Friendship: Part 4 - Loyalty

A man of many companions may come to ruin,

but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

(Proverbs 18:24 ESV)

A friend is a trusted confidante to whom I am mutually drawn as a companion and ally, whose love for me is not dependent on my performance, and whose influence draws me closer to God.

Loyal:  Merriam Webster Dictionary

1)  : unswerving in allegiance: as
        a : faithful in allegiance to one's lawful sovereign or government
        b : faithful or devoted to a private person to whom fidelity is due
        c : faithful to a cause, ideal, custom, institution, or product

Synonyms: constant, dedicated, devoted, devout, down-the-line, fast, good, faithful, pious, staunch, steadfast, steady, true, true-blue

What is a loyal Christian friend?  What does loyalty look like in the relationship between two Christians?  The story of David and Jonathan provides an example of a commitment between friends which exhibits loyalty, and its components of faithfulness, allegiance, and devotion.  First, we see the two bound together in 1 Samuel 18:

...the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul.

(1 Samuel 18:1 ESV)

And further, in 1 Samuel 18:3, we see that Jonathan makes a covenant with David:

Then Jonathan made a covenant with David, because he loved him as his own soul.

(1 Samuel 18:3 ESV)

And then we see Jonathan's loyalty to David expressed through his dedication, devotion, and faithfulness by offering him his future place as King.  He sacrificed his own personal gain and in devotion to David, equipped him for the battles that would lead to David taking the thrown after Saul's death:

And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was on him and gave it to David, and his armor, and even his sword and his bow and his belt.

(1 Samuel 18:4 ESV)

An essential part of loyalty between Christian friends is the presence of the Lord between them.  Our loyalty to friends, or anyone else, should never compromise our loyalty to God.  In any close friendship between two people, it should always be remembered that in fact, this third element, God, is always present.  Jonathan realized this in declaring to David:

Fight the Good Fight

"Fight the good fight of faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called..."

(1 Timothy 6:12 NASB)

A hard lesson learned over this past few weeks:

• Faith is something we must constantly fight for
• It is a good fight

After a period of several months of very real transformation, I let down my guard.  In a sense, I became comfortable with where I was at and even overly confident in ways.  Things seemed to be going real well.  I felt that I was growing in my love of God, as well as my love of other people.  I spent time in the Word, in prayer, and in service to others.  But something was lacking.  I certainly wasn't as thankful as I should have been for the great things that God was doing in my life.  Pride crept in and rather than giving all of the glory to God, I think in some ways I was reserving some for myself.  I felt that I had things under control.

"Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls around like 

a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour."

(1 Peter 5:8 NASB)

Sin can creep in unnoticed.  It can spread like an infection.  In my complacency and attitude of having everything under control, I was not as quick to address things occurring in my thought life as I should have been.  After all, I had everything under control.

Love & Partiality

Over the past couple of years, I have spent a great deal of time working out what it means to love others as a follower of Christ.  It has benefited me greatly in so many areas to understand this real love; the love that Jesus demonstrated and spoke of.  As someone who was most frequently led by my emotional, gut feelings of love, this understanding has helped me tremendously.  It has given me a standard which I can use to compare what I felt was loving to what God says really is loving.  I have often found that my motives were less then selfless, kind, or from a place of being long-suffering.

As I have been seeking this understanding of love, it has bothered me that I have had a greater love toward some people, and conversely, a lesser love toward others.  I've felt pressured to decrease my love for some, while building it up for others for whom it came less naturally to me.  I thought that loving everyone equally was the Christian ideal that I should live up to; and perhaps it is, but it is not necessarily the place from which I can start my journey.  I have been rethinking things lately, not in a way that I shouldn't strive to be loving toward all people, but just in the sense that it isn't necessarily un-Christian or sinful to love some people more than you love others.  I think the greatest example of favoritism or partiality in love would include the love of Jesus for the Apostle John, as discussed below.

I guess I am at a place now where I feel some freedom to pursue loving those whom God puts before me and not getting so wrapped up in defining every thought, labeling and comparing every relationship, and analyzing every word and action.  Essentially, just because someone is "easy" or comfortable for me to love, doesn't mean that the love is a bad thing or something to be avoided or downplayed in favor of seeking to increasingly love the less "desirable".  While I will continue to strive toward greater love for all of my brothers and sisters, perhaps right at this moment in time, it is the people that God has put before me as friends with whom I can best put into practice and learn from about Christian love; both what it is and what it isn't.

