All of us have many acquaintances; true friends are a rare breed, for however long we possess them in our lives. We may have years of closeness, then drift apart for awhile; over the years our politics and our faith traditions may change; but there remains a "soul core" of who we both are that will forever resonate between us whenever we have the opportunities to re-connect.
Friends are Gifts from God, Faces of God, Arms of God, Words of God because they shine with God's faithful love for us. Friends, quite simply, teach us how much God loves us because God lives in them (as God lives in us). So their smiling faces, cozy hugs, words of comfort, humor, and assistance all are signs of God's love for us, coming straight from God's Heart through their loving hearts to us.
When we live in deep friendship, our lives are shared: we rejoice with each others' love, marriage, births of children; we listen, counsel, comfort, and sometimes pray with each other through life's traumas; we cry with each other at funerals; we are there at Hospice as sturdy support when a friend is dying. In the mysterious circle of life, we understand God our Friend better because of the friends He has given us; and we better understand how to be faithful friends to each other because of God's' faithful Friendship with us.
The words of Sirach describe friendship: " A faithful friend is beyond price, no sum can balance his worth; a faithful friend is a life-saving remedy, such as he who fears God finds; For he who fears God behaves accordingly, and his friend will be like himself." (Sirach 6: 15 & 16.)
The closer we walk in friendship with God, the more we understand unselfish love, and the more likely we are to choose friends who are like us, capable of friendship, capable of unselfish love. Jesus himself said that no greater love does a person have than to lay down his/her life for a friend. When the phone or door bell rings, no matter what time of the day or night, friends are there for one another. Because Jesus, our Perfect Friend, is always there for us!
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