Can I be myself with you?
Good friends have the confidence to share who they really are… To take off their masks. A true friend loves at all times, according to Solomon. In adversity, trouble, pain, struggle and separation, a true friend is there to listen as you expose your sin.
James 5:16: Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.
When I sin, I turn to a friend, a gracious Christian friend, and pour out my soul. My friend leads me to Jesus; he leads me to forgiveness.
Because we love, we understand this: When broken friends come to us, we welcome and accept them. They do not need our condemnation. Broken people need acceptance and healing.
Jesus, as the Eternal Word of God, left perfect friendship and fellowshipped with 12 dusty, dirty, well-meaning but sinful men. Jesus called these folks his friends. Friends because he had revealed to them what was closest to the heart of God. Friends because he came to lay down his life for them.
Did he leave perfect communion for imperfect people? Not really. He did it for imperfect, sinful friends. And when they confessed adversity, trouble, pain, struggle, sin and separation, he forgave, and brought them closer to God.
Kind of like what we do with our friends.
Quite different from an “I told you so!” or “Why did you do something stupid like that?” or a “Did you hear what ___ did? I guess he/she wasn’t what they claimed to be!”
I pray I can be a friend like you are describing.
There have been times in my life when I dreaded and almost got physically sick over the anticipation of needing to confess something to a brother, a good friend.
Ironically, when the time of confession came, the weight of the world (or in this case, sin) seem to be lifted off my shoulders.
Maybe that’s why its so important to “walk in the light as He is in the light.”
Yay! I can post a reply now!
I have been blessed with a couple of accountability partners for the past couple of years…men who share everything. One of them is moving away, sadly, and it is very hard for the remaining two of us to find someone to replace him. It has to be someone we trust implicitly and feel comfortable sharing everything with. Very few and very far between.