Have you ever experienced “Chunks In The Night”? No, this isn’t a Broadway musical. This is when you hear your 3 year old hurling in his bed at 4 a.m. Last night the Smith household experienced this phenomenon in full effect.

We had had a full weekend with the holiday and things. Lots of friend time, play time, and food. We were all sleeping soundly for several hours when we heard that awful noise that I haven’t heard since my dorm-mates got back from their parties in college. Chunks In The Night. Of course, at least my inebriated loser friends made it to the toilet to let go of a stomach full of poor judgment. My son? Nah, the mattress will do just fine Dad. When we walked into the room it was obvious what we were up against. Poor guy was sitting up clutching a monkey in one hand and a “doggy” in the other. All 3 of them soaked in partially digested Memorial Day fare.

If you are a parent you know the moment I had last night. You know, where you’re crouched down in the laundry room floor while your spouse bathes the little rascal. (meanwhile he/she feels much better and wants to play in the bathtub………..at 4:15 a.m.) But there you are picking the chunks of hot dog out of the sheets/stuffed animal fur thinking about just throwing it all away in a giant garbage bag. I got it all out and washed it on the hottest cycle. Then I went upstairs to change his sheets and make sure there were no chunks anywhere else. About the time I had it all clear his mom brought him upstairs. We prayed with him and laughed a little. All was well again and we were heading back to sleep as a family.

It had only taken 45 minutes. Not bad. 15 minutes later he hurled again. This time less chunks, but still enough to repeat the whole process again. You know, a little bit of puke is like being a little bit pregnant. No such thing as using “wipes” when you’re talking about kids spewing. 

All the while I kept thinking about my parents doing the same thing for me. You do it because you love them. Who knows, someday I’ll probably look back and wish I had one more middle of the night with them at this age picking out chunks and gathering memories. Love each other. . . . . . . . . . . and remember.Hunter 

Howdy folks!! I just got back from my first music boat cruise. For those of you who don’t know what I’m talking about this is a new thing out there in American Christendom. People make their vacation plans for the year for a cruise with a bunch of Christian artists.

Some of the ones on our boat included Casting Crowns, Leland, Toby Mac, Rush Of Fools, Hawk Nelson, Joy Williams, Matthew West, Newsong, and a few others. It was fun. We had 3 opportunities to play and they all went well. I’m sure Chris will post some pictures when he gets back. My wife wasn’t able to go because they cut off the age for children at 4 months and Samuel is 2 months old. Of course, 4 months/2 months/6 months………well, it’s all bedlam so I don’t know where they got that number. At any rate, I was a third wheel with Chris and Jenna (his wife) for 3 days and left early from Mexico after we had fulfilled our playing schedule. It was fun hanging with them and all, but at some point it’s time to let them be a married couple on a cruise and excuse myself. Cruising solo is no fun because all you do is eat to ease the boredom. Every one feels sorry for you too. Between these two you come home fat and feeling sorry for yourself. It was time to come home. My wife is glad I’m home too.

By the way, the minivan is running like a top and getting cooler with each coming day. I’m looking for some “high water” khaki pants and a good pair of redeemed lawn mowing shoes laced up too tight to round out the persona. Blessings to you all!

Hunter

Competition is wicked foolishness to God. Jesus did not uphold, possess, or esteem the virtue of competition. It is only a positive virtue in the eyes of this ridiculous world. However, when we aregiving credit to someone who has accomplished much we will mention their competitiveness as a mark of their greatness.

The competitive athlete. The competitive small business owner. The competitive politician. The competitive band. etc, etc. Competitiveness is rooted in primal insecurity within the souls of people. This insecurity is as old as the fall of man. It is one man’s need to prove himself better than another. Jesus taught the opposite. In fact, he taught us to especially love and serve those who were opposed to us! NEVER were we to prove ourselves superior to others. I have experienced the ill effects of competition in my own life. I’ve competed with others and won, but actually lost in the long run. I’ve also lost many competitions and been hurt in the process. One way or another I have hurt and been hurt because of competition. This is because it is not of God.

