The Black Hole of Need

[ This is part of something I wrote just before Christmas.   It is part of a message I like to call Vulnerably Dependent.   I just felt like this needed to be posted, so if it speaks to your heart that is awesome :) ]

One of the fears that keep us from abandoning ourselves fully to God is the fear that the work will be unendurable and the toiling will be too much.   We fear that our lives will lack joy and excitement when just the opposite is true.   Much of the church today speaks of a mundane and an unexciting life while the world lures us into a lie that it will provide the real destiny adventures that we so long for.  It is a trap set by the enemy to keep us wrapped in the safety of the mundane while constantly searching for the adventure God destined us to have. The unending search creates a loop of dissatisfaction and frustration that propels us into what I call the black hole of need.  A black hole of need that can only be filled by God, but because of the lies of the enemy we try and fill it with everything but Him.   

1 John 15-17 The MSG

Don’t love the world’s ways.  Don’t love the world’s good.  Love of the world squeezes out love for the father.  Practically everything that goes on in the world – wanting your own way, wanting everything for yourself, wanting to appear important – has nothing to do with the Father.  It just isolates you from him.   The world and all its wanting, wanting, wanting is on the way out – but whoever does what God wants is set for eternity.   

The black hole is a very interesting phenomenon that if allowed tries to become part of our very nature.   The really scary thing about the black hole is that it is just as rampant among non-Christians as it is among Christians.  The black hole tries to tell us that its needs are part of our personality. It interweaves lies into our daily life telling us that when we are stressed we must eat something, buy something, or do something.  When we are sad it tells us how to act and what to immerse ourselves in.  When we are happy it dictates to us how we express happiness.  In the end the black hole of need develops in our lives idols that steal our attention away from God.  If we all truly think about it there are things in our life that we always turn to before we turn to God. There are things in our life that you may be secretly holding on to tighter than God.

It is very uncomfortable to think about. That we modern day Christians would have many idols in our life.  The worldliness in us justifies many of them by telling us that it is responsible, smart, or even normal to hold certain things in such high places in our life. That justification veils our eyes to the truth. 

At this very point you may start feeling like I am trying to condemn you and your behavior, and that really there is no chance of living correctly. These are the lies of the spirit of legalism that seek to destroy even further what God really desires to be in our life. You see the truth is that God desires to be first in every area of your life because He does not want you to live under the burden of making your life mean something.   He does not want you to carry the responsibility of what He has called you to.    Most importantly He wants to experience intimacy with you on levels far beyond what you can imagine, all the time.  God does not want you to be a slave to your cravings, desires, lusts, wants, and needs.   God wants to be your provider, protector, and deliverer.  God wants to give you the desires of your heart.

At the heart of Vulnerably Dependent is the truth that if we allow certain areas of our life to be held higher than Jesus is in our life, then we simply are not living in the blessing or protection of God.   Those areas are automatically open to the enemy to do as he pleases.   It is when we put our hope in these areas, things, people, and dreams where true heartbreak and devastation come in.   A life dependent on God is not void of certain troubles, but the difference is when your heart is all His then He always protects and provides for it.

What seems to be the biggest risk of all, abandoning our selves completely to God, is really what secures us in the safest and most blessed place of all.

In Colossians 1:5-6 in the Message Paul says: “The Message is as true among you today as when you first heard it.  It doesn’t diminish or weaken over time.  It’s the same all over the world.  The Message bears fruit and gets larger and stronger, just as it has in you.”  I love this verse because it says that since the first time we heard the Word of Christ it has been growing larger and stronger all the time.    It is no accident that we as humans always have a desire for more.  More adventure, more people, more meaning, more money, more food, more creativity, more wisdom.  The list could go on forever, but the point is you ARE created for MORE.  In Jesus, dependently, more is not an insatiable word. More is what you were created for.   

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Even if you have been a Christian for twelve years there are times when you have to abandon yourself to Jesus, again. If you are in a season in your life where your heart is always hurting and you feel un-satisfied.  Give Jesus your heart and He will fill it up for you.

