I listened to a podcast the other day on the topic of friendship. When I hear people talk about friendship or read books about friendship and how important it is in our lives, I have often walked away feeling mixed emotions. It can be easy to wrap up the topic with a pretty bow, offering a picture of an ideal of what we should strive to attain. Often these types of books cause me to feel like something is lacking if my life, wondering why God has not allowed my life to mirror what I have read.
I think that there can be a danger of reading a few biblical principles, taking what is read and, in the same way that children pick up play dough and try to form a shape that they have pictured in their minds, we try to take the principle and mold it into what we think it should look like in our idealistic, American-dream influenced imaginations.
I don't think that's what God intended for us to do.
After listening to the podcast, I began to think back on the friendships that I've had over the years. I feel very blessed to have known some amazing women and very grateful to have had a handful of what Anne of Green Gables referred to as "bosom friends"!
I met my first very best friend when I was in middle school. Her name was Sharon. After walking home with me from school one day, I shared the gospel with Sharon, and she became a Christian. She began going to church with me, and we were pretty much inseparable throughout most of high school, facing all of the high school drama together and encouraging each other to live for God while attending a public high school. There were sleepovers and youth group events. We have so many good memories! After graduating high school, we worked at the same company for about a year.
We eventually drifted apart. Sharon got married and moved to another state. We have kept up with each other, off and on, over the years. I am so grateful to have had a friend during my high school years that was used to help me stand firm in my faith.
After graduating from High School, I worked full time for almost four years and saved money to be able to afford to go to college. During those few years, I was introduced to a young woman named Paige. I don't think I had ever met anyone in my entire life who was so much like me, and to this day, no one has ever quite been able to fill the role she had in my life. We immediately became the best of friends. When she met the man who would eventually become her husband, I was included in almost all of their dates. I know that might sound a bit strange, but it worked for us. Paige walked with me through some of the hardest years of my entire life. We laughed at the same things, loved the same music, and would often show up wearing the same outfit. I spent as much time as I could with her at her apartment, talking about God, watching movies, eating Ruffles potato chips, and M&M's, and one of my favorite memories of her was when she would stand on her coffee table, using a candle as a microphone as we sang at the top of our lungs to our favorite songs! Paige helped me seek God and helped me to grow in him.
After a short battle with throat cancer, Paige passed away at 28. She left behind her sweet husband and precious 2-year-old daughter.
I eventually moved to the D.C. area to begin college. The first day I moved into the dorm, I met my roommate, Jill. She became one of my dearest friends, and that friendship lasted through all of college. We were in each other's weddings, had our firstborn babies within two weeks of each other, and our husbands became best buddies. We double-dated, went to each other's homes over breaks, and pretty much grew into adults together.
Jill got married a year before I did and ended up moving back to where she had grown up. We have kept up with each other, off and on, over the years.
During my college years, I met Debbie, and she would become one of my closest friends. Debbie and her husband were both in my wedding, and we were very close as couples. We had our babies within months of each other and began raising our children together, living in the same apartment complex and eventually living across the street from each other. Debbie and I spent hours talking about God, homeschooling, and how to raise our children. We exercised together, prayed together, and, when we lived across the street from each other, we often ran across the street after our kids were in bed so that we could spend a few minutes talking. We were very much like sisters.
When our kids were elementary school-aged, Debbie began to struggle with some mental health issues. She ended up losing her marriage and isolated herself from anyone who knew her. She passed away a little over a year ago.
I've had a few mentors - Sharon, Bonnie, Mignon, and Deannie. I have several other dear sisters/friends - Kelly, Sue, Emily, Kelsey, Kacie, and Caity. Women I have met over the years, most of who don't live near me anymore. As I have gotten older, it seems like close friendships have been harder to find and harder to maintain. Raising a family and working to keep a marriage healthy is more than a full-time job if you want to do it well. I've also found that my very dearest friends ended up living in my own home - my husband, my daughter, and my son. And even though both my kids are married now, other than my husband, they continue to be my very dearest friends.
Yes! I've been very blessed to have had a few really good friends in my 57 years of life. God has used each one in my life, and I pray that I was used in their lives as well. But as I think through my history, each friendship has been for a short season, and then they are gone. Some of them are people I continue to keep up with as we can, but each friendship has only been in my life for a very short time. And even when I was close to each of these precious people that God allowed me to connect with for a season, the friendship was slowly changing. We may not have been aware of it, but it was. Nothing stays the same. No one stays the same. People are in our lives for a moment, and then they are gone. We can never get back what was briefly there.
When the friendships I've had have changed, especially when the change was caused by death, there has been a void left that cannot be filled. I have been left with an ache in my heart that, although it fades with time, never completely goes away. And as I've gotten older and friendships are harder to find and maintain, I've learned that, even when I have those moments of closeness with another person, I need to be pointing them - and myself - back to God. He is the one who will never leave or change. He is the only constant in our lives. I believe that the reason that the friendships in my life have come and gone is so that I will not become dependent on a person but that I will learn to depend on God.
I love the story in 1 Samuel 23, where we read about Jonathan and David. David was hiding because the king wanted to kill him. His dear friend Jonathan came to him and pointed him to God. Verse 16 tells us that Jonathan "strengthened his hand in God..." and then Jonathan left him. He left him "strengthened in God." He left him focused on God. Jonathan was not needed anymore because he had directed David's attention to God. David had all he needed.
As much as I have enjoyed and cherished some very sweet friendships over the years, they were never meant to stay so I would need them. They were there for a season so that we would strengthen each other in God, and then they were gone. I was never meant to build my life around them or to plan my future with them in it. None of us is guaranteed another day. Biblical friendship strengthens us in God so that we can live the life we are called to live.
As I reflect back over 57 years, I am so thankful for how God has so elegantly woven His people in and out of my life, as only He can do, so that there have been people there to help bear my burdens and strengthen me in God. But I am also so grateful that there have been even more "alone" seasons when I have been forced to focus on Him. God has carefully positioned me in a way that has not allowed me to become too dependent on one friendship. This has also caused me to want to do whatever I can to make the most of my time with others and to purposefully strengthen them in God.
He is so wise!