I have and I haven't fallen off the face of the earth :)

Hi :)

Yes, I actually still have this blog.   No, I have not actually blogged since March of this year.  In truth I have two reasons why I have not blogged.   The first is the last 9 to 10 months have been the most spiritually dry of my life.  Second, which is a WAYYY better reason than the first, is that I am pregnant with our first born SON :).   Which I am assuming most of you know from facebook.

God has laid a bunch of things on my heart to share with you which I am sure will take several blog posts.  In this one hopefully I can catch you up on a few things in our life and from my heart.  

So .... remember when I posted about landscaping and being uncomfortable? In those posts I might have moaned about how after I had made all these declarations about wanting to grow that God was all quiet on the western front?  Well, needless to say God reads my blog and he responded.  Our life has been CRAZY for the last 5 or 6 months.   We have been challenged in about every way.   Good and bad.   We have grown.

In my post about landscaping I talked about doing, acting, and obeying and I referenced several verses from James describing what God was telling me to do.   In truth, because what means anything without truth,  I have not done a whole lot of doing, acting, and obeying in the specific areas God has asked me to.  Admitting that hurts but being real with myself is also awesome.   I am secure in the fact that God loves me beyond what I am capable of understanding, and I am also secure in the fact that the intimacy that I will have with God will only grow as I do, act, and obey.   Fortunately enough for me :)  God has made me uncomfortable enough that I am SO ready to do, act, and obey.   Coincidence?  I think probably not.

How pregnancy fits into all of this:

Last fall Chris and I started to pray about when to start a family.  I was starting to get the baby bug.   We just wanted to be on the same page with God.   In January of this year after Chris and God had a conference about what the Hill Family Vision was for this year, Chris announced that this was the year we were going to get pregnant.    Even though I had the baby bug and was ready to have a baby at any moment, Chris actually being ready totally freaked me out.   After MUCH praying and talking we really felt like God had said May was to be the month of conception.   Since we were successfully implementing natural family planning February, March, and April were extremely difficult because I just wanted to try and have a baby.  But, we waited because we trusted God.    Thankfully in this area of our life there was lots of obedience and listening and we very much counseled with God to make sure we were following his will.  

May came and we did all the things necessary to conceive a baby.   Naturally May was a super stressful and trying month in more ways than one, for me.   I had to seriously practice taking all my thoughts captive, forgiving people who hurt me, and seriously trusting Jesus.   Naturally during the time we were fertile we had a huge disagreement with a close family member that was nothing but an attack from the enemy to get me all stressed out in ways my body could not handle.  Thankfully I have a rock of a husband who stood in the gap for our family.   Thankfully God gave me the grace to just let Him fix everything.   He did and we absolutely love, respect, and adore that close family member.  

I have actually never done so much praying as I did in the time between conception and finding out if was pregnant.   I contended for the health of my body and the health of the baby that I trusted was growing inside of me.   A fight in me came out that I had never experienced before.  

The first weekend of June rolled around and we celebrated our third wedding anniversary.   It was perfect.   I am so in love with my husband and I am so attracted to him :).    That Sunday night I decided it was time to take a pregnancy test and it was negative.   I did not cry.  I kind of just responded like I am pregnant, whatever.   Over the next two days I went into major spiritual warfare mode and prayed as I walked G around memorial park.   I had this fight in me that was not going to give up.  I was pregnant and I was not going to except anything less.   During these two days I also started experiencing some early pregnancy symptoms.   I obviously, having never been pregnant before, had no idea.   But, my friend Julie who I was divulging my heart out to totally realized that I was probably pregnant.   The Tuesday following the Sunday of the negative test was actually our anniversary day.   Julie called me at 9 in the morning to say I absolutely had to take another test.  Then Liz called who was about 4 months pregnant at the time and knew nothing about my negative test, but she went on to tell me that her first test was negative and her second one was positive.   So, I took another test and it was immediately positive.   I cannot tell you the joy of seeing that little pink line.   I had all these great intentions of waiting until Chris got home to tell him that I was pregnant.  I even went and ran all these errands in preparation of a grandiose anniversary dinner.   As the afternoon wore on I could not wait another moment so I called him at work and told him.   He was absolutely thrilled and his concentration was ruined for the rest of the day.  We found out we were expecting on the day of our third anniversary.   It was truly the best present ever.

I can also say that the few days I had in between the negative test and the positive test gave me some perspective for people who try a long time to get pregnant.   I respect them in a way I never could have before.   Even though I would like to say something to help make their pain better I know I cannot.  I can just say that  I have this little, tiny, incomparable bit of understanding.   Not really enough to justify but just enough to know more than I did.

I can say that getting pregnant was a miracle.  Never before in my life have I been so sure of God.   I felt so blessed and so aware of God's mercy and grace that he would allow Chris and I to become parents.  While people get pregnant all the time, each time is a complete and utter miracle.   The creation of a new baby is a complete testament that God loves us and is all powerful.

You would think that after all the prayer, fighting, and good news that my faith would have been more than a mustard seed.   That maybe I would have entered into this rich spiritual time with the Lord and have become a super woman --- because that is totally what I thought would have happened.   But it did not.   Instead I became closed up as if I were the one, and not God, who was protecting my pregnancy.  I  went into survivor mode shutting down any unnecessary emotion and thought.   I was not relying on God for my baby and for me.   I just shut down.  

 Chris also got a huge promotion in May, which was an answer to prayer, but also required him to start working 60-80 hr weeks for about 3 months.   Needless to say the Hill house started playing defense instead of offense.

Which would explain why my spiritual life became so dry.  Which would explain the lack of blog writing.

But you know what - God did not leave me or Chris in that place for long.   But you will have to wait until tomorrow for that story :)