Men Doing Dishes ....

[ Picture credit to the Karra Hill - and one of her little signs in her kitchen ]

Sunday morning Chris got up before me.    Chris gets up before me almost every single day.   It is because he loves me and knows that my type B personality loves knowing that when his alarm goes off I still get a few more minutes of sleep.   What I love more is that Chris comes to wake me up instead of my alarm clock.   One of the many benefits of being married to the sexiest man on earth, Chris Hill.

So, Sunday morning Chris got up before me and when I walked into the kitchen he was doing the dishes.   It was one of the most romantic things I had ever seen in my life.   Fireworks were going off, rose petals were falling from the sky, and I am pretty sure angels were singing.

I walked into the kitchen just as Chris was finishing drying the last dish and he handed me a cup of coffee and walked with me to the couch.    Where we snuggled and had quiet times before church - and Chris might have started the last book in the Hunger Games.

Later on that day as Chris and I were trying to organize and unpack the last few boxes from our move.  I got to thinking about why Chris doing the dishes was the most romantic things on earth...

I believe it is because Chris was serving me in a way that meant a lot to me.   I love to cook which means I produce a large number of dirty dishes on a regular basis.   Not only does Chris always love my food but he was showing that he is committed to encouraging me to cook - by doing the dishes.   It is not necessarily the doing of the dishes that is the most romantic thing  - it is the thought behind what caused him to do the dishes in the first place.    He thought about me, thought about my time, thought about what I like to do, thought about what I had been doing, and simply wanted to bless me.    Chris sacrificed what he wanted to do at 8:30 on a Sunday morning to serve me.   That is what is so romantic and what makes me feel really safe as his wife.

It is also produced an atmosphere of honor in our house.    It produced an atmosphere of honor in my heart.   As his wife I am called to honor him and I most certainly try to do so.   But there is something about how Chris served me Sunday morning that made me respect him even more than I already did.   Chris serving me in the privacy of our own home when no one else knows about it makes me feel really safe and secure as his wife.   But it also makes me feel safe and secure to serve and honor Chris in public because I know that he will never take advantage of me submitting to and sacrificing for him.   I know that when I prefer and defer to him in public that I am doing so as a cherished and loved woman, and not as a dependent and opinion-less woman.   

At my brother's engagement party the men were sitting in my Dad's office showing off their guns.   I mean real live guns and not the muscles are their arms.    I walked in and asked Chris if he needed me to bring him anything.   This was a little scary for me because I was going out of my way to serve my husband in front of a lot of other men, and in the south sometimes men take it for granted that the women serve.   But --- my husband is a hunk of a man and would never take me for granted or view me as the "southern servant" whose only purpose in life is to serve her man.   Which is why I WANT to serve him and honor him - which in turn makes him want to serve and love me!

It is awesome and produces an amazing amount of respect and fun in our marriage.   

Blue Gold

I have coffee.  I have 30 minutes til it's time to go to church.  I am listening to the Live Horses EP from Needtobreathe.  My wife is on the other end of the house getting ready for church.  My WIFE is on the other end of OUR house getting ready.  Will the fun of saying "my wife" and "our house" ever go away?  I doubt it.  (Perk of being a boy...I get ready in 10 minutes.)

I am a happy camper.

Want to know why else I'm a happy camper this morning?  Well let me tell you.

BLUE GOLD

So I must preface and explain my hysteria/excitement this morning.  My wife is obviously a very fashionable young woman.  She always has been.  Her effect on my fashion sense is unmistakable.  It has been unmistakable since we started being "friends" back in the day.  She freed me from the undershirt.  She introduced me to the v-neck T.

Since we started dating the woman has been trying to get me into designer blue jeans.  Every year, armed with Christmas or birthday money we would trek to some outlet in hopes that this would be the year.

Why do I sound so hopeless and dejected in channeling those old days?  BECAUSE THEY WERE FREAKING MISERABLE.

"Why were they miserable, Chris?" you might ask...Why let me tell you.

