Aspen Hill Christian Church

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Hungers of the Heart - A Closer Walk With God [4th in 7 part series]

By Bob Chance | March 26, 2006

Dr. D. Robert Chance, Senior Minister

Hungers of the heart — growing closer in our daily walk with God. Today I speak of one of the most basic and fundamental hungers that we all feel — the need to connect — both to God and our fellow man.

When I was twenty and one I began my life-time in the ministry. One of the first of many cultural phenomena I observed in rural Bethel, Kentucky was the gathering of men down at Crouch’s General Store. Every day, throughout the day men would come and sit around the old pot bellied stove and talk about any number of things that were common to farmers and workers swap knives and tell tall tales. It went on throughout the day. During the summer when the stove was taken down and put away in the far back storage area of the store the men would sit and visit around an invisible stove — just as if the old stove was still there. Of course, I fit right and I loved to join and be a part (albeit a foreign alien from another world) of the gatherings as well.

Fast forward 40 years and I find it so funny that if I walk into McDonalds, first thing in the morning there will be a gathering of men, mostly older, retired men sitting at a table or two drinking coffee and swapping tales. It is absolutely hilarious to me, but not without significance. With all our cultural sophistication and 40 years removed the only thing missing is the pot-bellied stove.

During the seven Sundays of Lent and Easter I am turning our attention to what I am calling “Seven Hungers of the Heart”. They aren’t the only hungers of the heart but they are seven we all share in common.

On the first Sunday of Lent I spoke of the hunger of the heart to be closer to God. It’s important for us to get out of the daily traffic jams of life and spend some quiet time with our maker. We all hunger to renew and refresh our relationship with God.

On the second Sunday of Lent I spoke of the hunger of the heart to find a deeper purpose for our life than the just the daily struggle to survive.

On the third Sunday of Lent we turned our attention toward the hunger to have something to believe in beyond ourselves.

Indeed, we all hunger to be closer to God, to have purpose in life, and to believe in something beyond ourselves. Today, we turn toward the fourth hunger of the heart —

The hunger to connect in deeper ways with both God and with each other.

Hungers of the Heart — The hunger to connect!

I. Introduction :

Country singer, Vern Gosdin does a hauntingly beautiful song called “Chiseled in Stone”. The words go like this.

You ran cryin’ to the bedroom
I ran off to the bar,
Another piece of heaven gone to hell,
the words we spoke in anger
just tore my world apart,
And I sat there feeling sorry for myself.

Then that old man sat down beside me
and looked me in the eye,
and said “Son, I know what you’re going through,
You ought to get down on your knees
and thank your lucky stars that you got someone to go home to.”

(Chorus)
You don’t know about lonely,
Or how long nights can be,
Till you lived through the story
That’s still livin’ in me,
And you don’t know about sadness
’til you faced life alone,
You don’t know about lonely
’til it’s chiseled in stone.

So I brought these pretty flowers
hoping you would understand
sometimes a man is such a fool,
Those golden words of wisdom
from the heart of that old man,
showed me I ain’t nothing without you.

You don’t know about lonely,
Or how long nights can be,
Till you lived through the story
that old man just told me,
And you don’t know about sadness
’til you faced life alone,
You don’t know about lonely
’til it’s chiseled in stone.
You don’t know about lonely,
’til it’s chiseled in stone.
A great saint once said to God: “Our hearts are restless until they rest in God.”

We all hunger to connect.
We hunger to connect with God and we hunger to connect with other people.
We hunger not just to connect as in “connecting the dots” but as in connecting in deeper and more significant ways than just ships passing in the night.
Today, I will speak of our common hunger to connect in deep and significant ways, both with God and with each other through story. I hope you will recognize and respond to your own deep need to connect with others and with God and I hope you will think about what that says to us about what we should be doing in the church to help people find connections, both with God and with each other.

II. While we may experience it to different degrees and in different ways we all need to connect with others. It’s in our DNA!

We all share the hunger to connect.

On the one hand some people never like playing alone. They always need to be around other people.
Turned loose to play if there weren’t other people around them, they will go out and find them. They organize people, turn them into teams, gather them together, and always seem to enjoy being around other people.
They like being with people.

On the other hand some people seem to not need to be with other people in such a strong way. They like playing alone. Turned loose to play they will nearly always chose to play by themselves. My brother, Steve could play alone for hours on hours when we were growing up. He loved to play with bottle caps on the kitchen floor. He loved to play all by himself.

As different as we all still need to connect. Although some of us like to play alone and others of us like to play with others we all share the common hunger to connect. We all have the need to connect, though not all to the same degree or in the same way.

It’s in our DNA. Even those among who don’t know it, and don’t live it out hunger for connections. Ultimately, we all need to relate to others. Ultimately, we all need to relate to the one who is the creator and sustainer of life itself — our Father in heaven.

You can see in a hundred ways.
We join clubs.
We become part of teams.
We look for special friends to be with.
We form friendships, yearning to connect with someone beyond ourselves.
We learn first in family the art of connection preparing to later leave the family and strike out in life for ourselves ever expanding our connections with others.

There is a large and ancient member of the crocodile family that lives in northern Australia. The Aussies called them “Freshies”. They live in the Billabong sanctuary. I watched an absolutely marvelous show about them this week on the Science Channel.

They go back some four million years. They are essentially solitary creatures of the ever expanding and receding waters of the wetlands. They thrive on living solitary and lonely existence, never really needing community life among their own kind. Except when the mating season comes they are wily, solitary, creatures that will eat their own kind as well as anything else that moves in their territorial waters.