Now, I know this sounds crazy. How could I do what I do for a living and not compete? Up until a couple of months ago I would have said it was impossible. However, in March I was going through an extreme time of concern……..ok, WORRY about my life. I know I shouldn’t worry but sometimes it gets the best of me. During a particular bout with worry concerning my job I heard God speak to me. He said “I’VE NOT CALLED YOU TO COMPETITION, BUT I HAVE CALLED YOU TO BATTLE.” He began to show me how competition is the folly of this world. Then, he started to help me understand what it means to battle. We can successfully exist in this world and do our jobs. Even WIN at our jobs, but win with pure hearts and pure motives so that God alone is glorified. NOT us. I have much more to say about this that, I believe, would qualify it even more. However, I want to hear your thoughts on this. How do we function in a world bound in competition without engaging by it’s pathetic rules and standards?

Hunter

Hello my people and thank you for checking to see if we wrote anything today.

I recently began reading a book called The Peace Maker. This book teaches you how to have have a biblical response in resolving conflict. Right now God is teaching me how NOT to respond. I want so badly to honor Him through my relationships but this can be kinda tough. A while back I was reading in Keith Green’s biography about how he asked God to shine a spotlight on areas in his life that were not honoring Him. Through this prayer in my own life God has shown me that reconciliation is one of the areas where I can
improve. There are times when I want to just retreat to the middle of nowhere with my wife and my dog and not deal with people anymore, however I know this is not God’s will for my life. He has called us to be in community with one another and this DOES include those that can be difficult to get along with.

Last October my wife and I started going to a new church that has a heavy emphasis on community. I have learned so much from our house church (a.k.a. Small group). Doing life together is teaching me so much
about the importance of relationships and accountability. So…yeah, this is
what’s going on in my life right now.

Sincerely, The generally transparent, Christopher

I’m all for creativity. Sometimes to my own detriment. (if that’s possible) If someone told me they were going to write a song and create a word within it I would probably say “cool idea” then walk away thinking “good luck with that”. Although country music does this all the time with slang and variations of improper English, (which I love and embrace by the way) there aren’t many times when a word can be created out of thin air and given a vague meaning, then used as the title of an entire song, then be the title of a song that actually makes an album! We as Connersvine have done this and actually lived to not regret it.

A few years ago I came to Chris with a song called Hungerlove. It was not the Hungerlove you can listen to here or on the album. It was something I wrote alone in a whimsical moment of inspiration. Well, Chris liked the song but it always tended to go away when we startedtalking about album songs. A lot of times as a songwriter you have to write songs in order to finish others. By that I mean that many songs will never be used in themselves, but the idea/inspiration or pieces of the lyric or melody will be used on another idea in the future. Such was the case with Hungerlove.

One day we were in the studio with one of the co-producers of our album, Pete Kipley. We took a break and decided to write a song together. Chris started playing this “vibey” guitar rhythm and singing a really cool melody over the top of it. As lyrical ideas started to come I realized that many of the ideas I was having already existed in the old Hungerlove. When this happens you usually have to succumb and lay that old song on the altar. I layed it down allowing it’s meat to be separated from it’s bones and out of the picking came the new Hungerlove. Chris shows his melodic genius in this song. To me, somehow, this song consists melodically of very soulful verses, a passionate “hit you in the face” rock chorus, and a driving euro-rock bridge.

Lyrically it is a love song. It was written from the standpoint of a God longing for fallen creation to return to His love. The wonderful thing about this love, I believe, is partially summarized in this portion of the first verse.

“Though I see you’re running from me
the more you run the more you’re near.
Cuz I was there in the beginning
and I will be there in the end
with a heart that’s beating for you
and a love that wants to mend”

Contrary to how the world views love and relationship, God sees those seemingly farthest away from Him as those who are actually closest. He is the King of an upside down kingdom. Remember the rich are poor/weak are strong, etc. This worldly foolishness/wisdom of God comes through in the second verse as well.

“Welcome to the days of danger, risk, and security
where love will change your nature
if you will just believe.”

Danger and risk only can be coupled with security when God is involved. That is the whole idea of the song. To leave your life and your other loves and taste of the one true love and life that He gives. The risk is also self contained in the title of the song. What is hungerlove? To be honest it is hard to define. OK, impossible, but I’ll try. It is not a love you give. It is only a love you can receive. Don’t worry this is not heresy. The term hungerlove is my own guttural emotional recognition of the love I’ve received from God. With our limited and poor English language we do not draw the same discrepancies between loves that ancient languages do. We l-o-v-e cookies and our spouses/children/pets. This is Connersvine’s attempt to create a wordout of English that captures the voracious, passionate, appropriately jealous love that the God of the universe extends to every soul under the sky. His is a Hungerlove.

Hunter