The Best Friend You Will Ever Have - Part 1

Welcome to the In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Thursday, November 18th. When we think about our friends, rarely do believers think about Jesus. You can get to learn more about the best friend you will ever have. How many real true friends do you have?

Not nearly as many as you think. You have a lot of folks that you have acquaintances with, and you may have sort of levels of friendship that you call true friends, but deep abiding friendships, we don't have many of those in life because it takes time to develop that kind of a deep relationship. To whom are you a real true friend? Do you know what the real qualities of true friendship really are? All of us need deep abiding friendships. A fellow said to me one day he had a friend with whom he had been intimately acquainted and fellowshiped with every week, sometimes several times a week for 35 years.

When he said that all of a sudden I had this sinking feeling, I thought, 35 years with the same friend, I've missed something in life. As I began to read and began to study about friendship, I began to realize that we men aren't nearly as friendly as we think we are. In a survey of leading psychologists and therapists, they were asked the question, how many men in America really have a true friend?

And the vast majority of them said about 10% or less. Probably because so many of us are so busy doing our own thing, we don't take the time to develop friendships, deep abiding friendships as we ought and as God intends for us to have and as all of us really and truly need. One of the most priceless possessions we have is that of a true genuine friend. And I began to think about, well, let's see if Jesus Christ is really my friend. I know he's my savior. I know he's my Lord. I know he's my master.

I know he's God. But most of my life, I never looked upon Jesus Christ as being a friend. But if you'll turn to John chapter 15, you'll see a little different side of the Lord Jesus Christ, which all of us need to see and begin to discover what kind of friend Jesus Christ is to all of us.

Because in the midst of a few chapters here which Jesus spoke to his apostles in the upper room the night before he was crucified, he gave us some of the most precious, unforgettable, comforting, reassuring truths to be found anywhere in the Word of God. And in the midst of this 15th chapter when he'd been talking to them about their relationship to him and described that as a vine and a branch relationship, he says in verse 12, This is my commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing.

But I've called you friends for all things that I have heard from my Father I've made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you, and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you. This I command you, that you love one another.

Now let's look at that passage for a moment. He says in verse 12, This is my commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. In verse 17, This I command you, that you love one another. So in the midst of this dissertation on love, he's saying greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friend. That doesn't always necessarily mean that you give your life physically, that is blood for a friend. But there's another way to lay down your life for your friend, that is to deny yourself of your own selfish desires in order to please or to help or to aid or to encourage or to be a friend. Then when he said, for example, You are my friends if you do what I command you.

Let me tell you what that does not mean. That does not mean that Jesus is saying that we are his friends if we keep all the 10 commandments, do all the things, the Sermon on the Mount. What he's saying, because it is couched in love, he says, You are my friends if you do what I've commanded you and are just all couched in love.

He said, You are my friends if you love one another. Now, if you'll think about the life of Jesus for a moment, Jesus didn't spend most of his time with the great throngs of people. Jesus invested most of his time with a handful of fellows that he made his friends. He was a friend to every one of them. He tried to be a friend to all 12 of them, but one of them wouldn't let him.

Judas Iscariot. But of all those apostles, according to what the Bible says about them, more than likely, the youngest of them, John was Jesus' most intimate friend. He's the only apostle, though Jesus loved them all, about which the Bible says, John, the beloved apostle. Jesus had a friendship and a fellowship with them that was more intimate than all the others. And yet he did have other friends. Mary and Martha and Lazarus were his friends. And you see, if you look to see what Jesus said in the Gospels, he was always instructing others how to relate to other people and how to develop friendships.

And he continuously said we love each other, which is the basis of real true friendship. Now, when you and I think about Jesus Christ being our friend, most of us realize that he's our Savior, Lord, Master and God. And we sing what a friend we have in Jesus. I have found a friend in Jesus. He's all the world to me.

We sing these songs about him. But on a daily basis, how many of us really and truly think about, relate to Jesus Christ as our friend? So what I want to do in this message, I want you to discover three things. I want you to discover, first of all, what a friend Jesus Christ is to you. Secondly, I want you to discover, is there anyone to whom you are this kind of friend?

A third thing you may discover, is there anyone that you have a relationship with that you could call a genuine friend based on the qualities of true genuine friendship? That is, what kind of friend is Jesus? What kind of friend are you? And to whom are you that kind of friend? Is there anyone that you can call, he is my real friend. She is my real friend.

