A True Friend

I’m glad that God has given us friends. Can you imagine life without friends. Now, I know what it is like to have no friends, and I know what it is like to have a few friends, but never an immense amount of friends.

But any friend is a blessing, I don’t care what there background is, I don’t care if they are poor or rich, healthy or sick, a friend is a friend. And God gives them to us.

The truth is in this account about Jonathon, he could be an unsaved man, but I believe he was because of the fact that he trusted in God when he and his armor bearer went to face the Philistines alone only trusting in God’s leading.

But there is no doubt that God gave this friend to David.

It seems like God gives me friends. Sometimes I have friends in the strangest spots that end up being an encouragement to me, where a Christian should be but is not.

When I was in college, I had a very strange friend that I believe God sent to me. He was my boss, initially, but he ended up being a friend to me and the provision of God in my life for finances. I worked for him in a couple of businesses and made him money, but I made money for very little tiring work, just mainly responsibility.

But God gave him to me I believe to help me to through college financially.

I know in Puerto Rico that God gave us two Puerto Ricans who were both single, but became our close friends. Carmen and Wilfredo. God, later gave us an Army family that was a wonderful blessing and encouragement to us, and got excited about everything we did and ate up everything we taught and grew as a result.

In Japan in the six years we were there, God has sent people to befriend us and care for us so that we could minister for the Lord.

By the way - don’t get wrapped up in valuing yourself in how many friends are like that to your, rather if there is a place to be valued - it is on how many people you or I are a friend towards:

Who has God sent you to be a friend too?

God sent Jonathon to David.

I. Friendships are an important part of Bible teaching

You don’t need to be a Bible scholar that the Bible is one of the greatest texts in history on friendship and the wisdom of friendships.

Let me share with you a couple of verses that have become conventional wisdom in society:

When God asked Cain what happened to his brother Abel - his reply is well known in the end of:

Genesis 4:9 AV

And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother’s keeper?

Proverbs 17:17 AV

A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.

Proverbs 18:24 AV

A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.

There is not a military service or likely unit that has not quoted this next verse because of it simplicity with its very great scope as well.

John 15:13 AV

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

Proverbs 27:17 AV

Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.

Ecclesiastes 4:9–10 AV

Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow: but woe to him that is alone when he falleth; for he hath not another to help him up.

A. Friendship provides stability

Ecclesiastes 4:9–10 (AV)

B. Friendship provides encouragement and exhortation

Proverbs 27:17 AV

Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.

It is often my friends that remind of me of what God would have me to do; of what God wants me to be.

They challenge me exhort me, and encourage me.

They should not justify me, but should be patient.

C. Friendship provides fellowship

Proverbs 27:10 AV

Thine own friend, and thy father’s friend, forsake not; neither go into thy brother’s house in the day of thy calamity: for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off.

Humans are social beings, God made us with a need to cohabitate.

One of the reasons you marry your wife or husband is in order to have fellowship.

· I feel sorry for folks that are sad all the time in their marriage. That wife or husband ought to be your best friend. BFF.

II. Our Generation often has Warped Views of Friendship

Friendship is defined solely on how good other people are to us.

There is little to no room for forgiveness. They say things like

fool me once shame on you, but fool me twice, shame on me.

People will say that they won’t be helping people any more, accusing even friends for the smallest wrong or infraction.

Friends are listed in class order by who is most valuable to them.

If you don’t like my posts you are not my friend.

Friendship today can never tell the truth - they must always approve of whatever a friend does and never make a judgment

Networking rather than true friendship is the goal of many people because of their love of money is far more important than being a friend to people.

These attitudes are bad for any community and should not be named among professing Believers.

So what are some:

III. Godly Aspects of True Friendships

I think this principle is important:

A. Our basis should be concerned with how we treat others, not how they treat us

We live in a warped society, where people use and abuse people to get themselves ahead. Where they belittle those that are around them and without remorse.

I believe most people have a desire to be friendly; to be a good friend.

Proverbs 18:24 AV

A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly: and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother.

But the reality is that when we go out to befriend people and care about them, they reject us.

· In two families in this church, I have 10 rejections to dinner or fellowship.

I’ll be honest with you, that can be discouraging to continue to be friendly to people.

You might say, Pastor, you only invited me once, well, you said yes. I don’t have to invite you 5 times.

Now maybe they don’t like me, maybe I have bad breath, but that is a lot of rejections.

But it matters not; I am out to be a blessing to as many people as I can.

B. True Friendship is given without expectation

Notice verses 1, 3, and 4; for the most part this love and affection was one way.

It was Jonathan to David.

Jonathan did not wait for reciprocation in anyway; he just wanted to be a friend to David.

An English publication offered a prize for the best definition of a friend, and among the thousands of answers received were the following:

"One who multiplies joys, divides grief."

"One who understands our silence."

"A volume of sympathy bound in cloth."

"A watch which beats true for all time and never runs down."

But here is the definition that won the prize: "A friend—the one who comes in when the whole world has gone out."

· Encyclopedia of 15,000 Illustrations: Signs of the Times.

C. True Friendship hopes for the promotion of its object

1 Samuel 20:4 AV

Then said Jonathan unto David, Whatsoever thy soul desireth, I will even do it for thee.

1 Samuel 19:4 AV

And Jonathan spake good of David unto Saul his father, and said unto him, Let not the king sin against his servant, against David; because he hath not sinned against thee, and because his works have been to thee-ward very good:

D. True Friendship does not keep secrets or backbite

1 Samuel 19:3 AV

And I will go out and stand beside my father in the field where thou art, and I will commune with my father of thee; and what I see, that I will tell thee.

Friends know their own friend’s problems and shortcomings. A true friend will let his friend know he is falling into a trap on the one hand, but will not tell anyone else about.

But also, they will not harbor the ill feelings that others hold for their friends, they will inform them of what is going one.

Critical, judgmental spirits have got to go. If people have such spirits about my friends, I’m going to rebuke them, and I’m going to let my friend know.

E. True Friendship does not desire its own way

1 Samuel 20:31 AV

For as long as the son of Jesse liveth upon the ground, thou shalt not be established, nor thy kingdom. Wherefore now send and fetch him unto me, for he shall surely die.

We must not worry about what other people say or think or what kind of friends they are to us or to others, we must focus on the kind of friend God wants us to be.

Notice that God’s call did not go out to friends, nor did it leave out enemies, - it said that we are to “love thy neighbor as theyself.” Whoever it is, think of them first, think of their needs, think of their feelings; think of what they would like if you were them; of what would be an encouragement or a blessing to them.

IV. All Scripture on Friendship is meant to point to the truest friend you can have

2 Timothy 3:16 AV

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

All the Scripture on Friendship points us to the wonderful relationship each of us can have with someone that truly cares about us:

His name is Jesus - He is the one true friend that you can have.

He is not a friend that is a fair weather friend.

He is not a friend that leaves you when things get tough.

John 15:15 AV

Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you.

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