Let's be honest.  Most guys who wear designer blue jeans aren't built like your boy, Hill, here.  As my friend, Wes Whitney, says, "Hill has redwood tree trunks for thighs and the back-end of a bull moose."  Great for football and beating people up on the basketball court - one of my favorite pass-times - but not so great for trying to fit into that True Religion denim.

I am also 6'4" tall barefoot.  Add the normal inch to inch and a half boots that I wear, and you have another problem.  Seven only makes one length.  Guess they only claim to make "Jeans for all Mankind" or I'm not a part of "Mankind".  I'll let you decide.

Another issue.  Despite the rather "linemanesque" lower-half that I manage, I have a fairly skinny waist - 34 or 36 tops.  I REFUSE TO SAG.  If, admittedly as a luxury, I use my bday or xmas money for this kind of jeans, is it too much to ask that they really fit?  I didn't think so.

Hence, I had given up hope.  I was done trying these jeans on.  Ever.  Lucky makes jeans that fit me fine.  I was completely content to go with them from now on.

...and then the miraculous occurred...

Wes and Sheridan - best friends, partners in crime, etc - called and said that Wes had found these awesome Rock and Republic jeans at the Nordstrom Rack in Katy.  Wes shares my same frustrations with these "people" who make these sort of jeans, and Sheridan has also had a rather obvious effect on his fashion/desired to get her man into some good lookin jeans.  

Hope.

A gchat conversation later, Wes decided that I should come try the jeans on.  They might fit me better, and there were more out there that he thought might be better suited to him.  

OK.  Hopes not to high there, Mr. Hill.  Keep that excitement in check.

Yesterday, I tried them on.  It was as if someone took measurements of me and then made jeans.

I am Christopher Carl Hill.  I build fence, I know how to work cattle, I move large objects.  I now own Rock & Republic jeans.  Sometimes I find myself to be a strange blend of a person.  Now would be one of those times, and yet I am perfectly comfortable with it.

Mikala and Luke Engaged :)

My brother Luke proposed to his beautiful and wonderful girlfriend this past Saturday night.   She said yes and she is now his fiance.    Evan, Jeremy, Chris, and I get a new sister.   Our family is beyond excited and feels so blessed.

Congratulations to you two :)  --- you are loved and blessed.  We are proud of you and cannot wait for you two to get hitched July of this year!

The Continuing Quest of an Aspiring Super Woman Wifie Mama

It's in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone. 

 Ephesians 1:11-12 The MSG

Have you ever asked yourself the question who am I? Or, have you ever asked yourself what your purpose is in this life?  Have you ever struggled with the expectations that the culture around you puts on you?

Great!  - I have struggled with these questions myself over the past couple of years.   In fact I even have some blog posts to prove it to you:

No Mrs. Iron Pants

Bombs in your heart

God answers my questions to bombs in my hearts

I am no man

Super Woman Wifie Mama

Provision Instead of Pride

Believe me when I tell you that if I took a little bit more time to search through the archives of this blog I could find ten more posts about me searching for who I am supposed to be in life.   I fought my own inner struggle concerning my own femininity, purpose in life, skill set, my role as a wife, and my future role as a mother.

I had no peace and always had this un-answered question clanking around in my heart.   An un-answered question that shaped my perception of people, events, and what other people thought about me.

This past summer I was riding around in my car listening to Kevin Weaver, and God answered my question.   

God always wants to answer your questions.   It is usually a matter of you wanting to actually hear the answer.

God's answer came to me in several parts.   The first part was realizing that I was proud.   My pride manifested in my life out of my belief that God was not big enough to defend and provide for me, so I went around trying to defend and provide for myself.   Underneath my pride was fear.   Essentially I had things in my life that I wanted to protect at all costs.   Things and dreams and expectations that I was willing to sacrifice anything for.   This may be what some people in the bible might define as idols.   

I was afraid that if I truly surrendered to God that he would make me do things that I really did not want to do, or give up things that I really did not want to give up.

