DownshoreDrift

Try seminary years, chief. I still have good friends from college, and one from middle school who I've done my best to keep in touch with, but overall, I'm mostly close to the people I'm around consistently. That means now that my roommate from NOBTS, and one of my best friends, moves to SWBTS next week, we probably won't keep in touch that much. I know that's how it usually goes, although if we meet five years from now we'll pick back up where we left off. I didn't even meet him until my first semester here (August 2004). It seems that's how it goes these days, though. In part, I think maybe this is why I want to get married. (IN PART.) To have a lifelong friend. But that's a whole post on my own blog. Later.

I've got several friends that I grew up with, and we are still close. They are like brothers to me. We get together about once a year and it is a time where I can be myself. They've known me through good times and bad and knew me before I was a preacher man. So, they see through me pretty well. Plus, it is good just to laugh and relax without worrying what anyone will think later. Yeah, those guys are more than brothers. We helped raise each other in a lot of ways, have had great adventures, have been in each other's weddings, and I pray will sit on a porch somewhere 50 years from now, remembering good times. God has blessed me greatly with their friendship.

Alan, I think I had something like that going. Until Katrina. I can honestly say this- the friends I have, God has indeed blessed me to have. I finally felt like I had my band of brothers... family... something different (I've been to two of their weddings, missed two, and there's a fifth coming up this August). But now we're all spread out. Oregon (soon to be in Fort Worth), Mississippi (soon to be Fort Worth), Anniston, Kentucky, Atlanta... so you know. It's just the way things go. But if I keep talking about this, I'm going to get depressed. I have good friends here, but I hate seeing them leave. But this is the Katrina Diaspora, and will remain so for the rest of our lives.

I see the following challenges to true friendship:

1. Our value of individualism
2. The notion that dependence equals weakness
3. The building of our castles and walls, our personal, individual fiefdoms
4. A culture where, because of a desire to feign independence, we hide our hearts
5. The loss of intimacy due to a culture where we value the outside more than the inside, the material more than the spiritual, heat more than heart, etc.

As a result of these kinds of cultural and worldly values, ones that creep in even into Christian communities, we have a hard time building godly, loving, lay down your life kinds of relationships. Marriages and friendships both suffer.

I know I'm guilty. May God forgive us for believing the lies that it really is all about ourselves and free us to a life filled with and consumed by Him. When that is our passion, we will show ourselves to be friendly and build amazing relationships. Proverbs 18:24a

While on summer project with Campus Crusade, God taught me so much about what "real" friendships are about. By that I mean, being vulnerable and speaking truth to one another. When I returned to college after being on project, I was drawn to girls that shared that same passion for truth in friendships. I keep in touch with several of my friends from summer project however the majority of my closest friends came from invlovement in church during college. We continue to talk regularly and try to plan a trip to the beach each year. It's sad to see the trend of more folks withdrawing from frienships and community....we need each other for sure!

One last comment on this before I drop it, because if I don't drop it, I'll get pretty sad again. Donald Miller talks about communal living in Blue Like Jazz. Five or so guys living together in one house until they get married. That kind of stuff. I'm completely for that. One hundred percent.

What might that look like? Church plants that have one house and keep rotating in and out new guys to live among each other in a discipleship relationship. Perhaps.

Good words. I had to write a concept paper for my church planting class in seminary regarding church planting in urban environment. Basically, my concept was pretty similar to what you are talking about, Joe. Rent out a big house, bring people together to live there, have common rooms, and do ministry out of it. That way, when you meet folks and invite them back to the house, they get to see and experience Christian life instead of just hearing about it on Sunday. True spiritual friendships develop around LIFE, not around meetings. Maybe that way we wouldn't have to talk about church and friendships in separate conversations.

I have found that most of my friends come from my church life/family, I have had very few relationships from my childhood carry thru to the present. I have noticed lately God has started to change that, a person here or there from my past has come back into my life recently and I have been able to reconnect with them, usually after they have come to or reconnected with Christ.

Childhood friends?!? I've lived in about 30 different places (30 moves, 28 different cities) and the last 12 years have been in Tulsa: the longest I've ever stayed in one place. Most of my close friends have been work colleagues: the way you guys talk about college or seminary, my wife and I talk about friends from "the Rapha days". The up side is, you learn to make meaningful friends quickly.

I have two brothers I grew up with, a step-sister, and five much younger half-siblings. My two (full/biological) brothers may, in fact, be my best - certainly the most consistent - friends.