This is a story of God’s faithfulness and answer to prayer regarding a lifelong friendship of mine. It makes my heart so full of joy every time I think about how God worked throughout our lives and friendship! I share this story, both because it’s encouraging to my soul to remember what God has done in my life, and because I hope that it might encourage someone else to put their hope and trust in God to work in their own difficult situation, whatever it may be. This is also a story of God not giving up on people. Distance, brokenness, failures don’t stop Him from loving you and those you care about, nor from accomplishing His greater purpose in the lives of His children. FriendshipA true friend is such a blessing, and I’ve been blessed to have one of these friends in my life. She’s one of those friends with whom you can pick up right where you left off, even when time and distance and brokenness has gotten in the way. My best friend and I met when we were about nine years old. We lived in the same neighborhood, and every now and then I would see her riding her bike around, and I wanted to meet her. Our brothers were already friends, so it seemed natural that we should be friends too! Despite her being the more outgoing one, every time I would start to approach her to say “hi,” she’d ride her bike back home, or run down the hill back to her house. But I was determined! Once I finally managed to introduce myself, we were inseparable from that point on. During the summers, we would spend several days at a time together. We’d play all day, and then she’d spend the night at my house. The next day, we’d play all day again, and then I’d go spend the night at her house. We never got tired of each other’s company. We spent our days reading teen magazines to learn all the fashion and make-up tips, playing outside building forts, singing all the songs from our favorite movies, having deep talks, and sharing secrets with each other. We even started an odd-job service in our neighborhood together, since we were too young to have jobs, but hungry for cash! Oh, we were such good friends. One of the things we often talked about was God. I grew up in a Christian home, but my friend did not. Sometimes I would talk to her about what Jesus had done on the cross for our sins, and while she was interested in what I had to say, she wasn’t ready to accept Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior. I prayed for her daily, and sometimes she would come to church with our family on Sundays. (Although coming to church with me at that age was definitely just another chance to hang out rather than out of a genuine interest in the sermon!) Nevertheless, she heard about Jesus both from our family and from the pastor. Changing TimesIn junior high, my friend’s parents divorced, and she ended up moving away from our neighborhood with her mom and brothers to an apartment in town. We were sad, but this didn’t immediately impact our friendship. My mom was a stay-at-home mom, and was generally willing to shuttle us back and forth so that we could still see each other. As time went on though, she started making new friends in her apartment complex, and I didn't get to spend as much time with her. Her new friends weren’t the type of people I clicked well with, and I think they were probably into a lot of things they shouldn’t have been. I tried hanging out with her new group of friends a few times, but I just didn’t really fit in. Failures and RegretsMy family eventually moved to a neighboring city, so it became even harder for us to connect. We talked on the phone often, but it was more challenging to hang out in person. One of the biggest regrets of my life happened during one of those phone calls. The topic of God came up again, and I asked my friend if she had accepted Jesus into her heart as her Savior. She replied softly, “No, but I want to.” Silence. I panicked. What do I do now? I should pray with her and help her ask help Jesus into her heart, but I’m too afraid to pray out loud! You see I was terrified and too insecure to pray with people. I had been my whole life. I didn’t know the right words to say, and I was afraid of sounding stupid. I guess that’s what it was. So I let the moment pass. Friendship fail. Now her eternal destiny is all screwed up because of me! It wasn’t really, because none of that depends on me, but that’s certainly how I felt for a long time after. Drifting and DistanceWe grew up in the days before cell phones, so it wasn't easy to get a hold of my friend. She was quite the social butterfly, so she was always out doing things with her new friends, and when I called her house, she wasn’t usually there. We drifted. We drifted, but I never stopped trying. She was my friend and I didn’t want to lose her! I continued to pray for her, despite our drifting apart. Faith and More FailureOne of the last times I saw her was on a Sunday when she came to church with our family, as she still did on occasion. This particular Sunday, the pastor prayed a prayer for those who would like to invite Jesus into their lives. It wasn’t anything unusual for a Sunday morning, but later that afternoon, we were walking up the stairs to my bedroom, and my friend out of the blue told me that she had prayed the prayer with the pastor that morning! I was ecstatic! And once again I didn’t know what to do or say. I should say something to help her know what to do next. I should help her study the Bible. I should teach her how to pray. But I didn’t know how to teach her those things. I didn’t really even know how to study the Bible very well for myself at that point, but I knew it was important. Again, friendship fail. I let the moment pass, like I had on that phone conversation months earlier when she said she wanted to ask Jesus into her life. I kicked myself and wondered for years “what if” I’d done it right? Fortunately for all of us, God doesn’t allow our failures to get in the way of His plan. My own inadequacies didn’t stop God from accomplishing His purpose in her life, but I wouldn’t know this for over a decade. Broken Heart and Unanswered QuestionsI think I only saw my friend a few more times after that day, and then I could no longer get a hold of her. I tried calling her so many times over the next months, maybe even years. But no answer. Even when I left messages, no call back. The last straw was when she actually answered the phone one time. I said “hello,” and I know she knew my voice, but she didn’t say anything. Silence. And then she hung up. Oh, my heart was so broken, and I started sobbing. I had so many questions. Why didn’t she want to talk to me? Was she ok? Did she know it was me when she hung up? Moving OnThe whole thing was starting to feel like a crazy obsession and I just had to let it go. If she didn’t want to be friends, I couldn’t force her. I resolved myself to stop reaching out to her, but I continued to pray and just trust God for His work in her life. I suspected that she was into some things with her new friends that she didn’t want to share with me. Whatever it was, I was heartbroken, and I had to move on with my life. Even though my heart was hurt, I continued to pray for her, and I hoped that one day God would allow us to reconnect. Life went on, and I matured and grew physically, emotionally, and spiritually during that time. I went off to college, traveled, started working, and got married. I thought about my friend often, with so many unanswered questions, and continued to pray for her over the years.
