 Amen. So keep your place in 1 Samuel chapter 20. This is of course the continuing story of David and Jonathan as Saul is after David and we see Jonathan's actions here to protect his friend. Just a great example of friendship in the Bible, Jonathan and David. We'll look at that in just a few minutes but what we're going to talk about this morning is friendship. We're going to talk about the idea of friendship. Now I preached a sermon I think it was a little over maybe it was close to a year ago on friendship and I talked in that that's when I brought the cat to church and everyone remember that right? I brought the cat in and just talked about being friendly and how we are to be friendly and you're to kind of get outside to be friendly. You turn to Proverbs chapter 18 you know the the context of that sermon was no matter what your you know your personality is is that we should step outside that and be friendly. The Bible says in Proverbs 18-24 it says that a man that hath friends must show himself friendly. So if you want to have friends the Bible is saying you must be friendly. You're like well you know that was the context of that the whole idea of that sermon was that you know it was basically to try to convince you to be a friendly church. You want to be a friendly church and you know it's everybody's kind of common tendencies to want to just talk to the people they know the best and and just kind of stay within their circles of comfort but when we have visitors in the church when we have you know look you should just get up and talk to people we should be getting up and going and being friendly and showing ourselves friendly. That was the whole idea of that that sermon. We want to have a culture here of being friendly people. When people come in to the church they want to come in here and we want them to walk away thinking those people were really friendly. Those people were friendly. So that was the context of that sermon. So you say what about this morning? So this morning I want to talk about something a little bit broader. I want to talk about something a little bit broader. Keep your place in Proverbs 18-24 and I want to look at this idea and I'm going to give you three simple steps this morning from the Bible just looking at the mainly Proverbs that talk about friendship and what the Bible says about friendship and I want to talk about having friendships and keeping friendships this morning and I want to give you three steps this morning that will that will allow you in your life just three very basic biblical steps to allow you to have and keep friendships for the long term in your life. This is something that a lot of you say this sounds very simple but this is something that a lot of people struggle with in their lives. Not only do I think the statistic that I with the last time I looked at it was 25 to 30% of people in the United States. This is outside of Christianity outside of church. 25% of people that's one in four people have no friends. They have no close friends. I'm sure it got worse over the last two years but what I want to look at this morning is how it is very biblical. It is very biblical and it is a great blessing to have friends. Friends defined as what the Bible says and to keep those friends for a long time. If you are the type of person that you have friends but I kind of have different friends every six months or I have different friends every year or whatever look that is something that in the Christian life should not happen. In your Christian life you should have friends for a lifetime. You should have friends for years and years and years. You should have the same friends. So that is what I want to look at this morning. I'll give you three basic steps on how to have long term friendships in your Christian life. So the first one is this. Keep your place in 1st Samuel chapter 20. You're going to look down at Proverbs chapter 18 and look at verse number 24 again. The Bible says in Proverbs chapter 18 and 24 a man that has friends must show himself friendly. There is a friend that stick closer to a brother. So look what the Bible here is saying is that it is possible to have close friends. It is possible to have close friends that are closer than even your brother. Brother that means that's talking about your literal brother. Like your brother or your sister in your family. So the Bible says that it's possible to have very close friends. So the first thing I want to look at this morning and this is the big miss with most people. Step one in having long term friendships and this is the big miss with people is having the proper defining principles of who your friends will be. That is step number one. Turn to Romans chapter 14. Just get ready for that. But what I'm talking about is what I would talk about in the engineering world of having the proper design criteria for your friendships. Like who are my friends going to be? Who should I be friends with? What does that mean if someone, and this is the big miss for most people, this is if you've ever heard about people saying oh well he fell into the wrong crowd. You know he fell into the wrong crowd. He fell into you know some group of bad friends. This is the miss right here is that their friends, the design criteria for their friendships was wrong. Design criteria what do I mean? If somebody comes to brother Jeff and they want to build a building the design criteria would mean well this building has to hold this many people. This building can only be one story. This building has to fit within this footprint of land or of this lot or whatever it is. The design criteria is just what you base you know that thing off of. So what are our friendships to be based off of? And this is the big miss that most people have. You know this is this would be somebody for example you know it's like what do I want out of this friendship is the kind of things that you have to ask. These are the designing principles that you need to think about when you look at who you should be friends with. What is important to me? When you think about things that people choose to align themselves and people choose friends with think about things like you know a motorcycle club. You know this is one way people do it. Like oh we all bought the same brand of motorcycle so