Week Nineteen of Ordinary time

by Bruce Benedict

“Christians think differently about friendship because their understanding of friendship is rooted not in rosy accounts of human perfectibility but in a God who remains ever faithful to us and who never, no matter how egregious our failings, writes us out of the story of divine love.”  — Paul Waddell

As I write this I am deep in the woods of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.  This weekend a group of friends are busy recording a new collection of folk songs inspired by the field recordings that Alan Lomax captured in this very area during the late 1930’s.  Mostly songs about lumberjacks, bad food, and lost loves. 

This, like true friendship, is a gratuitous experience.  Our group stumbled upon this project a few years ago and we continue to labor at it for the joy and delight it gives our collective sense. It doesn’t necessarily benefit any of our careers and our spouses and families have sacrificed to support us. 

CS Lewis observes in the Four Loves, “To the Ancients, friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves; the crown of life and the school of virtue. The modern world, in comparison, ignores it.”  He goes on to say that few value friendships because few truly experience it. And it makes me wonder about the friendship that encompassed the relationship between Jesus and his disciples. 

In John 15 as Jesus moves closer to the cross he says to his friends, "No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.”  Jesus unites what is distinct between friendship and family into something different.  Friendship moves from the “least natural of loves” to a relational reality with access to the deepest knowledge of the Father. Jesus is describing a new reality for our world. 

Friendship has always been a precious oasis in my life.  My early family experiences were super traumatic and as I’ve moved into adulthood I've realized that my friends have always born a heavy burden of companionship and support. I love knowing that Jesus infuses those relationships with holy grace, and that in all of our brokenness the Father welcomes us to his familial table for food and fellowship.  What a grace!!