Friendships

As Christians, the world expects us to get along with everyone.

Our Lord’s commands to love one another
and to love our enemy
and think that we should be people with hundreds of friends.

If we love everyone, then certainly we should be popular – loved and liked by the world.

Yet, we know that it is impossible to have that many friends.

Our daily experience is that there are people in this world whom we can’t stand.

For some reason or another, our personalities clash and we just can’t get along.

Though the Christian response to such people in our life should never be hate, there are just some people that make it so easy.

I knew a person like that a long time ago. I tried to be friends, but everything about this person grated at my nerves. She was like nails on the blackboard of my soul. I think, perhaps, I had the same affect on her. I dreaded our encounters and even found ways to avoid them.

We could not avoid one another completely, we shared friends and activities. We went to the same church.
We were just different – had different perspectives, different ways of doing things and different goals in life.

Now, the world does not expect to see that kind of relationship among Christians.

After all, we are supposed to love one another.

Yet, we did love one another. If I needed something, she was there to help.
If she needed something, I willingly gave back.

We may not have enjoyed the time together; we did not pretend to like one another for the sake of appearances.

Our love manifested in very real action and I will be forever grateful for the things she did for me and my family.

“Let love be without hypocrisy. "