Friendship | Paths of Blessing

Hey, what up.

It's Mark Carter.

I'm the pastor of Fierce Church.

Welcome to our podcast.

I'm so pumped that you're able to join us today.

I hope this encourages you, inspires you, strengthens you, gives you hope to keep pressing on, and it's my prayer that this sermon gives you a more expansive view of God's love for you.

Enjoy the message.

Beginning of the story.

One time I was a child and I used play outside and there were a bunch of boys in the neighborhood.

One family had five boys and they ran the neighborhood.

It was kind of like they were the law and the order.

You know, sometimes I get frustrated and wanna take my ball and go home and sometimes they told me to take my ball and go home.

The youngest I was closest in age to.

He was like two and a half years older than me and we would spend our time climbing trees.

He had a really great tree outside of his place because it was perfect for reenacting World War II bombing sequences.

There are multiple turrets that you could get to.

We took the European theater by storm One day.

We were walking around the neighborhood and found a new tree and it was taller but slimmer than the bomber the B-2 bomber that we're usually with.

So here's what we did.

He helped me up into the tree.

Right, I got up in the tree and then I realized that for him to get into the tree he couldn't just go to the other side.

I had to climb up higher than I had gone in that tree before right in the tree.

And then I realized that for him to get into the tree he couldn't just go to the other side.

I had to climb up higher than I had gone in that tree before right New tree.

And so I get up there and then I look down and I freak out I'm too far, too far gone.

The natural born instinct of fear of heights kicked in.

I did not want to die by falling.

And so my friend, who realized that this wasn't a great bombing tree, there weren't multiple turrets, can't fight Hitler like that.

So he climbed down and then looked back up and was like all right, let's go.

And I was like I can't, I can't.

And he's like, ah, you're being a baby, you know tough love.

Still frozen, not moving.

Still frozen, not moving.

He had to climb back up that tree and put my foot back down on the next level, right, but if you remember, I had to get help getting up and to jump down, still terrified, and he sat there with me for what felt like days, but he sat there with me until I jumped down and I didn't get hurt, thankfully, or anything like that.

But as I look back on that I was like, oh man, he was a reliable and trustworthy friend, and that's what we're talking about this morning friendship, not just because we're in the middle of a friendship recession, but friendship actually has huge benefits in your life.

I was going back over these stats and they blow my mind.

Grant study is a 80 plus year longitudinal study on happiness out of Harvard and the leading indicator for happiness and overall life satisfaction.

You guessed it Close quality friendships, close quality relationships.

Just to make clear what that statement means more important for your life, happiness is friendships.

More important than fame or money Right.

More important than social status IQ your genes Right Comes with mental benefits.

You are more likely to remember things at the age of 80 if you have close quality friends.

You are less likely to be overtaken by depression and you fight addictions more greatly.

If you have close friends.

There are physical benefits.

It is a better health indicator at the age of 50 for how your heart will be at 80, friendship is than your cholesterol levels.

It has a bigger impact on your health than diet, exercise, air quality, weight loss.

Hopefully I've convinced you at this point.

It's a big deal.

Friendship's a big deal, all right.

So then, I already alluded to though we're going through a bit of a friendship recession COVID hard on the interpersonal relationships.

Covid was hard, but this is it was just an exacerbation of a already trending, already trending recession.

Here's the truth.

Like teenagers today this is 2019, average teens spent, on average, one hour a day with their friends.

That's half of what they did in 2000 and a third of what they did in 1985.

Right, so then, whatever friends we have, we you know like, you graduate from high school and either you leave those friends or they leave you, right, and you and you try to be career oriented.

But then you have, you develop friends there and then you and then you choose you got to go get a job, so you have to leave those friends again.

And many, many folks look back on those times.

They're like, oh, those were the closest friends that I had.

Here's the strange thing If you don't continue to develop relationships, it has effects on other parts of your life, not just physical and mental wellbeing for yourself, but, right, you're less likely to get a job if you don't have close friends.

You're less likely to have a satisfactory marriage, because marriages that are built on friendships are more satisfactory.

And if you're like me, right between career and family, the one good friend that I have is my spouse, and when times are hard for me, times are hard for her.

She's the only one carrying my burdens.

22% of young men say that they have zero friends, friends being defined as that you could share anything in your life with and you could share anything with your life.

And, as I just said, for most men, that answer is one, and it's their spouse, and I promise you that your spouse would love to not carry those burdens alone.

Shouts of praises.

I've never heard a sermon on this miracle before, this miracle of Jesus.

Well, you know, he maintained 11 adult male friendships in his 30s.

It's incredible Career and family.

Career and family.

We spend so much time parenting double the amount of time parenting that our parents did and there's just not a lot left over.

But we've already talked about how important friendship is, and so I want you to wrestle this morning with that.

I want you to wrestle this morning with that.

In the church we talk about community.

I don't know if you saw the slide the best you is in community, but at the granular level, we're talking about friendship, your relationship with another person, the love and the attachment that forms there.

But if all that you do, some of you don't even do this, this.

I don't mean this to be harsh, I'm just trying to say the truth here.

After church, if you spend uh, no, let's do, let's do the stat first well-sighted study.

It goes like this 50 hours to get to a casual friendship, 200 hours more to get from a casual friendship to a close friend.

All right, let's do some math Ready.

After church.

I talk to the same person every Sunday for 15 minutes.

It only takes four years to form a casual friendship and 16 to form a close one.

To form a close one, this is about friendship, because God wants you to have good friends.

We're in the book of Proverbs.

This morning it's the series Path of Blessing In the book of Proverbs, and a scholar referred to the book of Proverbs as a treatise on friendship.

We'll step back for a second.

Proverbs is about wisdom.

That's what Proverbs.

As a treatise on friendship, we'll step back for a second.

Proverbs is about wisdom.

That's what Proverbs are.

Wisdom is the skill of living.

It's the skill of living.

If you're good at living, one could be called wise.

And to be wise, you have to understand how God created the world and understand that, even in these general principles that he has called us to live.

We live in a fallen world, and to be able to navigate those truths would be described as wisdom.

Here just gonna put these ideas together now.

Friendship is super important for your life, and to live a successful life you have to have friends.

It makes sense that then the book of Proverbs has a lot to say about friendship.

Okay, a disclaimer before we go on.

I'm gonna say friend a bunch, I'm gonna try to say close friend or best friend, or close friends, best friends, but I might mess up.

But when the Bible is talking about friendship, they're talking about deep friendship.

They're not talking about Facebook friends.

The amount of Facebook friends that you have does not correlate with mental health.

It doesn't.

So we can call them friends and you can like all you want, but what we're looking for is a deep friendship that loves, okay, okay.

So what is friendship?

Proverbs 17, 17.

A friend loves at all times.

A brother is born for a time of adversity.

Comparing family and friends Family, they're for you in hard times, right, but they don't always like you.

Think about your siblings growing up Like they'll beat the snot out of you, but then if somebody tries to come at you, they'll get all defensive right.

Thank you, thanks.

I appreciate it.

Wish you were nicer more of the time.

A friend, though, loves at all times and in all circumstances.

We'll go to Sesame Street.

Okay, cookie Monster, you know I won't do the voice lest I offend cookie lovers.

Okay, I should do it All, right.

So the situation is Cookie Monster pours out a bag and a big cookie falls on the table and his best friend is there staring longingly at the cookie right.

And then he, you know double, takes on the friend and says and his best friend is there staring longingly at the cookie right.

And then he, you know double, takes on the friend and says what friend for?

And then sings this long song about friendship and then concludes the answer is that friend's someone you can share cookie with.

And he gives his cookie to the friend and the friend, being a friend, says would you like to share?

And he says, no, happy to give cookie.

This is Cookie Monster we're talking about Maybe the greatest self-sacrifice in the history of Sesame Street.

A friend loves at all times, not just in adversity, but good and bad.

They're there.

They show up when stuff hits the fan.

They're there for you.

But here's a secret about friendship is that friends aren't just like a happenstance, right, you discover them actually.

Happenstance right, you discover them actually.

You can't force them.

You discover them.

Proverbs 27,.

Perfume and incense bring joy to the heart, and the pleasantness of a friend springs from their heartfelt advice.

Pleasantness is a word that means like sweetness, like you find in food, and it's here surprising.

It's surprising.

The pleasantness of a friend springs from their heartful advice.

Something like this Brandon, you were talking with your daughter earlier about your conjoined love of food, right?

Oh, you love food too, right?

Oh, you hate traffic as much as I do.

Oh, you think that the political options that we have in America are disappointing.

Like you can form, you come, you come around the same truth it's like sweetness of a food.

We have table sugar.

Back in the day, this wasn't the case, couldn't just add sweeteners artificial or natural, to everything.

If you were going to eat something sweet, you had to find it Honey, berries, and boy, was it a treat when you did so.

It is with friendship, but this is why being in America is so tough is that everything is transactional.

Even a lot of the friends that we have are transactional.

You have them around because they have money, or they make you laugh or they were encouraging to you in some way, but if they didn't offer you anything, would you be there for them?

