Tuesday, October 18, 2011

Covenant Friendships

Second blog post in 2 days! Be impressed. You could say I'm procrastinating, but in my defense, my big scary test of death was moved to next week.

I've had several conversations over the past few weeks that have just pumped me up in life. A lot of them have focused on what makes a good, solid, life relationship (meaning marriage relationship). One was centered around the meaning of family. The most recurring conversation has been discussing this question: what is a TRUE friendship?

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Highlands is in the middle of a sermon series called "Covenant" (let me just say, even if you don't go to COTH, come for this series..it is blowing my mind). Last week, John Maxwell was the guest preacher. He preached on Covenant friendships.

According to Maxwell, there are 3 types of friendships:

1) Surface Friendships
-"Hey! How're you doing? Well great! I'll see you soon!"
*so basically, everyone I run into on campus

2) Structured Friendships
-people you see on a daily basis because you have to
*people in classes, at work, even at church

3) Solid and Secure Friendships
-built on unconditional love
*these friends are few and far between


Maxwell went on to say that few friends are true friends. He talked about how much time and energy goes into being a true friend to another person. He also made sure to make the audience understood that the ONLY person who can make you happy is yourself.
(if you want a copy of my sermon notes, please ask...this sermon was too good not to share)

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This got me thinking: what kind of friendships do I have?
I can confidently say that I have at least 1 "Solid and Secure" (not including my family), possibly even 2 or 3. I also know that I'm currently forming friendships that could one day be "S and S." I do have quite a few people in my life that I know would do anything for me and I return the favor.
I realize that I have entirely too many "Structured" and "Surface" friendships. It's sad really. I talk to some people every single day and there is absolutely no depth to the friendship. I also have no desire to work towards any depth in the friendship.

So I am striving to work on forming better friendships, and I first have to start by being a better friend. I want to branch out and form more "S and S" friendships, meaning I have to be willing to devote the time and energy on this person.

The hardest part of this sermon to me was realizing how one sided some of my friendships are. I have moments of frustration quite frequently when I feel like even my best friend isn't putting enough time and energy into our friendship. But I've also learned that with people, you have to learn to deal with their personalities and work around things in order to have a strong friendship.


I feel like I'm getting to the point of rambling, so I'll leave this post with a verse that gave me a lot of encouragement.
Thanks to all my friends and the people who shared in the conversations that led to this post.

God bless.



"...A sweet friendship refreshes the soul."
                      -Proverbs 27:9

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