let's all be friends. Like that's not that's not the right way but that's that's what I'm talking about. What are the designing principles of who I'm gonna be friends with? You know many people are like we like the same sport so we're all gonna be friends. Many people or we have we have the same hobbies so we'll all be friends. But there's nothing wrong with sports and there's nothing wrong on its face with hobbies but these should not be the designing criteria the designing principles of who we are friends with in our lives. You think about you know people even people have some pretty silly stuff like we all like Star Trek so let's be friends. You know let's be in a Star Trek club or whatever right a comic book club. These are the shallow things that people today are using to define who their friends are. Okay but the problem with the Christian is we can't do that. We can't do that because we can't I mean some people define friendships just by we all like the same sin. You know this is the the drinking buddies right here. You know they literally they're only friends with each other because they're they're validating each other in their own sin. I mean that's the that's the drinking buddy club right there. The guys that go out after work and just drink together it's like we're all just validating ourselves in our own sin. That's all that is. I mean these are the wrong ways to define friendships. These are how people fall into the wrong crowd. This is how you know people fall into the wrong or bad friendships. So the first thing I just I'll give you a just a personal example of how I define my friendships. Okay my my friendships are defined by biblical principles and doctrine. That's what defines who my friends are and who they're not. You know I mean they that people they're saved. You know they're they're saved people they believe the right gospel but much more than that much more than that they they look if you're saved and you study the Bible you go to church you under it's pretty easy to understand the basic principles of the Bible. It's pretty easy to see what God wants you to be doing in your life with your life with your family with your children. This is why we come to a church like this. This is why I went to Verity Baptist Church. This is why you come here. So I define my friendships on people that you know based their lives on I mean they're saved and then they base their lives on biblical principles and doctrines. If it's in the Bible that's what we believe. But here's the thing in Romans 14 outside of that outside of that I'm pretty lenient actually on who my friends are much much much more than I used to be 20 years ago before I was saved. Look at Romans chapter 14. We kind of get a guiding principle. Romans 14 it doesn't go through everything here but what it's trying to get you to understand is a philosophy. It's trying to give you a philosophy here a methodology on things that you should be concerned about and things that you shouldn't be concerned about. Look at Romans 14 in verse number six. We're just getting kind of a guiding principle on friendships here. So like I said my friendships are defined by people that you know they're saved they believe the right gospel and they're they're living their lives by the Bible. They're living their lives they're raising their children by the Bible. But look at Romans 14 in verse number six. My friendships are not defined on everyone having the exact same opinion of me on as me about everything. Okay but look this is people will try to do this. My my friendships are not based on that. Look at verse six of Romans 14. The Bible says he that regardeth the day regarded it unto the Lord and he that regardeth not the day to the Lord he does not regard it. He that eateth eateth to the Lord for he giveth God thanks and he that eateth not to the Lord he eateth not and giveth God thanks. So this gives two examples right here. It gives an example of somebody who who regards a holiday a holy day and somebody who doesn't celebrate a holy day. Somebody that celebrates Christmas and somebody that doesn't celebrate Christmas. It's saying hey as long as they both do it to the Lord I know of one person is not celebrating Christmas so they can be pompous and and arrogant and you know degrade those who do celebrate Christmas that's wrong. But if somebody feels like in their conscience well I don't really think Jesus was born on that day so we just choose not to celebrate that day. You know and then the person that does says well we might not believe Jesus was born on that day or whatever but we just we find it a nice day to you know recognize the birth of Christ. It's like they're both right is what the Bible is saying. It's like don't don't be getting after each other over those types of things. The same thing with eating certain things and not eating certain things. Some people may you know say I don't like crickets or whatever. I'm not gonna let that one go for a while. But you know I don't like crickets because I believe you know I mean look there's nothing wrong with eating crickets. I can't even come up with a biblical reason that you would not eat crickets other than it's a bug and why would you eat it. But anyway the point is it's we're not supposed to divide over those things. We're not supposed to divide over things like that. It says verse 7. For none of us liveth unto himself and no man dieeth himself. For whether we live we live unto the Lord whether we die we die into the Lord. Whether we live therefore or die we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ both died and rose and revived that he might be the Lord of both the dead and the living. Verse number 10 kind of wraps it up. But why dost thou judge thy brother? Or why dost thou set it not thy brother? For we should all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. It's just saying like on these things that are just outside the Bible. The Bible doesn't even really I mean even like Christian standards. I mean maybe I don't go to a place that another person goes to. And I choose that you know I don't go to this place because I have too many TVs and I don't want my kids at the ages that they are seeing the things that are on the TVs. But somebody else does go to those places because they're like it's