Every Longing Heart
Saturday, December 20, 2025
Today’s Reading: Hebrews 10:24-25
Some animals prefer to be solitary. That blows my mind. They actually spend their entire lives alone, as their environment allows, and that’s the way they want it! The desert tortoise doesn’t even stick around to see her eggs hatch. Humans are social: we don’t do well when we are isolated from others. (That’s probably why I can’t fathom anything preferring to be alone its whole life!) As social creatures, we interact, pair up, group up, communicate, and cooperate. Again, it’s the way we were designed. As God has connection with Himself in the Trinity, so His image-bearers crave relationship and community.
In 2023, the United States Department of Health and Human Services (!) published Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation: The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory on the Healing Effects of Social Connection and Community. “Epidemic of loneliness”? Aren’t we the most globally interconnected society ever? The summary finding was this: We have fewer in-person interactions than previous generations, resulting in fewer friendships, more reports of loneliness, and an increase in associated health risks. The surgeon general compares the health impact of loneliness to that of smoking 15 cigarettes a day! Our bodies are responding poorly to loneliness because we were made for connection!
So much adolescent angst stems from teens just wanting to be accepted by their peers. Well, who says it’s just teenagers? We all want to be accepted, to have relationships. We want marriage, intimacy, family, friendship, cooperation, support, and community. Oh, how we ache when relationships are lacking.
“Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up.” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 NIV)
The trouble with human relationships, though, is that they always disappoint, because humans are always flawed, no matter how much love exists between people. Our deepest point of connection needs to be with Someone who is unfailing, full of forgiveness, always good, and truly looking out for our best interests.
Jesus is “a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” (Proverbs 18:24 NIV) God desires a relationship with us, and Jesus made that possible. He is our savior, our teacher, our brother, our healer, our closest confidant, our companion, and our comforter. Any longing for relationship can be fulfilled in Him, if we choose.
David said, “Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” (Psalm 37:4 NIV) It took me a long time to see this, but the verse is true because the logic is circular. We receive the desires of our hearts because what we desire is the Lord. It reminds me of a tricky but profound quote from St Augustine:
Love God and do whatever you please.
That doesn’t seem right, does it? What he meant here is that when we truly love God, “whatever we please” will align with what He wants. Here is his full quotation: “Love God and do whatever you please: for the soul trained in love to God will do nothing to offend the One who is Beloved.” As our relationship with the Lord deepens, our souls are more satisfied, and our other relationships benefit.
To be clear, God wants sincere hearts who desire reverent relationship with Him. He knows our hearts; He knows when we’re just talk. The Lord said through Isaiah:
“These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been taught.” (Isaiah 29:13 NIV)
He makes provision for human connection, too. Thank God for His Body, the Church! This is His means of expressing His love through human interconnectedness. Again, we aren’t perfect because we are still affected by the Fall. But in the Church, we have brothers and sisters who encourage, support, bless, teach, and hold us accountable.
“How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!”
(Psalm 133:1 NIV)