Competition is wicked foolishness to God. Jesus did not uphold, possess, or esteem the virtue of competition. It is only a positive virtue in the eyes of this ridiculous world. However, when we aregiving credit to someone who has accomplished much we will mention their competitiveness as a mark of their greatness.

The competitive athlete. The competitive small business owner. The competitive politician. The competitive band. etc, etc. Competitiveness is rooted in primal insecurity within the souls of people. This insecurity is as old as the fall of man. It is one man’s need to prove himself better than another. Jesus taught the opposite. In fact, he taught us to especially love and serve those who were opposed to us! NEVER were we to prove ourselves superior to others. I have experienced the ill effects of competition in my own life. I’ve competed with others and won, but actually lost in the long run. I’ve also lost many competitions and been hurt in the process. One way or another I have hurt and been hurt because of competition. This is because it is not of God.

Now, I know this sounds crazy. How could I do what I do for a living and not compete? Up until a couple of months ago I would have said it was impossible. However, in March I was going through an extreme time of concern……..ok, WORRY about my life. I know I shouldn’t worry but sometimes it gets the best of me. During a particular bout with worry concerning my job I heard God speak to me. He said “I’VE NOT CALLED YOU TO COMPETITION, BUT I HAVE CALLED YOU TO BATTLE.” He began to show me how competition is the folly of this world. Then, he started to help me understand what it means to battle. We can successfully exist in this world and do our jobs. Even WIN at our jobs, but win with pure hearts and pure motives so that God alone is glorified. NOT us. I have much more to say about this that, I believe, would qualify it even more. However, I want to hear your thoughts on this. How do we function in a world bound in competition without engaging by it’s pathetic rules and standards?

Hunter

I’m all for creativity. Sometimes to my own detriment. (if that’s possible) If someone told me they were going to write a song and create a word within it I would probably say “cool idea” then walk away thinking “good luck with that”. Although country music does this all the time with slang and variations of improper English, (which I love and embrace by the way) there aren’t many times when a word can be created out of thin air and given a vague meaning, then used as the title of an entire song, then be the title of a song that actually makes an album! We as Connersvine have done this and actually lived to not regret it.

A few years ago I came to Chris with a song called Hungerlove. It was not the Hungerlove you can listen to here or on the album. It was something I wrote alone in a whimsical moment of inspiration. Well, Chris liked the song but it always tended to go away when we startedtalking about album songs. A lot of times as a songwriter you have to write songs in order to finish others. By that I mean that many songs will never be used in themselves, but the idea/inspiration or pieces of the lyric or melody will be used on another idea in the future. Such was the case with Hungerlove.

One day we were in the studio with one of the co-producers of our album, Pete Kipley. We took a break and decided to write a song together. Chris started playing this “vibey” guitar rhythm and singing a really cool melody over the top of it. As lyrical ideas started to come I realized that many of the ideas I was having already existed in the old Hungerlove. When this happens you usually have to succumb and lay that old song on the altar. I layed it down allowing it’s meat to be separated from it’s bones and out of the picking came the new Hungerlove. Chris shows his melodic genius in this song. To me, somehow, this song consists melodically of very soulful verses, a passionate “hit you in the face” rock chorus, and a driving euro-rock bridge.

Lyrically it is a love song. It was written from the standpoint of a God longing for fallen creation to return to His love. The wonderful thing about this love, I believe, is partially summarized in this portion of the first verse.

“Though I see you’re running from me
the more you run the more you’re near.
Cuz I was there in the beginning
and I will be there in the end
with a heart that’s beating for you
and a love that wants to mend”

Contrary to how the world views love and relationship, God sees those seemingly farthest away from Him as those who are actually closest. He is the King of an upside down kingdom. Remember the rich are poor/weak are strong, etc. This worldly foolishness/wisdom of God comes through in the second verse as well.

“Welcome to the days of danger, risk, and security
where love will change your nature
if you will just believe.”

Danger and risk only can be coupled with security when God is involved. That is the whole idea of the song. To leave your life and your other loves and taste of the one true love and life that He gives. The risk is also self contained in the title of the song. What is hungerlove? To be honest it is hard to define. OK, impossible, but I’ll try. It is not a love you give. It is only a love you can receive. Don’t worry this is not heresy. The term hungerlove is my own guttural emotional recognition of the love I’ve received from God. With our limited and poor English language we do not draw the same discrepancies between loves that ancient languages do. We l-o-v-e cookies and our spouses/children/pets. This is Connersvine’s attempt to create a wordout of English that captures the voracious, passionate, appropriately jealous love that the God of the universe extends to every soul under the sky. His is a Hungerlove.

