.... -to be continued

Mission To Mexico Completed !

Our two day conference March, 15, 16, 2013 that we called Juarez Vive ! was successful in accomplishing our goal in bringing inspiration and revival into the hearts of our brothers and sisters in the Lord here in Juarez and it also paved the way for the opening of a new bible school here of which I am now it's director.

We have been offering two courses since April and plan on returning in the Fall to begin our first trimester system of courses with courses that we have obtained from International School of Ministry (ISOM) the largest DVD based bi-lingual Bible school in the world. We are excited about the possibilities.

we worked with a team for one week in the Mexican town of Guadalupe which is across the border from Fabens, Texas which is about 30 miles south of El Paso.

We worked with others members of the team made up of volunteers from around the USA who came down the week of October 13-20, 2012 to work on pouring a concrete floor for the new cafeteria being built at Casa de las Gemas Children's Home which is being built under the leadership and guidance of Pastor Steven Brewer the director of Tapestries of Life Ministries headquartered in Fabens.

The floor has been poured !
I was here in the Juarez area last in October, 2012 where all of us volunteer missionary workers lived

together at the Fabens headquarters and we crossed the Mexican border each morning to go to work at the children's home and then cross back over the border to spend the night at our home base in Fabens.

When this Children's Home is complete and up and running with the kids living there it will be the largest children's home in all of Latin America.

We are now embarking on a new mission to Juarez, this one to bring the city of Juarez a 2 day conference to encourage, anoint and equip at least 1300 believers who will attend this event to be the lights of Juarez, to begin to make a difference in their city for the kingdom of God. Stay with us as this mission unfolds in the days ahead up to our date for the conference we are calling "Juarez Vive !" ( Juarez Lives ! )

Friday and Saturday March 15, 16, 2013

Serving Him,

your missionary to Mexico,

Hermano Nick

ps. Thank you for your prayers and support for this mission.

Mission To Juarez

Welcome to my blog of my missions to Mexico serving God in Juarez on the border of El Paso, TX.

One of my previous missions to Mexico began on October 19th, 2011 when I arrived in El Paso for the purpose of working with a ministry based in Fabens, TX about 30 miles south of El Paso called Tapestires of Life.

From October 22-29, 2011, I was part of a team of volunteers from around the USA that came down to work for a week at a very large children's home being built in the desert of Guadalupe, Mexico which is on the border of Fabens, TX.

Pastor Steve Brewer has been building this facility by the grace of God as workers and materials have been provided for over the past 15 years. It is now a multi-million dollar facility that is almost ready to be occupied by over 300 of Mexico's neediest children.

We came down to lay the foundation for the new cafeteria which will soon stand on this property that God provided.

After our work week in Guadalupe came to an end I returned to Juarez and began working with a local pastor in his church and visiting two other local Children's Homes; Juventud con Vision and Rivers of Mercy.

This blog highlights some of the things God had me doing here. Be blessed as God inspires you to do something for His kingdom as He has me.

The Word of God

Romans 3:23

New International Version (NIV)

²³ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Romans 6:23

New International Version (NIV)

²³ For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in^[a] Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 5:8

New International Version (NIV)

⁸ But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Romans 10:9

New International Version (NIV)

⁹ If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

True Fasting - Isaiah 58

Isaiah 58

True Fasting

¹ “Shout it aloud, do not hold back.
Raise your voice like a trumpet.
Declare to my people their rebellion
and to the descendants of Jacob their sins.
² For day after day they seek me out;
they seem eager to know my ways,
as if they were a nation that does what is right
and has not forsaken the commands of its God.
They ask me for just decisions
and seem eager for God to come near them.
³ ‘Why have we fasted,’ they say,
‘and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
and you have not noticed?’

“Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
and exploit all your workers.
⁴ Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
and in striking each other with wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
and expect your voice to be heard on high.
⁵ Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
Is it only for bowing one’s head like a reed
and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the LORD?

⁶ “Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
and break every yoke?
⁷ Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
⁸ Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness^[a] will go before you,
and the glory of the LORD will be your rear guard.
⁹ Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.

“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
¹⁰ and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.
¹¹ The LORD will guide you always;
he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land
and will strengthen your frame.
You will be like a well-watered garden,
like a spring whose waters never fail.
¹² Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins
and will raise up the age-old foundations;
you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls,
Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.

