"Friends Forever"
John 15:9-17
May 17, 2009
St. Paul United Methodist Church
Rev. John A. Fleming
Eric Haas was my best friend in the first and second grades. The school we attended, the Andrew Jackson Elementary School, was half way between our houses. The walk to and from my house to the school and the one from Eric's house to the school was about the same distance. Some afternoons and most Saturdays, Eric and I begged our mothers to spend a little time together.
I cannot tell you what cemented our friendship, but I can tell you that when Eric's dad's job transferred him to state way up north that at the time I had never heard of, it broke my heart. A day or two after the moving van pulled away, three boys in my class were trying to decide who was going to be my new best friend. Something about that just didn't seem right.
In high school, I had a couple of friends who I considered my best friends. John Curl was one of them. We had played on a summer baseball league together and when we made the school's team, our friendship got stronger. He was one of the pitchers and I was the catchers, a natural friendship flows from such a relationship.
We rode to practices and games together and spent a lot of time on the weekends at each other's houses. On Friday night's we would ride around in John's car, in what we called ‘cruising,' something the shy guy in me hated.
Jeff Martindale also vied to be my best friend. I am not sure what brought us together. I think it was a mutual friend we had. Jeff got a wiffle ball team together and asked me to play on it. We spent a lot of time playing against Earl and his team.
When it was time for Jeff to get married, I was one of his groomsmen. His dad was his best man. When it was time for me to marry my new best friend, Susie, Jeff was one of the ones who stood by me.
Speaking of standing beside Jeff, I remember the Saturday morning that he called and told me about his dad's aneurysm. It was a very bad situation. The aneurysm caused a massive stroke and David Martindale, just forty-seven years old was near death. Jeff asked me to come and be with him. I was on my way to becoming a pastor. I had a year of seminary under my belt. I would be spending most of my life using words, words of encouragement, words of hope, and words of blessing. That day words escaped me. To be honest with you, I had no idea of what to say to Jeff. To tell you the truth I don't remember if I said anything at all. I am sure I did, but nothing memorable. As it turns out, best friends don't always have to say anything. Simply being there that morning was more than enough.
So when the same kind of thing happened to my sister, Jeff was one of the ones I wanted to call. We hadn't seen each other in a decade. Other than the Christmas letters and cards we passed back and forth, we hadn't talked. None of that seemed to matter.
We are friends. The news of Emily's death spread quickly in these hallowed walls. We all knew about it very quickly. I cannot say that I was surprised when I saw my friends showing up in places like the hospital waiting room and walking through the front door of my parent's house.
When it was time for the worship service, that memorial service that was tough to bear, I looked around the church. Beside me, behind me, above me, were the familiar faces of my friends. It is an image I will never forget.
What I have done to begin this sermon, you can do. It's not too hard to recall who are friends are. I read a troubling statistic that said that sixty-percent of men over the age of thirty cannot name a single person they would consider a close friend. The forty percent who can, name someone from their early childhood. The statistics for women are better than those for men, but still friendships are fleeting these days. They must not be.
For a few minutes this morning I would like for us to think about what it means to be a friend both to one another and to Jesus.
Now it seems to me that our friendships have certain rules or expectations that come with them. Here is one. Trust has to be there. You have to know that if a secret or a dream is shared and you want that to go no further than your friend's heart, it must go no farther than that.
Here is a second expectation. There must be a mutual admiration. There must be something that draws us together. Friendships are born when circumstances are similar. Friendships are sometimes born because the same blood that runs through our veins runs through their veins. My sister was not just my sister, she was my friend.
Now here is my number one, non-negotiable rule for being my friend. What is important to me must become important to you.
These are the rules for being a friend. You could name others. But what, friends, is involved in being a friend of Jesus? Our scripture lesson for this morning is a perfect fit for our talking about this.
We pick the lesson up exactly where we left off last weekend. Jesus has just talked about the power of being connected to a vine and he has just spoken of abiding in his love. These words of his come in what scholars have come to call Jesus' farewell discourse. You will find these parting words in John's thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth chapters.
Like I told you last week, in these passages, Jesus is talking about what life will be like once he is gone and what disciples should do. Jesus gives great images and lessons for that life, including things like bread and wine, a water basin and a towel, and a vine and a branch. Here he gives us the image of being his friend. Jesus says, "I do not call your servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing, but I have called you friends." One of the ways Jesus defines friendship is by being in the know. He also defines friendship by what you do. What does Jesus say we must do? "This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you." As I have loved you, yikes! Jesus, could you ask us to do something a little easier than that?
Friends, don't you remember how Jesus loved? He loved with a kind of love that we have come to call Agape love. It is the kind of love Paul wrote about in what has to be his most famous chapter, the thirteenth one to the Christians in Corinth. He wrote, "Love bears all things, believes all things, endures all things, hopes all things, love never ends. Now faith, hope and love abide, these three, but the greatest of these is love."
The kind of love that Jesus is calling you to have is the kind that loves despite the failures and the faults and the mistakes. It is the kind of love that does not keep a record of wrongs. It is the kind of love that believes the best about you and is quick to forgive.
This is the kind of love Jesus is talking about. Jesus' love is conditional; its condition is that we are love as he loved.
Just in case you think that you come to a friendship with Jesus lightly and haphazardly, let me remind you of what Jesus said to those first disciples, "You did not choose me, but I chose you."
I like to sing with the group Phillips, Craig, and Dean, "Who am I that you are mindful of me, that you hear me, when I call? Who am I that you are thinking of me, how you love me? It's amazing. I am a friend of God he calls me friend. It really is amazing, friends.
It's getting late so let me close with a story. In his book On The Anvil Max Lucado tells about visiting a man named George when he was a pastor in Miami. He's not sure what drew him to George and his musty little trailer, but something did.
George was unusual. He had a patch over one of his eyes. There wasn't a hair on his head. He had lived hard and had stories to tell. Max went to see him one day and he saw sitting over in the corner of the trailer was Ralph, George's friend. There was a certain wildness to Ralph. His hair was long, his beard unkempt.
George asked Max to sit down and then he said, "Preacher, I want to show you my most prized possession." Max looked around the trailer looking for what George was talking about. There was hardly anything worth mentioning, so he asked, "Where is it, George? What is it, George?" George put his arm around Ralph and said, "My most prized possession is my buddy Ralph!" Ralph's wrinkles stretched and he soon showed a toothless grin.
Two old codgers had found the most important thing in each other, a relationship, a friendship. And I have found it in you. I only have a month of Sundays left to be your preacher and pastor. I have a lifetime to call you my friends. My number one rule for friendship is that what is important to me must become important to you. Friends, this church is important to me and everyone in it. Let us love as Christ loved us. Amen.