FBC Daily Devotional – November 10, 2020

Faith Baptist Church

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10th of November, almost a third of the way through the month of November already, this Thanksgiving month.

00:07

I hope you're finding a lot to give thanks for, finding something new every day.

00:13

Are you thankful for the friends that you have? How are your friendships anyway? I've read articles about, and even books, about the difficulty of having friends and maintaining friendships, especially for men.

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I want to talk about that the next couple of days. Today I want us to consider just how dangerous friendships can be.

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What I mean by that is they can be kind of delicate, fragile.

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And they're fragile, I think, when they're built on the wrong foundation.

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Anytime you're building on the wrong foundation, it's whatever you're building is eventually going to crumble.

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But I'm going to be focusing on some verses in the book of Proverbs.

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Proverbs has a lot to say about friendships, but this one particular verse points out the fact that our friendships are vulnerable or fragile if they're built on the wrong foundation.

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Proverbs 19 verses 4 and 7 say this, wealth brings many new friends, but a poor man is deserted by his friend.

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All a poor man's brothers hate him. How much more do his friends go far from him?

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He pursues them with words, but does not have them. That's really not much of a friendship, is it?

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If the friendship is built upon the wealth of one or the other party, you think about that prodigal son in Luke chapter 15, the story

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Jesus tells, who has his inheritance, he goes off into far country, and he has a bunch of friends as long as he has his money, but when his money gives out, his friends desert him.

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Well, there's more ways in which that desertion comes than simply when the money runs out.

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Let me give you some things to think about, some questions to ask. Are there any friends that you have, and this kind of takes some honesty on our part, but are there any friends that you have that you're friends with them only because of what you get out of it?

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That would be a hard thing to admit, wouldn't it? But do some honest evaluation.

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Is there a friend on your friend list that you consider to be a friend? You call a friend, but if that person wasn't giving you, you weren't getting from that person what you're getting out of that relationship or that friendship, would you still be that person's friend?

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Well, let me ask it this way. Do you have one of those kind of friends, those friends who just drains you?

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And I mean by that. I don't mean by that that you have some emotional times together, and you're hurting with them, and that's draining.

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What I'm talking about is that you get the sense that the person is just using you, and it's like the only time they call you or want to talk to you or want to get together is when they want something from you.

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That kind of a friend is not really much of a friend because as soon as you say no to something that they're wanting you to give them, then eventually they just drop you.

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They'll go looking for another quote friend who will just keep enabling them or giving them what they want.

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Well, let me also ask you this. Have you ever been heartbroken by somebody who thought you thought was a friend, but they deserted you when you were going through a rough patch, and you really needed the emotional support, you needed the encouragement that comes from a friend, but they just deserted you or maybe even they kicked you while you were down?

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Well, that's a friendship that's built on a pretty shaky foundation, and that kind of friendship is rather delicate and fragile and vulnerable.

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Friendship can also be delicate or fragile if it comes under attack, and it can come under attack in a couple different ways.

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Sometimes friendship comes under attack through gossip or slander. Think of Proverbs 16, 28 that says, a dishonest man spreads strife and a whisperer separates close friends.

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Has that ever happened to you? I think that's kind of stereotypically a thing among, pardon me for using this as a stereotype, but teenage girls, middle school girls, they have their little clicky friendships, and one gets jealous of another, and then they start the gossip thing.

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But listen, that's not something reserved exclusively for middle school, junior high age girls.

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That is the kind of thing that can happen all through life, and it doesn't just happen, you know, like between a group of friends when jealousy comes into play, but it can happen when somebody passes on a rumor, passes on gossip, or expresses slander, and somebody who you thought was a friend listens to it and believes it, or gives credence to it, or starts to look at you in a completely different way, and you sense that there's now this distance between you because somebody gossiped, somebody spread slander.

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So this vulnerability comes when gossip and slander attack.

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But another way that a friendship can come under attack is when love fails to cover things, when love fails to cover things.

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Proverbs 10 verse 12 says, hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all offenses, and Proverbs 17 9 applies that to friendships when it says, whoever covers an offense seeks love, but he who repeats a matter separates close friends.

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And I think what this, well, I know what this is getting at is the fact that, you know, we can easily get offended.

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We can wear our feelings on our shirt sleeves, and we can so easily get, you know, embarrassed by what somebody else does or says, or there's so many ways where things that should just be covered by love, where we just let it go because we love the person.

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We don't want to hurt them. We don't want to see them hurt. We just let it go. When we're not able to do that, then that failure to let love cover that, that offense, quote unquote, ends up separating good friends.

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Has that happened to you? Has it happened to you when, you know, maybe you inadvertently said something or did something, maybe you intentionally did it, and your friend just couldn't love you enough to let it go, couldn't love you enough to let that love cover it, and instead allowed it to cause a wedge in the friendship, and the next thing you know, you're going your separate ways.

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Now, certainly in the New Testament, there are directions of when, you know, one party offends another about what to do in those kinds of situations, and when it's severe enough that it does cause a rift and cause strife, then you employ those means.

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You go to that other person. You try to make that thing right, but here I think what the book of Proverbs is getting at is when these, you know, little things that just should be let go aren't let go.

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You know, Peter brings that out also in 1 Peter 4, verse 8, when he says, above all things, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins.

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Keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Well, I hope you're a good friend.

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I hope you're a good friend, and I hope you have at least one or two or three good friends where your friendship isn't so delicate, but it is secure.

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We'll talk more about the blessings and some of the challenges of friendship in the next couple days.

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I trust you'll be able to come back and join us for the devotionals in the next few days as we look at this subject together.

09:56

In the meantime, have a good rest of your Tuesday, and trust God will bless you richly in it.

10:02

Father in heaven, thank you for friends, for good friends, friends that don't allow the challenges of gossip or slander or even petty little offenses to get in the way, and Father, I pray that you would deliver us from those who would claim to be friends, who are only in that friendship to get something from us, and Father, please don't let us be that kind of a friend.

10:31

Give us a good Tuesday, we pray, and may we live for you and love you in it. We ask it in Jesus' name and for his sake.