saying don't you we're all going to stand before Jesus and find out what we did right and wrong. It's like there's no reason to separate over these types of things. It's talking about you know outside of like basic biblical principles that the Bible defines specifically is saying don't be it not. Don't be divisive against your brother over these things. It's what it's saying. So this is talking about like different standards, different opinions on things you know outside of like the basic doctrines of the Bible. Like I said I'm pretty lenient. I mean I know a lot of my friends have different opinions than me on several different things. But we all agree on the principles of the Bible for sure because that's my design criteria. Turn to Proverbs chapter 27. Turn to Proverbs chapter 27. Let's look at some examples of this. Go to Proverbs chapter 27. Examples of this are things like you know your view of history. You know maybe you know you have a different view of something that happened 300 years ago or a historical event than I do. Hey whatever. You know I mean that's that's just the way I mean politics. I mean I care less. I think I care less about politics every single day of my life. I'm certainly not going to like separate from friends that I have you know that we both believe the Bible. I'm certainly going to separate from friends over politics or you know a view of something that's happening in the world. I remember almost a year ago I was talking with Pastor Anderson. I was talking with Pastor Anderson and we were talking about all kinds of things like all of these big historical things and we're talking about you know the world wars. We're talking about the revolutionary war and somehow I don't know how it got brought up. Maybe I brought up. I don't know but the French Revolution got brought up. Now I know some stuff and I have opinions about the French Revolution and what happened there and what I think you know my my opinions on you know the philosophies that were at play there but I by no means an expert on the French Revolution as a matter of fact it was kind of such a question mark in my mind that I like two or three years ago I bought this book that's like this thick because I was like I would just like to know more about the French Revolution. I bought this book like this thick and I haven't read it yet. It's still sitting on my bookshelf. I haven't had time to read it and I was talking with Pastor Anderson and I hope he wouldn't mind me telling this story but we're just kind of going off on our thoughts on the French Revolution and he had quite a different take on it than I did and I was I was just like I had never really heard that take before but it was also very clear that he like he had really looked into the French Revolution. He really knew like a lot of the different players that I had never even really heard of and it was pretty clear but it look it was just kind of like I kind of came away from that conversation being like you know maybe he's right about that. I don't know if he's it I need to look into the French Revolution more. It's kind of how I came away from that conversation but I certainly wasn't like oh he has a different opinion than me like it's like no the Bible says in Proverbs 27 it says iron sharpeneth iron. It says so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friends. Look I don't want a bunch of yes men for my friends. I mean it's okay that you know a friend of yours would have a different take on something because guess what that sharpens you that makes you better in many cases. I'm not talking about different Bible doctrines and Pastor Anderson and I were both to you know we were both very clear on like you know just like even as we got out of that conversation just being like hey all that matters is the Bible. Amen. Amen. But look a man can sharpen the countenance of his friends. I mean who wants a bunch of friends that just agree with everything that they say. I don't. I mean some people I'm sure want that and some people would have a very some people have a very difficult time. Some people have a very difficult time if somebody doesn't agree with every single opinion that they have. These types of people are not going to have any friends in their life because there's like no one on the planet that has every single same opinion as you on every everything. So look the Bible says that your friends your friends should sharpen you. There's a there's a good saying that I love it's out there it says if you're the smartest one in the room you're in the wrong room. You should hang around friends that that make you better. Pastor Mahia who's coming here in just a couple of weeks him and I were talking for several hours and he was talking to me about how he got started preaching and the different types of preaching that he does and he was just kind of just talking for we were in a car for a long time and we were talking for hours. He was talking about all these different types of preaching and the the the preaching that he likes and the the benefits of each different one and I'm just sitting there and I'm just like taking it all in because that's something that I'm not even close to an expert on and so it's it's great to be sharpened by people like this but if you're you get into conversations and you're the kind of person you're like I need to I need to at least pretend like I know everything about this or I need to have friends where I know everything or I'm the one that knows the most about everything or at least I need to make it look that way look you're not going to have any friends and if you do they're not going to sharpen you you're going to have a bunch of people that just agree with whatever you say and that's that's not what the bible says friendship should be friends should sharpen friends friends should sharpen friends so look I mean I because I'm an expert on some things but I'm the who's an expert on everything nobody all right so look you should have biblical defining principles on who your friends are but I'm not talking about small doctrines either I'm not talking about we all have to have the exact same you know opinion on bible prophecy because guess what most people that have opinions on bible prophecy including myself are going to be wrong in a lot of places