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Healthy friendshipsThe Bible's pattern and teachings on healthy friendship?One Christian author has written: 'Today, true friendships seldom occur. Very few sing the praises of friendship because very few have experienced its heights.' Someone else has said that 'friendship is God's way of apologising to us for our families'! Perhaps for some, friendship is a very painful topic where reaching out and offering the hand of friendship has led to rejection or a betrayal of trust. It may be that for some, the experience of the school playground - not being part of the 'in' group - isolated with no friends to call our own, has left its mark on us to this day. Bemused by the whole concept, profoundly discouraged by our early bad experiences, we shy away from friendship altogether. For others, friendship and sex may have become intertwined with boundaries not respected - perhaps in an abusive way - leaving us with a perspective that equates so-called friendship with sex and an inability to truly share ourselves in a way that respects our own integrity as people and respects the plan that God has set out in his Word for the way we should relate to one another. Mixed reviewsIt may be that in your experience (as in mine), friendship receives mixed reviews - we have experienced some of the lows but we have also experienced some of the highs - times when we have drawn close to another human being and they have drawn close to us - times of fun, of trust, of honesty, of vulnerability, of knowing and being known. For me, friendship has also offered an opportunity to experience God and his grace reaching into the deep recesses of my heart. Friendship has the potential to bless us beyond our wildest imaginings and enable us to bless others. I believe friendship offers a God-given route to experiencing intimacy we so much desire. What I offer is some insights as to how the Bible views the pattern for healthy friendship, followed by some applications we could make to our own lives. David and JonathanThe obvious place to start is the story of the friendship of David and Jonathan. The full story is found in the books of 1 and 2 Samuel. Sometimes this wonderful tale of friendship is hijacked by those who want to promote the idea that God approves of same-sex lovers. There is no evidence whatsoever that this was the case for David and Jonathan. If that had been the case, David and Jonathan would have been killed under the OT law and God would not have permitted their friendship to be held up in his Word as a model for others to follow. In 1 Samuel 18.1-4, we read: 'Jonathan became one in spirit with David and he loved him as himself. And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. Jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic and even his sword, his bow and his belt.' The two men click - a friendship and an adventure begin for them both. When, tragically, Jonathan is killed in battle, David laments: 'I grieve for you, Jonathan, my brother. You were very dear to me. Your love for me was wonderful. More wonderful than that of women.' (2 Samuel 1.26). The first lesson is that friendship is based on mutual commitment. It reflects the command Jesus gave to love your neighbour as yourself. However, friendship is not just a general neighbourliness. Both parties are committed to do good for one another and find happiness in doing so. That leads onto the second lesson: friendship involves sacrificial love. Jonathan gave David his symbols of status, his sword and his bow and belt. He humbled himself, becoming equal with David. Friendship cannot be built if money, status, job, church affiliations are used to build up our sense of self-worth. In friendship, we stand with another person on level ground and we must do that to benefit from mutual humility, vulnerability and trust. Sacrifice and truthIn helping David escape the wrath of Saul, Jonathan's own father, he assists the process that leads to David becoming king, and so loses his own right to the throne. It is in this way that David views Jonathan's love to him as 'more wonderful than that of women'. Sacrifice that promotes the good of the other is the cost of true friendship. We might like to ask ourselves how often we are prepared to give to friends and potential friends in a way that benefits them but costs us dear. Our chief example is, of course, Jesus, who humbled himself and became a true friend to sinners like us and then gave everything he had, that we in turn might gain everything. The context of Jonathan and David's friendship is one of great stress - Jonathan's father threatened to kill David and Jonathan pleaded for his friend. Jonathan shared with David all that had gone on - we learn that friendship involves honesty and openness about our lives - sometimes in the midst of turmoil and conflict. For myself, I have found that running parallel with my struggle to find my true identity in Christ is a deep struggle with honesty. I have found that as honesty with the right friends has increased, so I have found greater strength to face the painful and confusing issues in my life. As the trauma continues with Saul, Jonathan places himself at David's disposal. In chapter 20 of Samuel 1, we read of Jonathan saying to David: 'Whatever you want me to do, I'll do it for you.' The lesson here is that healthy friendship is not just talk - but often involves action on behalf of the friend. What was central to this friendship, as it needs to be in ours, was their desire to see God's will done. At its most simple, I guess the challenge is: how God-centred are our current friendships? Do we pray for our friends? Do we seek to offer them spiritual encouragement to build up their faith? Do we make time to pray with them? If our friends are not Christians, then are we praying for them and witnessing for Christ in our actions and words? At the end of this chapter, the two men part in order to carry out the plans God had for them. There was nothing clingy about this friendship - both men knew that God had work for both to do apart from one another. Are we able to see the bigger picture - God's intentions for the lives of our friends? Sadly, we often want to hold tight to close friends, believing that were they to leave, we would return to a state of loneliness. On reflection, I think this sense of desperation has often hindered the development of my friendships. Friends and potential friends have sensed the neediness and shied away, feeling unable or rightly unwilling to enter a relationship that is not on equal terms, but rather more likely to turn into a client-psychotherapist type of relationship than a healthy friendship. Wrapped up in all of this, I think, was the mistaken belief that once human intimacy is achieved, I will be secure. That, of course, is a horrible lie. The truth is that I need the friendship of my Saviour Jesus - above all else. God has clearly made friendship to be of great potential benefit to us but as we look at the world and some aspects of Christian culture, friendship has taken a real battering. Our fast-paced consumer culture can make us believe that in friendship, we are also consumers. We have rights and expect a good return for our time and money, whereas in reality, friendship is a long-term potential high-yield investment. Others firstTV soaps and chat-room relationships on the Internet can also affect our thinking, and draw us to a fantasy world of false intimacy and affect our ability or willingness to engage in what can be a somewhat disappointing and frustrating real-life experience of another person in friendship. Our churches sometimes don't help by giving the impression that any friendship between members of the opposite sex must be a prelude to getting married - and any close friendship between members of the same sex something very dodgy. To find friends and for them to find us means a willingness to look out for others first, setting to one side our own needs at least for a time. As we do so, opportunity to engage in friendship grows as people respond to our interest in them and they take an interest in us. I am not pretending that this is easy for some, and can feel very fraught and risky, but ultimately it is worthwhile. I was saying goodbye to a Dutch friend recently, and in the course of our parting, words he said: 'Stefan, I just want you to know that you have made a real contribution to my life,' - I know I feel the same about him - and I guess that summed up for me what a benefit there had been in friendship, through its many ups and downs, and how God has used each of us to bless the other. It is through friendship that I have often encountered grace, found acceptance and, at times, profound healing. Friendship is . . .A commitment that involves developing and practising the virtues of: * Trust In a friendship - so long as we have chosen wisely - we are likely to find: * Support The Bible's patternDavid and Jonathan* Mutual commitment - 1 Samuel 18.1-3 What else does the Bible say about friendship? * Two are better than one! (Ecclesiastes 4.9-12) God calls us his friends* Exodus 33.11 Further reading:The Relationships Revolution by Nigel, D. Pollock, IVP (1998) Stefan Cantore© Evangelicals Now - March 2000 |