Round 1... Accomplished!

Hi Friends, Family, and guests,

I'd like to share with everyone that all my assignments for this semester are handed in and taken care of, and that the two tests that I had to worry about went by smoothly. The past two weeks have been very busy, making sure that time was used effectively to get the job done. In my previous post, I mentioned that I was baptized and that I now have some video footage to share with everyone.

The next part of my agenda in sharing the adventures thus far, happens to be my trip to the Zoo with my house-mates. I can say it was a long needed day coming, with the tests and assignments to worry about the week before, and some much needed kick back time on the weekend. I've also always wanted to get some footage of Kangaroos and Koalas, so what better way then to get some shots at the Taronga Zoo in Sydney. You can enjoy the footage and share the good times with everyone back home.


As for the rest of the news in the life of Paul, Christmas time is coming soon, and sooner than that, my Birthday is in exactly one week! Whoa... I didn't even realize that until I saw the date and calender on my laptop. Cool! I'm gonna be 24! Ten days after that, is the graduation ball near the Darling Harbor for all students (Hills & City) to have... well... "a ball". I'm already wondering and considering who I should ask to go with... and well, if things pan out the way I'd like them too, you'll find out who at the beginning of December when I get pictures from the night coming. Other things I'm looking forward to and looking into, happens to be another job opportunity with my room-mate Diego. There's also a potential house near the church with room and board, but I'm not 100% sure about leaving my place I'm at right now. God has presented many opportunities and many blessings in this month, and I'm so greatful for them all. Well, my time is running short, and I've got a few things to do on my agenda, so I'll catch you all in the near future, and a reminder to my readers to be blessed and live life to the fullest. God Bless, and have a great week!

Knock Knock Knock

That's the sound of opportunities!

Well, as many of you know, I've been working on videos for my blogs and doing some random other videos with new friends here at Hillsong, and with that, comes opportunities... but I'll get to that in a moment.

I'd like to share the news with everyone that I've been baptized! as of October 28th, 2007, I made my own public declaration to take the dunk and make my commitment that much more publicly known that it has ever been before. I know that I was previously baptized in the catholic faith as an infant, but my conviction came when I realized that being alive for 2 months of my life and than being baptized does not imply it was my own decision. Another factor for myself was that baptisms represent burying the old self and rising the new by declaration, and that as an infant being 2 months alive and being baptized didn't leave much room for "the old" to even exist. I also must apologies since very little people back home knew that was my plans, but the truth be told, I signed up for it and kind of forgot that I was getting it done, until about three days before going I received an email from Hillsong about it. So please forgive me for not saying anything about it earlier, but out of love I'm letting everyone know the day after it happened. Hopefully by next week I'll have pictures and videos to share with you all.

As for the opportunities in my life, first of all, I may have found a cheaper and bigger house to live in with some great guys who are second year students. Also I'd be moving in with a good friend of mine, Michael from Michigan, where we'll be living a nice 10 minute walk away from Hillsong Church. This blessing is huge for savings on fuel, bus fare, rent and time between days and classes. Its not 100% official yet, but it has been worked on, and we've met with the people that want take up the lease coming this December.

The next opportunity is that working with the video guys here at Hillsong, first of all has been loads of fun, second of all a great experience. The word thus far is that the three main students that do the videos for United and for Wild-Life youth, are leaving and need someone to take over and carry the torch. Thanks to working with some of these guys, they want to put in a good word for me to work with some of the worship pastors and video crew people to help make the cuts they want. So I've been blown away with this as an opportunity, praising God for it immensely, and loving life!

Well as promised, I'd have the Blue Mountain video ready for you by this post, so enjoy the Blue Mountains, and I'll send the pictures and videos of my baptism next post.

Mountains and Lightning

Hello Friends and Family,

I send my love and best wishes to all who read this, thanks for being so faithful in hearing the news from this Crazy Canuck in the land down under. I have great news to share, I've started working again This Thursday already and will have more work this coming Saturday and possibly have an interview with an elderly home to work there on a more scheduled basis. I'm absolutely loving life here, and enjoying my time with great new friends.

Last Monday I had the opportunity to take on a 5 hour hike at the Blue Mountains not far from Sydney (about a 2 hour drive out of town). The adventure was with 3 friends from our "ONR" neighborhood, Diego, Hannah, Sandra, and myself. I carried the backpack with our 10 bottles of water and some hiking snacks the whole way down and back. We found a place we called "Paradise" at the bottom of the valley of the Blue Mountains at the 2 hour mark of hiking. It was an incredible place to see, and makes me want to go there again to camp out. We ended up finding 3 main sources of fresh mountain water that ran past our path, and it was so cold and refreshing to drink. The water was naturally filtered by the vegetation up stream, and was crystal clear and so pure and so delicious. I question why we drink tap water after drinking that... and to answer anyones question, no I did not get sick after drinking the water. I have some pictures to share with everyone from the hike and I should have a video ready next week from the Blue Mountains. As for a video this week, I have some incredible footage of Lightning in Sydney as of last week, so I hope you enjoy it, and be blessed.

