What R U Looking 4?
 . . . finding what you need for the new year
 I Need a Real Friend
"There was a man all alone; he had neither son nor brother. There was no end to his toil, yet his eyes were not content with his wealth. ‘For whom am I toiling,’ he asked, ‘and why am I depriving myself of enjoyment?’ This too is meaningless – a miserable business!" – Ecclesiastes 4:8
It is amazing that these words were written 3000 years ago by King Solomon of Israel, for they capture one of the pressing issues in American society in the 21 st century.

People are connected with others more than ever before with email and texting and Facebook and Twitter, and yet more than ever before a significant number of Americans say that they often feel lonely.

Many of us have substituted responsibilities for relationships. We are willing to take a little time to tweet or update our status, but there is precious little room in our lives for real, face-to-face conversation.
As a result, some have hundreds of facebook friends, but not one friend that they will call upon in a crisis situation. We don’t want to put people out or bother anyone, and then we also want to protect our own space and our own feelings, so we resign ourselves to going through life without deep, committed friendships.

But the reality is that God never intended for us to live that way. We’re hungry for deeper relationships and thirsty for real friendships because God designed us to share life together, especially in the church – the community of faith.

So the Bible has a lot to say about this issue. You might say that the Bible is a book about relationships – how people relate to God, and then how people relate to each other. This is a textbook on relationships.

It begins with the vertical – how you relate to God through faith in Jesus Christ. That’s always primary. That’s the first priority of Scripture. But it also covers the horizontal – how ordinary people learn to get along with each other.

The Bible talks a lot about the horizontal, because that’s where so many of us need help. We live in a broken world, and we are broken-world people. We have all been bruised and battered by relationships that have gone sour, and we’ve known the pain of failure, the bitterness of mistreatment, maybe even the heartbreak of abuse.

The Bible doesn’t sugar-coat that reality. It faces it fairly and squarely with the result that broken people can come to the Bible and find not just a diagnosis, but also a prescription. Not just an analysis of the problem, but also a way toward forging healthy, energizing relationships.

There are a lot of examples of good and bad relationships in this book, and there’s plenty of wise counsel in both the Old and New Testaments. But this morning I just want to focus in on one narrow slice of recorded history where I think we can come to understand from the life of Jesus how His followers, the church – you and I – are to relate to each other.

Late on a Thursday night before He is arrested and crucified, Jesus has gathered in the Upper Room with His disciples. He alone knows the truth about what the next day will bring. No doubt the disciples sense the seriousness of the moment, but they have no clear idea what is about to happen.

With Jesus leading the way, the group goes out to the Garden of Gethsemane on the slopes of the Mount of Olives. This is not the time for crowds of adoring fans to surround Jesus or for people who want Jesus to do something for them to petition Him. He has come to the Garden to pray.

Let’s look in on the scene recorded in the Gospel of Matthew:

"Jesus went with His disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and He said to them, ‘Sit here while I go over there and pray.’ He took Peter and the two sons of Zebedee along with Him, and he began to be sorrowful and troubled. Then He said to them, ‘My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.’" – Matthew 26:36-38
As Jesus wrestles with the greatest agony of His life, He wants his closest friends to be there with Him. He doesn’t want to go through this by Himself.

Now, there’s not a question here of His divine ability. Jesus is the Son of God with all the power of heaven and earth. He could go it alone if He had to. He had proven that when He faced the devil in the wilderness. But in the climactic moment of His life, Jesus wants His friends to watch with Him, to stand guard as He agonizes over what is to come.

What could they do about what was about to happen? Absolutely nothing. Later when Jesus is arrested, Peter draws his sword to defend his Lord, and slices off the ear of the high priest’s servant. That’s the kind of friend most of us would want.

But we know Jesus healed the servant and told his friends not to fight. There was nothing they could do to help Him because His crucifixion was God’s will so that our sins might be atoned for.

Jesus’ friends could not share in His suffering or stop it from happening, but they could be with Him as He faced His most difficult hours.

Folks, that’s informative about the kind of friendship we are to offer one another in the church. If Jesus desired His friends to stay with Him as He struggled, how much more do we all need that kind of relationship?