This is why CS Lewis says that it's sad when people try to just, they're just desperate for friends but they can't find any.

Because friends are discovered.

If you were to come up to me and I'm like, what do you think about traffic?

And they're like, oh, love it, hate it, what do you think?

I don't know, I just want to be your friend.

Friend, if you have nothing, there's nothing to share.

And if you're going nowhere, you'll have no fellow travelers.

Friends are discovered.

Friends are also forged.

They're not only discovered.

You don't stumble upon best friends, you have to develop the relationship.

And they're forged.

We're going to go through four C's.

The first is constancy, constancy.

They're forged through constancy, proverbs 18, 24.

One who has unreliable friends soon come to ruin.

But there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin.

This truth is depicted in the 1999 pop hit Mbop by Hanson.

I don't know, the hook is very, very catchy.

So if you're like me, you didn't pay close attention to the verse, but let me read it for you.

You have so many relationships in this life.

Only one or two will last.

You go through all the pain and strife.

Then they leave you.

You turn your back and they're gone so fast.

Yeah, they're gone so fast.

Hold on to the ones who really care.

In the end they'll be the only ones there.

True friends are there when nobody else is.

My wife has really good college friends and every summer we get together.

And last summer someone had the great idea of like talking about why we were friends, and one gentleman to another was saying hey, remember that time in the ungodly hours of the early morning when I called you and you got in your truck and came Like that you always show up for me.

You know those guys are good friends.

That's friendship.

Constancy, availability number two.

Second way to forge a friendship constancy and carefulness.

And I don't just mean like tiptoeing around, like, in particular, sensitivity and tact when you're talking with somebody Proverbs 25.

Like one who takes away a garment on a cold day, or like vinegar poured out on a wound, is one who sings songs to a heavy heart.

My wife and I we've miscarried several times, but our first miscarriage was in particular hard for me.

Now I could share a story about how people were insensitive to me, but I'll share an opposite one.

I had learned that the average age of childbirth is going up in America and that corresponds with a greater chance for miscarriage.

Pregnancies over 36 are called high risk.

It's a bit of a misnomer, not that bad, but it means it increases in risk for something weird to happen with the pregnancy.

And I started talking to everybody.

I knew about this because I didn't want them to feel the way I did Good heart, because I didn't want them to feel the way I did Good heart but completely missed that some folks that I was talking to were struggling with infertility.

Some folks didn't have a partner to have a child with.

One couple had just had twins at the age of 42 and thought I was judging them for their life decisions.

We have to know someone enough to be aware of their internal landscapes to be able to speak to them from our hearts to theirs.

Here's a funnier example Proverbs 27.

If anyone loudly blesses their neighbor early in the morning, it will be taken as a curse.

My wife and I did youth ministry and we did mission trips together where you'd have to get the kids up in the morning and she would like go kid to kid, singing, rise and shine and give God the glory, and rubbing their backs awake, right, and I blasted techno and threw light switch raves.

And it wasn't long before a student found this verse and brought it to our attention and we took it into consideration and continued to do what we always did did In order to be a friend.

We have to be careful.

You need to remember about folks' stories.

Oh, I shouldn't say it this way because of their dad.

Oh, I need to text them on this anniversary because they lost somebody that they loved here.

On and on, it goes right.

We have to pay attention to the relationships that we're in so that we can be careful.

A true friend would.

We need to be constant.

We need to be careful, constancy, carefulness.

The third is candor.

Candor, proverbs 27, 5 and 6.

Better is an open rebuke than hidden love.

Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies gifts.

Wounds from a friend, painful rebuke, saying the tough things when it needs to be said.

I knew a guy who was going through some issues and he started inviting.

He was married and he started inviting this other gal into his life and at first she was supportive and she would help do things and they would kind of kind of was like a third wheel.

But soon he was spending more and more time with this gal and I had to say something.

I had to step in and say like hey, like I don't know if you see this, but you're going to trash your marriage.

Now, the thing about friendship is you're tying your heart to another person and so when you share something that's hurtful, it hurts you back, and so when you share something that's hurtful, it hurts you back.

Just don't rush into these types of conversations, is maybe my word of advice.

We have to have them, but just like don't hear this sermon and then just like nobody cares what you know until they know that you care.

Counsel is the last one.

We have to be in people's lives.

There's constancy.

We have to be careful about their emotions.

Carefulness.

We have to wounds, friendly wounds.

Candor, and then, finally, we have to have counsel, and this is Proverbs 27,.

As iron sharpens iron, as so one person sharpens another.