Home Sweet "Over-Seas" Home

Hi Everybody,

I want to share some great news today, I found some temporary work today with two other College students unpacking and delivering furniture in a warehouse. The job is great, and the pay is decent, but the hours are few. I can't complain, it will be the first time I've been paid to work here in Australia and that's something to praise God for!

I've also compiled this video to commemorate our amazing family here in Australia in our wonderful community of Old Northern Rd from Hills Campus.

Enjoy:

Palm Beach Sunrise

Greetings friends & family,

I love you guys so much! I've been understanding more and more lately how blessed I truly am with God inside of me and my friends and family at my side. I've received great encouragement, words from God that have shaped my life, and a passion that continues to burn brightly.

I received a great blessing last week, and I won't say who it was from, but I will say that God will not hold back his blessings in your life for what you've done, that your financial aid was a blessing at the most opportune time, and that because of your faithfulness, other students have a "second chance" and helping each other with our struggles in daily living. I only pray that God can continue to bless others as they search God for answers in the same manner, no matter what the heart's request is.

I want to share with you all a video and some great photos that my room-mate and some neighbors of mine took on an adventure that will not be forgotten. I'll start by introducing what happened in the beginning and the photos and video will help see what actually happened.

It all started at 1:00am October 1st, 2007 when a small group of us thought how amazing it would be to see the sun rise here in Sydney on the Pacific Ocean. With very little influence, we all knew that would be something crazy and awesome to do, spontaneously, and take the plunge. We packed what we needed, some warm blankets, pillows, towels, and some snacks, and left for the beach at 2:00am in the morning. When we arrived at the beach it was roughly 2:30am, and we unpacked what we needed to keep warm during the midnight sky, and rested a while to anxiously witness a glorious sunrise. The rest of this story will be taken care of with the pictures you'll see and a video to watch.

Link to the video:

Prophets Abound

OK,

So, for the last week and a-half, our house has had no internet, because of our GB of internet being close to our maxed limit. So, I'm sorry that I never had the chance to say anything extra on my blogs since then and sorry for that delay as well.

On the brighter side, I have more experiences to share since then till now.

Let’s start from 2 weeks ago...

I attended a seminar for two nights on Tuesday and Wednesday night called "Sense & Sexuality" with guest speakers Allan Meyer and Sy Rogers. The seminar was great; a lot of applicable teaching was presented on our make up for our drives with our sexual maturity and identity. I particularly enjoyed hearing Sy Rogers, since his previous lifestyle before accepting Christ was homosexual. His insight on what life is like before and after his decision was extremely insightful. Most people think that when you've become a Christian, you just magically have all your problems go away, because you're "taken care of" now, but the reality of it all, is that we have to fight for our freedom sometimes, and Sy Rogers explains that his cravings for his past was not an easy burden to dismantle in his life. It was with the help of God, as his strength, through his weaknesses that prevailed. Sy learned that his memory was very functional at the worst of times, and it was running towards God saying "help me" rather than running away from God saying "hide me" that made the difference. He's now a married man, with one beautiful daughter who’s recently married, and is now speaking across the world of his testimony and previous struggles, and sharing his victory in Christ.

So that was just the seminar, and there's more that has happened since then too. College continues to grow in excellence, and I continue to grow passionate in serving and building great character with integrity for God.

I've had an interesting past week, considering I've had prophecies pour into me several times from totally different random people through out the college. The first one started in one of my lecture classes, I like to sit up front in my Doctrine 2 class, and the teacher is Lee Burns who's the principal of the college at the Hills campus. He spoke of ways to simply encourage one another, and through his "example" he just decided to encourage and pour prophecy in my life. He mentioned I was a man of God, with great character and integrity, hungry for the word, and obedient to God's call and will. He continued to encourage and made note of a destiny with God, and I was in a way shocked and yet confident that those words would soon come true to pass.

