A FRIEND CLOSER THAN A BROTHER

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In Christ, Mark

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

The righteous choose their friends carefully, but the way of the wicked leads them astray.

One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

Proverbs 12:26, 18:24

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

How do you choose your friends?

I’m not talking about social media and Facebook here but rather friends from a socially personal perspective. I think the answers to the question would probably vary.

Some people are so socially integrated that they consider any person they hit it off with as being a friend. They have no problem interacting and relating to others, giving second thought to carefully getting to know someone before getting close. A recent television advertisement underscored this kind of person when two men were cheering loudly for their team, exchanging fist bumps and even embracing when their team was winning. After one of the men left the scene, the other man’s spouse came, apparently having had to use the restroom, and asked, “Who was that?” Her husband simply responds, “I don’t know.” After a cutaway to promote the business, the ad flashes back to the scene where the man who had left returns, sees the other man’s wife and simply asks, “Who’s she?” It’s funny but often a true representation of how people interact in friendship sometimes without really knowing one another.

Well, not everyone is so liberal when it comes to their approach to friendship with others. For some people need a lot of time to warm up to someone enough to cross into the realm of friendship with them. These people are more guarded and may even set their standards for friendship so high that they have very few people they would even refer to as friends. People with this attitude toward friendship will prefer to label those they associate with as acquaintances rather than friends, reserving the latter word for the closest and deepest relations they have with other persons.

Then there are those who have trouble choosing the right friends. They definitely lack discernment and judgment in their selections, perhaps willing to forego sensibility for sinfulness, especially if they decide to hang around with friends who trend more toward wickedness than righteousness. For when someone sides with those who live for sin, they will end up falling into that same sinfulness and suffer the subsequent consequences for that.

Finally, there are fair weather friends. Maybe you have had a few. Perhaps you have even made the mistake of being one. These kinds of friends will be there for you until really need them. Then they won’t be able to be found. They are unreliable and often times are only a friend because they want something from you.

Yes, there are all kinds of friends out there and any number of methods for choosing them. Looking at our proverbs for today, we find the word of God speaking about that every matter:

The righteous choose their friends carefully, but the way of the wicked leads them astray. Proverbs 12:26

One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. Proverbs 18:24

Going back to the question about how we choose friends, the right answer, the Biblical answer, is right there in the first proverb. We are to choose carefully, falling back on our righteousness to do so. We’re not to make quick decisions when it comes to who we befriend. No, we’re to proceed with caution, allowing the Lord to reveal to us whether a person is suited to be our friend or not. For when we rely on righteousness, then we rely on the only One who will perfectly guide us in the right ways which include choosing who our friends are. The Lord will never lead us wrong but the wicked will always lead us astray or prove to be unreliable and only leave us in ruin. There’s a lot at stake and this is why we had better choose our friends wisely.

This might be enough for our word from the Lord today but there’s one more critical point to me made about choosing friends. And I wouldn’t even call it a point but more of a proposition.

For what if you could have a friend who would always be guaranteed to be there for you and always love you, a friend who would always be available to listen and talk to, a friend who would never abandon you or lead you astray? What if you could have a friend that would stick closer to you than a brother or sister or any other person who you consider family?

Wouldn’t you want a friend like that?

I know I would and I know I do have such a friend.

His name is Jesus.

Look at His words from the Gospel of John:

My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are My friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from My Father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in My name the Father will give you. This is my command: Love each other. John 15:12-17

Believe, trust and follow Jesus. Obey His commands. Love one another as He has loved and you will be considered a friend by Jesus, the One who God the Father placed in authority over all creation, the only One who is the way and the truth and the life, the only One who can open the way to living with God forever (John 14:6).

Jesus laid down His life for each of us. There is no greater love that someone can have for another than that. And this Savior, God’s only Son sent to save us, longs to be our friend, a friend who will stick by us closer and more faithfully than anyone else.

Looking for a friend? Choose Jesus. For there is no better friend you will ever have, a friend who will be with you forever.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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