This realization that I was proud shattered this wall I had put up around myself to protect myself, and I realized for the second time in my life how good God really is.   God will defend me if I allow him to, and he most certainly will provide for me.   

I had one of those out of body experiences where I saw myself working so hard to hold on to these dreams, expectations, perceptions, and things in my life.   These dreams, expectations, perceptions, and things all had never been fully submitted to God.    I had always told him what my will was and never asked for his assuming that because I had these dreams that they were his too.  

I was like a starving child hunkered down over a piece of bread protecting it, while a kind a loving Father was trying to give me fields and fields of grain that would sustain me for a lifetime and more.  

Riding around in the car that day changed my life.   In a simple prayer and opening up my heart to hear God - He saved me from myself.

I have finally come to a moment in life where I have nothing and there is nothing that I would not be willing to give to God.    This is one of those postures that must be submitted to God moment by moment in life.

In the last six months I have learned so much more about who I am because I am willing to just know God, and in return God is showing me who I am.   As Paul suggests in the verses in Ephesians at the top of this blog: God has designed glorious living for us.  All we have to do is seek him.

Once you have surrendered your dreams, expectations, things, and perceptions to God he will usually give you back the ones that He wants for you.   Once God gives you something it is His responsibility to carry it out and your responsibility to know Him and obey Him.   I find this to be AWESOME because God must provide the way for His promises.

I recently just got the book Having and Doing It all by Christine Caine which basically says by seeking God he will show you what your all looks like.   When your all comes from God then He equips you do it and to have it.   

The most unique and truest YOU can be found in Jesus.   You just have to allow Jesus to show what is keeping you from going deep into Him

Such is the quest of an aspiring Super Woman Wifie Mama .....  along with my growing passion for making homemade pizza :)

ya know ... because that is part of who I am!

The Diamond H Ranch

On January 1st we packed up the puppy and headed to the panhandle to see Chris's family.   

This is the Diamond H Ranch mail box.   Todd, my father in law and marketing expert, would never leave his mail box un branded.   No mail box is complete with out its own customized camo over lay!

No ranch would be complete without its own baby wild boar either.   Meet Spot - who was being babysat by Grandpa Toddy.   Apparently Grandpa Todd would like some grandchildren!

My mother in law, Karra, has two stoves in her kitchen so she can adequately feed all the hungry cowboys.   Her kitchen would not be complete without her own Diamond H brand in her back splash.   Karra understands my love for kitchens and feeding people, so she lets me take over the kitchen whenever I come to visit.   Her kitchen is a picture of perfect organization and I LOVE cooking in it.   

Here is the view from the back door of the ranch house looking out over the north pastures.

Here is the back view of the ranch house.  Todd and Karra added on about 2000 square feet to the old existing ranch house.  The windows at the top are of the bunkhouse which sleeps about 15 people, or 15 future grandbabies.   

This is the side of the front of the ranch house.   Not the best picture but you get the idea.

The mantra of every ranch wife.

We celebrated Todd and Karra's 30th wedding anniversary by making them Boeuf Bourginion from Julie Child's cookbook.    It took all day but it was worth it.

Prepping for the Boeuf

 We made asparagus, roasted pearl onions, sauteed mushrooms, and mashed potatoes to go with the Boeuf.

This is Chris helping prepare the Boeuf.

We also got to help a first time mama cow give birth to her 125 pound son.  It was an amazing experience and not nearly as gross as I thought it might be.

We had a wonderful time with Chris's family.   Going to the Diamond H is like going on vacation.   Cell phones do not work and there is always a perfect sunset.   

This is was Giada's second visit to the ranch.   She learned how to jump cattle guards, almost got killed by donkeys, almost got eaten by hungry mama cows, and learned how to go under fence.   She also got to go to the lake and de-stuffed a stuffed animal.   I would say she also had a great vacation.

