F is for Friends {The real life kind}
I just have been in awe this week of how great is the gift of a friend, and how rich I am to name a few special people the real-life (not Facebook!) word, friend. I had a few challenges this week, and just felt overwhelmed by the love and support of friends, often unknown by them but just expressed in their simple smile, hug, look in the eyes, squeeze of a hand. We often have no idea how much is at stake in how we treat people!
A little kindness goes a long way.
Then, last night, I met a dear girl new to our church and began to chat. She so vulnerably admitted that she’s new to the state and so longing for friends. I loved her immediately for her honesty! I’m praying God will tuck her into our fold and she will find fast-friends very soon. But it got me thinking, if friends are such a blessing, and if we all want them, how do we make them?
Clicking “friend request” on FB is easy, but actually “inviting” a friend into your life can be hard. Scary. A close friend of mine laughingly said that she was asking me out. Meaning, she was expressing her intentions in being more purposeful about spending more time together, knowing it benefits us both. I loved, again, her honesty, and vulnerability. Hm…maybe there’s a theme. Now please, I am not pretending to be an expert on friendship, I’m really just reflecting a bit and processing what are perhaps some pieces of wisdom for making (and keeping!) true friends. A few thoughts…
- Be filled up by God. We all know it’s true. Needy people make others run for cover. No one wants to be sucked dry, and when we aren’t filled up by God we automatically turn our straws to someone else and get our fill. People full of God’s presence and joy are attractive to others.
- Be honest. (In love!) Maybe this is a given, but no one wants a fake friend. Perhaps I’m a bit sick in this respect, but I’ll admit there are times I’ve literally wanted to stop someone and say, “Ok, please just tell me you have some area of weakness or struggle because otherwise I’ll never want to hang out with you again.” Sorry to be so blunt, but it’s true. On the flip-side, we also don’t want loose-cannon friends who blab every dark thought that comes through their mind, yes? Dear me, discretion is godly! Enough before I say something I regret.
- Be vulnerable. This is certainly related. Now, I do not mean we all have to hang out our dirty laundry the first time we meet someone. But vulnerability is very attractive. At the root of this is humility and confidence. When we’re humble we can be confident and when we’re confident and secure we have the courage to be vulnerable.
- Listen more than you talk. (Nothing more needs to be said on this.)
- Be reliable, dependable, loyal, faithful. Good Christians make good friends (and good spouses!).
- Always endeavor to edify your friend and leave your time together more like Jesus than you were before. This is the best way to decide who to be friends with. Who makes you love Jesus more? Who makes you want to be like Jesus more? Who leaves you feeling full, inspired, courageous? Or, conversely, who sucks you dry and leaves you feeling negative?
When you're pretty sure you are a disappointment.
I always thought the worst thing was not getting chosen. Being overlooked, left out, not being picked for the team or the party or the date.
Do you remember that happening and how bad it felt? Realizing that someone purposefully didn’t choose you, that in someone’s mind they would be better off without you even being there. I remember getting stung a couple times and rubbing the spot for quite awhile.
But it turns out there’s something much worse: Getting chosen and then it becoming glaringly obvious that you were not as expected. That you are a disappointment. That perhaps you’re kept because of mercy, pity, or dutiful obligation, but the unspoken truth is that if the whole thing was done over, they wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. You’d be out.
Perhaps you were chosen for the team but reality is you’ve never seen a minute in a game. Or, like poor Skeeter from The Help, you’re set up on a date and upon arrival Mr. Wonderful’s face is painfully clear: You’re not quite what he’d hoped for.
That is, perhaps you were chosen, but had they really known you you’d never have been chosen after all.
Yup, this takes the cake.
This goes far beyond the surface scratch of being merely overlooked. One can easily explain that away. Perhaps they don’t know your hidden talent, or you were having a bad day, or maybe your beauty isn’t outward but if they knew your amazing personality things would be different. Being initially un-chosen is rejection at arm’s length. Not big deal.
But the second kind is another beast altogether. That is, rejection at our core. That is, rejected for who we really are. After we’ve been known. After we’ve been proven. After we’d washed off our makeup and slipped off our clothes, so to speak. Rejection that whispers, “Had I known, I never would have chosen …”
Do we wonder why divorce is so diabolical?
To be known and then rejected is eternally worse than never being chosen in the first place.
Why the dark thoughts, you ask?
This darkness (That yes, I have felt in my brief 31 years), this sting, this ache that strips us bare and leaves us raw and oozing pain, it helps us see the glory of the gospel.
The ravaging love that revolutionizes our souls.
Yes, it arrests our hearts to realize that “In Him, we were also chosen” (Eph. 1:11). We ARE chosen, picked, singled out, by the love of God in Christ. But this! But this is what should bring us to our knees in thanks and stand us on our feet in confidence:
“For God knew his people in advance, and he chose them…” Rom. 8:29
Known and chosen. Chosen and known. We have been chosen by God even though He knew everything we would ever do. He knew what was under the clothes, the makeup, the masks. He knew the blunders we’d make and the limits we have.
He knows that really, we’re not that put together.
He says, “I have known, and I have chosen.”
I don’t know who this is for, but some sister needs to know it today: You are not a disappointment to God. He has never regretted his choice in you. He has never thought, “Had I known…”
You were already known, and chosen.
