January 23, 2022

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. . . the LORD said to Eliphaz the Temanite: “My anger burns against you and against your two friends, for you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has. Now therefore take seven bulls and seven rams and go to my servant Job and offer up a burn offering for yourselves. And my servant Job shall pray for you, for I will accept his prayer not to deal with you according to your folly. For you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has.” [Then Job’s friends did what] the LORD had told them, and the LORD accepted Job’s prayer.
And the LORD restored the fortunes of Job, when he had prayed for his friends. Job 42:7-10

Intro: I lost two companions this month

I did not know them personally, so I can’t say they were my “friends”
– I’ve known them only through their writings
• when I became interested in contemplative prayer, Thich Nhat Hanh introduced me to mindful meditation
• Jim Forest, an Orthodox Christian writer, helped to broaden my spiritual growth, and enhanced my understanding of icons
◦ these men knew, respected, and appreciated each other – they were friends
◦ so I enjoy their friendship vicariously
– the theme of my talks is intimacy, and today I will go over intimacy between close friends
• I can only share a few ideas
• a thorough exploration of friendship would require a whole series of talks in itself

Job had three friends who were close–at first
Now when Job’s three friends heard of all this evil that had come upon him, they came each from his own place . . . . They made an appointment together to come to show him sympathy and comfort him. And when they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him. And they raised their voices and wept, and the tore their robes and sprinkled dust on their heads toward heaven. And they sat with him on the ground seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for the saw that his suffering was very great. Job 2:11-13

So far, so good
– sometimes the best way to comfort someone in grief is to just be present
• stunned and empathic silence can provide more comfort that empty words
• in fact, they would have done better to remain silent
(later on, Job will say as much:
Oh that you would keep silent,
and it would be your wisdom! Job 13:5)

But when Job began to talk, they panicked
– his speech was dark and hopeless
• and it threatened their whole notion of reality and God
◦ the dogma that people believed and on which they staked their lives,
◦ was that good people get the good things of life, and bad people get the bad things
• Job’s experience and his bitter complaints contradicted their worldview and sense of justice
◦ here he was, a good and righteous man, suffering the fate of the wicked
– the fear Job’s friends felt turned to anger quickly
• in his second speech he warned his friends,
He who withholds kindness from a friend
forsakes the fear of the Almighty (Job 6:14)
and later on, My friends scorn me (Job 16:20)
◦ Job will call them
worthless physicians (Job 13:4) and miserable comforters (Job 16:2)
◦ he will complain and cry out,
All my intimate friends abhor me,
those whom I loved have turned against me. . . .
Have mercy on me, have mercy on me, O you my friends
for the hand of God has touched me! (Job 19:19 and 21)

When we reach the end of Job’s story, God reconciles him to his friends
– what happens in the passage I read earlier surprises me
• God assumes the roll of mediator – he tells them how to repair their relationship
◦ even with wealth and livestock, Job was not fully restored until he had his friends back
• the process of reconciliation included a sacred ritual and prayer
◦ their friendship was for God a serious concern
◦ serious enough for him to intervene personally
– before now, did you know this?
• that friendship not only involves us physically and psychologically, but also spiritually?
So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift (Mt. 5:23-24)

Nowadays, when we use the word friend, we have to qualify it

Someone is a “close” friend, or “true,” or “good,” or “casual”
– sometimes the qualifier expresses doubt, as with a “supposed friend”
• the reason for this may be that we do not know what “friend” means
– Facebook has made a mess of the concept of friend
• it keeps offering me total strangers as “friend” suggestions
◦ as if friends of my friends can become my friends also with a simple click
◦ no one has one thousand “friends”!
• to “unfriend” someone is a terrible way to describe a preference
◦ when all you want is to stop your newsfeed from being filled with political rants or photos of kittens

We can get a general idea of what friend means from the Proverbs

The wise sage tells us,
A friend loves at all times (Pr. 17:17) EVEN ON YOUR WORST DAYS
A man of many companions may come to ruin,
but there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother (Pr. 18:24)
– conversations with a friend lift our spirits
Oil and perfume make the heart glad,
and the sweetness of a friend comes from his earnest counsel (Pr. 27:9)
• even a friend’s brutal honesty is valuable
Faithful are the wounds of a friend;
profuse are the kisses of an enemy (Pr. 27:6)
• you can trust a friend with your worst secrets
Whoever covers an offense seeks love,
but he who repeats a matter separates close friends (Pr. 17:9)

Intimacy with a friend is built on trust and safety

That is because, in order to get close, we have to “reveal” our inner self
– not everything, but specific things
• for instance, in order for what we feel and experience make sense to our friend
• if my friend is going to understand me, he or she will have to know me,
◦ to know me, I have to reveal parts of myself
– that is one side of the coin – the other side is discovery
• our friend reveals a hidden inner self, and we begin to discover who this person is
◦ in reality, there are two discoveries friends make
◦ I discover what my friend reveals, but I also discover parts of myself
Iron sharpens iron,
and one man sharpens another. . . .
As in water face reflects face,
so the heart of man reflects the man (Pr. 27:17 & 19)
• friends share things that wake us up to what lies inside our own hearts
Olivier Clement, “Spiritual progress has no other test in the end, nor any better expression, than our ability to love. It has to be unselfish love founded on respect . . . a disinterested affection that does not ask to be paid in return, a ‘sympathy’, indeed an ‘empathy’ that takes us out of ourselves enabling us to ‘feel with’ the other person . . . . It gives us the ability to discover in the other person an inward nature as mysterious and deep as our own, but different and willed to be so by God.”