Thank you for enduring my iphone pictures

my LOVE - challenged

[ Disclaimer: This post is simply a result of some heart reflecting and does not have to do with anyone directly in our lives.  In plainer words: no, no one has been mean to us. ]

This year Chris and I have probably gone to church less than either of us ever have in both of our lives combined.   When we have gone to church we have even been asked if we are attending somewhere else.

"Why?" -  you ask, maybe even slightly shocked.

Mostly because a lot of our friends have gotten married this year and one of us was usually in the wedding party.   Weddings these days require a whole weekend and usually several before hand.    We have been super blessed by these weddings.   We have been even more blessed to see our friends enter amazing marriages.   The big cherry on top of the all that is having more married couples to live life with.

Not attending a whole lot of community based worship had done three things to me.   The first being that I am required to have Holy Spirit quiet times by myself.   Quiet times have become more valuable because I have to seek the Lord myself and hear from Him myself or I will be completely empty.   I have learned that in order to do that I have to be completely open and humble before God - which is really really hard to do.   Secondly I have realized that I really really miss church and I cannot wait to get back involved and attend regularly.

Finally - I have begun to question some of my Christian based and culturally acceptable beliefs and actions.   You see I grew up in Church and in a Christian family.   I went to elementary in the early 90's.   I am a product of focus on on family parenting.  

I was taught in more ways than not to separate myself from the sins of this world.  Which is a good thing for sure.   But was I also taught to judge the sins of this world?  

Never before in my life have I ever been so challenged to love the sick and hurting of this world.   Never before in my life have I ever felt such compassion for those who do not know the true depth of Jesus's love for them.   I have not (at least up until this moment of my life) ever been called to love the sick and dying of Africa, India, or Haiti.    I have always always seen the sick and dying closest to me and felt the most for them.   The ones in the poor neighborhoods that I occasionally drive by, or the ones I shop next to in the grocery store.  I always think of the ones who might be in sexual slavery in the very city I live in.   While this has been a huge awakening in me this year and I am still trying to work out how to love the orphaned poor here in Houston - something else has also caught my heart.

It is this:  that we as American Christians are some of the most judgmental people on planet earth.   Myself being the chief "judger" of them all.   I started asking myself: Am I condemning more than I am loving?  Am I more quick to call a Christian brother or sister out than to give them an encouraging word?  Am I more quick to judge their actions than to try and understand their motivations?

Unfortunately the answer to most of these questions was yes.

The root cause of most of these terrible characteristics in me was pride and fear.   My own pride and fear came out of believing in too small of a Jesus.   A Jesus whose love was not big enough to cover my own inability and the inability of others.   Thankfully my desperate quiet times yielded some good wisdom and love from Jesus who showed himself to be so much bigger and more capable than my human heart could imagine.

I have realized that my form of Christian love was so mean, so I had to change it out for a God kind of love that is beyond human understanding.   This is no small or easy thing because it sometimes requires you to love even when you don't want to or even when you do not understand.

As Chris and I have grown up more this year we have encountered more circumstances that require more of this kind of love.  

There are two specific categories where my love has had to grow:

1.  People who knowingly sin and suffer the consequences and still need to be loved.
- Yes it might be their fault they are in the mess they are in, but I am not called to judge them.   I am called to love them.   If they ask for advice I can give it, but I am not called to condemn them.    I am defined by Jesus who loves me so much he gave His life for me.    Jesus never shunned these people.   Jesus showed more love than the culture of the time had ever seen.    The Church should be defined as such -- showing more love than the world has ever seen.   Yet, the church is made up of people.

2. Christians who condemn others way more than they offer love.
- This is really where I get in trouble.   My self-righteous flesh wants to go into butt kicking mode.  There is quite possibly no one or nothing more mean in the world than a condemning Christian.   A condemning Christian is afraid of sin and has too small of a view of God.   A condemning Christian believes one must outlaw sin instead of receiving the grace to overcome sin.   A condemning Christian lives by the law of legalism instead of the law of grace.   Yet, a condemning Christian needs my love just as much as any other person does.   When it comes down to it I am not called to condemn the condemning Christian EITHER - I am called to walk in God's empowering grace and love them TOO.

