Seeking a Heart Like His - Through Friendship

For those of you who don’t know, I am currently doing a Beth Moore Bible study on David. This study is so rich and has prompted my thinking in so many ways about what it meant for David to be a man after God’s own heart and what it means to me to be a woman after God’s own heart.

I alluded to friendship in my last post in the Heart Like His series, but I wanted to go back and revisit it. Friendship is a lost art in our society. In the age of social networking, we include hundreds, if not thousands in our “friend” list, and yet, research continues to show that the average person reports only having 1.5 close friends. Many people report having no close friends. Think about that, no one to confide in when things get tough, no one to walk by your side or share big news.

One of the toughest parts of moving for me is leaving my friends behind. I feel so greatly the loss of people that I have shared life with, that have walked through good times and bad times with me, that have opened up new worlds and new interests to me. And even when I know I will forge new friendships ahead, it is never easy to leave other ones behind.

There are those rare friendships, though, that transcend place and time – that become constant threads through different chapters of life. I’ve been fortunate to have more than 1.5 of those – friends that I can pray with, cry with, laugh with, celebrate with, share life with. Friends that are so refreshing and special and irreplaceable. They encourage me and challenge me and teach me and inspire me. And they make my life so much more than mediocre.

David & Jonathan in 1 Samuel 18 & 20 is a beautiful picture of that kind of friendship. It may seem odd at first that David and Jonathan became such fast friends. In the first encounter between them, Jonathan makes a covenant with David. Fast friends. If we look closer at their lives, we start to see all that they had in common, why their spirits were knit together so quickly. In 1 Samuel 14, Jonathan attacks the Philistines with his armor bearer and claims an important victory for Israel. Compare that scenario with David’s fight against Goliath (1 Samuel 17) and you will see that David and Jonathan had quite a bit in common – both stepped into battle courageously, both had faith that God would work on their behalf, neither was intimidated by the taunting of their enemies, and both inspired courage in others leading Israel to great victories.

Jonathan’s friendship proved invaluable to David, protecting him from Saul’s jealousy and allowing David to escape with his life. And David would never forget that – mourning over Jonathan’s death (2 Samuel 1) and providing for his family (2 Samuel 9). Some friendships are like that- they leave deep imprints on our hearts and change our lives forever.

I’m forever grateful for my forever friends.

“There is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” – Proverbs 18:24
“A friend loves at all times and a brother is born for adversity.” – Proverbs 17:17