Penitas, TX – March 30-April 5, 2025

During the last eight years that I was working for money, I often had to travel to places around the world with little advance notice.  The flights usually departed early in the morning, so I’d call for a cab to pick me up in the wee hours after midnight.  In January of this year, I heard a song written by Kevin Welch and performed by Kevin, Keiran Kane and Fats Kaplan, “A Prayer Like Any Other.”   The first verse captures the essence of those early mornings waiting for the cab to show up.

It’s way past midnight, everyone’s asleep

Outside the window it’s quiet on the street


My bags are packed, my guitar too

Taxi’s coming, nothin’ I can do

Oh Lord, keep your eye on my friends


I’d just feel better knowing you’re watching them

I’ve got to roll, take a little spin

While I’m gone, keep your eye on my friends

The end of each month at an MDS response has some of those same feelings.  People who’ve worked together, eaten at least 40 meals together, and shared stories of life and faith, have become good friends.  At the end of a response, those feelings are amplified. As tools, equipment and vehicles are ready to leave, we realize the clients, neighbors and community members have become friends as well.

This final week of the Penitas MDS Response we had no weekly volunteers, so the long term folks stepped up again.  Our last two houses were dedicated.  The services for each were well attended by client families, plus several people from Region 3 of MDS, and local organizations who provided the funding needed to purchase materials.  After the final dedication, the family provided a delicious meal of flautas,rice and salsa.

Gotta get home the only way I know    

The long old road, steady and slow

One of these days, I’ll come back

If the creek don’t rise and stuff like that

Oh Lord, keep your eye on this place

Keep it warm, keep it safe

You know I depend on your saving grace

While I’m gone, keep your eye on this place

The long term volunteers are headed home, some flying and some taking the long road, steady and slow.  I think most volunteers think about returning to a community to see how it is fairing, but few actually do it.  I have only returned to an area when another disaster created the need for MDS to respond again, but the prayer for God to keep an eye on places like Penitas is very real and repeated often.

This is just a prayer like any other

Nothing more, nothing less

Just a prayer like any other

One more time could you just say yes

Oh Lord, keep your eye on me

You know how foolish and reckless I can be

Light up my way, so I can see

Oh Lord, keep your eye on me

Oh Lord, keep your eye on my friends

Oh Lord, keep your eye on this place

Kevin Welch’s prayer and the prayers of MDS volunteers leaving for home, at the time they are spoken, do not feel like just another prayer. They are specific expressions of love and concern for friends, places and self, all spoken within a framework of reliance on God’s amazing grace.  Nothing more, but certainly nothing less.

As we leave the MDS Penitas response in Hidalgo County, Texas

Joanne, Judy, Donna, Brian, Jonelle, Elvin, Laura and Carl