God is Indescribable - Trusted Friend

 

[Jesus said] “These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. 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. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. These things I command you, so that you will love one another.” (John 15:11-17 ESV).

 

Our reading today may be familiar to you. We have been in this passage recently. As I was read from Proverbs recently, I came to a verse declaring the importance of a “friend.” Solomon writes: A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. (Proverbs 17:17 ESV). One of God’s greatest gifts to humanity is relationships. We are created for relationships; we are designed by God to be in community with others.

 

We will meet many people over our lifetime. With some, we will have no more than brief interactions in passing by, and with others we will have friendly acquaintances. Still others will become friends, even close friends, and others will become companions for life. With some friends our relationships can feel as close as family, like a brother or sister, and we may love them just like family members. These are friends who will be there in both good times and bad, triumphs and tragedies, times of joy and times of sorrow.

 

Did you know that, in Jesus, God is actually our closest friend? He isn’t a passerby who merely sizes us up, or an acquaintance who enters our life from time to time. Jesus is our brother, our closest friend, who gave up his own life so that we can become the adopted children of God, members of God’s everlasting family, and coheirs in his eternal inheritance (cf. Romans 8:14-17).

 

What an incredible truth to ponder today! He is our trusted friend! This is the nature of our God!