because the bible is not clear on it like who's Babylon is it us is it not I don't know I have an opinion but it could be wrong you know look it's mainly just these biblical doctrines and principles the main ones and then living and adhering to these principles raising our children to these principles you know all the other stuff I mean this is how this is how christians by the way this is how christians I look at some of who my friends are and I look at where they came from I look at their cultures I have friends that came from completely different cultures than me I have friends that were born in different countries than me but we're all great friends why because we all adhere to these biblical principles all right that is the first step in being able to have long lasting friendships is choosing your friends on the proper criteria and everything look everything outside of that that's how that's how like we people would come and they would look at who I'm friends with they would look at who we're all friends with in this church and they would be shocked because it's not how most people today choose their friends most people choose their friends are very shallow things people that grew up in the same town as me people that went to the same high school as me all these shallow things is what people define their their friendships the christian friendship is defined on the bible only which means we're gonna have friends from all different backgrounds and all different cultures but now we all just we're striving for this culture this is how you will have friends for your whole life turn to proverbs chapter 17 so that's the first one that's the first one and most people are a complete miss on the first one all right so if you pick your friends if you choose your friends with the right design criteria you're heading in the right direction but there's more to it than that turn to proverbs chapter 17 turn to proverbs chapter 17 now we're going to get into the story a little bit about david and jonathan but look at proverbs chapter 17 in verse number 17 the bible says a friend loveth at all times and a brother is born for adversity the second key to having long lasting friendships notice how it says at all times the second key to having long lasting friendships in the christian life is loyalty loyalty to your friends the bible says a friend loveth at all times you know what that means that means the good times and that means the bad times in your life i mean you ever heard of the the the saying fair weather friends fair weather friends that's a friend that hey you know this is this is this is the the billionaire this is what he has yes fair weather friends because he has friends that are they're friends with him because like everything's good like he has all kinds of money and it's just all everything's paid for and all this this is the type of person that you know wants to have friends by just paying them and buying them things and just giving them i mean these are fair weather friends that you're going to have if that's how you operate fair weather friends they're there they're your friend as long as things are good but you lose that money you go through hard times in your life and the fair weather friends are going to leave you turn to john chapter 15 turn to john chapter 15 so the second thing that you need to understand about friendship and having a long lasting friendship is you should be a loyal friend a friend loveth at all times the good times and the bad times look at john chapter 15 now you're going to put a bookmark in john chapter 15 because we're going to come back there at the end of the sermon go to john chapter 15 and look at verse number 12 jesus says this is my commandment that he loved one another as i have loved you so jesus is telling us hey love one another and then look what he says he says greater love hath no man than this that a man lay down his life for what for his friends so jesus here is saying is like how well how loyal how loyal should i be to my friends well if you really want to love your friends you'll give your life for them is what jesus is saying he's like that is that is the best friend you could be a friend that is going to literally sacrifice his life for his friend so once you have friends defined properly you should stand by your friends literally jesus is saying even if it costs you your life my wife is reading a book now about these five missionaries it's a very famous story it's called through the gates of splendor it's about these five christian missionaries that wanted to reach this tribe in south america somewhere i think and they wanted to reach this tribe and this tribe was very violent and it was this tribe that was that was just i mean it was just this tribe was just wicked it to to hell they were they were violent they just killed their own children and they just had like this burden to get the gospel to these people and these friends these missionaries they literally they devoted their lives together they're all from they're from different backgrounds these guys they devoted their lives together and they all died together they all died together with the the goal the mission of getting the gospel to this tribe and look they their deaths ended up changing generations changing getting the gospel into that tribe and changing that tribe for generations that tribe has changed today because of those five men that died but what do they do they literally died for each other they literally laid down their life for the gospel they really died for jesus i get that but their friendship was defined by biblical principles by the gospel and their friendship i'm sure they all didn't have the same opinion on everything i'm sure maybe they had different political thoughts on certain things or what but their main goal they they literally took to their deaths together this is what it's about they stood by each other here's the thing people drop friends for the craziest things people drop friends for differing opinions people drop friends because friends make mistakes some friend makes a mistake or slips up look i'm not talking about abandoning the bible i'm not talking about a friend that's like i'm just going into sin now you know and you need to stand by me in my sin that's not what i'm talking