Well, this is my first blog post of 2021 so happy new year guys! I hope January and February have been amazing for you so far!
I’m going to be completely honest with you when Lydia gave me this topic I was a bit stumped because this is a topic which I don’t particularly have a strong opinion on, I have touched on this slightly in previous blog posts but its not something in the past I have really given much thought, but over the last few weeks I have been really thinking about this and reflecting on my relationships.
In past blog posts I touched on how it is so important to surround yourself with godly relationships, however, in day to day life that is a little bit harder because lets face it, not everyone you interact with are going to be Christian, that doesn’t mean that, that friendship or relationship loses any value! In fact I personally think those relationships with people help push you further in your faith as gives you the opportunity to talk to people about your faith a little bit more.
That being said, friendships when one of you is a Christian and one of you isn’t definitely has its challenges…one big thing I find to be a major difference is a difference in opinions. Sometimes i’ll be chatting to a friend in college and they’ll say something I don’t quite agree with, for a while this did bother me because I would just come away from the conversation feeling frustrated that they felt that way, or that they would take that particular view on a certain topic, but then I really thought about it; I started to think things along the lines of: they could be just having a really really bad day, they may have had a personal experience that made them feel that way, these thoughts then further developed into me leaning into God a little bit more – God is the only one who knows that person inside and out, He has a plan for them and as much as I, on occasions, don’t agree with what they are saying, God is in control of it. So, instead of getting angry at our differences I tried to rationalise and understand why that person feels that way or why they said that. Just because a friend of yours isn’t a Christian doesn’t mean that your relationship with them is any less valued, some of my closest closest friends are not Christians and I absolutely love talking to them about it all.
So, now I want to go onto the beauty of friendship, friendship is such a wonderful thing and is something that God encourages. Developing that relationship with someone who gets you and completely accepts you as you are, someone who will pick up the phone and be there for you no matter what, someone who is not going to judge you and just someone who understands you through the madness of life!
The amount of endless FaceTime calls I have had with my best friend that range from the both of us being in floods of tears to giving each other pep talks and just asking each other what we’re having for dinner… those are the little things that really do make friendship so beautiful and that is something I pray everybody experiences because there is no better feeling than just knowing that you have someone to go to. And for those people reading this that may be feeling isolated due to lockdown or perhaps feel like they don’t have that friend who they can call and talk to about everything…well…God is that friend, He is that person that you can call up in floods of tears, or call up and share how amazing your day has been, He is always there, He is never too busy to hear from you – He WANTS to hear from you! So perhaps in this time of such uncertainty and loneliness if you feel like you don’t have that friendship, turn to God. He is the bestest friend you could ever have, His love is so everlasting, all He wants is a relationship with you, so lets lean on Him as we would our friends.
‘I have loved you with an everlasting love ‘ – Jeremiah 31:3 [NIV]
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