March!

 Hello everyone!

This is it. The final stretch of the academic year at UT Dallas! Everyone is back from Spring Break, and we now only have five more weeks of meeting together before the students start to go in different directions for the summer. To be honest, the next five weeks feel like closing time to me. We recently talked about in one of our meetings with all of the student leaders at UTD about what it means to 'finish well'. For them, that could be applied to finishing well in classes, in their Focus on Jesus bible studies, or in their small group, especially to the students that are graduating, these are potentially the last few weeks in our ministry. For me, that also includes the transition from finishing this internship and transitioning into a 3 year commitment to being on staff. Your time in an organization is often remembered by how you end or leave it. We talked to our students about how as disciples of Jesus, we need to do everything we can to end on a positive, life-giving note so that our legacy is a God-glorifying one. 

With that, Felipe and I really thought about what we wanted to do with this last month in our small group. We feel good about having discussions the next four weeks about common misconceptions people tend to believe early on about God or their faith. Misconceptions like "God doesn't talk to me", "God is angry with me", or "Following Jesus just isn't fun". We then want to spend a week just encouraging each other about the year and reflecting on how we each have grown. Then, the final week will be marked by just talking about transition. What will the summer look like as most of us go back to our hometowns? Or since there are so many freshman, how will everyone look to continue these friendships that you made this year when you no longer live in the dorms, so they take more effort to maintain? Please be praying that our small group continues to grow closer over this time!

Beautiful weather means more small group meetings outside! For this one, we spent some of it playing soccer (hence the penneys), so I had to bring the oranges to eat during it. 

I receive random photos like this throughout the week as my guys hang out. Shoutout to these guys specifically who stepped up in our community to serve by helping people move dorms when more help was needed!

Night of Gospel Worship!

This month, my good friend Lailah put together an entire night gospel style worship, including a lot of elements from Black church that I have never experienced. She worked so hard planning this event, and I really do think God met us there that night. Lailah is trained as a dancer (she danced professionally before joining FOCUS' staff), and included a praise dance during this worship night. I really had never heard of praise dancing before this (and if you are in that boat now, you should google it)! In an unexpected way, but not really that unexpected because God ALWAYS moves in the ways we sometimes least expect it, the praise dancing was so impactful for me to watch. She did a great job with this whole night, and I am glad to be serving at UTD with Lailah!

A photo from earlier this year with Lailah just so you can put a face to the name!

This month, we also had our family night at the Grove AND I gave my first sermon! We are in this series of false gospels that our generation (GenZ) tend to follow, often at the expense of the exclusive nature of the Gospel that Jesus shared. I talked about the false gospel of safety and security, focusing on how we often let fear drive us to stay in situations where we feel the most comfortable, often at the expense of where God could be leading us. That sermon can be listened to here if you are interested!

Me giving my sermon at Family Night!

I got to drive down to Waco to watch my sister play in a women's rugby match with her school. Pretty impressive if you ask me. 

I also got to go camping with CK and Josh on Broken Bow lake! It was CK's first time camping and I think he said he enjoyed it. I forced them to take this photo though lol.

Going forward this month, we are preparing to send students to SICM (Student Institute for Campus Ministry), where we join alongside a sister ministry in Washington state and spend a week growing in leadership and growing as disciples on our college campus. Would you please be praying for the students who have decided to go and are starting to fundraise for the trip?

Since I have decided to stay on staff at UTD for next year, I will also begin fundraising again for next year. In the next few weeks, I will reach out to you all about being on my support team for the next 12 months. But if you know already that is something that you would like to do or you have any further questions, please feel free to reach out to me first. 

I love you all and I hope you all enjoy the warmer weather and budding trees that Spring brings! Please continually be praying for God to move in the lives of students on college campuses. Jesus is in the business of bringing life to people's lives, and I have seen that in abundance this year on my college campus. The songs for the month for me are "I Know a Name" by Elevation Worship and "Name Above All Names" by Charity Gayle. 

With love,

Paul