Is there anyone? So what I'd like to do is I want us to look at the life of Jesus Christ as a friend. I want us to view him as a friend today and in the light of the characteristics and the qualities of Jesus Christ as a friend, we can evaluate our friendship with each other. We can conclude whether we really have a true friend or not. We can also conclude the fact of whether we are or know how to be that kind of friend to someone else.

So I want you to get a piece of paper and a pen. And I believe this will be extremely helpful to you, my friend, if you will write down these 10 qualities of friendship that are found in the life of Jesus Christ. And you remember what he said? The Bible says about him, he is the same yesterday, today and forever. If he would be a friend of those apostles, he will be our friend. If he would be a friend of Mary, Martha and Lazarus, he'd be our friend.

You see, Jesus didn't have to send a runner ahead and say, Oh, go tell Mary and Martha, I'm on my way to get ready to cook because I don't want to walk in on them surprised. What friend do you have that you can just drop in on without any warning and you won't embarrass them and you won't even be embarrassed? How many of us have true, genuine friends that we can say, Now, when you really and truly need a true friend, a genuine friend, that's my friend. Well, what are the marks of true friendship?

Number one, the marks of true friendship, first of all, let's look at them from Jesus' point of view, and then let's relate them to each other. He loves you just the way you are. Jesus loves you just the way you are. Now, he knows all your faults, all your frailties. He knows all of your mistakes, all of your sins, all of your secrets. He knows the intentions of your heart. He knows your thoughts. He knows what you would do if you knew nobody would ever know. He knows the deepest intents. He knows the motivations of your heart. He knows everything there is to know about you, and at the same time, he loves you fully and completely. He won't ever stop loving you no matter what you do. You can't ever do anything to alter his love for you. It is always a continuing, unalterable love. He doesn't love you for what you do and cease loving you for what you fail to do. He just loves you for being the person that you are, and that, I believe, is a genuine quality of true friendship.

You just love the other person because they're somebody, not for what they do for you, not for what you can expect of them, not because they live up to your standard, but Jesus loved people just because they were persons. How many friends do you have who love you just the way you are, who know what they know about you and still love you no matter what? Who would not stop loving you if they discovered something about you that you had never told them and that nobody else in the world ever knew? You have anybody like that?

Let me ask you this. Is there anyone you love just the way they are and you won't be disappointed when you find out something that appears to be ugly? Is there anyone in whom you won't be disappointed that no matter what they do, you just love them just the way they are? That's the way Jesus loves us, just the way we are. There's a second quality found in him and that's this, that Jesus Christ accepts me. He accepts us just the way we are. Jesus accepts you just the way you are, but now watch this.

Not only does he accept you the way you are, but he's not satisfied allowing you to be less than he knows you are capable of being. And so what does he do? He urges you. He motivates you.

He prods you to become the total person that he wants you to be. And you see, a true friend wants the best for you. A true friend wants you to mature. A true friend wants you to become everything you're capable of becoming.

A true friend is looking out for your best interest and a true friend is going to respond and react to you in your best interest. Jesus Christ accepts you just the way you are. You don't have to do anything to get acceptance. He accepts you just the way you are no matter what. But he won't ever let you be satisfied being less than he knows you're capable of being. Now, he's not going to put pressure on you that makes you so uncomfortable that the friendship and the fellowship is distorted.

The pressure Jesus will put on you will always be loving pressure to motivate you to become the total person God wants you to be. There's a third characteristic that's found in Jesus and that is he understands you fully. He understands when you're hurt. He understands why you're hurt. He understands when you're discouraged and why you become discouraged. He understands when Satan has worked you over and you're oftentimes tempted to give up. He understands when you get all out of sorts. He understands when you say things you shouldn't, when you think things you shouldn't, when you relate to other people in ways that you shouldn't. He understands you when you sin against him.

I didn't say he approved it. I said he understands it. You see, the reason he understands us so well is because wherever we've been with temptation, trial, heartache, and burden, he's already been there.

He's already been where we've been. And you see, he understands in a way that is encouraging and uplifting. And is it not true that all of us need somebody who fully understands us and doesn't try to explain everything and sort it all out and give us a bunch of solutions, but who just is willing to accept us as we are lovingly and understands why we're where we are at this point in our life and is not trying to make us over in a hurry, not trying to get us to match up to their expectations, but just understands. Friend, when the bottoms drop down in your life, is it not true that you want to talk to somebody who really understands?