about i'm talking about a friend that maybe wrongs you in some way and then you know even comes to you and apologizes like hey i'm sorry about that was wrong of me to do that and then friends just ditch their friends you know here's the thing folks that we need to realize and people people get this wrong about us all the time we believe we believe that we are saved by grace through faith alone we are not saved we are not going to heaven by anything that we do yet people will look at us they will look at someone living a bible believing christian life they will look at our separation they will look at places that we go places that we don't go people that we hang out with people we don't hang out with things that we do things that we don't do and they'll look at us and they'll say they'll say man you're a bunch of legalistic Pharisees but here's the thing we're not a bunch of legalistic Pharisees we're not a bunch of legalistic Pharisees see our people but people see our principles they see our separation and they assume that about us look no the legalistic Pharisees are the Pentecostals they're the ones they may look similar to us but they're the ones who have a pastor saying you better separate you better do this stuff you're going to go to hell you better dress the right way you're going to go to hell we are doing these things and i'll show you at the end why we're doing these things but we're doing these things not to get ourselves to heaven we look different so look here's the thing don't be a Pharisee in your friendships don't be don't have a friend that messes up and then be like we're done i tell my kids all the time i tell my kids all the time i was like you kids are so lucky you kids are so lucky because they have friends look you see some of these friends and a lot of you probably have these friends they have friends from from verity they have friends from first works they have friends from sure foundation you know what these are going to be friends for life that they're going to have but if one of their friends like does something wrong to them or slips up or whatever it's not like oh i'm not your friend anymore i mean how i mean what how would you feel if you had friends and you made a mistake in your life and all of a sudden your friends are like we're not friends with you anymore because you made a mistake you're like thanks i'd rather have no friends than have friends like that seriously to have friends you know what those are fair weather friends guess what we're all living this biblical life we're all living these biblical principles we're all trying to raise our kids by these these principles of separations we're all trying to keep our kids from this wickedness out here and it can be done but it might be possible that my kids or your kids or somebody's kids mess up and then you know we're not to be these Pharisees they just want to destroy and just be like i don't want to be your friend anymore it's like that's crazy what kind of psychopath would would want i mean would would be that kind of friend and nobody nobody would want a friend like that you would rather if you if all your friends were like that and you knew it you would not want them as friends so look friends are going to mess up friends may have different opinions than you and you know what even even so but you need you should be loyal to your friends i'm not talking about like if you know i'm the pastor and all sudden you know like i do some horrible thing like get divorced or and then i'm just like i should still be the pastor because i'm the pastor that's this isn't what i'm talking about i'm saying like we still adhere to biblical principles but just one of your friends just slips up in his life he slips up in his life go to first Samuel chapter 18 first Samuel chapter 18 you know what it's the tough times it's the being friends and it's being loyal through tough times and here's the irony of it if you've never if you've never had a friend for longer than six months or you've never had a long-term friend maybe you've never even or you're just the kind of friend that anytime that you find something wrong with every one of your friends and then you drop them you know you you change friends like you change shirts if you're that type of friend you have no idea what i'm talking about but here's what really solidifies and strengthens friendships the irony is this what strengthens friendships is going through tough times with those friends loyalty strengthens friendships you will probably not find a friendship in the bible of two men that is stronger than the friendship of david and jonathan look at first Samuel chapter 18 in verse number one tough times and loyalty through tough times it solidifies and strengthens friendships look at how it began with david and jonathan and it came to pass when he had made an end of speaking under Saul that the soul of jonathan was knit with the soul of david and jonathan loved him as his own soul you know what had just happened you know what had just happened in the previous chapter this army Saul and his son their kingdom was being threatened their kingdom was being threatened by the philistines they were all they were all literally terrified they were terrified that they were going to be overthrown and destroyed by the philistine army and this kid comes along and he he wins this victory he wins this victory for Saul and for jonathan this is when david killed goliath when he was speaking to Saul in verse number one this is right after he brought Saul goliath's head and it says this is what began and solidified the the soul of of jonathan being knit to the soul of david friendships through trials are forged stronger turn to ecclesiastes chapter seven so strong look your you could have friendships so strong no this is super important to understand this part turn to ecclesiastes chapter seven you can have friendships that are so strong that Solomon himself compared this strength of this friend of friendships between two men two two even even relationships that he could have with his wife or you know we know the messed up problems that he had there but the point is look at ecclesiastes chapter seven in verse number 26 ecclesiastes chapter seven in verse number 26 and i find more bitter than death the woman whose