Authentic Friends

A couple old friends just replied by email to snail mail letters I wrote them recently. I hadn’t been in touch with either in ages.

How comforting to hear from those who have known you forever and have seen you weather many a storm and watched you pull through time and again! I shared with them how my life had taken some nasty turns recently. They were like “Wow, Man! We’re right here for you!” Nothing had changed.

Amazing how certain friendships can be so ready to pick up again after so long. A therapist friend says all relationships go through rupture – for a host of reasons. The question is whether we are willing to do the work of repairing them. In some cases, it is better just to leave the past in the past and pick up at the present. In others, it is necessary to go back and work through the rupture. With these particular friends, distance caused the separation, and a quick exchange of letters sharing the gist of recent happenings sufficed.

Old relationships lacking currency and immediacy cannot substitute for “here and now” friends. What these oldies do have is the ability to validate us in ways immediate friendships cannot. The old ones see a much broader picture of who we are. They understand that the sum of us is not merely what they are seeing of us today. They know we are more than a single or a handful of episodes. Whatever today offers, no matter how awful, it is not the final verdict of who we are as a person.

For me, one “old” friend, my wife, has the maximum view available to humans – she knows both the broad and the immediate. As far as human friends go, there is no competition.

But there is One who has a far more complete perspective on each of us, a truth easy to forget when immediate friends rush to judgment or old friendships fade. Besides the broad and immediate views, God has the insider advantage – seeing me like no one else, not even I myself, can. Plus, God alone sees me from the future. Broad, immediate, insider, future -- all make for a vastly enhanced perspective. Like 4D vision.

Hillary Clinton famously quoted the old proverb, “It takes a village to raise a child.” It also takes a village to live a life. I firmly agree that “no man is poor who has friends,” a saying made famous by the movie “It’s a Wonderful life”. I’ve long relished the idea that I was wealthy from this angle if no other. Lately I’ve realized that some of these assets have been tied up. I am heartened to regain access to them and discover that they are still quite valuable, at least as broad friends, if not immediate or current.

God speaks, among other means, through people and when we access these old friends we are likely to hear God that much more fully. The voices of multiple friends are not redundant. Lacking God’s megaview, they each provide a unique perspective. Even when they say the same thing, they confirm what others see. The “two-or-three witnesses” validation is crucial to countering lying or misinformed voices, regardless how voluminous.

No wonder God said man (male or female) was not meant to live alone. God made us social, made us to live in community. We are, if anything, relational creatures. In God’s likeness.