By David ReayMonday 19 Aug 2019LifeWords DevotionalsFaithReading Time: 2 minutes
There are “friends” who destroy each other,
but a real friend sticks closer than a brother. (NLT)
One of the truest tests of the worth of a friendship is whether the person you supposed to be a friend only draws close when they are in trouble. It is sadly true that we can cling anxiously to another person out of sheer loneliness. The other person ceases to be an individual in their own right but is rather a prop to us in our distress.
Of course true friends help one another in a crisis. But excessive clinging becomes oppressive. The other person becomes frustrated and we who cling become disillusioned as we discover our loneliness or whatever problem we have is not solved by that friendship.
It is true that friendship can help us overcome loneliness. But if we see our friend as primarily the means by which we cease to be lonely, we have misused them. We have treated them as a mere means to our own ends.
We are to reach out in friendship to others not out of our emptiness but out of our desire to enrich their lives. In doing so, we will likely find our own lives enriched as well. Real friendship creates space between the friends, not suffocating closeness. Real friendship respects the others free individuality and doesn’t demand they become clones of us.
Real friendship is, in fact, rather rare. And so it is to be treasured when we find it.
Blessings
David