Friends

I was thinking about what to write tonight, and it occurred to me that I should write about friends. I have a friend that I have had since kindergarten, friends that I have met along the journey of raising my children, friends from my homeschooling days (not so very long in the past!) and friends from my children’s orchestral careers. I have mostly women friends, though I do have a few male friends as well. I like to think that I am an equal opportunity friend, meaning that it doesn’t matter the background, gender, color, education, or anything else. I like many different types of people, from the ones who know absolutely nothing about music, to the music oficionados; from the people who know about trauma to the ones who have always led fairly safe lives. The one thing that all these people have in common? They’re all nice people.

Now, I have had some friends who turned out not to be true friends. I’ve had friends who lie to me or talk about me behind my back. Those are not true friends and they certainly do not stand the test of time. They did not make the cut.

If I want to think back to my best friend, who is always there for me no matter what, I look to Jesus. He is, who I refer to as my 3 a.m. friend. What do I mean by this? He doesn’t care if I “call Him up” at 3 a.m. He is always happy to hear from me and to help me work out the issues I am having, even if it takes all night. I think of the song “What a friend we have in Jesus,” and it’s so true. He is our brother, our Savior, our friend, and our Lord. He’s the whole enchilada, as it is said.

Our other friends here are just an extension of God’s love for us. He gives us friends to help us through the tough times and rejoice with us in the good times. Theirs is the shoulder to cry on, and the hand to hold. They minister to us as Christ would and we minister to them in their time of need. So be Christ-like and be there for a friend. Maybe it’s not even someone with whom you were particularly close, but you saw a need and you were a friend. This is what we are called to do.