| With Friends Like These - article by Joel Hempel Who needs enemies? The Yale Book of Quotations states that comedian Joey Adams originated this saying. But it is no joke when friends can’t be trusted. When I was a preteen, my neighborhood friends and I built a clubhouse in my backyard. Not long after constructing it, I suggested we convert the clubhouse into a church. For some unknown reason, they agreed. Of course, one of our first acts as a church was to take up an offering. One day, when I came out to the church, I looked under the floorboard where we kept the money, and it was gone. As I recall, the total amount was 55 cents. Later in the week, when visiting my best friend, Jimmy, I saw the money in his guitar case. We had an ugly falling out! Two weeks later, Jimmy apologized, we made up and continued being best friends. With friends like these – we can deal with our enemies. Because true friends – even trusted friends – make mistakes, work through tension and disagreement, forgive each other, grow in their love for each other, and continue to provide the support needed to face our adversaries. Friends are crucial for our spiritual and emotional health and well-being. Thank God, Jesus is our eternal Best Friend Forever who will always be there for us, will never betray us, and is the one to be trusted above all others! But Scripture helps identify the kind of human friends we need to help us deal with enemies like frightening and painful diseases, broken relationships, financial challenges, emotional stress, oppressive temptations, and so much more. To get a handle on Christian friendship, Scripture provides this most helpful verse: John 15:13 (NIV): Greater love has no one than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. Jesus literally laid down his life for us. Few of us are called upon to do the same – except those who sacrificed themselves in war or as first responders. But we can lay down our life in many other ways. Laying down our life, or what the Bible calls denying ourselves as we follow Jesus, is challenging. Whether it is putting aside our needs to care for another, giving our energy and resources – sometimes to the point of exhaustion, or being present when needed elsewhere, such dedicated love can feel beyond our reach. Thank God for grace! Not only his saving grace through Jesus Christ but also his equipping grace. Not one of us can love with the self-sacrificing love Scripture describes. Therefore, we can thank God whenever we fail to follow through with our commitments and good intentions. Why? Because each failure gives us another opportunity to receive God’s forgiveness and acknowledge our dependency on the Lord’s strength. With God as our strength, we can recommit and be for each other the kind of faithful friend Jesus is for us. | 
