Friendship

*Note this is not a Jack post, this a Jenny journal post! 

This year has taught me about a lot about friendship. The strength of my friendships have been tested as the convenience of being close to one another, distance wise, has changed. And I have added a new little buddy into my life, Jack, who is taking up most of my time. I have had to make new friends, something I haven't had to do since my first week at college, because I always had friends and family around.

When Mike and I were going through premarital classes our mentors asked how we would balance our friendships and marriage. I thought I was the perfect little wife-to-be replying, "Oh no I just need Mike, he is my very best friend". The wife  cracked a smile and responded with something like, "Jenny, God blessed you with other people in your life. You can not expect Mike to be everything to you. You need your family. You need friends. Your marriage will be better if you foster those relationships." My bubble was busted. But I knew she was right.

I should have just responded honestly, I mean Mike and I have always been very social people and have had lots of friends, a quality we both were attracted to in each other. And not just lots of friends, but old friends. The kind of friendships that have taken a while to build and take work to maintain. I remember thinking that if Preppy had those type of friendships, people that have known him for years and years and still want to be around him, then he must be a catch.

One of my new year's resolutions is to become a better friend again. To my friends that have know me since I was 7 years old, to my Hope College family, to my new friends that have made moving to Alabama so much easier, I want to become a better friend even to my family members. The time needs to be devoted to foster these relationships. As I get older I don't want to forget how to open myself up and let my guard down. Mike and I are blessed. God has put amazing people in our lives and we have the chance to build incredible friendships with them.

I want to share with you some text from the wonderful book I have mentioned before, Cold Tangerines, by Shauna Niequist. I absolutely love the picture she paints of God's purpose for friendship.

After the meet, I was soaking wet and exhausted, still wearing a crazy wig and soggy tutu. Jessie's mom came to find me as I was closing up the pool. She held my arm and looked right into my eyes. "Until you have kids of your own," she said, "you will never know what this is like. As a mom, all I wanted to do was run down the bleachers and jump in with my clothes on to finish the race with my daughter, and I'm so glad you did. Thank you for caring about my child the way I would have if I was right there."

That's what friendship looks like to me. Friendship is acting out God's love for people in tangible ways. We were made to represent the love of God in each other's lives, so that each person we walk through life with has a more profound sense of God's love for them. Friendship is an opportunity to act on God's behalf in lives of the people that we're close to, reminding each other who God is. When we do the hard, intimate work of friendship, we bring a little more divine into daily life. We get to remind one another about the bigger, more beautiful picture that we can't always see from where we are. (page 49)

True friendship is a sacred, important thing, and it happens when we drop down into that deeper level of who we are, when we cross over into the broken, fragile parts of ourselves. We have to give something up in order to get friendship like that. We have to give up our need to be perceived as perfect. We have to give up our ability to control what people think of us. We have to overcome the the fear that when they see the depths of who we are, they'll leave. But what we give up is nothing in comparison to what this kind of friendship gives to us. Friendship is about risk. Love is about risk. If we can control and manage it and manufacture it, then it's something else, but if it's really love, really friendship, it's a little scary around the edges. (page 50)