Sitting alone in a crowded cafeteria was by far the most fearsome of landscapes I faced growing up. It beat anything that Camp Crystal Lake or Elm Street had to offer. I moved from school to school as a kid. When you're in elementary you sat as a classroom. There was no fear of the lunch room. Perhaps we had fear of being on the losing end of the dreaded “silent treatment” but I knew enough in elementary to keep me from being a pariah. Don't pick your nose, don’t mix up chocolate milk with your food and don't be gross to girls. In junior high it was a whole new ballgame. You didn't have to sit by classrooms. It was the beginning of the click system. Football players sat with football players. Pretty girls always seemed to sit together too, as if by natural magnetism of hair spray and make-up. Back when I was in school the black kids and Mexican kids all sat together too and very rarely would you see someone of another color sit otherwise. I wonder just how much time I spent in my early life trying to keep, maintain, gain or impress friends.
The idea of a friend has been cheapened since that time, but in essence I think it all goes back to those junior high lunch room days. We can amass thousands of “friends” on Facebook, but how many do we really know? Twitter classifies those friends as “followers.” Sounds even spookier if you ask me. We have this God complex to surround ourselves with dutiful slaves of opinion. Like this picture, tag me in this, forward this message and share in the comments below what you really think.
This past Sunday I was reminded that the true friendships we have are but a taste of what God desires in a relationship with us. Perhaps I have a distorted view of God. While I don’t consider him a scorekeeper of wrongs or a God who is ambivalent to what’s going on in our world—like say, Supernatural season 5 God—I don’t consider God to be a friend. I’ve always considered God as someone to worship, my leader, my advisor.
Sometimes God, to me, is a disapproving parent, especially when it comes to my sin. God hates sin. In the Bible, there are some damning words when it comes to sin. It’s considered burdensome, to putrefying sores, to a yoke, a debt and a scarlet stain. Just why did Jesus ask God on the cross, “Why have you forsaken me?” Jesus’ death brought all our sin upon him in one fell swoop, the sins of those who had died before him, the current sins of those living, and all the future sins of those coming after, like us. For that one brief moment, God could not look at the sin that wrought Jesus just before he died. He hates sin that much that he couldn't even look at his own son.
But let’s get back to friendship. Our pastor this Sunday challenged us to rethink what having a relationship with God really means. How can you have that closeness with God when you don’t seek Him on a daily basis? This is why I feel so disconnected when I go a few days without devotions, or when I miss a Sunday service, or when I miss share group, and especially when I choose to sin. Sin is the ultimate separation from God. All God wants is to be reconciled with us. Sin disturbs that relationship. In fact, the more I think of a God who made us in his image, the idea of friendship becomes much more tangible.
Our pastor on Sunday used a few references that stuck with me. Consider Moses. In Exodus 33:11 it is said that God spoke to Moses face to face “as one speaks with a friend.” Imagine having that one on one conversation with God. I always felt I would bow in terror, feeling the terrible guilt of having carried this sin around with me. Or consider Abraham. in James 2:23 Abraham believed God and was considered God’s friend. In those relationships, there was reverence, obviously, but not one of a slave and his master.
Perhaps it was my view of what constitutes a friend that is the true distortion.
I think it has taken me a lifetime to find true friends. Outside of my wife, no one was as close to me as anyone outside of my mother. Considering the sermon, I happened to be seated next to what I consider my best friend. His name is Randy.
Randy helps me with projects I have here at the house, helping me put together a new deck after our porch fire a few years back. He’s taken our kids when my wife and I needed a date night. He’s been to my son’s baseball games, and I’ve been to some of his daughter’s soccer games as well. He’s shared in the spoils of his hunt, providing deer steak on occasion, to my son’s delight. We have gotten so close we even planned a vacation together with our families. More importantly, he’s prayed for me when I needed it the most. He’s been a soothing voice for my son and daughter when they have questions. It’s more than just meeting him for a movie kind of friend. This is the type of friend that our pastor was talking about. Being with him I get a glimpse of what heaven will be, surrounded by your loved ones.
During our week of vacation together, Randy was dealing with the loss of his uncle. All week he had been on the phone with family members and his father, trying to make arrangements for the funeral. I knew he was hurting being so far away. He decided to cut his vacation short one day so he could be back in time for the funeral, and I didn’t think twice about cutting mine short as well. Here was a guy who had helped me accomplish so much in my own life so it was the least I could have done. Mourn with those who mourn.
During that past week, Randy had been working on his uncle’s eulogy. I knew from our conversations with him that many of his family members lived far from Christ. We’ve talked about my family too, where I would say it’s a strong 50/50 chance.
Arriving at the funeral home, I felt this was going to be the type of ceremony I would not be used to. The funerals I have attended have always been ceremonial. A pastor speaks on behalf of the dead to give hope to the living. In this case, Randy’s uncle had no pastor speak on his behalf. His viewing had no more than 20 or so close members of the family. It was a feeling of mourning rather than a celebration. When my great grandmother died we had mariachis!
So the funeral home assistant brought up a lectern, checked the sound and abruptly turned off the instrumental music like someone who would skip a needle on a record. Randy spoke of sin and separation, of choices and heavenly consequences. I felt at that moment that God had made Randy to save the people in that room who were living far away from Him. Randy was speaking to his family like a friend. And it hit me, a true friend loves you so much he would do anything to make you happy. He would tell you the truth when you needed to hear it and under no circumstance would a true friend leave you behind. Isn’t this true of God as well? He doesn’t want us to be separated from him. He provided Jesus as our path to salvation so that we didn’t need the confirmation of a click a group or assembly to prove our worth. He wants us to realize he’s right beside us when times are tough and he will always tell us the truth no matter how much it hurts. In this one moment I had been given the best gift God has ever provided me—a best friend.
I don’t know the hearts of those in that room who decided to take a step closer in faith. I know Randy continues to have dialogue with many of them and he doesn't judge them for their choices. He weeps for them and he will continue to love them. I do know that what my pastor had to say on Sunday was perhaps a way for me to unwrap my stubbornness of late, my disconnect. When you begin asking God for that type of relationship with Him, you have to be willing to know that He’s coming into the house to do some structural damage. And like my friend Randy, he’s coming with his tools and expertise. When Randy helped me with my porch, he arrived so early on the first day I wasn't even dressed. Imagine not being ready for God, undressed before the world, your sin exposed. But friends reach out their hand, guide you, help you, lift you up. Friends help you build on your foundation. No project is too daunting for my friend Randy. No situation unmanageable. That junior high kid who was afraid to sit alone will never have to worry about doing so now because this man of God decided that I was worth getting to know. For him I am thankful, and I know to be his friend is to continue to have those intimate moments with God. Randy deserves that above all else, someone to walk beside with, sharing those little glimpses of heaven.
