Weekday Warrior | Week 2

Well, morning. How are we doing Rock Point?

I was reading this stat the other day that said the average social media user is on seven different platforms. Isn't that crazy? They're on Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram maybe but I was thinking about it and I'm like, there's only one that truly matters and that's the OG, MySpace. Y'all remember MySpace? Who had a MySpace?

Let's go. Who still checks their Myspace? I'll have one lady in the last service, I was hoping for one but my favorite thing about Myspace, this was the first social media platform that I was on in middle school and you know outside of that, I'd always like post you know a profile picture of me flexing for the ladies.

And then I'd always have a John Mayer, typically like free falling as my profile song that I was rocking out to because I wanted a beachy feel for my profile. But the best thing about MySpace was their top eight feature. Like, you could rank your top friends from one to eight. Like, think about how honest that is.

Going through and it was funny you know, our social lives depended on it in middle school. I just remember I desperately wanted to be my friend Manny's you know, top top friend in his top eight and and then you know at school we'd have maybe like a fight, some tension or whatever and I'd go check the profile and I'm like, are you kidding me? I dropped from two to seven?

Is that truly how he feels about me? I'm like and then Steven over here in his top eight was six and now he's number two, like I didn't even know that they were friends. It's creating all kind of tension between friendships and everything.

My other favorite thing about the top eight was you could always, you you were always in the know when someone broke up. Like, oh, they're dating, that's so cute, they have each other in their, you know, top two friends and oh, that's so sweet. And then you go check the profile like a week later and you go, oh shoot,

he dropped out of her top eight. They're broken up at this point, that's wild. I just remember, oh my goodness, guys, you think I have a shot with Jamie now that they're broken up? And my buddies would be like, there's no chance, you're number seven and you've got three dudes ahead of you for

that number two spot, it's not gonna happen. We've come a long way from the top eight haven't we? Where we're on these different social media platforms and we have hundreds and some thousands of followers

but I think where we find ourselves today is a lot of us don't have even eight people that we would consider close friends. Some of us don't even have a few that we consider close friends. And one of the things that we learn is that we're the most connected generation, but studies show we're the loneliest generation.

And so I brought some stats to kinda just speak to this and the dilemma we find ourselves in. This is a study from Landmark 2021 American Perspective Survey, they found that fifteen percent of men report having no close friends, up from three percent in 1990. That's a five fold increase.

Ten percent of women in 2021 report having no close friends. In 1990, fifty five percent of men had six or more close friends, but by 2021 that had fallen to twenty seven percent. Women's friendships also declined a little less dramatically

though from forty one percent having six or close or more close friends in 1990 to twenty four percent in 2021. And studies show that fifty nine percent of people have a best friend now compared to seventy five percent in 1990.

So we're seeing this decline in close friendships and some researchers are calling it a friendship recession that we're in. And this friends friendship recession is actually leading to what our government is calling a loneliness epidemic.

Because of our lack of friendships, this is what it's doing to us. One in five Americans, which is about fifty two million people, say they felt lonely for much of the previous day. Thirty percent of adults, so that's right, one third of this room,

say they've experienced feelings of loneliness at least once a week over the past year. And we don't have to be medical professional professionals to know the impact that loneliness is having on our health. Loneliness leads to higher risk of heart disease, stroke, dementia, depression and anxiety.

Loneliness increases the risk of early death as much as twenty six percent. The mortality, this is the crazy one, the mortality impact of being socially disconnected is similar to smoking up to 15 cigarettes a day.

I'm sharing all these stats and for some of you in this room, you don't need the stats to tell you how painful loneliness has been to you. You've walked into this room and you're hurting because you don't have close friends and people to lean on in some of life's toughest

moments. Some of you in here are saying, I am that stat.

And you don't need convincing to believe what God said in Genesis two eighteen, it says, then the Lord God said, it is not good for the man to be alone. He's not just talking about guys when your wife goes out of town and you start reverting back to your college days. Is that just me?

But he understood even before sin entered the world, this is right in the garden with all the trees and the beautiful rivers and the amazing animals, he said all of that is good except for one thing, and that's man being alone. And what's interesting about that, loneliness being such a problem,

is ever since the garden, the enemy has been trying to convince us that loneliness is a good thing. He's been trying to drive us away from a relationship with God and a relationship

with each other which is what we're made for. Tries to convince us that when you're going through issues, when you're going through the storms of life, it's just easier if I just do it by myself. I'm I'm fine, I don't need anyone, but the studies show differently

of how impactful and painful it is to be lonely and not lean on people. But where a problem existed, God created a solution. And a solution wasn't just spouses for each other, but it was also Godly friends that we could go through life together with and enjoy

life and enjoy each other and enjoy these exciting fun times. I mean isn't friendship such a gift from the Lord? Like laughing until you cry, telling stories with your friends, quoting the dumbest movies together. Here's my favorite one, anyone share the dumbest reels on Instagram with one another?

Why did you send me that bro? Know, but friendship is amazing and God has blessed us with that so that we can enjoy and experience

peace and all these things in life, but he didn't just give us friendship to enjoy, he also gave us friendship we could fight the battles of life together with. And really that's the big idea that we're gonna be running with this morning is that Godly friends fight together.

You could turn with me to Ecclesiastes four twelve, we're gonna start there. This is Solomon. Solomon was given supernatural wisdom from the Lord and he writes this saying about ancient travelers. He says this, persons standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back to back and conquer.

Three are even better for a triple braided cord is not easily broken. Basically what he was doing is he was examining an ancient Palestine, he was he was he was examining people, travelers and people who are on those dangerous roads back then and he came to this conclusion that those traveling alone are not very smart.