Man --- growing up in HARD.  Kicking butt seems to be a lot easier :)

In essence this challenge to love is really all about faith.   Do you believe God is big enough to cover all?   Do you believe God is big enough to cover all the sin in the world and of the church?  Do you believe God is big enough to cover differences in different theologies?  Do you believe God is big enough to love all of who you are?

Faith comes by hearing the word of God or reading the word of God and acting out what it says.   God never lets you down which why we build up our faith.

It is possible that Chris and I have some condemning Christians in our life.   It is my challenge to show love to them in the hope that they see a much bigger God.

I feel this is a better option than a Jess ready to kick butt?  I know my husband would agree, and probably my would Dad too.

So what does this have to do with not attending very much church?  Being a little more outside of the church I have seen a little more what the church looks like (sometimes) to the outside world.    I want the church to be a place where every sinner feels free to go.   The church should be a place where every unmarried pregnant mother to be feels safe.   A place where every divorcee finds peace.   The Church as a whole should be so much more loving than the world.   There are some churches that do this and there are some that don't.   Unfortunately the world sees more of the churches and Christians who don't.

We must have a balance between  encouraging people to live a grace filled life so they do not sin and accepting and loving those who do sin.   While also calling out those in the church who refuge to stop sinning.    While the perfect balance of these things seem impossible I believe it can be found in Jesus.

A Christmas Blend

A List:
1. We are drinking Starbucks Christmas blend coffee right now.  It is amazingly smooth and delicious.  After you have tried many coffees you realize that some are good and some are amazingly drinkable.  The Christmas Blend is amazingly drinkable.   You will quickly find yourself pouring a second cup.

2.  We had Christmas in Magnolia this year.   It was fantabulous.   One thing Christmas reminds me of on my side of the family is the severe shortage of girls.   My Mom's brother's kids consist of 3 boys and a girl, and my Dad's brother's kids consist of 3 boys and girl.   I also have three little brothers.  

3.  We spent Christmas Eve with my Mom's side of the family.   Our tradition is to open one gift an hour until they are all un wrapped.   In between each unwrapping we fill ourselves with all the wonderful food that continually comes out of the kitchen.   We end the day with a vigorous round of Christmas bingo.    Chris and I dominated again this year, but in true oldest child fashion gave one of our gifts to one of the younger kids.

4. Chris and I laid in bed Christmas Eve night and read the Christmas story to each other.  This made me miss the Hill side of the family's special Christmas Eve tradition of reading the Christmas story as an entire extended family.

5.  Christmas morning is spent with the just my immediate family.   This year I made Pioneer Woman's cinnamon rolls and a special batch of gluten free rolls for my brother.   I love this morning every year.   We only let one person open one gift at a time to stretch it out as long as possible and to see what everyone got.   The sibling love gets better every year.   My brother's girlfriend got the boys nerf guns.   Needless to say a huge nerf war quickly ensued.

6.  We spend Christmas afternoon with my Dad's side of the family.   I love this time because it is always super chilled.   When we gather with this side of the family the testosterone levels always rise to incredible heights as we have 7 boys ranging from 15-26 all in the same room.   My only girl cousin and I always manage to find a spot away from all the manliness.

7. We are leaving this Saturday to drive to the Diamond H ranch in Childress, TX to spend Christmas with Chris's family.   I cannot wait to drink coffee on the couch with my Mother in Law (love) :)

8.  I am babysitting my brothers great dane for a couple of days.    Jack The Great Dane is my Giada's best friend in the whole world.  She is completely in love with him and cannot be reasoned with in any way when he is here.  Jack on the other hand is in love with Luke (my brother) and mopes around and cries when separated from him.  

9. This Friday we have our last wedding of 2010.  We will have officially attended 12 weddings this year.  Chris being in at least 4 and I in one.

10.  The weekend before Christmas was my birthday.  Which was spent attending one graduation and two weddings.   Chris still managed to squeeze in a cupcake party for me :)