A Friendship Worth Fighting For
A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. – Proverbs 18:24
Have you ever wondered how long a particular friendship would last? I remember a time when it seemed a dear friend and
I were drifting apart. Living in different cities and both facing busy college schedules, it seemed the e-mails and phone calls were getting fewer
and farther between. Visits were becoming too expensive and harder to fit into our busy schedules. When people asked me about her life, I began saying,
“I don’t know.”
I started wondering how long this friendship could last. Surely we would always be friendly the few times a year we would see each other. No doubt at those
times we would get together at least for a few minutes to “catch up” on what we had missed, but I might be the last to know if she became violently
ill, found a fabulous job, or took an international vacation.
Then, the thought came to me that this was a friendship worth fighting for. We had a lot of history together. We were close friends. I would just have
to set my mind that I would do my part not to let our friendship die.
Isn’t that the way it is with our Friend, Jesus? Satan will put up many barriers to prevent us from having a close friendship with the Friend who sticks
closer than a brother. Sometimes it seems that we get so busy that it is difficult to communicate or visit with Him. At times, Heaven seems a long
distance away; we do not see Jesus physically and have Him ask if we want to get together after church or some night this week. We do not “run into”
Him accidentally and end up having a wonderful conversation.
Jesus does remind us of our friendship, though, and is willing to talk anytime. He reaches down in so many ways to show us His love. He is fighting to
save our friendship too, and has a good many angels working on that as well. We know that if we do our part, nothing can separate us from His love
(Romans 8:39). We need to remember that this is a friendship worth fighting for!