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"Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends." -John 15:13
We were made to do life in community, with friends side by side as Jesus was to His disciples. Someone to listen to our thoughts, pain, guilt, dreams. Someone to companion us through all circumstances of life and to love us in spite of our differences.
A profoundly important attribute of Jesus was his friendship to His beloved band of followers. We are the first example of friendship to our children.
We were never meant, or expected, to do life alone. Friendship teaches us how to become an invitation of love to others in everyday life, and how to teach our children to be a friend throughout life.
Cultivating a heart for friendship lays a foundation that will serve our children (and you!) the rest of your life. One of the deepest blessings of my life at this stage is the very close, intimate, inspiring, fun friendships I have with my now adult children. But, of course, as with everything else, it took years of heart-work. After all, we invested years and years in one another's lives.
I pondered what would build strong friendships with my children when they were quite small. What principles build friendship?
1. Time and Availability. Whatever the age, children develop better when they know we will make our time together a priority. People grow close not through monitoring one another’s behavior but by working together, playing together, talking together, celebrating together, weeping together. Relationships develop when people are there for each other—and that’s as true for parents and children as it is for anyone else.
2. Acceptance and Unconditional Love. In building meaningful relationships with my children, I must learn to accept unconditionally the person God made each of them to be—even with personality traits that differ from mine or that make me uncomfortable. I need to accept the “warts” and irritating characteristics that may never change. I have to love my children with a mature commitment that reaches past my feelings for them, which can change from circumstance to circumstance.
3. Affirmation and Encouragement. I believe most children, (and adults) are acutely aware of their limitations and their failures. While they might need correction for their mistakes and or even confrontation for their sinful selfishness, they also need recognition for their real efforts and accomplishments and positive reminders of who they can be with God’s help. And sometimes we need to remember, "It is to a man's honor to overlook a sin."
4. Grace. Our children need us to give them the grace to grow. If we make them think that we expect perfection, then eventually they may give up trying to please us, because they know they will always fail, or they may spend their whole lives feeling guilty for their failures. And sometimes when life has too many rules, as teens, our children will quit telling us the truth of what they are doing for fear we won't understand or will condemn them. (We cannot live by fear.)
5. Relationship Training. We need to consciously train our children in the skills and attitudes that will enable them to sustain positive relationships. A person can only experience true intimacy when his heart has been deepened and exercised in real love and commitment. Practice in manners and speech and gracious behavior comes over a lifetime of cultivating this day in and day out. This is taken from Mission of Motherhood by me!)
Friendship is not frivolous but essential to our emotional, spiritual and physical well being. Solomon, the wisest man in the world, wrote this.
two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their labor:
If either of them falls down,
one can help the other up.
But pity anyone who falls
and has no one to help them up.
Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.
But how can one keep warm alone?
Though one may be overpowered,
two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
We were made for companionship, community, close friendship. We are happier deep down, flourish more, grow stronger in every way when we have a close friend standing with us in life.
Work is better with a friend, helping one another up from a fall, keeping warm, defending against an enemy.
He also said, “A friend loves at all times.” Proverbs 17:17—when it is convenient, when it is not.
Jesus made very clear that friendship, laying down a life for a friend, was the centerpiece for passing on the knowledge and love of God from one generation to another. It is why he chose his disciples and modeled to us what love and influence looks like. Seeking godly friends, building this kind of community is holy work.
“Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.” — Marcel Proust