Friendship

I have been thinking about for friendship for the past couple days. Friendship has become so important to me over past couple of years. As I have passed through the seasons of my life, friends have come and gone. I have maintained contact with a number of friends from my teen years, but because we have gone our seperate ways and literally live all over the country, it is really hard to maintain the closeness. In my mid to late 20's and early 30's I had a lot of friends. As I began to renew my relationship with Jesus Christ, I realized that I could no longer be the person I use to be or do things that I use to do - I did not want to be that person anymore. I made a decision to not put myself in certain circles anymore. Lets just say I spent a lot of time in bars for several years with my "friends". I do still drink on occassion in moderation and do still keep contact with the old crew, I am just a different person now - I am walking with Christ. I have told my old friends this and they are really cool with it and respect my position of not wanting to party 24/7.

Today I face a bit of a challenge. I am trying to build friendships with other christians and I am finding that it is a lot of work. I find that I am always taking the initiative to call or make contact to set something up. I am always making the first move and then the second and then the third and so on. I find myself sitting back and thinking about previous encounters and wondering if I made some kind of mistake or perhaps offended somebody in some way. I find myself playing the time spent together back in my head to figure out what I could have done differently. I guess most guys just don't need what I am looking for. Maybe its like this with everybody? I read a quote today that said something like "Wanting friendship is split second decision, but real friendship takes time". I know friendship is something that needs to be worked on, I simply feel like I am always the one working at it. I was talking to Tammy (my wife) about it the last couple of days and she does see what I describe here as well. I tend to think its a guy thing, but I am sure there are others (men and woman) out there that feel the same way. For now, I will just continue to pray about it and ask Him for guidance when it comes to friendship.