This is a famous passage, and so this is very similar to candor, except it has to be reciprocated.

If you're the only one giving advice and you never take it.

You're a therapist or a boss or something right.

You go to counseling and they're like, hey, you can't just sit in your basement all day, you're going to get depressed.

You've got to go touch grass at some point.

It's like that's great.

Here's my advice to you Don't tell me what to do with my life, I don't know.

You don't talk back to the counselor that way.

That's not the relationship right.

Or your boss right.

Your boss is like, hey, on that presentation, great way to do this, should have transitioned there.

You gotta hit this.

So this is the selling point.

You know, like you can't, you can't lots of relationships you don't just like give and take the feedback, but in a friendship you do.

I, early on in ministry, I was struggling with a sermon on how to preach it.

This is a classic problem where you want to preach the good news that Jesus has died for our sins and calls us into transformed lives, but people fall off on one side of the horse all the time.

They either think God just wants me to do good things or doesn't matter what I do.

God loves me.

And I was stressing, stressing about what kids would do 20 years from now if they remember these exact words from the sermon and one of my friends spoke into my life and said hey, you're forgetting about grace.

No, no, no, I'm not forgetting about grace.

I'm telling you that's the discussion.

I'm trying to figure out how to preach grace.

No, no, no, you're forgetting about you.

You are forgetting about grace.

You're putting too much weight on this sermon for these words at this time and not trusting in what God can do through you as an imperfect vessel and it wasn't man.

We were going back and forth and I was like, oh, this is so encouraging.

And then I'm like, oh, actually, I remember why I came to this.

I have to talk to you about how you handled this relationship.

Hey, thanks for that feedback.

Actually, I have to talk to you about how you handle this relationship.

Hey, thanks for that feedback.

Actually, I have something to say to you too.

That's friendship.

That's friendship as iron sharpens iron.

You have to be counseled.

You have to be counseled.

Okay, so you got to stay in their lives.

How do you forge friendships?

Got to stay in their lives.

Constancy.

You have to be counseled.

Okay, so you gotta stay in their lives.

How do you forge friendships?

Gotta stay in their lives.

Constancy.

You have to be emotionally sensitive, careful.

You gotta speak the truth in love, candor, and you have to take counsel.

You have to counsel, you have to take it as well.

All right, so if we discover friends and we're forging friendships, what is there that's left?

Well, if you're like me, I look back fondly.

I look back fondly on friends when I think of all the illustrations that I have about close friends.

They're from a while ago.

And then I look at what Proverbs calls us to do for friendship and I'm like I don't.

I'm not a good friend.

Maybe that's why I don't have great memories, because I'm not a very good friend.

Good news Jesus is the ideal friend.

Jesus is the ideal friend.

If Jesus is the pinnacle of human history, how does that affect our friendships?

Here we go from the beginning of the Bible.

In the beginning there was a garden.

You're aware of this.

Yes, okay, adam and Eve, not yet Just Adam.

And what was not good?

At this point, sin had not entered the world yet Adam had a great relationship with God.

He walked with him in the garden, one-on-one with God, and yet something was not good.

What was it?

It's not good for man to be alone.

It's not good for man to be alone.

So then all of the animals are trotted out in front of Adam.

And then it came to the golden retriever and Adam said, ah, my best friend, no, he needed a helpmate suitable.

And so Eve was created, and thus all of human society.

The longing in your heart for friends is not sinful.

It predates sin.

A perfect person has that longing and maybe this is a hint into God himself that God has perfect unity in the Trinity and yet created us.

And Adam had perfection, no sin blocking his unity with God, and yet he longed for others, so that we're not simply made for our relationship with God but for each other as well.

Now you know how sin messes this up.

Selfishness gets into relationships and breaks everything apart If you've ever been in or around through a divorce.

Friends get divided.

It breaks and tears that relationship.

There was a pastor once who was talking about heartache and difficulties and trials in the Christian faith and he said I don't say this, but he said this cancer, don't whine about cancer.

Tell me about being betrayed by your closest friend, which I don't want to make light of cancer.

But this guy has given you a little in to his heart about how badly he was wounded.

When you care for somebody and they tear you apart.

We have some glimpses of great friendships in the Bible David and Jonathan, naomi and Ruth but the pinnacle is with Christ, where he comes and says I no longer call you servants but friends, because you're made aware of the plans of God, namely that through Christ we might have great relationships again with god and with others.

Jesus, though, is the ideal friend.

He promises, and surely I will be with you always, to the very end of the age.

All god's promises are yes and amen in Christ.

He is constant in our lives.

