Hello, Old Friends Part Three

I have had the most wonderful June and early July! Here's why:

I have the best friends.

Now I'm sure you think that you have the best friends. I'm sure yours are very good friends -- but mine are the best. Seriously.

Years ago, mine had a baby shower for me, a huge one. And this after I had not been to their baby showers, because I was going through infertility and couldn't take the emotional stress.

Mine did not let me pay for one meal while I was visiting on my birthday trip -- because I was turning 50, and because, as they put it, "You don't have a 50th birthday every day." And this after I had moved away and wasn't there for their 50th birthdays.

Mine clear their schedules when I come to visit. They drop mostly everything and make time and room for me to visit and be with them. They spend endless hours listening to me drone on about life wherever I live, kids and husband and life in general. We go to the same restaurant and order the same food, year after year. And this after I have not been there to listen to them at various times, because I only visit about once a year.

Mine will tell me I'm whining and to get over myself. They will agree with me that yes, I am crazy, and I probably do need a change of medication. They will tell me when I'm wrong in no uncertain terms, and to straighten up and fly right. And this when they could really just give up and go on to an easier, less challenging friend. It is hard to be friends with me. Expectations are high, and they live up to them. Consistently.

They communicate my value to them in infinite ways. And this when I am very nearly an abject failure in communicating to them their infinite value to me.

I don't have a lot of friends. You can count them all on about a hand and a half. There are maybe seven at best. Probably more like five.

But . . .

Most people don't enjoy the kind of friendships I have. They are deep, they are long, and they are precious. Endless people have entire lives go by without experiencing the kinds of friends that I have. And I don't just have one -- I have several.

I am no gardener. But these relationships are like plants. You grow them over long years of time. It takes patience and strength for them to grow. Pruning is hard; sometimes you have to cut away the dead parts. But the blossoms that result are far and away worth whatever pain was suffered.

So today I am thanking God for these relationships on which I cannot place a value; they are irreplaceable and priceless to me. I'm not sure there are even words with which to thank God for these people; they are Him to me in this world. I see Jesus when I look at them.

Have you seen Jesus today?

xoxoxox