heart is snares and nets so he's he's he's got some bitterness towards women but this is his own fault and her hands is bans who so pleases god shall escape from her but the sinner shall be taken by her behold this have i found say at the preacher counting one by one to find out the account which yet my soul seeketh but i find not one man among a thousand have i found but a woman among those have i not found now of course we know from first king's chapter 11 that Solomon had seven hundred wives and 300 concubines and that is what took his heart from the lord this is what he's lamenting here in verse number 26 he's saying if a man is strong towards the lord he's like he won't fall into this snare of these women because it was the women that took him away from the lord it was the women in him just you know giving into all their false gods and giving them what they wanted that they literally stole his heart from the lord and look the lord told him that that would happen but he did it anyway and guess what it also stole it stole the opportunity that he would have to have a strong relationship with a wife he never had look what he says here he says one man he said i've had a good friend he's like but guess what it's one in a thousand it's one in a thousand but he never had a good marriage well you're not going to have a good marriage if you have 700 if 699 other wives you're not going to have a good marriage i'm sorry all right but the point is is that if we just look at the kind of the secondary lesson here of what he's saying in chapter seven he's saying in verse number 28 he's saying even a loyal friend which is such a powerful thing is one in a thousand it's extremely rare he says you know what i've had a loyal friend but it's still it's it's rare the rare the the rare friend is one that is loyal is what we can take from solomon's lesson here so all i'm trying to say is be one be a loyal friend stand by your friends in good times which is easy and bad times which is not so easy many times turn to proverbs chapter 27 you say well what if a friend you know what if a friend like goes into sin and what if a friend is is is struggling with you know his christian walk you know what what then turn to proverbs chapter 27 turn to proverbs chapter 27 proverbs chapter 27 and look at verse let me go there myself and look at verse number six proverbs 27 look at verse number six look look what the bible says here it says faithful are the wounds of a friend but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful you know what this is saying you know saying a friend if if two men are friends and one friend starts doing something that's not right it's it's saying if a friend wants to sharpen his friend in that case he's saying hey you need you need to get out of that sin you need to get back into the principles of the bible you need to you know he needs to tell him what he needs not what he wants to hear what he needs to hear and you know what the bible is saying the bible is saying that that's faithful that if a friend would would try to grab his friend that's going into sin pull him back into the christian life is that that is faithful you know what that's loyalty that's a loyal friend it's a loyal friend that tries to get somebody out of sin that tries to pull their friend back from sin saying hey look that's not right it's not friendship to just have somebody that just goes into sin and just go with them into sin and just you know follow them into that or pretend like it's not a problem that's not faithful that's not loyal right so look here's the two things so far you need to choose your friends with the right criteria you need to choose your friends by biblical principles find friends that that are saved friends that believe the bible and friends that are trying to actually live the bible because look there you could you could have a lot of friends out there that are saved that believe the bible but just they're not going to do anything that's in it you could have a lot and you know you need to be separate from those friends the bible is saying just just if we're living by the bible if we're saved you know that should define who our friends are and the next one is stand by your friends stick by your friends turn to proverbs chapter 18 what's the third one turn to proverbs chapter 18 proverbs chapter 18 here's the interesting thing the same way you get friends by being friendly the bible says you know is the same way you know if you look at proverbs chapter 18 where we started the sermon proverbs 18 24 the bible says a man that hath friends must show himself friendly so the same way you get friends is going to be the same way you keep friends so in order to keep your friends you must show yourself friendly you must be friendly you must take action in your life i have a i have one friend i'll call him out by name here i have a friend that i've been friends with for a long time ever since we moved to california brother salvador from verity baptist church many of you know brother salvador we've been friends for a long time and brother salvador he shows me up on this first constantly brother salvador he sends me a message every single time my kids have a birthday every single time it's my anniversary every single time it's i'm not saying i i'm i'm not trying to get you to all you better do this i'm just saying like this is what he does he sends me a message every single child that has a birthday my birthday my anniversary i mean he's constantly happy happy birthday pastor he's constantly reaching out to me and he's he's constantly showing me up as a friend where i'm just like i need to be a better friend here but what's he doing he's reaching out he's keeping in touch we don't we live three hours away now we live three hours away he's he's constantly reaching out and making sure because friendships the unique thing about friendships is you know think of the second law of thermodynamics if you don't add energy it's going to die friendships both sides have to add energy constantly both sides of a friendship have to be adding energy so brother salvador is just constantly adding energy to the friendship and then i'm constantly you know talking to him and you know like i said he's better at it than me he's better at it than me he's