Jesus, my Friend

Yesterday God showed me some ways to evaluate true friendship. One is how friends respond to sudden wealth. Lottery winners say they are inundated with “friends” who come out of the woodwork. They act as if they are long-lost buddies, but are really after a share of the cash. True friends rejoice instead of hold their hands out.

Today’s reading from Spurgeon points to the other friend-test — adversity. How do people respond when I am in trouble? Do they run away or do they stick by me? True friends are revealed when I have trials.

However, true friends also are revealed when they have trials. A gentleman in our church became ill while on vacation last month. He knew that he would not make it home, so he made a video. He spoke to his grandchildren and to several young people he called his “adopted grandchildren.” He pointed them to Jesus and sang to them. This video, played at his funeral, revealed a heart that thought of others. Even in his last days here on earth, he was following the example of Jesus.

Jesus knew when He was facing death also. He took His disciples to the garden of Gethsemane where He prayed about it. When Judas and the soldiers came to arrest Him, He was ready, but He was thinking about His disciples too.

So he asked them again, “Whom do you seek?” And they said, “Jesus of Nazareth.” Jesus answered, “I told you that I am he. So, if you seek me, let these men go.” (John 18:7–8)

As Spurgeon points out, this is love, constant, self-forgetting, faithful love. Yet as the devotional writer also says there is far more here; these words are the very soul and spirit of the atonement. The Good Shepherd is about to lay down His life for the sheep. He pleads that they must therefore go free. The Substitute is bound, and justice demands that those for whom He stands as a substitute should go their way. Yet in this, Jesus is more than a substitute. He is my Friend.

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 15:13–17)

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Lord, when I am in trouble, my world tends to get smaller. I think of myself and my situation, and maybe those closest to me. While this may not be overtly sinful, it is certainly not what You did in Your greatest trial. This year You gave me a focus verse and remind me again today that I need to grow in my love for others and in selflessness.

Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourself. Look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. (Philippians 2:3-4)

You counted others more significant than Yourself. You did it as You walked this earth, and You did it in the garden and on the cross. Obedience to the Father was Your consuming interest, so You took care of that, but dying was also for others, for me. Your death gave me life, and with that life the ability to bear fruit in Your name. Because of Your great heart, You can now call me Your friend. Grant me grace to be a true friend — to You and to those around me.