The reveal part of friendship will always be a challenge, a risk
– and it can be scary – “Did I say too much?!”
• but in close friendships, being vulnerable is not as uncomfortable
◦ we know that all can be forgiven
• but some of us get stuck – we identify too much with our “old self”
◦ with its guilt and shame – it’s ugly past and ugly impulses
◦ we fear that if we’re seen for what we are, we will be rejected
– the blessing vulnerability brings, is that it frees you to be yourself
• you don’t have to modify yourself to be accepted
• intimacy in friendship requires integrity at every turn
◦ If I’m going to be known, it has to be for who I am — all my integrated parts
◦ but friends also appreciate the fact that we are in a state of “becoming”

We cannot force a friendship

We may see someone or meet someone we would like for a friend
– so we reach out to that person – but that’s as far as we can go
• if you are coerced into spending time with someone,
◦ that person is not a true friend
• we’ve been told to choose our friends wisely
◦ but I don’t know that we choose our friends
◦ I think we just find each other somehow
and at beginning, you can’t predict where it will go
– everyone who has had friends makes mistakes
• one mistake: you try to befriend a person incapable of being a true friend
◦ someone with a personality disorder, like a narcissist
◦ that person simply cannot be there for you
• another mistake: you have a close relationship, but
◦ the other person has a bad influence on you (2 Sam. 13:3)
◦ or we have a bad influence on each other — a wicked chemistry
C. S. Lewis, “. . . the dangers are perfectly real. Friendship can be a school of virtue . . .; but also a school of vice . . . . It is ambivalent. It makes good men better and bad men worse.”

Friends do not grill each other for personal information
– they don’t ask for confessions or pry into secrets
• we talk about our mutual interests – whatever we both love
• this is the essence of Christian friendship; God is our first and greatest love
– don’t trust the person who pries or spies
And when one comes to see me, he utters empty words,
while his heart gathers iniquity;
when he goes out, he tells it abroad (Ps. 41:6)

One of the deepest wounds we can suffer is a friend’s betrayal

For it is not an enemy who taunts me—
then I could bear it;
it is not an adversary who deals insolently with me—
then I could hide from him.
But it is you, a man my equal,
my companion, my familiar friend.
We used to take sweet counsel together;
within God’s house we walked in the throng. . . .
My companion stretched out his hand against his friends;
he violated his covenant (Psa. 55:12-14 & 20)
– friendship is a covenant, a sacred bond
• the two of you do not have to cut your hand, drip blood on a rock, and bury it in the earth
(like my friend and I did when we were eleven years old)
◦ it is still a covenant, a shared understanding and agreement
Even my close friend in whom I trusted,
who ate my bread, has lifted his heel against me (Ps. 41:9)
• John says this verse was fulfilled in Judas (Jn. 13:18)
◦ and when Judas approached Jesus in the garden to kiss him, the Lord said,
“Friend, do what you came to do” (Mt. 26:50)
◦ Jesus had already forgiven him

Jesus told a parable about laborers in the marketplace, hoping to get hired. The owner of a vineyard came and made an agreement with them to pay them a days wages for working his vineyard. Around noon he found other laborers and sent them into his vineyard to work it. An hour before quitting time, he sent other laborers into his vineyard. When at the end of the day, when he paid the laborers, he began with those who arrived last and paid them the same amount that he paid those who worked half a day and those who worked the entire day. Naturally, those who spent the whole day working complained that this was unfair. But when the owner justified his actions, he began by saying, Friend, I am doing you no wrong (Mt. 20:13-15).
Referring to the laborer as his “friend” was an invitation. The laborer could stand side-by-side with the owner and with the right attitude, share his generosity. It was an invitation to form an alliance, to do good together, to board the Jesus “friend ship” and sail with God

Conclusion: This has been for me a week of surprises

Walking our dog Kona on Tuesday, I ran into a friend I had not seen in several years
It was a wonderfully joyful moment,
and we arranged to spend time the next day to catch up

Later in the week I received a message from a roommate of mine from fifty years ago
He was stationed in 29 Palms, and I was there planting a church
His message read, “You have been in my thoughts and trust all is well. How are you doing?”
Later, I noticed that he sent the same message to another friend from our church there,
and then later I noticed he sent it to yet another
We are all still friends who have loved each other all these years

Then, Friday, I received text from a friend who lives far away
She asked, “When can we chat?”
So last night we were on the phone for two or three hours.
Each of these encounters brought rich blessings

We miss out on so much love by not staying in touch
God cares about friendship – so he helps us reconcile and repair them when they rupture
Then, finally, there is Jesus Christ, A friend of sinners
Not an imaginary friend, but the true Friend, our best Friend,
Always forgiving, always faithful,
and if Jesus were the only friend I had, he would be enough