Friends In Deed

Hand of Friendship, Chateau Thierry, France

A couple of years ago (I think) I posted a blog on correcting errors.  I introduced it with this paragraph:

I met a dear friend through the internet when I left a short message correcting an item she had posted. She did not take well to the short, terse note and we had a long explanatory exchange that led to friendship.

Recently, because of a multitude of things going on in her life, I did not  include her in a prayer request I sent to a mutual friend.  I was wrong.

The only way to have a friend is to be a friend – Ralph Waldo Emerson.

By not including her in the prayer request, I deleted her opportunity to show her friendship.  I was wrong.

Christ spoke of friendship in more than one verse:

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. (John 15:13 KJV)

Jesus laid down His life.  Would seem from that that he did so for friends.  Do you think of yourself as His friend?  Jesus had more to say about the subject in the next verse:

Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. (John 15:14 KJV)

Christ also showed the greater love that God has for mankind by laying down His life for those yet to come. The billions of people alive today, and the billions who came before.  Including those who decline to be friends with Him.

Solomon agreed with Emerson:

A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. (Proverbs 18:24 KJV)

Another quote I ran across, but could not locate the author is:  Friends are people we choose to be family.  I agree with that.  For what ever reason we make that first contact, however the friendship grows, true friends become family that do stick together.

Never take friends for granted.  Let them know how important they are – to us, and to the Lord we serve.  His resurrection was for them, too, and it is up to us to remember that, teach that, live that.

Rather than a lifetime, these friendships may last an eternity.