I came across this sermon from John Henry Newman (1801-1890).  I think it is worth a read:

Encouragement For Struggling Friends

In many ways, my first year of following Christ seemed (to me) to be marked by a lack of encouragement from other Christians around me.  Not that encouragement was non-existent; more-so just muted, conditional, or somewhat reserved.  I think several factors played into this, one of which was the unfamiliarity of many at my church with homosexuality and how it looks to transition from the "gay lifestyle" to that of committed follower of Jesus.  At times I felt that it was up to me to prove to my brothers and sisters in Christ that I was serious about my new life.  While never outright told this, I sensed they felt I had to first "fix" certain aspects of my character, attractions, and sexuality in order to prove myself worthy of their encouragement and praise.  This deficit of encouragement that I perceived often contributed to a lack of hope on my part and caused me to question whether any of this transformation was even possible.  Rather than being pursued by my bothers and sisters at the church, I felt that I was always in a struggle to stay connected to the Body.  I often wanted to leave the church and find one where I would be embraced on terms equal to the embrace of sinners who struggled in more "comfortable" ways.  It was often a struggle to stay a part of this community of believers.  It was as if I had to constantly remind them "Hey, there is hope for me too! I am not beyond God's power to save and heal!".  Being a new believer, I was perplexed by this as I thought that these statements were ones they should have been loudly proclaiming to me, not the other way around!

Hope and Singleness

A friend recently asked me the question "What gives you hope?". It came up during a discussion about my outlook on marriage. I expressed that I don't have a pull to get married, and in fact I don't suspect that it is God's will for me to do so in the foreseeable future, and likely ever. It struck me that what my friend was really expressing through this question was his view that without a spouse I was facing a future of uncertainty, loneliness and incompleteness; that I was somehow falling short of God's plan for His children.

It has been my observation that the church in general does a rather poor job of expressing God's gift of singleness to people.  Christians often make assumptions that singleness is a temporary condition.  Temporary in that, under "normal" circumstances, it is only to be experienced while one seeks out that significant person to join with in marriage.  This attitude implies that marriage is the highest of callings and leaves singleness as some sort of inferior state of existence.  I also see the idea expressed, often subtly, that upon reaching a certain age, one who is still single must be in that situation because they are somehow damaged, are sinful, or otherwise "broken".  Even those well intentioned phrases of referring to one's spouse as "my other half", or the statement that the marriage partner "completes me" further perpetuates this myth of single people being somehow only half a person or incomplete.

Love

All of my life I remember periods of falling in and out of "love" with other guys.  I thought highly of myself for these feelings of love I had for others; that I was somehow superior in my caring for others due to this "love".  What I wasn't so conscious of at the time, though, was just how self-seeking my love was. Sure, I was a nice guy in many respects.  A certain aspect of my love was geared toward helping the person I was loving.  However, I have more recently come to see that the ugly side of this love was a desire to get something from the other person.  I had that powerful "feeling" of loving someone, but unfortunately this "love" was not what is spoken of in the Bible in the following text:

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

God's Patience

I have been bothered since writing my last post that I missed the real truth of patience.  The amazing story is not the patience that the Spirit develops in us (although it is vital), but rather the awesome patience that God displays toward His creation.  How quick we are to lose patience with our fellow brother, friend, coworker, or loved one when they don't live up to our expectations?  What hope would we have if God's patience looked more like man's?  How much more have we fallen short of the Fathers expectations and hopes for us than our fellow man has fallen short of ours?  It is immeasurable.

Intertwined with His mercy, God's patience is displayed throughout the Bible.  Toward the Israelites in Nehemiah 9:17:

        They refused to obey and were not mindful of the wonders that you performed among them, but they stiffened their neck and appointed a leader to return to their slavery in Egypt. But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and did not forsake them. (Nehemiah 9:17 ESV)

In 1 Kings, God displays His patience with Ahab.  In Genesis 6, He was patient with His creation before the flood.  Also, in Psalm 103, we see God's patience described by His mercy, slowness to anger and His steadfast love:

The LORD is merciful and gracious,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
(Psalm 103:8 ESV)

In 2 Peter 3, God is described as patient in His desire that all should come to repentance and salvation:

The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance. (2 Peter 3:9 ESV)

God's patience toward sinners is a great gift to us.  He wants us all to come to repent (Acts 3:19) and gain eternal life with Him (Jn 3:16).  Where would we be and what chance of salvation would we have if God had the patience of you and I?

