Friendship

Do you have someone that you can call a friend? I don't mean an acquaintance, but someone who you can be real with, who you can trust, who you can tell anything to? It might sound like a silly question, because doesn't everyone have friends? I have noticed that as people get older, they tend to have less friends, and the friends they have are often not close friends.
I believe we need at least one true friend. If you have a friend like this, you know what I am talking about. To have someone who can support and encourage you is invaluable. To have someone in your life who lifts you up and helps you to feel good about yourself is priceless. In fact, it is one of the prime ways that God created us, to be in relationship and fellowship with others.
Another important aspect is that Jesus is not only our Lord and Savior, but He is our friend. It is good to have friends who are flesh and blood; physically present in our lives. But it is equally important to know that Jesus is our friend. As we are told in John 15:15- "I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you." As a friend, Jesus makes known to us the things of God: the truth of God, the power of God, the wisdom of God. As a friend, Jesus makes sure we are never alone.
Do you need a friend? Pray to God to bring you that special friend. But also remember that Jesus is always there to be your friend.

A Useful Person

In a Peanuts comic strip, Linus is eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and in the middle of a bite, he says to Lucy: “Hands are fascinating things! I like my hands…I think I have nice hands…my hands seem to have a lot of character…these are hands which may someday accomplish great things…these are hands which may someday do marvelous works! They may build mighty bridges or heal the sick, or hit home-runs, or write soul-stirring novels! THESE ARE HANDS WHICH MAY SOMEDAY CHANGE THE COURSE OF DESTINY!!” Lucy comes over and looks closely at Linus’ hands, and then says: “They’ve got jelly on them.”(The Gospel According to Peanuts, p.36)
In Ecclesiastes 2:11, this verse says- “Then I considered all that my hands had done and the toil I had spent in doing it, and again, all was in vain and a chasing after wind, and there was nothing to be gained under the sun.”
We can easily feel this way, because all too often we are not seeking to fulfill what God created us to do and be, but instead we go off and chase our own selfish dreams. We need to understand that God uses people who seek to do His will. Think about Mary, the mother of Jesus. Mary was one who humbly sought God. We are told in Luke 2:19: "Mary quietly treasured these things in her heart and often thought about them."
Mary created a habit of listening to God.
God speaks to people who listen. God uses people who desire to be used. So if you want to be used by God, if you want to do something significant with your life, if you want to be chosen by God, then you need to seek to listen to God and follow God's plan. You probably need to stop thinking that you have all the answers. When we seek to do it on our own, it will seem like we are chasing after all the wrong things and that life is in vain. We need to understand that we are trying to satisfy ourselves with things that won't satisfy.
We need to gain a new perspective on life and believe that God can come to us and speak to us and choose us as God did Mary. Then we can know we will have been a useful person.