Good Ol' FacebookFifteen something years later, now that we had this handy tool called the Internet, I decided to do some Internet sleuthing (“aka” stalking!). Call me crazy, but I was still a determined to find my friend! It took a long time, because she had intentionally made herself hard to find, but one day by God’s grace found her! I could hardly believe it, and my eyes welled up with happy tears. Although she had used a different name on Facebook, I had managed to put together some shared connections and found her picture! The picture was of her holding her newborn baby in a hospital bed. She was older now, but it was definitely my friend! And she was a mama now! I excitedly poured over the rest of her Facebook page to see what I could learn about who she’d become. I looked over her pictures, including those of her wedding. And what made my heart the happiest was seeing pictures of her with her husband at church activities and going on a mission trip! I rejoiced that she was okay, that she likely knew Jesus, and that God had been faithful in her life when I couldn’t be there for her. He had watched over her and protected her throughout the years, when I was no longer able to be in her life. And if that’s where my search for her ended, I was content just to know that she was alive, happy, and that God was in her life. But of course I wanted to see her! Rejoicing over God’s Faithfulness Now came the scary part – reaching out to her. It had been a very long time, I still had a lot of questions, and I wasn’t sure how my communication would be received. I greatly feared more rejection, but I had to try. She had Facebook messaging blocked on her account, but now that I’d discovered her married name, I was able to track down her mailing address. I sent her a card in the mail with a brief note and my contact information, and put the rest in God’s hands. Now I waited. On June 28, 2012, my long lost friend sent me a message on Facebook! Nervously I opened it, and as I started to read, I could hardly hold back the tears. God is so good. Here is a snippet of what she wrote that totally blessed my socks off: I think about you and your family often. If nothing else, I'd really like you to know you were a pivotal person in my coming to Christ. Your's and your family's kindness and persistence definitely planted seeds that later blossomed. Also, coming from a broken home, I often reflect on your family unit and find myself looking to model that in my own home. What encouragement! Sometimes you just never know how God might be working in someone’s life, even when you can't see it. God had heard my prayers and held my friend tight in His hands, and I was blessed to be able to see the outcome of my endless prayers over the years. ReconnectingWe got together for lunch a week or two later and spent hours and hours catching up, sharing memories from our childhood, looking at pictures, and learning who the adult versions of each other had become. I asked her to share how her faith in Christ had come about. I was curious how much she remembered from our childhood, and what had taken place in her life since we were younger. Much like I suspected, she had become involved with some things that she wasn’t proud of. Her life went off track for a while, and amongst other things, she had started dabbling around with astrology, which opened her up to demonic influence and activity in her life. She told me some crazy stories about how she would wake up in the morning with big claw marks on her legs that weren’t there when she went to bed. There were other things too, but that’s the one I remember most distinctly. Naturally, she was afraid and turned to another Christian friend in her life. (Yay God for giving her another Christian friend!) That friend and her mom helped her turn her life back to Jesus. They prayed with her and told her that she needed to burn her astrology books to break the demonic stronghold that had formed in her life. When she did, the books went up in black smoke. After that, she was committed to Jesus and has been growing with Him since. I asked my friend if she remembered that day she told me she prayed with the pastor at church, but she didn’t. Even though it wasn’t a moment she remembered, God was faithful not to let her go, and I’m so thankful to Him for that. I believe that moment back then was real, but it was just a seed in God’s plan that would later blossom. We barely scratched the surface of all we wanted to talk about in that first reunion, but we continue to have lunch dates at least a couple times a year. We’re older now, and our lives are busier, but we have picked up right where we left off! A Picture of God's Love For UsI'm not so arrogant as to think I'm just like God, but I think this story provides a good picture of how God loves and pursues us. Maybe that's why He allowed things to happen the way they did. Just like I so persistently pursued my friend, even from the very beginning, so God pursues us. He chooses us to be His children and doesn't let us go. I didn't choose my friend because there was anything so perfect about her or anything like that, and I didn't keep pursuing her for so long because she treated me so well. In fact, she really wasn't a very good friend for a stretch of time. It hurt when she parted ways with me, but she was still my friend, and I still loved and cared about her. God chooses and pursues us and even lets us go our own way for awhile, but He never stops loving us. If we're being stubborn, sometimes He gives us over to our own devices so that we can see what life is like without Him, experience the consequences, and run back to His loving arms. God is deeply grieved when we turn away from Him, but He never stops loving us, and He never stops pursuing those who are His children. Lessons to LearnWhile my story is not your story, I want you to come away with a few things:
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AuthorFull time office worker, full time wife, and full time lover of Jesus. I'm kind of a Bible nerd, and I have a passion for finding ways to introduce Jesus in a practical way to everyday people doing everyday things. Archives
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