For as far as back as he can remember, Rickey Hill knew God was calling him to play professional baseball. The only problem? He was born with a defect that required him to wear braces on his legs — and his father, a stern Baptist preacher, wanted him to enter the ministry, not professional sports.
But his faith, combined with a fierce belief that miracles are possible, compelled Hill to persevere and realize his dream.
“I always believed that I should be a professional ballplayer,” Hill told The Christian Post. “I’ve never, ever wavered from my faith, period. Never did, which would be easy to do when your father’s kind of against what you’re doing. I still never wavered from my faith at all. It’s the same still today.”
Hill’s remarkable story is the subject of a new film titled “The Hill,” starring Dennis Quaid, Scott Glenn, Colin Ford, Randy Houser and Joelle Carter. It showcases how Hill, who possessed a natural ability to hit a baseball despite his disability, overcame multiple obstacles to make it to the minor leagues, eventually leading the 1978 Grays Harbor Loggers to a Northwest League championship. He was the team’s top home run hitter.
“God gives you the talent; either have it or you don’t,” Hill said. “It’s just a matter of what you do with it. You can take that talent, and you can work. Scripture says that faith without works is dead. You can have all the faith in the world, but if you don’t have that work that goes along beside that faith, it’s dead. So I always looked at that Scripture my whole life, knowing that I had to work to make it happen. And I did, every day.”
The narrative of “The Hill” revolves heavily around Hill’s relationship with his father, a well-meaning yet stern pastor (Quaid). Both roles pulled at Hill — the passionate preacher’s son who once mimicked his father’s sermons and the dedicated athlete who knew he had a higher calling on the baseball field.
The film captures how Hill managed to bridge these worlds, eventually realizing, “You can serve in ministry anywhere.” Throughout his life, he’s been guided by Philippians 4:13: “I can do all this through Him who gives me strength.”
“I wanted to be in the ministry, but I also wanted to play baseball at the same time, so [my father and I] kind of battled it out there a little bit and came to the conclusion that I can serve in the ministry while I’m playing ball,” he said.
“My father let me decide on my own, and when I told him that I would do both, he understood it,” he continued. “In the end, he loved every bit of it. God kept the spirit going in me, and I never stepped away from it.”
Read more at: www.christianpost.com