Hunter

Good day people with a computer.

About a year ago I learned about an organization started by one of my favorite authors Donald Miller called The Belmont Foundation. When I was about four years old my Father left my Mother, two sisters and I. Being so young I didn’t totally understand what that meant. As I grew older the void left by having no male presence in my life was tough and I am still to this day wrestling with my own issues that this vacancy has left in my life. I was blessed with a great Mother and sisters but at this point in my life I have realized that in a country where over 50% of marriages end in divorce (including the church) we have over half of our country’s children growing up in single parent households.

The Belmont Foundation is devoted to help fill this need by developing mentoring programs for children (mostly boys) without Fathers. This is a cause that is very dear to my heart and I want to raise awareness of this epidemic in our culture. If you are interested in getting involved or learning more about this organization check out their website www.belmontfoundation.org.

Chris

Hey good people of the World Wide Web. Hunter and I just finished a great weekend of shows. Friday night we were in Plainfield, IN at First Baptist Church of Plainfield. We had a great time getting the full band back together and playing again. Saturday night we played at The Filling Station in Rushville, IN. This was the second year in a row that we have had the opportunity to hang out with the youth in Rushville. Again we had a blast and were able to partake in the glory of Pizza King which is right next door.

Now we are gearing up to head to Colorado Springs on Thursday and Friday where we are going to lead worship for a Focus on the Family chapel service and Hunter is going to speak. We are excited to be with the good people at FOTF and the get the opportunity to worship with them. Also, to me there is little greater than the feeling of looking out a window and seeing mountains instead of flat corn fields. I love my state but lets be serious, in a fight mountains would kick corn’s butt.

Keep us in your prayers as we travel and share the message and songs that God has given us. We are so grateful for your support and prayers.

Chris

OK, I know this might be a lame post. However, today my wife made up a recipe for cookies, and they were UNBELIEVABLE. She made oatmeal/peanut butter/butterscotch cookies and I’ve had 4 already.(it’s only 6:12 p.m.) I’ll probably hit 10.

Eating these cookies has renewed my love for cookies in general. (such a healthy love to rediscover) At any rate, I need to know some new cookie ideas. What is your favorite cookie? Is the recipe easy? Obviously there are the standards (chocolate chip, peanut butter, etc), but what I’m talking about are the cookies maybe you or someone you love made up or had passed on to them that are really good secrets.

Please think hard and let me know. This is world changing stuff! By the way, I’m working toward getting the next song commentary posted soon. Time has been scarce and I want to be thorough as you who read my posts already well know. Alright, off to get another cookie.

Hunter

Samuel Hunter Smith
7 lbs. 5.5 oz. - 21.5 inches - Curly brown hair
Thanks for all of your prayers!!

Hunter

Baby #2 is on the way!

My wife and I are having this one on this coming Tuesday, the 4th of March. That is actually our other sons birthday as well. Please pray that all goes well. We are very excited!

I have an idea for a series of posts about our album. Chris and I worked hard on this album for a long time and it would be special to me (if nobody else) to write a little bit about each song’s story. Chris is out on the road working hard finishing the tour so this is least I could do. (in my nonexistent spare time!) By the way, this is in no way a plug for people to buy our album, but………well………….ok, just buy our album. That way the story behind each song will make sense to you. It doesn’t matter to us how you purchase the album. If you’re worried that I’m using some manipulative tactic to sell albums then, well, you’re right…..I guess. However, you’re not being duped for our own selfish benefit. We believe in the message of our album.

We believe that God has a purpose in it and we’d love to share the origins of each song. Once I was talking to some guys from a large and very well known band about their album. We were talking about the process of writing the songs. One of them said, “Well, we knew we had the single (meaning the big radio song) so the rest of it was just filling up the tracks.” This was hard for me to hear. I believe that we as artists are entrusted with a unique responsibility to express an important message to people. Furthermore, I believe God is worthy of more than
just a bunch of “filler” so that we meet our deadlines. We have been touched by God through the process of writing and recording this album and we believe others will be touched also through the process of listening and understanding it’s journey.

We’ll start tomorrow with the first track, a song called “Glory Be”. Until then!!

Hunter