Resolution time

Friend is defined in the dictionary as “A person whom one knows, likes, and trusts; a person with whom one is allied in a struggle or cause; a supporter, and sympathizer”. In Proverbs 17 it states that “A friend loves at all times” and thus takes the Webster’s definition further by indicating that friends “love” each other “ALL OF THE TIME”. Hmmm

How many friends do you have? Polls indicate that most folks do not indicate that they have many friends; I would imagine that if they actually read these definitions to the people to whom they were polling that the numbers would dwindle even more.

Every year in December and even into early January I feverishly work on my goals for the upcoming year. Heretofore much of that time was spent in formulating goals for our company, but since I have retired my emphasis has been on personal goals; thus I gave my personal goals almost my entire attention this year for the very first time.

You might be interested to learn that at the top of my list for next year is to develop more friends. Jesus commands in John 15:17, “This I command you, that you love one another”. If we obeyed that one command, we would have plenty of friends. Lest you take this command lightly, understand that when Jesus was asked what the “greatest” commandment is, He responded by saying that we should love God, our Father, with all of our heart, soul, mind, body, and spirit, (or words to that effect), and second, we should love “each other” in the same fashion. It is right up there at the top of God’s list, hence my emphasis on it in regard to formulating my personal goals for next year.

Aside from obeying God’s second greatest command there are numerous other benefits to having friends. Friends offer a great sounding board for ideas, laugh with us and cry with us and help console us when we are down; friends share in our triumphs when we are riding the pinnacle. They especially help us when we are facing adversity or tackling difficult endeavors. The Bible includes a comparison to a three braided cord, (three friends) not easily being broken vs. a single strand, (or going it alone).

OK, friends are a good thing, now how do we go about grooming some additional friends. I always consult the Bible for answers to tough questions and the Bible tells us again in Proverbs, “In order to have friends one must be friendly themselves”. Hmmm What is friendly? The dictionary defines it as, “Warm, comforting, fighting on or favorable to one’s side, being worthy of a friend”. If we look at that definition it is easy to understand that it would be fairly easy to be friendly if we loved one another; however have you ever looked at the Biblical definition for love?

1 Cor. 13:4-8 tells us, “Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails”.

That is the pure love with which God loves His friends and I think that those lofty standards for love are entirely impossible for mere humans to achieve without God’s help. In fact Jesus takes it even another step when He stated, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends”. How many folks would you lay down your life for?

My friends I am here to witness to you that Jesus did just that for “His” friends. Do you want to be His friend? (Rhetorical question, of course one would want to be the object of God’s pure love; one would have to be pretty much a complete idiot not to want God to be their friend.) If you want to be His friend, He warns that one cannot be His friend and be friends with the “world”.

In other words there are some things that we need to forego and we must turn from our sins and seek His righteousness. He goes on to tell us how to do it in the passage below. My plan for the New Year is to try harder to follow it. It all begins by accepting Jesus as our Savior in recognition for His dying on the cross for our sins and then by doing the best we know how to follow Him, realizing His definition for His love for us, (now would be an excellent time to reread God’s definition of love that is stated above). Give your heart to Jesus today, won’t you? What a friend we have in Jesus!

John 15:14,
You are my friends
if you do what I command you.