No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My FatherI have made known to you. John 15:15

            Everybody wants friends. Our world is lonely because almost all communication is now done online and on the phone as they text one another.  I’ve seen “friends” sitting at the same table at the restaurant texting each other on the cell phones!  On our social media platforms, “friends” are requested and accepted.  That seems to be the proof of popularity.  The more “friends” you have, the better you feel about yourself. Some people have thousands of “friends,” many of whom they might have barely known and don’t now at all…but they are “friends!”   The concept of true friendship has been lost, especially what God has provided in friendship.

            Friend was a covenant term; Abraham was called the friend of God (2 Chronicles 20:7; Isaiah 41:8). In light of the New Covenant, Jesus called His disciples His friends. What does that mean? It means what David and Jonathan exemplified in their friendship: Whatever you need me to do, I will do it (1 Samuel 20:4). Jesus said the same thing to His friends: “You will ask what you desire, and it shall be done for you” (John 15:7). True friends are closer than brothers (Proverbs 18:24), and no friend is closer or more loyal than Jesus.

            Let your friendship with Jesus be closer than all others. Be bound to Him in love and faith through His New Covenant (Matthew 26:28).  As the great hymn writer wrote: What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear!