Cultivating my friendships (Proverbs 18:24; Proverbs 27:6, 9-10, Philippians 4:4-9)
Billy Milton - December 10, 2006
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“ Perfume and incense bring joy to the heart and the pleasantness of one’s friend springs from his earnest counsel.”
Viv passed on to me this book to read. It’s called ‘How to survive, and thrive, as a church leader’ and is written by an experienced church leader called Nick Cuthbert. It’s brilliant and I would suggest that we all could do with reading it whether we are church leaders or not. Anyway, as I was reading it with half a mind on what I am going to be preaching today, I came across this passage that pulled me up short. Maybe because I recognise myself in it. Nick writes, (p68)
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”As I have got older, and particularly at times when I have been unwell and forced to look at life in a fresh way, I have valued friendship more than anything else. How many people do you know of, or have read about, who have become highly successful by the world’s criteria, who have been there and done it all and are surrounded by trappings of wealth, and yet end up miserable because they have no friends? The sad fact is that the majority of men have almost no friends. They have colleagues, golf partners, and drinking buddies, but no real friends.”
I remember as a teenager an old friend (60ish) of my parents saying to me, “Billy, if by the time you reach my age you can count your real friends on one hand you can count yourself a fortunate man.” As a teenager I thought that he was being a bit melodramatic because I had dozens of friends. As I grow older I am uncomfortably aware that he might be right. The words of Solomon seem all the more true when he writes, “ Perfume and incense bring joy to the heart and the pleasantness of one’s friend springs from his earnest counsel.” (27:9) Do you have a real friend that spending time with is like breathing in perfume and incense? I’m not talking here about drinking mates that egg you on to get drunk and I’m not talking about the girl that runs beside you in the gym. I’m talking about someone who knows you and loves you despite all your faults. Someone once said, “A friend is one who knows you as you are, understands where you’ve been, accepts who you’ve become and still gently invites you to grow.”
Paul put it this way, “Don’t think only about your own affairs, but be interested in others, too, and what they are doing.” Phil 2:4, NLT . Do you have friends like that who look after your interests? Would you like to have friends like that?
What can we do about this situation? How can we be sure that our lives are filled with deep and meaningful relationships that grow over a lifetime? Aside from a few things that should be obvious; bath, brush your teeth, and change your underwear regularly there are a few things that we can all do and I want to highlight just 4 this morning that will help you cultivate your friendships.
1. Bring the big issues to God. You’ll not succeed in building and maintaining close friendships if you are always sucking the life out of everyone. There must be give and take for a friendship to last. Prov 18:24 says, “There is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Hey, I know some of your brothers so that’s just as well, eh? I have had friends in the past who almost sucked me dry. Oh I liked them well enough but eventually they became no fun to be around. Every time we met became like a counselling session and eventually I found myself avoiding them. Decades later they haven’t changed. They are still hard-done-by negative, moaning people. They don’t take their issues to God first – they just lay the burden on their friends.
Take a good honest look at yourself and your friendships – what do you talk about? Are you constantly gaining support from your friend and not giving the other way? As Christians we have the wonderful privilege of being able to take our burdens to Jesus. He says in Matt 11:28, “Come to me all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.”
If you examine your friendships and discover that all you seem to be doing is sucking your friends dry then can I suggest that you bring your burdens to Jesus. Leave them at the foot of the cross and do not pick them up again. You’ll become a better friend because most people like being around fun people who are not continually moaning. That doesn’t mean that you can’t have the occasional moan with a friend but just don’t make it the norm. Don’t build a friendship on mutual depression.
The second thing, which is strongly related to the first, is this….
2.
Deal with your hurts.
Hurt people, hurt people.
In Genesis 4:3-8
Cain was upset with God and with his brother Abel because God did not accept his offering. He didn’t deal with his hurt but instead ending up killing his brother. A hurt person hurting another innocent person.
