How Can I Belong

Find Your People, Day 4
By Jennie Allen

Nothing in my relational life has helped me more than coming to terms with these simple truths: You will disappoint me. I will disappoint you. God will never disappoint us.

Accepting this shifts our expectations from people to God. And He can handle our expectations. But because our current world has been built on such rampant independence, it will take deliberate intention to return to the kinds of relationships that God had in mind for us to enjoy.

The most frequent question I am asked online is “How do I make friends?”

This is something sixty-year-olds are asking, twenty-five-year-olds are asking, and young moms are asking. I get it, because the art of making and keeping friends was never really spelled out for most of us.

But is it possible that we are asking the wrong question? What if that intimate circle we’re craving is actually found in the wider network of the village that we’ve been missing?

We wait for those perfect few friends to come along, and then we look to them to be everything to us. What if the power of a little team of friends is that each one brings different things to your life?

I have fun friends who always make me laugh. I have wise friends who give me advice and call me out. I have encouraging friends who cheer me on and tell me what I’m doing well. I have challenging friends who disrupt my thinking or push me to take greater risks.

If I expected one or two people to fill all those roles, no one would ever hit the mark. Also true: if I didn’t appreciate the unique roles my friends play in my life, I might be mad that my “challenger” friend doesn’t encourage me more, or my “wise” friend isn’t fun all the time.

If I start to see that God has put different people in my life to bless me in different ways, then I can both embrace who they are and rest in what I bring to those relationships.

Maybe the question we are really asking behind the question of “How do I make friends?” is this: “How can I belong to an intimate community of people?”

God, what “village” do You have for me? How can I grow in intimacy with that community? I pray for eyes to see how different people in my life show me different aspects of You. Amen.

As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. Proverbs 27:17

Carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. Galatians 6:2

But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. 1 John 1:7