Who's not trying to give you a bunch of solutions? Who's not trying to say, well, why don't you do this and why don't you do that and here's what you ought to do, but rather just able to understand you just where you are at this point in your life. And you see, all of us don't ever remain at the same point in our life. We change with time. Personality sometimes changes. Attitudes change.

Desires change. All of these things change in our life, but you see a true friend just hangs in there, accepts you, loves you, understands you and keeps on loving you. That is in spite of what you do or say, their understanding is such they accept you on the basis of being a person.

They don't cast you off. You're not a friend today and not tomorrow. You see, someone to whom you're a friend today but not tomorrow, that's not true friendship. If they're waiting for you to make a mistake, that's not true friendship.

And you remember this. If criticizing your friend is very, very, very painful to you, more than likely you're a true friend. But if you can criticize somebody else and he doesn't hurt you, that's not real friendship. You see, the deep of the relationship, true friendship, is not critical. Confronts, yes. Confronts, indeed, but not critical, not judgmental, because you see, true friends hurt when they have to confront, hurt when they have to bring to surface something and say, that's not right. You need to change that. True friendship is able to be understanding no matter what.

That's the fourth characteristic. That is, with Jesus Christ, you can be totally open and honest about everything. Let me ask you this. Is there anybody today who is your friend with whom you can be absolutely, totally open and honest with them? I mean, you can tell them anything, and they won't be harsh in their remarks. They will not be quick to respond in criticism and ask why and tell you how ashamed you ought to be.

But rather, just listen. Is there anyone with whom you can be absolutely open and honest? Most Americans will live their lives and never spend one minute totally opening themselves up to anybody in their whole life.

You know why? Because we don't trust other folks. Because we don't have the kind of deep relationship where we feel we could just suddenly be transparent and totally open, able to cry when we need to cry, share the deepest thoughts of our heart. Is there anyone with whom you can be absolutely and totally open? You see, one of the reasons we will not open up to other people is we're afraid if they find out what we really like, they'll reject us. They won't like us. But you see, since Jesus already knows what you really like, He's not going to be disappointed.

So you don't have any fear of Jesus suddenly turning on you, rejecting you, judging you, being critical of you because you began to unload your heart to Him. You see, He already knows it. Do you have a friend today that you can trust with the innermost being of your heart and tell him, this is the way I really feel, this is what I may appear to be, but here's what I really like, here's what I really feel, here's how deep I'm hurting. Is there anybody today that you can be a true friend with and open up and say, this is my real heart, and not fear being judged, totally transparent and open? Do you have a friend like that? Well, there's a fifth one. He's committed to you as a friend.

Now think about this. Jesus Christ is committed to you as a friend. He won't ever disappoint you. Oh, you may get disappointed, but it won't be because He disappointed you.

Your expectations may not have been exactly what wisdom and love would provide, but Jesus won't disappoint you. He'll never let you down. He'll never leave you. The Bible says He'll never forsake you. The 23rd Psalm is a beautiful affirmation of His walk with us, but you see, there's something about Jesus that's better than just having a friend to walk with us, because the Bible says He not only is my Savior and my Lord, the Bible says He's your life.

He's living on the inside of you. Jesus is committed to building a friendship relationship with you, and did you know that that's a life, that is an eternal commitment, not just a lifetime? Is there anybody that you expect to be your friend as long as you live?

Is there anyone today that you can say, He's committed to me, and I'm committed to Him? We are friends, no matter what. Everybody else in the world may leave me, but I know that he or she is my friend.

You see, that's the kind of friend Jesus is. You can't ever get Him to leave. There may be some places you'd like to go that you wouldn't want to carry Him too late. He's your friend. He's going with you everywhere you go. He's going to be faithful. He's going to be loyal. He's trustworthy.

He'll never disappoint you. He is a true, genuine friend. Do you have one like that?

Let me ask you a little bit more probing question. Are you that kind of friend to anybody? Loyal?

Faithful? No matter what other people say of what they do, they can always count on you for your emotional encouragement and support, whatever circumstance they may be going through. You see, that kind of friendship takes developing. Time, talking, listening, loving, understanding. Are we so busy doing our thing that we're too busy to develop loving friendships and relationships? Jesus is committed to us. Is there anyone you're that committed to? Thank you for listening to The Best Friend You'll Ever Have. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.