Easter 6

May 20/21, 2006

HE'S VERY FOND OF ME

You need all the friends you can get, right? That's what I often say to a youngster here at church or a teenager when they introduce me to someone who's here with them. Either they'll bring their friend to meet me or I'll see them together and walk over. (Our students and teens, by the way, are some of Family of Christ's best inviters and ambassadors.)

I'll walk over to them. "Hi, I'm Pr Nate," I'll say. "I'm glad to meet you. Are you Beth's friend? Well, Beth needs all the friends she can get." It sounds odd - and then when they look at each other and realize that I AM teasing, of course, I'll say, "But then, Emma needs all the friends SHE can get, right? - so it works out!"

'S true, isn't it? Now, I just stumbled on to that way to make introductions a little easier for young visitors, but once I realized what I was saying, I actually use it often, including with adults and their friends, because it IS true.

Friendship is not easy. 60% of men over the age of 30 cannot identify a single person they'd call a close friend. Most women say 5 or 6 other women are close friends, but look more closely and many of those connections turn out to be functional, not relational - they're based on kids in school and sports, or a common interest in crafts, or something else.

Girls know how hard friendships can be, how quickly you can be hurt by your own used-to-be best friends. Boys think we're supposed to have tougher outside shells but we have soft hearts that want most of all to love and to belong.

Our need for friendship is felt most of all when absent. Your heart hurts when you're by yourself, ALL by yourself in crowds of other people... when you're with others but alone and the only conversation you can have is the one up here. But that's nothing compared to the loneliness of being in a crowd when you can see kids who used to be your friends - maybe even as recently as yesterday - over there with someone else - and you are here alone!

Life happens to grownups, and friendships change. We move away, marriage and family and work affect our available time, changing political or religious values or a dozen other factors come into play, and the friends we once treasured are absent strangers now. And, of course, they may be feeling that way about you.

It's tough to come to a new church where you don't know anyone and feel alone in a place that reeks of friendship - and then if you don't see anyone who somehow looks like you by age or circumstance or race or clothes, you know that finding common ground may be even harder.

Every one of us needs all the friends we can get, but Jesus said, "I call you my friends." I don't call you servants, not mere teammates or neighbors, not members of a church, not even (here) disciples, learning commandments and practicing the habits of faith - not to start with, anyway, and not for Jesus. Rather, "I call you friends because," he said, "I CHOSE you. You did not choose me" - as if this love and friendship depend on us, as if how Jesus feels depends on what we do for him or how we live or what God gets from us. "I chose you; you are my friends, for as the Father loved me, so I love you."

God's friendship to the friendless - either real or only felt that way - God's friendship to the unfilled heart. You are never alone in that lunchroom, in airport corridors, or that all-too-quiet kitchen. You may actually BE without a friend in the entire world and know it - but "I call YOU my friend," said Jesus - and if you need some tangible evidence, here it is [bread, wine, water, Bible].

We need all the friends we can get, right, boys and girls? And when no one likes you or wants to play with you on a Saturday and the big kids don't want you hanging around, "I call you friend," said Jesus. Do you think I'm only talking to students under 10? I'm talking ANY age! Men, do I have 40% of your attention? Friend, he said. God's friendship for the unfilled heart, the empty heart, the broken heart... a friendship for women based not on something "out there" - children, gender, appearance, not even the quality of our relationships themselves - but friendship based in the purity of God's love.

First year seminary grad Charley Amorito was assigned to SW Minnesota for his first congregation, to an open-country church (as it's called), right out there beneath the sky at the intersection of two county roads surrounded by bean fields and acres of corn - and the church cemetery, of course.

One day, coming out of the parsonage next to the church, he saw a huge eight-wheel John Deere parked with its 20-row cultivator right behind it. He went to investigate. He found the 60-something farmer sitting not, as he'd expected, beside a grave in the cemetery or in the church but on an outside bench looking east. And it was clear the man was praying.

When the farmer heard Charley's footsteps he opened his eyes, stood, and shook hands. Embarrassed that he had interrupted, Pr Amorito stuttered out an apology but the farmer waved it off with good humor. Not knowing what to say next, the pastor blurted out, "You must be very close to God." The man thought a moment, smiled. "Yes. Yes, I am. He's very fond of me." [2]

How would it change what you think of yourself if you trusted what Jesus chose for you to hear today? We all need all the friends we can get. Well, we got at least One.

Nathan Castens
Chanhassen, Minnesota

[1] David Leininger, "Jesus' Friend," citing The Clergy Journal for his info (without reference) and quoted in eSermons.com
[2] This one has a history! Originally from Brennan Manning, then published in What's So Amazing about Grace? by Phillip Yancey, and adapted by Brett Blair on eSermons.com Details of my story are entirely fiction!