Everyone wants to have friends, and as Christians we cleverly say that to have friends we must be friendly. Undoubtedly true, yet nonetheless a true friend, a real friend, is hard to find. He will not usually be hard to keep but he will be hard to find.
The character that wrote the letter in the recent Frankenstein post sought someone with similar taste. C. S. Lewis defined friendship as something that "arises out of mere Companionship, when two or more companions discover that they have in common some insight or interest or even taste which others do not share, and which, till that moment each believed to be his unique treasure (or burden)." (The Four Loves)
Friendship, true deep Friendship, is hard to find. Yet it is not so much a rarity, but rather a novelty. In another book Lewis wrote, "a man seldom mentions what he had supposed to be his most idiosyncratic sensations without receiving from at least one (often more) of those present the reply,'What! Have you felt that too? I always thought I was the only one." (Surprised by Joy) There are people out there just like you. In a very unique way you are just like everyone else.
A third look into the mind of Lewis produces, "Are not all lifelong friendships born at the moment when at last you meet another human being who has some inkling (but faint and uncertain even in the best) of that something which you were born desiring, and which, beneath the flux of other desires and in all the momentary silences between the louder passions, night and day, year by year, from childhood to old age, you are looking for, watching for?" (The Problem of Pain)
We are all looking for friends. We all want someone to identify with and be intimate with. They aren't really that rare. There are people like us. There is in fact One who offers to be closer than a brother. This Man is more like us than any other. He has experienced everything we have ever experienced and has practiced, even enjoyed, many of the practices we enjoy. He just never got involved with the bad stuff, and so He is there to help us get out of the bad stuff, even to overcome it all. He has been out looking for friends, in fact He not only went out seeking friends but He even went out to save (or rescue) friends. He wants to be our best friend and His name is Jesus.
If Jesus becomes our best Friend that doesn't mean it's over. We can have more than one friend. It's just that we can only have one best Friend. But we can have the 'next best friend.' Just as accepting Christ is the biggest decision we can ever make there is another very important decision to be made in life, actually the second greatest decision.
This second decision and 'other best friend' is the person you marry. They say that 'opposites attract' and it is, partly, true. But a relationship such as marriage although it may be sparked by attraction it is not founded upon it. According to one professor, conflicts do not come from God (He is a God of peace) therefore we must look for the coincidences because it is certainly better to enjoy the coincidences than to resolve the conflicts in a relationship. Plus with coincidences you will have a 'common' ground on which to stand and therefore build.
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