Friendship

I have remarked before about the depth of friendships, but it has surfaced again as a reminder of how we live today.  Our next door neighbors who are in their late 70's and 80's remember a day when the neighborhood was a real neighborhood.  The men all worked, and the women stayed home and had coffee time together every day. The men and their wives would often get together on the weekends go out to eat together or have dinners at each other homes. It was quite the neighborhood back then.  Neighbors would watch out for one another, and were there for each other when crisis would befall any of them.  Today, all that is left of those six or seven neighborhood couples is our next door neighbors and I have often wondered when they look around the neighborhood how sad it must be for them to remember what was.  Today, we have a good neighborhood, but its different. We say "hi, how's it goin'" and that's about it. We have tried to engage our immediate neighbors once a year at a backyard BBQ, and its fun, but it's very shallow.  Except for our elderly neighbors, we are socially estranged from everyone else around us the rest of the year.  Now I tell that story because I feel that is the way it is for many of us. People come and go from our lives, and very few people stick to us as close friends.  We do have close friendships, but they are few are far between. Some now live thousands of miles away, and friendship is maintain by email or a weekly phone call. It's hard to imagine what the neighborhood was like back in the day when life was much more simpler.  Yesterday, when I walked the dog along the Mississippi River, I ran into three walkers who past me by going in the opposite direction. Each time I blurted out "Hello"  not one of them responded, they kept their pace ignoring me and my friendly greeting.  I realized as they passed by that they had their ipod ear buds in and couldn't hear me if they wanted.  It was a great illustration of how we live out our lives, doing our own thing, with our own agendas with ear buds in our ears. They were tune in to the music of their choice, drowning out the surroundings around them.  That of course is a choice, and many have chosen to follow that course.  Is it because it's easy that way? Relationships take time, and they can be messy.  They get into the personal side of people lives that may not be pleasant, so we opt to avoid the kind of work it takes trying to relate to each other.  Too much work, too much stress, so we put in our ear buds, and go on our way.

Relationship with God can be equally as messy. It's true He doesn't have the drama that our friends do, but He does expect us to have a life that requires standards and values that may conflict with our agendas. Friendship with God takes work, and the mess is on our side, but it still is something we opt to avoid.  We want to live carefree lives without the commitment of staying true to the relationship.  The result?  The same as it is with our neighborhoods, the shallow hello's and goodbyes.  

It think it is important to evaluate friendships, and work at developing some close intimate friends that will be like that neighborhood of old, where friendships can grow deep and relate to our everyday lives. The same is true with our relationship with God. How much time is spent cultivating a relationship with Him other than the obligatory prayer or occasional church attendance?  More work will be required on our part to develop the kind of relationships that can keep us away from the counselors office, and the pharmacy. 

Keeping it honest and truthful...K