Happy Monday. “Saying ‘just a friend’ is like saying eternity is ‘just forever’ or that the ocean is ‘just a pond.’” –Jack Hyles
My mind goes to friends today for two reasons. First, I am teaching the book of Job in my Sunday School class and about the not-very-good friends who came to “comfort” Job. With friends like this, who needs enemies? Second, every week I think of you, the friends I know, and of those I have not yet come to know. However, I am aware that you, like I, need something to start the week. In the book, The Fine Art of Friendship, we are challenged to realize how precious friendship is. “It can’t be bought, borrowed, or manufactured, but must be cultivated like a tender plant.”
We need one another! Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 says, Two are better than one…if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow….and a threefold cord is not quickly broken. Is that not what is needed in this impersonal world?
Someone once said, “A friend walks in when the rest of the world walks out.” Proverbs 17:17 says, A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.
A soldier was asked after being severely wounded, “Did you fall?” He replied, “No, my buddies gathered so close to me that I couldn’t fall.”
We should have a desire to BE a friend. If we look around, we will discover many lonely people in our churches, neighborhoods, and places we frequent are crying for someone to notice their need and be their friend.
Do you need a friend today? Jesus said in John 15:15, I call you not servants…but I have called you friends... Continued in verse 16, He says, Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you… Did He choose us, even with our faults and failures? Yes!
Victor Hugo wrote, “The greatest happiness in life is the conviction we are loved for ourselves, or rather in spite of ourselves.” The hymn by Joseph C. Ludgate says:
“Friendship with Jesus,
Fellowship divine,
Oh, what blessed sweet communion,
Jesus is a Friend of mine.”
by Beverly Hyles
From the Mondays with Beverly blog. Reprinted with permission.
