Most everyone longs for deeper friendship. Women are more apt to talk about this sort of thing… but I cannot tell you how many men confess to feeling alone, cut off from significant friendships. A guy can be married, have a house full of kids, be surrounded by people all day long, go to church… and yet feel very much alone.
Recently a husband and wife reached out to me. The wife has a number of friendships. She’s a mother with little kids—her life stage affords her a wealth of natural connections with other moms. But not the husband. They were both asking for advice, “How do we cultivate deeper friendships? Nobody seems interested, everyone is so busy. Nobody wants to come over, and if they do, they’re quick to leave.”
Of all the things we covet in this world… we most covet relationships. We covet the bonds other people seem to enjoy. We lament standing on the outside, looking in, wondering why we’ve been so unfortunate to lack meaningful relationships. I don’t think social media helps the situation. It has a way of amplifying the comparisons/pain. But we want to be known, loved, accepted, admired, cared about…
Most everyone has relationships; few have “significant friendships.” In your Bible, two men, David & Jonathan had one of the grittiest, enduring friendships of all time. As David races into battle, and strikes a deadly blow to Goliath… King Saul is watching from a distance. Saul order his commander, “Find out who this young man is.”
Standing alongside King Saul that day is his son, Jonathan. Immediately after David finishes talking with King Saul, 1 Samuel 18:1-4 says, “Jonathan become one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself. From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return to his family. And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself. Jonathan took off his robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic, and even his sword, his bow and his belt.”
Maybe we can demystify friendship this morning. One key to friendship is natural affinity. We tend to develop a natural affinity for those who walk with us, help us, or encourage us during critical points in life. Have you ever noticed? A common struggle often glues our souls together for a lifetime. David & Jonathan shared the common experience of war. After the war, Saul didn’t permit David to return to his family. These young men faced a lot of different things together.
We also develop a natural affinity for those we admire. King Saul was a veteran warrior. Jonathan was an aspiring warrior (he did after all have a sword and bow right)? How Jonathan must have admired David’s skillful victory. A key to friendship is sharing common interests, passions with someone. To a certain degree, friendship has to be natural, organic, and cannot be forced. Jonathan was able to “become one in spirit with David” because of their shared interests and experiences.
Another key to friendship is generosity. What did Jesus say? “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Twice we’re told how “Jonathan loved David as himself.” Do you remember how King Saul’s armor, sword, and helmet were too large for young David to wear into battle? Well Jonathan’s robe, tunic, sword, bow, and belt were just the right size! For a friendship to work you must be willing to give of yourself, give of your time, give the robe off your back, your tunic, your sword, your belt… Jonathan didn’t withhold anything from David.
Part of generosity is asking yourself, “Am I willing to be completely for another person? Am I willing to give whatever is needed, even when its costly?” Here’s a book, here’s a tool, here’s a lure, here’s a plane ticket, here’s an opportunity. Selfish people are the single most lonely people on the face of the planet. In contrast, generous people are some of the most relationally rich people you’ll ever meet.
Another key to friendship is faithfulness. 1 Samuel 18:3 says, “Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself.” I can’t think of many friendships that aren’t severely tested from time to time.
Take Jonathan and David for example. We’re told in 1 Samuel 18:5, “Whatever mission Saul sent him on, David was so successful that Saul gave him a high rank in the army. This pleased all the troops and Saul’s officers as well.” Do you think a tad bit of jealousy might have every crept into David & Jonathan’s friendship? Everything David touches turns to gold. Every giant he faces falls on its face. God’s favor is all over him.
In 1 Samuel 18:6-7 we’re told when the fighting men returned from battle, all “the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs, and with timbrels and lyres, dancing and singing, ‘Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands.’” The Bible says “all of Judah came to love David.” At what point as a son to Saul might you get sick of hearing David’s name? David this, David that, Jonathan who?
A testament to Jonathan’s faithfulness was he didn’t let jealousy, or negative feelings, sour his friendship. And let me just amplify this point. If we cannot manage our inner insecurities, our dark side, if we cannot mange our inner emotions whether anger, jealousy, contempt… we will sabotage every potential friendship around us. A test of faithfulness is whether we can love others even in their success.
In 1 Samuel 18:8, 12, the Elder King Saul didn’t manage David’s success, and his own insecurities, so well. First, he became angry and jealous of David. He thought to himself, “They have credited David with tens of thousands, but me with only thousands. What more can he get but the Kingdom?” But then second, the Elder King Saul became fearful of David. Twice Saul hurls a spear at David, trying to pin David to the wall! At one point, Saul even asks his attendants/Jonathan to kill David!