It is a part of the Divine goodness and mercy, yet differs from both. God being the greatest goodness, hath the greatest mildness; mildness is always the companion of true goodness, and the greater the goodness, the greater the mildness. Who so holy as Christ, and who so meek? God’s slowness to anger is a branch of His mercy: "the Lord is full of compassion, slow to anger" (Ps. 145:8). It differs from mercy in the formal consideration of the subject: mercy respects the creature as miserable, patience respects the creature as criminal; mercy pities him in his misery, patience bears with the sin which engendered the misery, and giving birth to more.

Personally we would define the Divine patience as that power of control which God exercises over Himself, causing Him to bear with the wicked and forebear so long in punishing them. In Nahum 1:3 we read, "The Lord is slow to anger and great in power," upon which Mr. Charnock said,

Men that are great in the world are quick in passion, and are not so ready to forgive an injury, or bear with an offender, as one of a meaner rank. It is a want of power over that man’s self that makes him do unbecoming things upon a provocation. A prince that can bridle his passions is a king over himself as well as over his subjects. God is slow to anger because great in power. He has no less power over Himself than over His creatures. 

-Stephen Charnock (1628-1680) (1)

(1) The Attributes of God, A.W. Pink 

Testimony

Thanks for visiting my blog. I thought I would start off by introducing myself and giving my testimony to God's work in my life.

Growing up Catholic, I remember from a very early age the Bible's condemnation of homosexual behavior. The strengthening same gender attractions I experienced as a teenager were frightening to me and served to produce overwhelming feelings of shame. I spent many years trying to suppress my attractions and holding out hope that these urges were just some kind of phase I was going through. I thought that eventually I would be just like all of my other friends who were interested in girlfriends, dating and marriage. These hopes for change never did materialize. Perhaps out of some anger with God, I started to act out on these homosexual desires. I reasoned that if God had created me as a gay man than it was simply cruel and unreasonable for Him to expect me to pretend to be something that I wasn't. I'd asked Him repeatedly to take these desires away from me and He didn't, and so I rationalized that the problem was with Him – not with me. It took many years for me to really embrace homosexuality. I had been spending large amounts of time on gay websites where my focus was really on finding other local guys to meet up with. In my late twenties, I finally summoned up what I considered at the time to be the courage to come out as gay to pretty much everyone I knew. I felt a sense of freedom that this part of me was finally out there. I really had the full support of my mom and sisters as well as many of my friends. The gay community offered me something that I had been denying myself through my secrecy for years. I felt embraced and accepted. As time went on more and more of my time was being spent at local gay bars – often drinking excessively and eventually getting into other drugs, especially cocaine.

As I continued down this path, God continued to be further and further from my mind. Finally, in my late 30's, I had started suffering with anxiety and panic attacks. With my awareness of the negative effects of cocaine, I was often fearful that the panic attacks I was having might actually be a heart attack. Finally, on New Years Day of 2010, after a couple hours with a rapid heart beat and feeling lightheaded, I drove to the emergency room. I was somewhat scared and for whatever reason, I decided to talk to God. Selfishness pretty much characterized my life during this period of time, and rather than simply praying to Him for guidance, I tried to make a deal with Him. I told Him that if He just allowed this episode – what I thought was a heart attack – to pass, I would work on being more healthy....I might even start exercising. Well, as I should have known, we don't set the terms of a deal with God. This was the point in time God began to change my life in ways that were unlike anything I had ever experienced...

After a couple of hours in the emergency room, the diagnosis was once again a panic attack. I felt relieved and went back home. I didn't give any thought at all to that bargain I had made with God. I did, however, have the desire to go online and look for a personal trainer or some type of gym to possibly start working out. I didn't really do this out of any sense of obligation to God because of my “bargain”. I simply felt like I wanted to take some steps to be more healthy. I stumbled across a website, contacted them, and I soon got a call from one of the trainers and started exercising. Everything was going along fine but I was becoming increasingly aware of changes in my thoughts, which were becoming more drawn toward spirituality. Well, I soon found out that the step-father of my trainer was a Christian Pastor. My perception of Christians was pretty negative at the time – mostly due to the conflict I perceived between the church and homosexuals – so I thought this was an interesting development. I found myself being somehow drawn to my trainer as well as his sisters, who were also personal trainers and who I would often see at the studio. I had no idea what it was that was drawing me to them, just a perception that they had something that I lacked. Well, our conversations soon turned toward God, spirituality, and religion and he invited me to attend his church some time.

I never did find whatever it was that I was seeking from the “gay community”. Since coming becoming a follower of Christ, my life has changed in so many profound ways. I struggled with the issue of homosexuality and how it fit into God's plan for me. It was immediately impressed upon me by God that the sexual activity had to stop right away. Somewhat to my surprise, God graciously enabled me to obey Him in this area relatively easily. What I was left with though were thoughts of being alone for the rest of my life and never having that “significant” person like a spouse who you could rely on to be there for you through hardships or in old age. I frequently burdened my new Christian brothers with unrealistic and selfish demands, expecting them to fill emotional needs I had that no one person could ever fill. God used my struggles in looking for comfort from others to bring me much closer to Him. In those frequent times of isolation and intense feelings of being alone, He faithfully revealed Himself to me. Although my prayers to Him were geared toward relieving me of my loneliness, He always chose to do something even better than that. He would come to me right in the very worst moments of my loneliness. When I felt like I could get no lower, no more pitiful, depressed, unloved and abandoned by everyone, He constantly whispered to me; “I'm still here and I always will be”. I'm a pretty stubborn person and so it took quite a few repetitions of these periods of depression. What He was doing was reinforcing to me the promise He makes to believers in Hebrews 13:5:

“...I will never leave you nor forsake you.”

So while up to this point I had believed that I would get closer to God through Him rescuing me from all of my emotional struggles, I now came to realize that it was in finding Him right there with me in the worst of my struggles that most powerfully demonstrated His power and compassion. I had spent years avoiding my struggles through secrecy and pursuing selfish interests and so God seemed to be demonstrating to me that my path to healing had to include facing struggles head on and being transparent with some good brothers. He showed me that no matter what situation I faced, what needs I had, or what I thought wasn't going my way, He never leaves me. He would be with me through every moment of the rest of my life. While my order of things was to first find friends who could meet my needs, His order for me was to find Him first, to cast my needs upon Him, and only then could healthy relationships begin to develop.

Transformation for me has not been a change in my attractions from men to women. I still struggle with same sex temptations. While the temptations I face in this area have lessened over the past couple of years, the real transformation He has worked in me has been in giving me the freedom to make different choices in the midst of those temptations. My struggle with homosexuality allows me to feel the depths of Gods love for me like nothing else I can imagine would. He took an area of my life that I felt I had no control over and turned it in to one where I have the freedom to choose Him rather than sexual sin. This continued struggle is a powerful reminder to me every single day that I am completely unable to live up to God's standards on my own, and that it is only through the power of the Holy Spirit and the death and resurrection of Christ that I am able to claim any sort of victory in this area of my life. By coming to know that I am weak in this area, I can offer it up to Him as something I am powerless to control and can only rely on His strength to keep me in a place of obedience. Apart from God, I have no victory in this area of my life.

I have found comfort in many of the verses in the Bible, but here are 2 of them that I have found most impacting.

The first is 1 Corinthians 6:9-11:
"Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God."

God's never condemns us for our sinfulness without offering us hope and encouragement. Because He sacrificed His Son to atone for our sinfulness, He can say to us “and such were some of you”. When we place our trust in Christ we are a new creation, free from the labels of our past, and with a new identity that is in Christ.

The second verse is James 5:16:

"Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed..."

It was by putting my struggles out there among my brothers that God was able to work through those good brothers to demonstrate to me His compassion. By letting my brothers more fully know me, God could use them to provide healing for me within healthy Christian relationships.

Thank you for allowing me to tell you some of the ways that God has been at work in my life.