constantly reminding me about what it means to be a friend and i'm look i'm very he's sharpening me he's sharpening me i'm very thankful to him for that look you need to be taking action towards your friends you can't just be like oh these people they contact me um every every once in a while um they're my friends well they're probably just in the case where people are just constantly reaching out to you people that come into a church and people are just being nice to you constantly but you do nothing in return you're not doing anything towards that friend look that's just someone being nice to you that's just someone that's just giving to you that's not that's not what the bible would call a friendship because a friendship needs to have energy added on both sides and that will be a strong friendship actually look actually showing that you care by doing things by taking action it takes effort it takes effort to maintain a friendship especially especially friendships where people don't live in the same town as us we have a lot of friendships like that where people don't live in the same town as us but you know you need to be reaching out keeping in communication how are you doing i mean just all these different things visiting people i mean these are what you know keeps friendships alive friendships the third point is that friendships require regular maintenance you know just just like anything you know you don't maintain your car you just use it i mean how many people have you know i know people like this you ever met somebody that they buy a car and they just drive it until it breaks and then they throw it away and they get a new car look it's not a it's not a it's not a cheap way to live they just drive it till it breaks they don't change the oil they don't do anything they don't put tires on it they don't put brakes on it they just literally drive it until it stops running you ever met somebody like that and then they go and they they're like i need a new car and they go get another car and they do the same thing look people some people operate in a in a friendship that way you're not going to have long-term friends if you operate that way you have to maintain you have to maintain you have to talk talk to your friends how are you going to know if your friend is in a good time or in a bad time if you never talk to them if you never reach out to them you know if you never ask them hey how are you doing do you get in conversations you know you this is the person who gets in conversations they just talk about themselves constantly when you get in conversations with your friends how are you doing what are your concerns tell me about what's going on in your life and they're just like i i just i'm having problems and i need i need help with this thing at my house and you're just like be that warmed brother you do nothing but look if you talk to your friends you'll know when they're going through hard times you'll know when they're going through bad times you can actually help them you can be a prophet to them as james chapter two says and guess what that will make your friendship stronger that will solidify your friendship turn to first samuel chapter 19 first samuel chapter 19 look at what jonathan did look at what jonathan did sol hated david sol was trying to kill david and jonathan just think about it from a worldly monarchy perspective jonathan his dad was the king you know what that means from a worldly perspective now we know what the bible says we know in first samuel 15 that sol's already lost the kingdom that he's no longer the king but he thinks he is he's just like i'm doing it my way i'm doing it the world i'm still the king and my son's going to be the king and but look at what jonathan is doing despite himself look at verse number four of first samuel chapter 19 says and jonathan spake good of david under sol his father and said unto him let not the king sin against his servant against david because he had not sinned against thee and because his works have been to the word very good you know what he's doing he's kind of wounding his father here he's kind of you know lightly you know wounding his father he's giving some faithful words to his father saying dad what you're doing isn't right what you're doing is is sin david has done nothing wrong and he's doing it at his own detriment look at first samuel chapter 20 in verse number 30 sol knew this sol knew that jonathan loved david and david loved jonathan and they were just great friends look at verse 30 of first samuel chapter 20 the bible says then sol's anger was kindled against jonathan and he and he said unto him thou son of a perverse and rebellious woman so clearly sol didn't have a good relationship with jonathan's mom do i not know that thou has chosen the son of jesse to thine own confusion in order to confusion of thy mother's nakedness here let me just translate verse 30 for you he's like you're just like your mother it's what he says to jonathan he says you you know you're just like your mother he's like you've chosen david over your own self but that's what you're supposed to do as a friend you're supposed to choose your friends over yourself a friendship should and will require sacrifice but you know a lot of people a lot of people they're just like they don't want to sacrifice anything they don't want to sacrifice anything for anybody he's like this is the fair weather friend look at verse number 31 for as long as the son of jesse liveth upon the ground thou shalt not be established nor thy kingdom wherefore now send and fetch him unto me for he shall surely die basically sol is saying don't you know that as long as david's alive you're never going to be the king and he's like what are you an idiot but jonathan didn't care about himself he cared about what he cared about the principles that his friendship was based on and as long as the principles that his friendship was with david were based on were true he was going to be loyal to his friend this is a huge lesson for us in friendship just be loyal and look maintain those friendships and maintaining a friendship could cost you it could cost you it could it could mean that there's sacrifice involved just like jonathan didn't care his dad threw a javelin at him his dad literally tried to kill him