Our Deep Need for Connection

My computer wouldn’t connect to the internet. As you know, pretty much everything we use a computer for relies on an internet connection.

I sorta panicked. Really. I grew increasingly frustrated that I couldn’t connect, and therefore couldn’t get things done that needed to get done.

I fumbled around for a couple hours with reboots and amateur attempts at fixing the issue. Still not connecting, I called Apple Care. That hour or so on the phone stumped a well-intentioned guy who eventually scheduled my appointment at a local Apple Store.

There I took a seat next to this whiz kid rapidly pounding keys on my laptop, fluently speaking Wozniak-ian language. In a few minutes my computer was back online, connected. He was very kind and patient explaining why my laptop wasn’t connecting to the internet. I didn’t understand a thing he said.

I didn’t care to understand why. I just wanted to reconnect.

This morning I thought about all that had gone on with my computer — not connecting, the panic, the hope of reconnecting. It led me to examine the previous week and confess that I hadn’t been connecting with God. I hadn’t ignored Him; I had opened my Bible a couple times. I offered up some prayers. I went to church.

But I felt disconnected.

And in that state of acknowledged disconnection, I’ll be honest: I began to panic. In this case, “panic” was a good thing. Just as desperation drove me to devote time to resolving the computer issue, despondency drove me to seeking resolution and (re)connection with God.  As I’ve encountered a disconnect with God at prior seasons of my life, this is something I’ve learned: Rather than approaching God differently, I approach Him desperately.  God sometimes meets us at the level of our desperation and desire.

A disconnect from God isn’t my only battle nowadays. I have also felt disconnected from my own body – not exercising, eating poorly, not getting enough sleep. I’m disconnected in a way that I don’t pick up on physical clues, the unique ways God designed the human body to warn me of dangerous fatigue or some sort of burnout. (Perhaps my deep connection with donuts hasn’t helped.)

I have also felt disconnected from healthy community. Although I talk to people all day, I’m reminded there’s a difference between talking to someone and connecting with them, ya know? I need that deep connection — that soul-level connection in which I puruse Jesus in the company of good friends.

I even feel, at times, disconnected from my calling and purpose. This isn’t the first time, and I know I’m far from alone in this. I’m just saying that I sometimes struggle to get out of bed, knowing I’m doing a good work or feeling connected to that good work. Ever felt that way, like you are going through the motions, adrift even as you serve and love others?

When the computer genius described the problem with my laptop, one word stood out to me: Corrupted. I don’t know if he was referring to a file or a software update. I just know he said, “corrupted.”

There once was a Garden apple – fruit glistening with the saliva of a sinful bite. That bite corrupted generations of connection. And still today, as I bite forbidden apples, my connections are corrupted.

There may be a less-cheesy way to weave in the metaphor of Apple Care, but here’s what I’m learning: God cares. God cares when an apple keeps us from what we were most supposed to do: Connect.

In a loving and gracious way, He longs to connect with me. God cares enough to open me up, to continue the process of changing me on the inside. His aim is to reset things to His original Garden code. My corruption. His cross. Our reconnection.

I’m no Spiritual whiz kid who knows how to fix my broken connections.  In fact, it’s difficult for any of us to fully understand how connection is restored because it’s supernatural. Whatever necessary changes that are taking place within you and me – redemption of corrupted stuff, the rewriting of healthier narratives – are brought about by a power and wisdom far beyond you and me.

Maybe it’s not important for me to understand why or how. God simply wants me to approach Him desperate to connect. Because pretty much everything I do in life relies on connecting.