Friendship...The Pillar of Faithfulness

While we Thursday Morning Bible Study girls are still basking in the after glow of yesterday's gathering, it is a good time to think upon yesterday's posting of the Pillar of Love - that good soil which is foundational in establishing the health of any friendship. Today, we are looking at the second pillar, that which supports and strengthens the growth and bloom of friendship. Proverbs 27:6 says that, "Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but deceitful are the kisses of an enemy."

Faithful is what we are looking at in this verse...throughout Scripture we see that God Himself is faithful and that this attribute characterizes those who belong to Him. The true spirit of friendship is faithfulness. Faithfulness is loyalty and trustworthiness (we will look a little closer at these two in a moment); faithfulness fosters growth and health in our relationships, and while it has many enjoyable and pleasing out workings, there will be times when faithfulness will require us to confront a friend (or to be confronted by a friend ourselves). This is never easy, and it carries with it the potential of wounding or hurting a friend, however, the risk of "wounding" our friend in order to make the way smooth for God's highest good in their life is one that we should be willing to take, just as we also need to learn to treasure those that God places in our life, that risk wounding us for God's highest good.

It does not always need to be a confrontation about sin, it could be something as simple as coming alongside a girlfriend that is struggling with her diet and is just about to order that cheesecake for heaven sake! But when it comes to those deeper issues of our faith, we just plain need to be sisters that sharpen one another, there is just too much at risk - sin will take you further than you ever intended to go, keep you longer than you ever intended to stay, and cost you more than you ever intended to pay. Wounding a friend is always worth the risk.

Faithfulness is not supporting your friends regardless of their behaviour - that is enabling. Faithfulness is lovingly coming alongside a weak or weakened sister, not to expose, but to shed light and to foster a safe place for confession, repentance and healing and new growth.

Of course, there will be times when your friends will make contrary choices, even after being lovingly confronted. As heartbreaking as this is to witness, for our own spiritual health, we must not allow the "works" or "actions" of those who choose to walk away from God and His truth to "cling" to us. The intention should always be to speak truth into and over the situation, not to implicate ourselves in any way with the sin or to become entangled in an unhealthy alliance.

This would be the "weeding out" that we talked about earlier in, "Friendship...A Lovely Garden." However difficult this may be, we have to remember that those who have been carried away by their own appetites (see James 1:13-15) have the distinct ability to reproduce (see 1 Corinthians 6:6) at an alarming rate and will ultimately choke out the life of other healthy plantings. Faithfulness can continue through praying for them...but with some, there does come a time when close proximity can be dangerous.

Which brings us to loyalty. Loyalty is one of the qualities of faithfulness...it is one of the greatest strengths of any friendship. This quality of loyalty, which grows out of faithfulness, is seen beautifully depicted in the life of Jonathan in 1 Samuel 18:1-6. Jonathan remained loyal to his friend David in spite of his father's anger and the fact that his loyalty to David would affect his own royal standing in the future. Jonathon took the risk! He could see the hand of God upon David and aligned himself with the purposes of God in David's life.

Loyalty in our friendships is important, but we need to be aware of the dangers of loyalties that have become misguided or misdirected. In order to avoid this, there is a need for perimeters for the greater allegiances in our life. For instance...

No relationship should ever distract us from our relationship with God or the purpose that God has built into our lives. Nor should a friendship ever pull us away from our marriage or family or detrimentally affect other friendships.

Another caution needs to be addressed as well, regarding loyalty - there is always the danger of falling into the trap of nursing people's wounds instead of actively working towards helping them become healed and whole! Many want to be accepted just as they are, an open, festering wound, rather than to grow and heal and learn new behaviours. NEVER build friendships upon the shaky foundation of wounds, and worse yet, common wounds! This can only perpetuate unhealthy thinking and unhealthy example.

We must be committed to building our most intimate of friendships according to the highest common denominator, the Word of God and His purposes for us. Be that friend that encourages and inspires her girlfriends on in the Lord, that they might aspire to reach their full potential in Christ. And require this quality in those that you draw closest to you as well.

Determine not to compromise your own commitment or example to line up with an other's poor thinking or poor example...it will ultimately only condone their behaviour and leave you in a weakened state. Live in such a way that your life is an example to those around you of what a woman of God should look like...not perfect, let's keep this thing real girls! - but taking responsibility for your own growth in the Lord. Our role as a faithful friend is to help others accept responsibility for changing and growing in order to become all that God has called them to be.

Proverbs 18:24 states that, "...a man of many friends will come to ruin, but there is a friend that sticks closer than a brother." Throughout our lives, we will be placed in the midst of many others...we need to understand the differences between "acquaintances" and "friends". Trying to be friends with everyone will ultimately dilute our ability to be a good friend to anyone, and let's be honest, just plain wear us out! When it comes to our loyalties, we need to make Kingdom choices.

Before I completely wear you sweet things out, there is just one more attribute of faithfulness that we need to look at - trustworthiness.

Trustworthiness, stands side by side with loyalty as another one of the qualities of faithfulness. This is a very fragile and critical area, because once trust has been violated it is hard to get back. One question that is beneficial in asking ourselves is, "Am I a trustworthy woman?" Many times, if we are not, we do not believe it to be true of others either, which leads to distrust in relationships and that just makes things messy and inauthentic. Trustworthiness is seen in the life of a woman that mirrors consistency and perseverance in her faith - more than ever before, we sisters need to be seeing this thing in one another, and experiencing this for ourselves. An acquaintance of yours today may become an intimate sister friend of yours tomorrow, simply by seeing the quality of trustworthiness displayed in your conduct today!

God is looking for women whose hearts are completely His - and when He finds these women, He strongly supports them!

"For the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth that He may strongly support those whose heart is completely His." 2 Chronicles 16:9

And the most beautiful thing is that those He considers faithful - He strengthens and puts into service!

"I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because He considered me faithful, putting me into service." 1 Timothy 1:12

Love and faithfulness...the first two pillars of any strong friendship - Monday we will look at the Pillar of Respect, until then have a wonder-full weekend!