because he wouldn't abandon his friend david so look that's some serious maintenance right there and i can't imagine two people being closer friends than these two men after what they went through together turn to jon chapter 15 so what do we see to maintain long-lasting friendships lifelong friendships in christian life you need to choose your friends properly according to the bible you need to be loyal to those friends and then you need to maintain those friendships and that means putting just like jonathan that means putting their interests before your interests you know what a great friendship is a great friendship is two men or two people two ladies whatever that they're constantly trying to outdo each other one friend helps one with his house and the other friend helps the other with his with his car or whatever and they're constantly like they're constantly thinking i need to help him i need to help him because like he's helped me i need to help him back that's two friends that are going to be good friends is two friends that are constantly trying to be a blessing to each other and they're trying to they're trying to out bless each other that's a good friendship right there that's a good friendship look at jon chapter 15 and look at verse look back at verse number 13 jesus says greater love had no man than this that a man lay down his life for his friends now if you can't choose keep your place there if you can't choose the right friends and you can't be loyal to those friends and you can't sustain friendships with people then guess what look at the next verse henceforth have i call i call you not servants for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth but i have called you what i've called you friends for all things that i've heard of my father i have made known unto you notice what he says in verse 14 he says you're my friends if you do whatsoever i command you so jesus is saying that if you follow my commandments life you're my friends now is every saved person a friend of jesus according to this definition no does that mean they're not saved no but this is this is jesus's definition of what a friend to him is he says you're my friends if you do what i tell you if you follow what the bible says you're my friends that means that there's a lot of saved people out there that aren't friends of jesus so you see how important you see how important your christian life is with being able to sustain friendships jesus literally calls living the victorious christian life living for him he literally calls that a friendship that's why good friendships and lifelong friendships they come along with the christian life lifelong friendships that it's a bonus it's a bonus to the christian life just like those missionaries they live for christ together they died for christ together but they were all friends of christ many people will never have long friendships and it's a shame it's a shame because you know this is the friend of the month friend of the year whatever you want to call it it's a fray it's a shame because if you're this kind of person that's just going to find something wrong with every single person that you ever come across you know the bible says you're never going to have long friendships and look that is a direct result the bible says that your christian life is a long friendship it's it's the same thing if you have the same problems with friends on this earth you'll have the same problems with jesus that's what the that's what jesus is saying because following what he says and following his commandments he defines as a friendship look it's a shame that people could be saved people could believe the bible and then not have long friendships it's a shame but you know what it's their fault because they're not following what the bible says you know i mean all people have to do is get in church stay in church follow the program of that church and you will have long friendships it's it's it's really that simple it might not be easy at times but it is that simple and you know it's a huge blessing i think of i think of like my friends and i just i just i can't even begin to tell you how much of a blessing my friends are to me it's a huge blessing and and if you're leaving it on the table and you're not listening to what the bible says and you don't have long friendships it's your your let you're leaving behind a huge blessing of this christian life base your friendships on principle you know even look even personality you know i have friend i have friends i have friends that have completely different personalities than me and you know what 20 years ago before i was saved i probably wouldn't have been friends with people that had such differing personalities for me now i literally don't care i mean friends and one one friend maybe likes trump maybe one friend doesn't like trump i could care less about that i could care less about that just and then be loyal to those friends and maintain your friendships look work on your friendships think about who your friends are today in this week you know when's the last time you you looked and you reached out to your friends and you said hey how are you doing how are you doing how is that thing that we talked about a month ago how how are you do you need is there anything i can do for you when's the last time you did that this is the maintenance look we get so we get so wrapped up in our own lives that we forget about everything except the way the world looks from our perspective that's wrong we should be wrapped up in the lives of other people i'm not talking about nosing into people's business i'm talking about just caring about the business of other people putting people's priorities in front of ours you know what many times you get wrapped up in your own self and you get wrapped up in things and you're down on things it's because you're too wrapped up in yourself go wrap up yourself helping somebody else go go go do some do some maintenance work on your friendships and build those friendships and help people out and you know what you'll feel a lot better about everything that's how you can have long lasting friendships folks it's not complicated but it does take effort and it does take biblical knowledge and biblical principle what's by our heads and have a word of prayer