Booker T. Washington was born a slave. In his autobiography he writes, “The most trying ordeal that I was forced to endure as a slave boy… was the wearing of a flax shirt . In that part of Virginia where I lived, it was common to use flax as part of the clothing for the slaves. That part of the flax from which our clothing was made was largely the refuse, which was the cheapest and roughest part. I can scarcely imagine any torture, except, perhaps, the pulling of a tooth, that is equal to that caused by putting on a new flax shirt for the first time. It is almost equal to the feeling that one would experience if he had a dozen or more chestnut burrs, or a hundred small pinpoints, in contact with his flesh…but I had no choice, I had to wear the flax shirt or none…
My brother John, who is several years older than I am, performed one of the most generous acts that I have ever heard of one slave relative doing for another. On several occasions when I was being forced to wear a new flax shirt, my brother generously agreed to put it on in my stead and wear it for several days, till it was “broken in”.
And, there’s a friend who is closer than a brother! Many of us have been hurt – scarred, not by a flax shirt, but scarred by evil and sin. Scarred to the point that it’s hard to make friends anymore. We’ve totally lost our confidence. But Jesus has come to wear the flax shirt for us. “He heals the broken hearted and binds up their wounds.” That’s what we remember at Christmas — Our redeemer Christ coming to earth, being mortally wounded so that we can be completely healed from our wounds. A true friend won’t hurt another person and then just blame it on their own hurts. A true friend will seek healing for their pain and the best place I know is from the one who knows what suffering is all about – Jesus himself.
3. Value your friendships above gold. Prov 17:17, “A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.” How do I know if I love something? I spend time on it and I spend money on it, normally. How do I know if I love someone – same criteria – time and money! But especially time. Money is limitless but there are only 24 hours in a day. How you allocate these limited hours gives a sense of value to where you spend them.
In a story called, ‘The Furnace Keeper’ we are introduced to one of the ancient kings of Persia who loved to mingle with his people in disguise. Once, dressed as a poor man, he descended the long flight of stairs, dark and damp to the tiny cellar where the furnace man, seated on ashes, was tending the furnace that heated the palace. The king sat down beside him and began to talk. At meal time the fireman produced some coarse black bread and a jug of water and they ate and drank. The king left but returned again and again for his heart was filled with sympathy for the lonely man. They became very good friends as time passed. At last the king thought, “I’ll tell him who I am, and see what gift he will ask.” So he did, but the fireman didn’t ask for a thing. The king was astonished and said, “Don’t you realize that I can give you anything, money, a city, even a throne?” The man gently replied, “I understand your Majesty. You have already given the greatest gift a man could receive. You left your palace to sit with me here in this dark and lonely place. You could give nothing more precious. You have given yourself and that is far more than I could ever deserve.” Value your friendships more than gold.
4. Maintain a positive attitude. There is a difference between working through a negative situation or and taking on a negative attitude to life. Life is full of troubles – none of us can escape them completely. Death, relationship problems, work, finances, sickness – we all experience it at some time. But, all of these things will be made worse by embracing a negative attitude. You cannot choose your problems but YOU CAN CHOOSE YOUR ATTITUDE! And what you choose will often determine what type of a friend you will be.
John C. Maxwell who has written many books on leadership wrote- “We see what we are prepared to see, not what is, we see things not as they are but as we are.” Let me explain that. On any given morning we can all look out of our bedroom window to see the rain pouring from the sky. For many of us our reaction will be, “Oh no – another horrible morning!” For Ron White (a guy in our church who grows trees) the reaction will be, “Oh fantastic, it’s pouring with rain. My trees will be drinking deep.” We see things as we are. Some of us believe that we were born unlucky and we look with envy at those who have been blessed with lucky genes! Let me assure you, there is no such thing as ‘luck’. But there is most certainly such a thing as attitude. And remember your attitude determines your altitude. Your attitude determines your friendships. In the reading from Philippians that NAME brought to us, did you notice Paul constant urging for the Philippians to get their attitude right? Watch out for it as I read this in closing.
Philippians 4: 4-9 “Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable; if anything is excellent or praiseworthy; think about such things. Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me; put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.
Bring the big issues to God, Deal with your hurts, Value your friendships highly, Stay positive and you’ll definitely cultivate your friendships.