Now the temptation here is to say, "Yes, that’s the kind of relationship that others need to offer me when I’m in pain. And sometimes others come up short. They’re not there when I need them."

I would say to you that the answer to our imperfection and our failings in this regard is not to apply Jesus’ need to other’s actions, but to our own. If we are going to have the kind of relationships in the community of faith that Jesus desired, it starts with me. You need to say, "It starts with me." I can’t control what every other person does. You can’t either. But I can do what I know is needed. And you can, too.

Are you willing to stay with people in their pain, to not give up on them, to watch with them, to let your presence communicate your care and concern? Every time you do that, you can be sure, you are blessing the life of that person, and God will reward you for it.

Jesus Himself says, "In as much as you have done for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you have done it unto Me."

So when you are a friend to others in this way, you are building and displaying your relationship with Jesus.

Now let’s look at something else Jesus says to His disciples on the night of His betrayal. This is recorded in the Gospel of John:

 "My children, I will be with you only a little while longer . .. Where I am going, you cannot come. A new command I give you – Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you love one another." – John 13:34-35
Now these verses may be very familiar to you. Jesus has just shocked his disciples by washing their feet, showing them that living in the kingdom – the community of faith – was a life of service rather than status.

So He says, "I give you a new command." But maybe it’s not so new to us.

Love one another as I have loved you.

How did Jesus love those He came to save? How was His love demonstrated?

Jesus loved the world with total vulnerability. He gave Himself so completely that the world turned against Him. The very world He came to save turned against Him and nailed Him to the cross.

Do we understand that Jesus had the power to stop people from hurting Him and He chose not to use it? He didn’t have to take the abuse. He says that He could call 10,000 angels to save Him if He wanted. He was the Son of God. All power was at His disposal.

But Jesus chose to go through with the cross. That’s how He loved you and me – with total vulnerability.

He says, "Do what you wish. But I still love you. Nothing you can do will make me stop loving you."
That’s the standard of relationship in the body of Christ. We are to love each other enough that we are willing to endure hurt from our brothers and sisters if necessary.

That doesn’t sound too appealing, does it? Nobody wants to be hurt by their friends. We want to be surrounded by people who will make us feel better about ourselves. The very idea of having friends who will hurt us seems absurd. Friends don’t hurt each other – they build each other up!

But that’s not the whole story. If you want to live in a world where no one will ever hurt you, you picked the wrong planet on which to be born. Wrong planet, wrong solar system, wrong galaxy.

That’s not the way it works.
Look with me at these words from author C.S. Lewis:

 "To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable . . . the only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers of love is Hell." – C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves
Developing deep, significant relationships with others opens up the possibility of being hurt.

We like to keep others at arms length, where they don’t really know us, and then they can’t reject us. That’s a lot of what we fear, that if you really knew me – my struggles and my faults – you wouldn’t want anything to do with me. So we keep things on the superficial level.

But here’s a truth – We will never grow fully in the life of Christ as long as we keep others in the body of Christ at a distance. The Scriptures say we are to hold each other accountable, and to confess our faults to one another in order that we may be healed and whole and healthy.

Now I’m not saying that you have to get on a deep, personal level with everyone in the church. That isn’t practical, possible or necessary.

But in the community of faith, you need to let a few people know you well. You need to let somebody close enough that they will say to you what needs to be said, even when you don’t want to hear it.

Now I’m pretty much done for this morning. But I want you to know, starting next week, on Sunday mornings we’re going to spend a part of our time together as faith community getting to know one another.

I’m not going to ask you to make confession of your sins to others, and we’re not going to force you to reveal things you want to keep to yourselves. But I think here at the Revolution, we need to work on building our relationships. We need to invest in developing our friendships.

This is something that will make a difference. It will help you and me to feel more connected. And it will help us live out Jesus’ words – "they will know you are My disciples by your love for one another."

Pray with me.

God, we thank You for the friendship You offer us through faith in Christ. May we all value that kind of eternal relationship with You. And help us to care for each other deeply and love one another authentically. May it be said of us, as it was said of those early Christians, ‘behold, how they love one another." May all those who are lonely around us see our love, and so be drawn to Christ.

This we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen"