Misuses of Friendship

Patty: Hi, I'm Patty from Michigan, and I'm a Revive Our Hearts Monthly Partner. One reason I support this ministry is it is something I can share with my adult daughter as well as her daughter. We can all grow together to be more like Christ. I'm so thankful that my daughter introduced me to Revive Our Hearts ten years ago. Enjoy today's episode of Revive Our Hearts, brought to you in part by the Monthly Partner team.

Dannah Gresh: Do you long for intimacy? Kelly Needham says a major component of your relationship with God is friendship with Him.

Kelly Needham: Salvation is not just that your sins are paid for; salvation is your sins are paid for so that you can go to a person and be in communion and fellowship with Him. That is a means to a greater end, a connection with God. You were made for deep relationship. That’s what our souls are all aching for.

Dannah: There’s a problem, though, and that’s what we’ll explore today on Revive Our Hearts for Monday, February 6, 2023. I’m Dannah Gresh, and our host is the author of Adorned, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Nancy: I think all of us can relate to the feeling of being disappointed in someone. You know how it goes: weset our expectations too high, only to have them dashed to pieces. It could be a spouse who turned out to be way different than you thought. Perhaps a best friend betrayed your trust. Or a parent let you down by breaking a promise. Maybe you yourself, in spite of your best efforts, have hurt a friend or spouse by your own insensitivity or selfishness.

There’s no question: when we talk about the subject of friendship, it’s an area fraught with pain, disappointment, and sin. 

And yet, Proverbs 18:24 reminds us, “There is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.”

Well, today and tomorrow on Revive Our Hearts, Kelly Needham is going to help us think through the dangers and the delights of authentic friendship. She gave this message in a breakout session at a recent True Woman conference.

Kelly and her husband Jimmy and their five children live in Texas. She’s the author of a book on friendship titled Friend-ish: Reclaiming Real Friendship in a Culture of Confusion. Let’s listen together. Here’s Kelly Needham.

Kelly: There are two things that I think unite all of us in friendship. If we could survey the room in our experience in friendship, based on our age, our life stage, and a thousand other factors, it would be a wildly different spread of our experiences. But I think there are two things that unite us here. 

We all want deep, meaningful friendships. We know we need it, we’re hungry for it, and we want it.

The second thing that unites us is that we’ve all found friendship to be lacking. We’ve all been there. Whether you have the best friends in the world and you still feel lonely, or you’re in a context at church where you feel like no one is showing up for you. We want deep and meaningful friendships, but we have found friendship to be lacking.

The world has noticed, too. In doing research for my book Friendish, I found two things culturally that were being affirmed. We now have more friends than ever, and we’re lonelier than ever. So, something’s broken with the friendship thing! We have more people around us, we’re more connected than any other generation in the world, and we are lonelier than any other generation in the world. Why? What is the problem?

You can read a ton of books on this, and I read many of them—a lot of Christian and secular books, saying, “Here’s why friends aren’t meeting the need.” Maybe it’s ways we practice friendship—there are theories out there across the board. But I want to give you my conclusion after a lot of research, a lot of sitting in the Bible of why friendship failing us? Why do we have more friends than we ever have had, and we’re lonelier than we’ve ever been?

I think the primary reason why our friendships aren’t satisfying us is because they weren’t meant to, and we think they can. We think that friendship can provide us with things that God has said only He can provide for us. So we keep looking to our friends for things that only Jesus has said He can be for us, and it breaks. We are trained culturally to do that. Every sitcom, movie, book, thing that has been set before you as far as what a model for friendship is, is looking to people for things only God can give, because the world does not know God. Our main relational needs are meant to be satisfied in Him.

• Only God can provide us the stability we long for.
• Only God can provide the constant sense of companionship we long for.
• Only God can provide the meaning and significance we long for. 

He alone can give that to us, but our culture has told us to look to each other.

In the past it was looking to marriage for that, but in this newer generation it’s looking to friends for that. Just like marriage, it will also fail, because it is not the fountain of living waters. Only Jesus is. 

So I think the primary reason our friendships aren’t working is we are putting things on them that only God can provide, and it won’t hold up. We’re trying to use a cup, a cracked cup, as a source of water to quench our thirst, when God says, “I’m the fountain.” 

In Jeremiah 2:13, if you’re familiar with that verse, He says, “You have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and you have gone out to find cisterns that are broken and cannot hold water.” We do that in our friendships all the time. I have struggled with that all the time.

Now, is it wrong to want that? Is it wrong to want stability, to have someone be a constant companion in your life? Is it wrong to want to matter to somebody, to have significance and meaning in a relationship? No! I don’t think so, because when God looks at the people in Jeremiah 2 and He says that—“You’ve forsaken me, the fountain of living waters”—He doesn’t say to them, “Stop being thirsty! Stop it! Stop longing for things so much, people!” He doesn’t say that. He has no problem with our thirst. He has no problem with the deep needs and aches in our hearts. 

His problem is we’re going to the wrong place to be satisfied. The thirst is not the problem. The longing that you have is not the problem. The problem is we’re taking it to the wrong place. We’re taking it to a group of people who cannot be that for us. We cannot be that for others; they cannot be that for us. Friendship is not the problem; the problem is what we’re expecting out of it.

What I want to do today is talk about three ways we misuse friendship, three ways we tend to look to friendship for things that only God can give. Three misuses; misuses of friendship that will actually produce a lot of problems and can be very dangerous to us. Then we’re going to look at how the gospel, our access to the fountain of living waters, transforms how we practice friendship. That’s where we’re going.

We have to start with the problems. We have to lay a good foundation; clear away what is bad, right? Build a good foundation, and build something good. So, three ways that we practice friendship that are misuse. 

Misuse number one: when friendship replaces Jesus; when we look to friendship as a replacement for Jesus. I just said this: He is the fountain of living waters. He alone is meant to be the source of the deep ache we have for relational connectedness. We were made for relationship, but primarily made for relationship with Him. He alone can satisfy the deep ache in our hearts. 

That’s why the New Testament is full of verses that will say things like, “This is eternal life, that they know You, God, and Jesus Christ whom He has sent.” Eternal life is to know someone, to know God. The language of the New Testament is full of things that are telling us, “Salvation is not just that your sins are paid for; salvation is your sins are paid for so that you can go to a person and be in communion and fellowship with Him.” That is a means to a greater end, a connection with God. You were made for deep relationship. 

That’s what our souls are all aching for, but a lot of times we refuse to go to Jesus with those things. We don’t believe He can satisfy us. We can’t see Him with our eyeballs, we can’t hear Him with our ears; so how in the world could He be real enough to us to meet that deep ache and longing? He can if we will go to Him in faith, but a lot of us refuse to, and take those deep aches and longings in our hearts and aim them at our friends. It will produce all manner of idolatry, codependency, neediness, conflict, bitterness, strife, and envy, because those friends cannot do that for us. We cannot do that for others. 

That’s the first way we misuse friendship; we take things in our hearts that only Jesus can satisfy and we look at a friend and demand that of them—not with our words, but with our actions. When we misuse friendship that way it becomes dangerous to us. It is a misuse of the good gift of friendship. That’s the first thing that we need to cast aside.

Misuse number two is when friendship is motivated by selfishness. Now, this is very connected to the first point, because if you are refusing to go to Jesus to get those deep needs met, you’re refusing to go to the fountain of living waters, then you will be thirsty. Thirsty people are needy people and demanding people.

If you imagine the way that I might interact around a table if I have not eaten for three days versus I just, like you, had a nice, wonderful lunch that we didn’t prepare. I don’t know where you ate lunch, but once you’re full you show up to a table of food differently than somebody who has not had access to food for three days. You come in hungry or thirsty; you come in needy. “I need to eat. I’m interested in taking only, because I am depleted.”

So if we don’t go to Christ to get our soul’s needs met, then we come to each other thirsty and needy—with legitimate needs, but that our friends can’t satisfy. So we begin to be driven in friendship by what we need. My motivation in friendship becomes, “I need something, and I am driven by that,” and that’s a problem.

What’s interesting here is that our action in friendship, the activity of the things that we’re doing in friendship, is very rarely selfish-looking. It usually looks very generous. We’re not necessarily needing transformation in how we act toward one another, but what’s motivating us underneath is oftentimes very “me, me, me, me, me,” what I need.

Let me give you an example. My husband is a musician. We used to tour and travel a lot. That was a hard season, because I didn’t have a lot of time to connect with friends. It was lonely. I also felt unimportant because I was kind of his sidekick and folded all the T-shirts for him and got the Sharpies out so he could sign things. I just was really struggling. So there were times when we would be at different venues and locations where really important, cool people were in the room. It was a festival, and other Christians artists who I grew up listening to are in the room. I’m like, “Ooh, this is cool.”

Who am I most naturally inclined to go greet and be generous with my attention to? Is it the caterer over here? No. It’s like, “Oh, the Newsboys are over here. I’m going to go say hi to this person.” I tend to aim my generous actions in befriending somebody who can give me something that I want. “I want to be important. I want to sit where the cool people are sitting.” 

I want to be generous, but I’m motivated by a need for meaning that I have. I’m struggling in my life right now. I feel like I’m displaced on the road with my husband, and there are people that I could look to to get that for. I’m going to get it by being very generous, but I’m motivated by my self-centered desires.

We do this a lot when we walk into church. We walk in asking the question, “Who’s going to say hi to me? Who’s going to greet me? Why has no one reached out to me?” Because we’re not going to the fountain of living waters, we’re thirsty and needy, so we come in motivated in how we operate towards one another driven primarily by, “What do I need? What do I want out of friendship?”

If you really look at what Jesus teaches us about how to care for other people, He calls us to be the friend to others that we wish we had ourselves. He says, “Treat others how you want to be treated.” What we actually should be doing on a Sunday morning or at a gathering, a birthday party, a baby shower—all those places we walk into with all our insecurities; we all have them . . . What we really should be doing is walking in going, “How would I want to be treated right now? What do I wish would happen when I walked through these doors? 

God has actually called me to be that to somebody else today: to walk into this space and greet somebody else, befriend somebody else; not to take something from them, but to give something to them. I can’t do that if I’m not satisfied at the fountain of living waters. I can’t. I’m too thirsty myself. 

So we start with misuse one, we can’t let friendship replace Jesus, and we can’t let friendship be driven by our self-desires and selfish needs. It is a misuse, and it will break. Friendship can’t hold up when both people are totally driven by their own needs. It will fall apart. Even if our activity is very nice-looking, what’s driving us? That’s what we need to ask.

The third misuse we’re going to talk about is this: when friendship begins to mimic marriage. We have always been attracted to the idea of one other person we can count on. “Just give me that one other person who’s my person.”

Now, by and large we’ve looked to marriage for that. It’s why we’ve been so attracted to a spouse—who’s that one out there? That’s why we watch all the chick-flicks, and we love it, because it feels so assuring to think about having one other human being who we are committed to and “I know they’ll be there for me.” It feels stable and secure.

Now, if you’re married in the room, you know that it doesn’t take that long being married to see that marriage can’t actually do that for you. You can be very lonely in marriage and very dissatisfied, even though you have that one other person. 

What I’m seeing now, culturally, is a shift from looking to this one other person in marriage to looking to that in a best friend. We tend to then start moving down the line. “If marriage can’t satisfy me that way, maybe I can find one other friend who’s the friend above all friends. We have this unique relationship, and we can be there for one another in a unique way. We can make a pact together, join our lives together.” It feels very attractive.

There is a new manifestation of friendship showing up culturally, this kind of “best friendship” versus just normal friendship, that mimics the institution of marriage. It’s exclusive, it’s binding, there are things showing up in it like jealousy. Jealousy should never show up in friendship.

So I want to talk about that, because it’s such a common occurrence that I have felt in my heart, this expression of jealousy. But let’s talk about what jealousy is.

Jealousy is not envy. They are two different biblical terms. Envy is, “I want what you have.” We sometimes use these words interchangeably, but the Bible does not. So envy is, “You have a new car; I want a new car. You have this nice house; I want the house. You have a good friend; I want that friend.” That’s envy.

Jealousy is, “I am intolerant of rivals.” Jealousy is healthy in marriage. If my husband were here today and some woman walked up to him and asked him out on a date and I overheard that and leaned over and said, “Oh babe, you should totally go do that. Have a great time!” . . . Hopefully one of you would pull me aside and go, “Something’s wrong with your marriage!” Or hopefully you would pull aside the Revive Our Hearts team and be like, “Don’t ask this lady back again!” That’s not right, is it? My marriage should have a healthy jealousy. I should be intolerant of any other rival of my husband’s affections. That is normal and healthy. 

It’s why God says He’s a jealous God: He is intolerant of rivals in your heart. He says, “I’m first; no one else. I’m a jealous God.” That’s what He means by that. He’s intolerant of rivals. And marriage, because it is a covenant relationship that is a signpost to God’s relationship with us, is intended to have healthy jealousy—not because marriage satisfies any more than friendship; it doesn’t. But it is pointing to a truth that matters.

But in friendship, friendship should never have jealousy. It is inappropriate in friendship, because we don’t belong to each other. In marriage God says we belong to one another. Paul will say that in 1 Corinthians, right, that even our bodies belong to one another in marriage. In friendship it is not the same. 

I’m called to hold my friends with open hands. If my friend makes a new friend, I should be happy for her, not jealous. So when jealousy perks up—and it will—if you’re a human being . . . I’m just telling you, I don’t know one woman I have talked to that hasn’t had that feeling. “My friend made a new friend, and I feel jealous. I feel protective. I don’t want that. You’re mine.” We want to cling to that. That’s unhealthy in us, and it’s a sign we’re looking to them for something that only God can provide.

More and more there are articles online and cultural manifestations of friendship saying that jealousy is healthy and good and a sign that that’s your real BFF! “Celebrate; you’ve found your BFF!” But for the Christian, it is not appropriate for us to practice friendship that way. We do not belong to each other. Our friends belong to God and Him alone, and we are called to hold them with open hands.

When we let our friendships begin to mimic the marriage union—it’s exclusive, covenantal, full of jealousy—it is a misuse, and it will break, and it won’t hold up.

Those are the three misuses. When we don’t go to the fountain of living waters, it shows up. We idolize our friends. We replace Jesus. We’re driven by our own needs and selfishness. We tend to form these exclusive, binding, BFF relationships that mimic marriage, and they’re unhealthy.

God has called us, and called me in my life often, to repent of those things. “Daughter, you’re looking to that friend for something only I can give. Turn around and come to me. They’re a broken cistern. It doesn’t matter how great they are; they can’t be for you what you want them to be. As soon as you look to them for those things, you’re just using them to meet your own needs, and you can’t do the very thing I’ve called you to do in friendship, to be the friend to them that you wish you had.” 

So He calls me to repentance, to turn around, to aim all of my deep relational aches at Him and ask Him, “Jesus, meet my need there. Meet my need. Fill me up.” I have to build friendship with Him to do friendship with others rightly. I have to feel deep communion with Him, and as I do, as I lay that foundation, built by the blood of Jesus—Jesus’ blood gave me access to this deep friendship with God . . . As I do that and find in Him the fountain of living waters, I will find that I can actually now re-enter the field of friendship healthfully, practicing it in a new and different way.

That’s where we’re going to go next: how does the gospel transform friendship?

Nancy: And that’s where Kelly Needham is going to go tomorrow, here on Revive Our Hearts. We’ve been listening to the first part of a workshop she taught on friendship at a recent True Woman conference.

Kelly’s book on this topic is called Friend-ish. It's a really helpful book about some of the ups and downs and challenges of having quality, godly friendships. You’ll find information about it within the transcript of this program at ReviveOurHearts.com or on the Revive Our Hearts app. 

And if you’re technologically challenged (as I sometimes am), and you’re thinking, “Okay, I have a smart phone, but I don’t know how to find the Revive Our Hearts app!” Actually, I've heard that quite a few times—maybe someone who listens to Revive Our Hearts on the radio, but they can't always get it at the time it airs there. Then they find out they can listen to Revive Our Hearts any time of the day or night by going to the Revive Our Hearts app. So if you are thinking, "I don't know how to do this." I'll tell you what to do: call up one of your kids or a grandchild, someone who understands these things, and tell them you want to download the Revive Our Hearts app. They'll pick up you phone and search for it and find it and get you started.

It’s a free app, and once you download it, it will always be on your device. You can listen to this program or any of our podcasts, and you can read the articles we post on our blog. Again, just search for and download the Revive Our Hearts app to get you set up.

Dannah: Thanks, Nancy. 

You know, the subject of friendship and relationships is something we’re emphasizing this whole month here at Revive Our Hearts. And I’d like to tell you about one way you can make a difference in the lives of others around you. Consider becoming a Revive Our Hearts Ambassador. 

Are you passionate about serving women’s ministry leaders and excited about what God is doing at Revive Our Hearts? If so, becoming a Revive Our Hearts Ambassador might be for you! For more information, check out ReviveOurHearts.com/ambassadors. 

Also, this month’s thank-you gift for your donation of any size is a booklet by Nancy. It’s titled Beauty in the Broken: How Humility Changes Everything. In it, she explains how vital a life of brokenness and humility is in our relationship with God and others. 

Again, we’ll send you a copy with your donation of any amount. Just visit ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1-800-569-5959, and request the booklet on humility by Nancy. 

Tomorrow Kelly Needham helps us see the power of the gospel to transform all our friendships.

Kelly: How do we see the gospel redefined in friendships—away from the cultural manifestations that we are trained to live and do and into something new? Our friendships with one another should look so different from the world's friendships. The whole way we do it should be different. But sadly, most of the time it's just the activities that have changed. We don't go to the bars, we go to Bible study.

But all the weird ways we tend to have jealousy and strife with each other and bitterness in our hearts, it doesn't change. The DNA of our relationships don't get transformed, and it should.

Dannah: I hope you’ll join us for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is calling you to authentic friendship in your pursuit of freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.