1 Samuel 19:1 says, “Saul told his son Jonathan and all the attendants to kill David. But Jonathan had taken a great liking to David and warned him…” A test of faithfulness is whether you can stand with someone no matter the danger, no matter the heat, no matter the cost. Jonathan stands with David a number of a different ways. First, he warns David of the danger he faces. Second, he advocates for David. As Saul flips into a rage, Jonathan tries to reason with his father King Saul, reminding him of everything David had done to benefit Israel and the King himself.
But then third, Jonathan is put into a position where he has to side with David even against his own father! Could you imagine? In 1 Samuel 20:30-31, Saul’s anger flared up at Jonathan and he says, “You son of a perverse and rebellious woman! Don’t I know that you have sided with the son of Jesse to your own shame and to the shame of the mother who bore you? As long as the son of Jesse lives on this earth, neither you nor your kingdom will be established.”
You know David and Jonathan reaffirmed their faithfulness to each other over and over, in countless ways…
1 Samuel 20:4, Jonathan says, “Whatever you want me to do, I’ll do for you…”
1 Samuel 20:9, Jonathan says, “If I had the least inkling my father was determined to harm you, wouldn’t I tell you?”
1 Samuel 20:17, Bible says David reaffirmed his oath of love for Jonathan, because he loved him as he loved himself.
Another key to friendship is vulnerability. Now I understand that for most people, this is where things could get a little weird. One of the dynamics we observe in Jonathan & David’s friendship is emotional vulnerability. Now understand there are cultural differences to the way people express affection, but in 1 Samuel 20:41, after Jonathan saves David’s life, we read that “David bowed down before Jonathan three times, with his face to the ground. Then they kissed each other and wept together—but David wept the most.”
What I want you to key into here is that both of these men had a comfort, a sense of freedom, to be real with one another, in an emotionally healthy way. The normal way most men interact is they puff up their chest and put on a macho exterior even when everything around them is falling apart.
Men have two great fears… First, that “I may need some other guy.” Then second,, “Some other guy may need me.” So the way this plays out is… (1) “I’m not going to weep because I’m tough and I don’t need anybody.” And (2) “Don’t weep with me, because I don’t want to be needed.” We’re afraid to be vulnerable! I’m just saying true friends can weep together and it’s no big deal. In fact, its liberating.
I think the ultimate key to friendship is the Lord. In 1 Samuel 23:16 were told how at one of the lowest points in David’s life, Jonathan “helped him find strength in God.” A few years ago a friend of mine was having marital trouble. He was actually being quite a jerk, and wasn’t loving his wife well. He was letting all sorts of terrible things creep into his marriage—pornography, verbal abuse, physical violence, drugs.
I couldn’t believe this friend was throwing everything away. I kept talking with both my friend and his wife, encouraging them to communicate, to do what was right, to stay sober and drug free and alcohol free, to get the pornography off their television, to develop a budget together… hey they had a lot of stuff going on! But the most important thing I did was I kept encouraging both of them in the Lord… to worship, to pray, to trust God, to forgive one another as the Lord forgave them, to be patient and invite God’s Holy Spirit to sanctify their marriage.
At one point one of their non-Christian relatives says to the guy, “You’re really lucky to have a friend like Jon… that guy isn’t giving up on you. I don’t have any friends like that, if I were ever in the same situation.”
I think relationships centered in Christ take on a different kind of texture and longevity. In 2 Samuel 1:26, Jonathan dies in battle and David gives a eulogy for his friend. In 2 Samuel 1:25-26 David says, “How the mighty have fallen in battle! Jonathan lies slain on your heights. I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother; you were very dear to me. Your love for me was wonderful, more wonderful than that of women.”
I know perverse minds might try to twist David’s words here. But I think what David is reflecting upon is that there was something transcendent about his spiritual friendship with Jonathan, his brother… that perhaps didn’t exist in the many unspiritual, and countless marriages he had throughout his lifetime. He experienced something meaningful in this spiritual friendship that was greater than the best he experienced in unspiritual relationships.”
Proverbs 17:17, “A friend loves at all times, And a brother is born for adversity.”
John 15:13, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.”
>> Spiritual Friendship mirrors Love of Christ (Romans 8:35-39)