Connected

Last night I found myself watching 'About A Boy' on TV. 

 

I haven't seen it in years and I had forgotten how much I enjoyed it.  Not least because I am a bit of a Hugh Grant fan. 

 

The film primarily follows the lives of Will - a 38 year old single man who has never worked a day in his life - and Marcus - a teenage boy who lives with his depressed mother and struggles to fit in at school.  This unlikely pair find their lives overlapping and discover that they have a lot to learn from each other.

 

At the beginning of the film, Will explains how he sees himself and his life:

 

In my opinion, all men are islands.  And what's more, now's the time to be one.  This is an island age.  A hundred years ago, you had to depend on other people.  No one had TV or CDs or DVDs or videos or home espresso makers.  Actually, they didn't have anything cool.  Whereas now, you see, you can make yourself a little island paradise.  With the right supplies and the right attitude, you can be sun-drenched, tropical [...] And I like to think that perhaps I am that kind of island.  I like to think I'm pretty cool.  I like to think I'm Ibiza.

 

This is an island age.

 

Isn't that the message we receive from the world?  We don't need other people for our happiness.  We can satisfy ourselves.  We can please ourselves.  We can fill our lives with things and experiences and technologies.  We can surround ourselves with people without ever having to really connect with anyone.  We don't have to risk being vulnerable or inconvenienced or uncomfortable.

 

But that's a lie.

 

We all need connection.  The grand narrative of the Bible is a story of people disconnected from God and from each other, seeking reconnection in a whole variety of ways.

 

In his book 'Sex God', Rob Bell writes,

The story [of the Bible] begins with humans in right relationship - in healthy, life-giving connection - with their maker.  All of their other relationships flow from the health of this one central relationship - people and God.  They're connected with the earth, with each other [...] Then everything goes south.  They choose another way.  And they become disconnected [...] We're severed and cut off and disconnected in a thousand ways, and we know it, and we feel it, we're aware of it every day.  It's an ache in our bones which won't go away.

 

Like Will, we can deny this "ache in our bones", this need for other people.  We can live separate lives and never let people get too close.  But we won't really be living.  Whether we acknowledge it or not, we are all connected.  We affect other people and are affected by other people.  The Bible says,

"We are like the various parts of a human body. Each part gets its meaning from the body as a whole, not the other way around [...] Each of us finds our meaning and function as a part of his body. But as a chopped-off finger or cut-off toe we wouldn't amount to much, would we?"

[Romans 12:4-5 MSG]

By ourselves, we don't amount to much.  We need other people.

 

By the end of the film, Will's attitude has changed: 

Every man is an island.  And I stand by that.  But clearly, some men are part of island chains.  Below the surface of the ocean they're actually connected.

 

We are all actually connected. And that is where we find our meaning.