The next word of I had was in a leadership group I meet in before chapel, and every Wednesday each member of the group gets to have prophecy done in their life. It happened to be my week for it, but the Sense & Sexuality seminar brought an encounter day with Sy Rogers to guest speak, so a week later passed and I received it then. I was told from three different people what they say, and 2 of the 3 were nearly identical and neither of those people had shared with each other what they received, and the 3rd prophecy was somewhat on the same lines, and encouraged the next levels of my character. The major theme from the 2 members went something like this: I am to be a great leader, in many areas of life. That I have a natural gift to lead, with words and actions towards other people. What some people may find difficult in leading, I will find it to be natural and with ease. That I will have a great team of leaders work with me, and change the perspective of the world in certain areas of life with God. That what ever my dreams are currently, they will only be the beginning of even greater things to come. That I will have two areas in my life that will be ever so important as my responsibility with this leadership offers. One being to be stronger and two being softer. To be stronger is defined that my intimacy with God and growing in Christ will be evident and crucial to my leadership. That intimacy will guide and guard many areas of my life and my very being and heart. God's plans will be clear and precise as I grow intimately with God, and move at an incredible pace. The second being softer applies for care towards others and those around me. The softness required of this leadership is also crucial, that there will be times to tend to needs of others, allowing for growth and "catch up" carrying others with me to even greater heights. With out this softness, I may trample over others with out intentions, but by default, and possibly leave important people behind and possibly damage those left behind by accident. Through the softness of the heart will I truly understand the intimacy I'll grow with Christ, and lead the way I aught to by example. With all of this in mind the final thought was that my dreams now are almost nothing in comparison to what God will do in 10 years time. I won't understand why or how, but the job is not to ponder, rather to act on what God blesses us with. Also that the team I will work with will be prepared by God and will also be key and crucial for the dreams to become reality and to do something amazing.

As some of us already know, that team is somewhat completed, but still not 100% there yet. Some of us on this team are being discovered, others are in the making, and others haven't even shown themselves yet, but soon will join the cause for Christ.

Now that's just the few instances so far where people have spoken and encouraged in my life, there's still more, and from people I really don't know that well at all. They just come up and boldly encourage and I'm left sitting there wondering sometimes, "God, why me?" Then I remember its all because of His grace.

I want to finish this post with an extremely amazing example of what "reality" , "mercy" and "grace" can offer us.

The story begins with a young man getting in his car after drinking too much, and recklessly driving home. At an intersection he crosses paths with another car and crashes into a wreck. The drunk driver is still alive, but the young man in the other car has passed away. The next week he is in trial standing next to the father of the diseased son. The father is presented with the penalty.

Reality: The father through bitterness wishes the worst upon the drunk driver and mourns the loss of his son, thinking justice has been served.

Mercy: The father forgives the drunk driver and leaves the charges into the hands of the drunk driver, letting the weight of his actions speak for them self.

Grace: The father not only forgives the drunk driver, but takes the drunk driver in as his own son. Not only giving him a second chance, but growing with him, and giving life back where it may have looked like it no longer existed.

God Bless, and don't forget to pray for me and send me emails... I love it when I get to read from you all.

PRoss02@Gmail.com










This picture is for Jon... he wanted me to send him a shot of what P&W looks like at Hillsong. One draw back though brother, this is only Power house, not their standard Sunday morning. So its filled with Young Adults, not all ages.

Happy Birthday Justin

Hi everyone,

It's my little brother's birthday today, he turns 17, so if anyone see's him... which can be rare at times... than please wish him a Happy 17th.

I just wanted to send a small recap from the past week, and it has been good and some minor bad things too.

I'll start with the bad... We still don't know or have the funds to pay the phone bill, and its past the due date since September 3rd. We're all praying for provision, and thus far, we're still believing something will happen.

The goods would fall in the category with having a great week, We had two guest speakers in the past week, one for our Friday morning, where classes like Church History and World Religion were canceled. Those happen to be two classes I really like, but the speaker, Tom Rawls, was very good, and instilled confidence to his audience. The second speaker we had was at Church in the services, his name is Reggie Dabbs. He's a great man, with a wicked history and testimony. When he was 7 years old, he found out that his parents were foster parents, and his real mother was a prostitute, and he was a product of "Mom trying to earn another dollar to feed her kids." The problem was that Reggie was given up for adoption, because his biological Mother couldn't afford to keep another child, and Reggies testimony starts with him learning what the Gospel means, and than realizing that his family all along was with Christ, and through this victory he now preaches to thousands, and leads a thriving church in Florida.

Other great things that happened during the week, from cousins Melanie and Marc, both gave encouraging emails, and loved hearing from both of them. You guys lifted my spirits, and made a good day into a great day. So thank you guys so much for doing that, I pray amazing blessings going both your ways. Also, Mom has been encouraging more so than usual, in the past week, and its been incredible. Talking to Dad on his birthday was another high lite, and today chatting with Justin on Skype was great.

I have some videos I'd like to post, I'm going to get some help from my room mates who used to work with multi-media stuff for over two years, and I'm sure I can get something going by next post. So hang tight, I'll catch you all later, and I love you and miss you all, and don't forget to be blessed.

With Love