The Freshie is an ambush hunter, lying motionless in shallow water near the water’s edge for small creatures to venture close. It will then snap its head sideways with a lightening-fast motion, capturing fish or insect in its sharp teeth. During the dry season they venture into the grasslands in search of food. The female does not protect her nest during incubation and many eggs are taken. An early wet season can cause flooding of the nest site drowning of the embryos. One of a hundred young will survive. They are wild and dangerous creatures who have little, if any need to connect with one another, let alone any other species.

We are different from the freshwater crocodiles of the Billabong Sanctuary.
We are not like crocodiles.
We need to connect with others of our own kind.
We cannot live unto ourselves.
We cannot live apart from one another.

We feel the need to connect — both with God and with man.

After one of my sermons several weeks ago Galen Queen made the insightful comment to me that companionship is the purpose of our life. I don’t know about that but Galen was certainly correct in lifting up the importance of companionship as a hunger of the human heart. Companionship is another way of saying “connection”.

III. Living disconnected is sad and unnecessary.

Some people never understood the deep need to connect with others or with God.
They seem to like to live alone.
Rather than nurturing their hunger to connect they actually nurture being alone.

Some people withdrew unto themselves.
The more they disconnect from others and from God the more they fail to even recognize, let alone nurture being with others.

Inevitably their world becomes smaller and smaller.
It’s always sad. They don’t need to live unto themselves.
They don’t need to be alone all the time.

The price of disconnecting and living alone is high.
When we don’t recognize and respect and nurture the fundamental hunger of the human heart to connect with others, both man and God we pay a heavy price.

The results of not feeding the hunger to connect can be terrible.

When we don’t recognize or feed the hunger to connect with others we shrivel and become something less than we were ever meant to be or could be.

IV. Living a connected life is just the opposite of a disconnected lonely life — it is a life full of friendship and companionship that brings us great joy.

I was with an elderly lady this past week who reflects such a wonderful beauty of spirit and depth of life that I found being around her sheer joy.
Her hair is thin and barely covers her head.
Once it may have been thick and covered her head but that day is long gone.
One strong she now depends on a cane to get around. She first noticed her flagging strength to stand and balance by holding on to tables and walls for longer and longer periods of time.
She is still strong of spirit and character.
She is articulate and quick to speak to issues with unusual insight and perception.

When asked from where your strength and spirit comes from she replies “I was and remain an activist. When you raise six children you had better speak with clarity and with strength, lest your children not hear and respect you.

She knows all about the hunger to connect.
She knows all about being around and relating, both to other people and to God.
Because she honors that hunger to connect she is comfortable around others and she is lively to be around.

This beautiful lady named Florence, old of body but young of heart is a joy to be around and to talk with, in no small part because she has recognized and responded to the hunger in her own heart to connect. When you are with Florence she connects with you and invites you to connect with her.

Recognizing the importance of both connecting and being connected guides and shapes of much of what we should be doing in the
church and within our individual lives.

Do you :
Do you think we in the Christian community have anything to say about connecting with each other and with God? I do!
Do you think we in the Christian community have anything to offer each other for recognizing, respecting and responding to this most fundamental of hungers of the human heart? I do?
Do you think we should designing our ministry around the hunger of the heart to connect–Both with God and with man? I do!

A very important part of the mission of the church is to help people connect — both with God and with each other.
A very important part of the mission of the church is to help people from withdrawing into themselves.
A very important part of the mission of the church is connecting us with God and with one another.

Most importantly, the church is called to teach and lead people to know that the most basic aspect to connect is our need to connect with the source of it all — God.
Our first task is to connect people with God.

Our most basic mission is help people recognize and feed the hunger in their own heart to connect with God.
* We do that by coming together in community.
* We do that by sharing in communion with one another.
* We do that by coming to worship together each week —
Singing and praying and listening and sharing together in the common quest to know and walk with God.

* We do that by working together to serve one another and to help one another through life together. The NATIONWIDE commercial is right — life comes at us fast — we need one another to face it.
* We do that by learning what true servant hood means and how we ultimately satisfy our own needs by responding to the needs of others — especially the dis-enfranchised, the unfortunate, the hurting and the lonely.
* We do that by learning to find our lives we have to lose them.

Florence reminded me the joy and the consequences of a life lived in connection with others and with God.

Closing

People however different share the fundamental hunger of the human heart to connect both with God and with other human beings. Even those among us who need to be around others less than others still need to connect.

People who don’t nourish the hunger of their heart to connect live with the sad and tragic consequences of living apart from others.
It can be done, but it isn’t necessary and it isn’t fulfilling.
When we recognize and respect our hunger to connect, both with God and with others we not only experience the joy of living a connected life but we help people feed the hunger to connect.

A woman comes to a well in Samaria to draw water. Without water she and her family cannot live. She knows that. While at the well she meets and connects with a carpenter from Galilee. Of course He is not JUST a carpenter. He is the son of God.

He is he son of man. While sitting by the well that day Jesus taught the woman at the well what she really thirsted for — connection with God. He gave her more just the water to quench her earthly thirst — he gave her the water of life to quench her soul.

What about you? Are you thirsty? Do you hunger to connect? We can help you with that thirst. We can help you with that hunger.

One of the wireless cell phone carries uses the image of more bars than any other carrier to enable its customers to be connected. “More bars mean more connections”.

What a great image for the church. Our mission is to help people connect, both to God and to one another. More bars for more connection.

May the hunger to connect with others and ultimately with God in your own heart be recognized and honored. Dropped calls are a shame. Being connected gives you life.

Amen.

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