Friendship

Count me in on Friendship “I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. John 15:9-10 NLTIf you love me, you will keep my commandments. John 14:15 ESVThis is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. John 15:12-13 NLTThis is my command: Love each other. John 15:17 NLTJesus knows his way around sacrificial friendship, as evidenced on the cross. If anyone boasts, "I love God," and goes right on hating his brother or sister, thinking nothing of it, he is a liar. If he won't love the person he can see, how can he love the God he can't see? The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You've got to love both. 1 John 4:20-21 MSGReal friendship is one of God’s greatest gifts, and it doesn’t stop with God!A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. Proverbs 18:24 ESVGod wills for us to have and be real God following friends.So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone… Ephesians 2:19-20 ESVIn him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Ephesians 2:22 ESVThe kind of relationships God wills for us to have take effort and intentionality!Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works. And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near. Hebrews 10:24-25 NLTAll the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer. Act 2:42 NLTWe need each other for both encouragement and challenge on our journey with Jesus!As Iron sharpens Iron, so a friend sharpens a friend. Proverbs 27:17 (NLT)Bad company corrupts good character. 1 Corinthians 15:33 NLTA friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. Proverbs 17:17 ESVLooking at friendship for what you can get rather than what you can give is not very Friendly or Godly! There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. John 15:13 NLTThe kind of friendship we’re meant to have is Godly and it takes God to have it!Closeness requires kindness, patience, persistence and a willingness to hear and obey God!Until we value relationships and people more than possessions and personal comfort we will never experience true life giving friendship. Pettiness is a manifestation of self-centeredness and is poison to friendship.Pettiness corrodes even the strongest bonds like rust eating away at the structure of a bridge until one day the weight of everyday life will cause it to fail.We will never be good together until we learn to be alone with God.Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. John 15:4 ESV