¹³ “If you keep your feet from breaking the Sabbath
and from doing as you please on my holy day,
if you call the Sabbath a delight
and the LORD’s holy day honorable,
and if you honor it by not going your own way
and not doing as you please or speaking idle words,
¹⁴ then you will find your joy in the LORD,
and I will cause you to ride in triumph on the heights of the landand to feast on the inheritance of your father Jacob.”
For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.

Psalm 46

For the director of music. Of the Sons of Korah. According to alamoth.^[b] A song.

¹ God is our refuge and strength,
an ever-present help in trouble.
² Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way
and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea,
³ though its waters roar and foam
and the mountains quake with their surging.^[c]

⁴ There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy place where the Most High dwells.
⁵ God is within her, she will not fall;
God will help her at break of day.
⁶ Nations are in uproar, kingdoms fall;
he lifts his voice, the earth melts.

⁷ The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.

⁸ Come and see what the LORD has done,
the desolations he has brought on the earth.
⁹ He makes wars cease
to the ends of the earth.
He breaks the bow and shatters the spear;
he burns the shields^[d] with fire.
¹⁰ He says, “Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth.”

¹¹ The LORD Almighty is with us;
the God of Jacob is our fortress.

Hebrews 10:1-18

Hebrews 10

Christ’s Sacrifice Once for All

¹ The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. ² Otherwise, would they not have stopped being offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no longer have felt guilty for their sins. ³ But those sacrifices are an annual reminder of sins. ⁴ It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

⁵ Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said:

“Sacrifice and offering you did not desire,
but a body you prepared for me;
⁶ with burnt offerings and sin offerings
you were not pleased.
⁷ Then I said, ‘Here I am—it is written about me in the scroll—
I have come to do your will, my God.’”^[a]

⁸ First he said, “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them”—though they were offered in accordance with the law. ⁹ Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will.” He sets aside the first to establish the second. ¹⁰ And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

¹¹ Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹² But when this priest had offered for all time one sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, ¹³ and since that time he waits for his enemies to be made his footstool.¹⁴ For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.

¹⁵ The Holy Spirit also testifies to us about this. First he says:

¹⁶ “This is the covenant I will make with them
after that time, says the Lord.
I will put my laws in their hearts,
and I will write them on their minds.”^[b]

¹⁷ Then he adds:

“Their sins and lawless acts
I will remember no more.”^[c]

¹⁸ And where these have been forgiven, sacrifice for sin is no longer necessary.

Romans Chapter 8

Romans 8

Life Through the Spirit

¹ Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, ² because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you^[a] free from the law of sin and death. ³ For what the law was powerless to do because it was weakened by the flesh,^[b] God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh to be a sin offering.^[c] And so he condemned sin in the flesh, ⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

⁵ Those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on what the flesh desires; but those who live in accordance with the Spirit have their minds set on what the Spirit desires. ⁶ The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. ⁷ The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. ⁸ Those who are in the realm of the flesh cannot please God.

⁹ You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ. ¹⁰ But if Christ is in you, then even though your body is subject to death because of sin, the Spirit gives life^[d] because of righteousness. ¹¹ And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of^[e] his Spirit who lives in you.

¹² Therefore, brothers and sisters, we have an obligation—but it is not to the flesh, to live according to it. ¹³ For if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live.

¹⁴ For those who are led by the Spirit of God are the children of God. ¹⁵ The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship.^[f] And by him we cry, “Abba,^[g] Father.” ¹⁶ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. ¹⁷ Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.

Present Suffering and Future Glory

¹⁸ I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us. ¹⁹For the creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed. ²⁰ For the creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope ²¹ that^[h] the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of God.

²² We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time.²³ Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies. ²⁴ For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? ²⁵ But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

²⁶ In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. ²⁷ And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.

²⁸ And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who^[i] have been called according to his purpose. ²⁹ For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. ³⁰ And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.

More Than Conquerors

³¹ What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? ³² He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? ³³ Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. ³⁴ Who then is the one who condemns? No one. Christ Jesus who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. ³⁵ Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? ³⁶ As it is written:

“For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.”^[j]

³⁷ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. ³⁸ For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,^[k] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, ³⁹neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Border Crossings - Mission News From The Juarez/El Paso Border

Friday, February 3, 2012