So you can be free to slip down those layers we clutch fearfully in front, and be bare before Him. He already knows and loves it all. You’re not a disappointment after all.
Oh amazing grace! {Thanks for reading.}
In the Time of the Butterflies
A novel for me is a portal into another world. That’s why I have to be so careful when I read them! Non-fiction I can engage, let go, pick up, drop when needed. But fiction on the other hand, or even non-fiction narrative, sweeps me away and into the world within the pages. Oh I love me a good novel!
So I limit my novel-reading to just during our vacation time. This means that usually only 3 book per year make the cut. They’d better be good.
My most recent novel treasure was In the Time of the Butterflies. This historical novel was set in the 40s and 50s in the Dominican Republic under the dictatorship of Raphael Trujillo (El Jefe). It follows the life of the four Mirabel sisters, national heroes who were political activists working to topple Trujillo’s regime and establish a free nation. The book follows their lives, working its way up to the climax in November of 1960 when three of the sisters were murdered by Trujillo’s men. It’s a fascinating read. As I turned the last page, near midnight on the last night of our vacation, I lay in the darkness thinking of several themes that stood out.
::Is it worth it?
It was only one line in the book, an afterthought, really. These women have given their whole lives for this cause. They’ve given their children, families, and eventually their lives. Thirty years later they’re national heroes. Trujillo was assassinated and a free nation is taking shape. But the surviving sister, Dede, looks around sometimes, and wonders, “Did they sacrifice for this?”
Meaning, as I understand it, the world is still a mess.
I have to admit I was left with the same feeling. Yes, as icons of freedom they gave the nation a lot of hope. But oh, how sobering to consider: “Are we sacrificing for something worthwhile?” Seventy years from now, in just the blink of an eye, we’ll all be gone. What are we sacrificing for?
Oh eternal things, oh that we’d continually fix our gaze on living for things eternal.
::Stepping off the pedestal.
The second fascinating thing was following the story of Minerva Mirabel, the ringleader sister who really orchestrated all the underground activity and spearheaded the rebellion. After serving a horrendous sentence in prison she is released and the nation looks to her as an icon. She is praised, celebrated, looked up to. And yet she struggles internally, as she’s lost her fire in prison and wants nothing more than to be home, safe, with her daughter. But all her internal struggles must be hidden, because she’s become a beacon of hope for her nation. So instead of letting them see, she remains strong, keeps up the front, keeps acting out the part of hero despite the crumbling she feels inside.
Which made me wonder about Christian leadership. It’s true, we as leaders help provide something to which people can look. I know Minerva kept up the hero-gig because she knew her people needed someone to look to. She did it for them, to give them hope. But as Christians, sometimes this is a struggle. Do we allow ourselves (by we I mean all of us, each of us are looked up to by someone) to be “looked up to” so that people can have hope, or do we insist on stepping down, letting the struggles show, refusing to be the hope, even if it means disappointing people along the way.
Of course you know the answer, right? We never have to be the hope of the world. Of course Christian discipleship involves setting examples and letting others look our way, but we never have to bear the burden of being a hero. There is only One Hero in this story, and His name is Jesus Christ. He is the hope of the world. He is the only One who never crumbles, who’s never divided. Isn’t that freeing?
So, In the Time of the Butterflies is a good read and a great reminder that we are so blessed by the freedom we enjoy. I’m struck all over again by how blessed we are in this country. Let’s enjoy it, thank God for it, live sacrificially for things eternal, and never succumb to the pressure to be heroes.
{Do you have a favorite novel you’d be willing to share with us? I’m always looking for a great read for the next vacation! Thanks for sharing, and reading.}
If you're wondering what to pursue in life …
At a recent women’s conference we looked at this, and I was floored. Talk about two contrasting lists! Check out how God relates to the proud, and to the humble:
- His wrath is on the proud (2 Chron. 32:25)
- He pays back revenge on the proud (Ps 31:23)
- He will not tolerate the proud (Ps 101:5)
- He mocks the proud (Prov 3:34)
- He tears down the house of the proud (Prov 15:25)
- He detests the proud (Prov 16:5)
- He punishes the proud (Prov 16:5)
- He humbles the proud (Is. 2:12)
- He throws the proud to the earth (Ez. 28:17)
- He scatters the proud (Luke 1:51)
- He opposes the proud (James 4:6)
- He saves the humble (2 Sam. 22:28 & Ps. 18:27)
- He keeps back disaster from the humble (2 Kings 22:19)
- He forgives and heals the humble (2 Chron. 7:14)
- He holds back destruction and delivers the humble (2 Chron. 12:7)
- He turns His anger away from the humble (2 Chron. 12:12)
- He hears the humble (2 Chron. 34:27)
- He guides the humble in what is right (Ps. 25:9)
- He teaches the humble His way (Ps. 25:9)
- He sustains the humble (Ps. 147:6)
- He crowns the humble with victory (Ps. 149:4)
- He shows favor to the humble (Prov. 3:34)
- He allows the humble to rejoice (Is. 29:19)
- He looks on the humble with favor (Is. 66:2)
- He gives rest to the humble (Matt 11:29)
- He exalts and lifts up the humble (Matt 23:12, etc.)
- He gives grace to the humble (James 4:6)
- He shows favor to the humble (1 Peter 5:5)