Have you ever heard someone say, "Go Where God Is?" I heard it somewhere a long time ago and always thought it meant to go where revival was happening or a church was really growing. Basically, it sounded like a physical place where people could see God's power with their eyes.

However, a few weeks ago I was waiting on God and Holy Spirit brought that very phrase up in my mind. I believe He was saying, "That is correct!" and "There is more to it!" Now, before I go any further I think it's interesting that the same words can have very different and unique meanings. 

Like much of scripture, people can interpret things very differently. If we don't have the power of the Holy Spirit working through us and enlightening our minds to God's truth in scripture, we can be very blind to the gospel. Holy Spirit revealed a whole new meaning to me about this phrase, "Go where God is." 

It is often very important for us to take action and actually GO to a place where God is obviously working. I believe the reason for this is that it takes us out of our comfort zones and our normal, everyday lives. It could be a jolt to your soul and help to wake you up spiritually.

However, there is far more to being where God is than just a physical location. Holy Spirit revealed that we need to be where God is moving in the spirit realm. Simply stated, do what He tells you to do, go where He tells you to go. If you don't know, seek Him until you do. You want to be obedient to the plan He has for your life. His plan will be the greatest adventure you will ever go on! God wants to have a vibrant relationship with us that is very active and powerful.

That said, Go where God is, is not what I thought. I believe what it really means is, "to be in the light as He is in the light," as it says in 1 John 1:7; or "to abide in me as my words abide in you," as found in John 15:7. "Walking according to the Spirit," in Romans 8 gives an extended discourse on what that means.

TO GO WHERE GOD IS is to be sold out for God's purposes; to walk with Him at all times; to live for eternity; to love others unconditionally; to make disciples and I could go on. God is Spirit and to go where He is, is to walk at all times with the Holy Spirit. We're not perfect at it, but we must pursue it with all our hearts. Will you join with us as we go where the Spirit of God leads?

I LOVE cooking and baking. At one point in my life, I may have said that my dream kitchen would have a plethora of counter space, every gadget to enhance the experience and, definitely, a dishwasher. However, God always knows better. He knows that if I had those things, I may have decided to settle down right there and be content to stay in one place for the rest of my life. Instead, we are currently on the adventure of a lifetime, living in an RV and traveling around the country! God has purposes that surpass my expectations every time.  

Typically, I write about the deepest feelings of my heart. I love to lay it all bare before you, exposing my real and raw emotions. But, today is not that day...

​Today, I want to talk about a more practical aspect of our lives: RV living with lots of kids and feeding them on a budget. Mostly because I have been killing it in regards to cooking and baking in a tiny home for a large family ;) haha… Seriously, though. We have learned some "Hoeckle Habits" that minimize spending (and, consequently, minimize stress to our marital relationship, if you know what I mean). And, I want to share a few of those habits with you. Before all that, here are some unexpected benefits that have increased our quality of life as a result of our swan dive (or, bellyflop) into RV life:  

• Baking and cooking have INCREASED! We can count on 1 hand the number of times we have eaten out since we left North Dakota last September. Talk about a budget saver!!
• Meal Prep has become a thing. I always knew it would be smart to do this, but I never really did it. I guess there is nothing like necessity to get me to accomplish a goal.
• Everything is MAGNIFIED: the joy, the noise, the tension, the laughter, the enjoyment and the fighting. Then, when it is all done, we sit down around the tiny dining room table and eat meals together.
• Time. I have been blown away by how good the slowing down of life has been for my soul. I am able to do things like bake bread in our tiny oven and make quality food for my family.  

***check out our Instagram post today for a picture of our me cooking in our RV :)***
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We really want to feed our children well. I want their main foods to be real foods that I cook in our itty-bitty RV kitchen. So, we focus on that when shopping, while attempting to hit our budget mark. Now, I didn’t start out with some master plan for meal planning and grocery shopping. I didn’t research blogs or vlogs or anything like that. Our method has just developed naturally over the past 3 months.

