Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods.
—Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics, Bk. VIII
This morning’s sermon text from Acts mentions the rift between Paul and Barnabas. Recounted in just a single verse (“there arose a sharp disagreement, so that they separated from each other,” Acts 15:39), this brief description covers what may well have been a bitter conflict between two men who had been close friends. Many of the scriptures we read and the hymns we sing this morning point to different aspects of friendship, both its blessings and its difficulties. Psalm 15 (Who Shall Abide In The Tents Of The Lord) describes the righteous man as one who “never brings shame on a friend.” By contrast, Psalm 55 laments the betrayal of someone who the psalmist calls “my companion, my familiar friend,” a betrayal even experienced by Jesus when He saw “friends through fear His cause disowning” (Stricken, Smitten, And Afflicted). As the hymn writer laments, often even our dearest friends may “despise” and “forsake” us (What A Friend We Have In Jesus). But, by God’s grace, we have “a best, a heavenly friend” who promises to “be with [us] to the end” (Be Still, My Soul; ‘Tis So Sweet To Trust In Jesus), a Savior who was Himself called a “a friend of tax collectors and sinners” (Matthew 11:19). Christ promises to give us the grace to navigate the anxieties, sorrows, disappointments, and trials that often accompany human relationships in a fallen world—and it is His name that will ultimately bring together both “friend and stranger.”
—Henry C. Haffner