He's constant.

He is a good doctor.

He loves to heal.

He is a good shepherd.

He knows you by name, psalm 139,.

He knows the hairs on your head.

He loves you.

He's careful candor candidly.

By his wounds we are healed different play on words there with friendly wounds he took our sins so that we would have life abundantly.

When he's in the garden of Gethsemane sweating blood, he just longs for his friends to be there.

And what are they doing?

Sleeping Peter, at the time of Jesus' trial, is going around this fire saying to everybody I don't know him.

I don't know him.

And Christ still went to the cross.

He cares for you, he longs for you to be in his life and he longs for us to be in each other's lives.

I wrestled with what exactly to say at this point.

This is the point that I would like to practically apply it to your life, and I've decided on a shotgun approach.

Hopefully, one of these many things will hit.

If we're to forge friendship, if we're to discover friends, you have to meet people and you have to talk about things that you care about.

One of the ways that I would encourage you to do that is the grove.

The grove.

You go to the grove not to make friends, but to pursue your relationship with God in prayer, online or by submitting to his word, or by being entrusted stewardship, financial freedom, being generous with our lives and what.

I hope that you find.

There are people who are like-minded, pursuing Christ wholeheartedly.

That you might join with them in side by side.

A start of something wonderful.

To be constant.

I advise the add a friend technique.

You're gonna watch a movie.

Add a friend.

You're gonna go shopping.

Take a friend.

You're gonna go get coffee.

Buy one for your friend, take it to the friend.

You can keep going.

Girls already have this down with the bathroom.

But there's lots of areas of our lives Candor.

People don't care what you know until they know that you care.

To be able to speak into someone's life, you have to earn it and to be able to wound them as friends, I would suggest overwhelming encouragement in the.

In the meantime, when you talk about the folks that you know and love, you should mention why you know them and why you love them.

When people's birthdays or anniversaries come up, don't just say happy birthday.

Say something encouraging to them.

Take the time to make it meaningful.

Words of affirmation go a long way.

It's tough out there.

We get beat up, knocked down, and for you to be able to be a respite for someone's soul, take that opportunity Then.

Then you'll have a great foundation to be able to speak into other people's lives and, consequently, to have them speak into yours.

Meals are my last one.

Take a breakfast a week and invite somebody to it.

Sign up for a summer supper and when you're eating, ask folks about what they care about or just listen.

Lots of folks I hear this all the time lots of folks begrudgingly go through small talk.

Begrudgingly go through small talk.

We've already said it takes 50 hours, 50 hours, to get to casual friend, and so if you're not willing to do small talk, how do you get there?

By listening Folks get excited or get saddened or get angry about stuff all the time, and that's.

Those are little glimpses into their heart.

Emotions are the language of significance, it's what they hold dear, and so by listening to what they care about, what they get excited about, what they get mad about, and remembering those things, you can talk about things that they like to talk about, and if they're a good friend, they're gonna be listening for your stories as well and you can slowly go deeper together.

The last pitch is it's not a pitch.

There's a gal in our church who said that their spouse is closer to God than he ever has been thanks to fierce men which shout out, to fierce men and to fierce women.

Thank you so much for committing to each other.

I mean, you guys are the.

It's like you know how we complain about times.

You know it's like ah, friendship, nobody cares about friends today, right?

Well, like, who's to blame?

But us, like we're the times.

If we want it to be different, different, we have to do something different.

It's like oh man, you know, I don't have any close friends.

Maybe committing to fierce man or fierce woman would be something that would be immensely helpful for you.

The church is different in this way.

This is it.

This is the end.

There's a whole bunch of reasons why people are friends Skin color looks the same, they have the same culture, they grew up in the same area, they go to the same work, they Googled the same thing, ended up at the same place, online forums or whatever.

There's all these different ways that we come together, but in the church we come together because of the grace that God gives.

If Jesus is the ideal friend and he is a good friend man, is it good to be friends with the king?

How much more should we pour out our lives to each other because of that goodness to us?

He first loved us.

Let's love anew.

Let's pray In Jesus' name.

Lord, we pray that you would give us the courage to be good friends this week.

God that you would make us prioritize friends and be constant in a select few people's lives.

God that you would bless us with candor and with carefulness.

God that you would love on us so much that we would be motivated to step out of our comfort zones and into deeper relationships with you and with others In Jesus' name.

Amen, amen.

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Whatever challenges you're facing, I know you can make it.

Don't give up.

Hang on to Jesus.

He won't let go of you.

Jesus loves you so much and we love you.

I hope someday we get to meet in person.

Thanks again for listening.