Without further adieu, I will share a few tactics that have helped us out in the kitchen:

• Beans and Rice and Potatoes! Not gonna lie: there is something so true about the amount of food 2 pre-teen boys and 1 mega-hunk of a man can eat. And, us girls are pretty big eaters, too. So, we have started making beans and rice and potatoes our main dish and making meat the side dish. One of our favorites is a simple rice, broccoli and chicken casserole; it meets every demand of cold weather comfort food!
• We buy our veggies and the fruit for our smoothies frozen. This has got to be one of the best ways to help your budget. Fresh fruit and veggies can get so expensive. Besides, the kiddos and I love to hide our veggies in a delicious smoothie camouflaged with bananas and blueberries. Also, RV = very limited fridge space.
• Fresh Fruit: we get loads of bananas mostly because the kids can operate them on their own. Also, we can freeze them to use in smoothies before they go bad. I try to avoid fruit like oranges that require extra work for me; I detest that white residue that gets left behind on my hands! In addition to bananas, every week we try to choose one other fruit that is on sale to enjoy. Josh is usually the one to go pick out another fruit for us because he enjoys spending his time comparing price per grape vs. per blackberry vs. per sliver of apple.  
• Simplify. Simplify. Simplify. Our dinner menu includes a repetition of about 7-8 of our favorite meals. This has made my life soooooo much easier. I love experimenting with recipes and coming up with dishes everyone loves, but for the practicality of the space we are in and the budget we are keeping, we have simplified even this aspect of our lives.

That’s it! That’s all the budgeting and food shopping and cooking advice I have for you for now. I would say the first month of our adventures flew by as sort of a “honeymoon” period: everyone was excited all the time, there was very little complaining, the mundane aspect of food prep was very far down on our radar. But after more than 3 months, real life has settled down upon us. We now realize the need for intentionality with our time during each day, and this includes feeding our bodies well.​

• A 29-year-old momma died of cancer this week. We had fasted and prayed for her healing. We had banded together believing that God would heal her. He didn’t. She died.

• I had ovarian cancer 5 years ago and my life was spared. We endured the loss of 2 babies because of miscarriages before the cancer was found. The cancer was miraculously contained and removed from my body. I live today while our babies never took a breath in this life.  

 

• Someone close to my family was diagnosed with cancer this week. Everyone close to the family is devastated.

So many tears shed. So many questions unanswered. So much heartache and pain.

What do we say about our perfect God when some prayers seem to get answered, while others are left seemingly unheard until the other side of eternity?

Honestly, I don’t know.

I don’t have answers for the deepest cries and heartaches of the soul. My words fall so far short from offering any hope or peace. Life’s most painful situations are more than my feeble knowledge can comprehend.

That is exactly why we need to look for Truth outside of ourselves. That is why I go running and crying to the Word of God, The Bible, Jesus.

I surround myself on every side with a stronghold of protection. I hide within high walls of defense to protect my soul from all assaults that threaten to destroy me. My shelter is simply holding onto the Truth; these truths are a powerful shield that I actively engage:

1. God is who He says He is in the Word of God, the Bible
2. The enemy is who God says he is… the enemy of our souls
3. I am who God says I am, a child of God

Jesus says that He is the Gateway to eternal life and that everyone who enters through Him will experience LIFE, FREEDOM, and SATISFACTION. God also says that He is the light and in Him there is NO darkness. So, where does death and disease and heartache and loss fit into this perfect God who is only light and love?

It doesn’t.

All darkness is from the enemy.

The enemy. He is the thief of joy; the thief of health; the thief of life. Jesus says that the thief has only one thing in mind: to steal, slaughter and destroy our souls.

Cancer. Death. Loss. Fear. Anxiety. Depression. Self-hatred. Pride. Shame. These are all tactics of the enemy to steal your soul.

I am a child of God. You are a child of God. We are children of Light. There is no darkness in us. What appears as darkness to our mind’s eye is merely a shadow meant to cover up the light. Death is only a shadow. But, because of Jesus, we are now light and in us there is no darkness.

Then, why cancer? Why death? I don’t know. I only hold onto what I know to be true... and, then I tell myself the truth over and over and over again. Until all doubt flees. Until all fear runs back to hell. Until my mind remembers who God is, who the enemy is, and who I am.

We must always hold onto Truth...mostly because it is so easy to get swallowed up by despair. We must speak the words of truth out loud because the power of life and death are in the spoken word. We must declare over our minds and our circumstances that our God has given us LIFE; our God has given us FREEDOM. Freedom from loss and freedom from fear and freedom from the enemy.

Therefore, I will keep fighting to see the fulfillment of all the promises God has spoken in His word. I will continue to cry out for healing when people’s body’s are ransacked with disease. I will declare life and freedom over the sick and those covered by the shadow of darkness.

I will continue to tell myself the Truth when my mind slips back into doubt. I will cling tightly to Jesus when the storms of life whip me around from all sides.

I will abide in Jesus and He will abide in me.  


References: John 10:10, Proverbs 18:21, 1 Thes 5:5, Rom 8:11, Rom 8:17...basically all of Romans