• January 2022

    • Friendship

      Author: Rev. Douglas McCallum

      Dear CPC family,

      In his book 7 Myths about Singleness, Sam Allberry has an excellent chapter on the subject of friendship. He argues that we all have a deep desire for intimacy, but that this common yearning has unfortunately become increasingly defined in purely sexual terms, especially in the West. Such distorted thinking has crept into the church, with damaging consequences. What we need, Allberry says, is to “rediscover a biblical category of intimacy that has been neglected in our cultural context and sadly even in many of our churches – friendship.”

      Proverbs 18:24 says, “A man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” Here we learn that the Bible distinguishes a friend from both a companion and a brother. A companion is someone you get on with and may spend a lot of time with, such as a work colleague or a schoolmate. You like them and enjoy their company, but they tend to come and go: if they move away, you’re unlikely to stay in touch with them. A brother, meanwhile, is a member of your close family; someone to whom you are tied by blood and biology.

      It is, of course, good for us to have companions, and it is a great blessing to enjoy close relationships with family members. But they are distinct from what the Bible would call a friend. Unlike a companion, a friend is someone with whom you enjoy a deep and constant relationship. There is nothing superficial or fleeting about friendship. A true friend is someone who knows you well and who is there for you at all times; someone with whom you feel able to share your deepest joys, desires and struggles.

      And, while there is often overlap between a brother and a friend, Allberry points out that one of the “peculiar glories of friendship is its entirely voluntary nature.” There is a sense in which a brother or a family member has to be there for you when the chips are down because of the obligations imposed by common blood. A friend’s obligation is, by contrast, entirely self-imposed. As Ray Ortlund puts it, “When someone loves you at all times, good and bad, and they don’t have to but they choose to – that person is a friend.”

      I say all of this because it seems to me that, if we are to live wisely and happily in God’s world, then we need to have such biblically-defined friends. Realistically, I suppose we can only have a handful of such people, maybe just one or two. But whether we are single or married, male or female, friendship is an important part of our sanctification. We will be the poorer for our lack of those who stick closer than a brother.

      Perhaps this is a challenge to you. It certainly is to me. Reading Allberry’s book made me question, for example, how much of a true friend I am to others and whether I have made enough effort to cultivate the sorts of friendships that the Bible commends so highly.

      But there is also great comfort to be derived from Scripture’s teaching on friendship. For we remember that, amazingly, Jesus Christ has called us his friends. He knows us and we know him. He has disclosed his heart to us, even as we pour out the love and longing of our soul to him. With him we enjoy the deepest and richest intimacy. More than anyone else, he is the Friend who sticks closer than a brother.

      Yours in our Saviour,

      Doug