He's like, you not only are you risking injuries out on that road where you have no one to pick you up and care for you, but also you leave yourself vulnerable to the attacks of criminals and thieves which were so prevalent out there on those roads.

And that's what he's saying, is that they can be, if you're by yourself you can be attacked and overcome. Well for a lot of us, we're we're going through life, the journey of life by ourselves and the enemy, we have an enemy, a thief that comes to kill, steal and destroy

from your life and he wants nothing more than you to battle the marital issues by yourself, battle the mental health in your own strength, the issues at work, the stress that you're experiencing, he's wanting you to go, yeah, you don't need people, just try journeying through life by yourself.

The scripture says that the enemy in first Peter five eight is like prowling, he prowls around like a lion looking for any one to devour. It's interesting about lions, they rarely ever attack the herd, they almost always attack the prey separate from the herd.

And so for some of us, really the key that we need to take home today is we need to stop fighting life alone. Stop fighting life alone. But the other key and what we're gonna walk through today is he says a triple braided cord is not easily broken. Basically when you intertwine yourself with the right people,

it's harder to break you. You can overcome, you can conquer. And so really what we're gonna do is we're gonna examine one of the best pictures of biblical friendship in the bible, which is the story of Jonathan and David together. But as we walk through these these these few key points, my challenge to you is to survey

the closest people in your life right now, and and really get a temperature check of how that compares to what a biblical friendship should look like. And really ask yourself this question, are these the people, the people close to me, are these the people that I wanna be interwoven with through life's battles? And so really the first thing that we're gonna learn about godly friends fighting together is godly friends fight beside each other.

And really we see this in the story in first Samuel, we're gonna start in chapter 18 verse one. We see this in the story of Jonathan and David. Now their friendship makes no sense, okay? Jonathan is King Saul's son. If you know a little bit about King Saul, he was the first king of Israel. He was God's

first choice to lead his people and the nation of Israel. But and it started out okay for Saul, but eventually he sinned against God, he disobeyed and then he made matters worse by justifying his sin and never turning his heart fully back to God. And so God basically said, fine,

if you're not going to truly follow me, then I'm gonna take the kingdom of Israel away from you and I'm gonna anoint someone who will follow closely after me, which was a little shepherd boy named David. And the awkward thing about this whole transition with the kingdom is that technically

Jonathan is the rightful heir to the throne. Right, once Saul passes on, it's Jonathan's to take authority, but God transferred that power over to David. And so Jonathan, it'd be so easy to push David away. Right, like if someone gets promoted over you at work,

my guess is that you're not trying to make that person your best friend. You're trying to find out all the ways, oh yeah, they were a little shady, I bet that's why they got that promotion. Right, like it's just not natural, it makes no sense that these two would be friends.

But the beautiful thing about Jonathan is that his heart was completely surrendered and sold out to God, even at his own expense. And he cares for David and he builds this amazing friendship that we get to learn all these lessons from. And so we're gonna pick up in first Samuel 18 verse one. Says this,

after David had finished talking with Saul, he met Jonathan, the king's son. There was an immediate bond between them, for Jonathan loved David. From that day on, Saul kept David with him and wouldn't let him return home. And Jonathan made a solemn pact with David because he loved him as much as he loved himself.

Jonathan sealed the pact by taking off his robe and giving it to David together with his tunic, sword, bow and belt. So what's happening here? I love what it says is that these two guys had an immediate bond. Do you ever have an immediate bond with one of your friends? Where you see someone and you're like, oh

yeah, we're gonna be friends, you're just as weird as I am. We enjoy the same things, we laugh at the same dumb jokes, like it's such a beautiful thing and I think some of the best friendships start with shared interests. One of my best friends, when we became best friends at the very beginning, we bonded over,

we both played sports at the same junior college. And it was so funny because we would exchange, or he played football, I played basketball, we would exchange stories about how our careers were cut short. In other words, we found out that we were coulda, shoulda, woulda's.

I'd be like, ah man, if my ankle didn't give out on me man, I'd probably be in the NBA. And he'd be like, oh, like my knee blew out, but man, was pretty quick, I'd probably be playing D one, you know, throughout my career. Like we just had this immediate

bond over shared interest, and it's probably the same for your friendships too. Have that bond, your kids play sports together, you you know, guys, you see it as, we battle on the golf course together or in that men's softball league together. Ladies, it's probably like book club or come on help me out ladies.

Pickle, pickleball, that's a great one. High there, thank you, that man actually it's, you ladies sound like you do some fun things together. Anyways, the point being is that shared interest is is a lot, where a lot of friendships start, but I think the danger is if your friendship only

stays with shared interest and it never goes below the surface. One of the things that I love to do with my friends, we play pickup basketball, but I love to golf with my friends. But the funny thing about golf is I'll spend four hours with my friends, I'll come back home and my wife will be like, hey, how's Joe doing?

I'll go, I have no clue. But he hits his five iron really well. I'm like, no, no, no, he he is struggling. He's struggling to hit his driver off the tee. But I never get to know those friends at a deeper level if it only stays as shared interests.

With our friendships, there's gotta come a point where the friendship goes below the surface, where we actually get to know who each other truly are.

Know what one another is going through, know what is going on in their families, know the hurts, habits, and hang ups, and the struggles that they're going through if we're gonna build deep meaningful friendships. And we see this with Jonathan and David, that they had shared values together.

One of their shared values was their faith wasn't just a formality, it was a reality. That they were both fully dependent on God throughout their lives. Both of them had different moments in their lives where they were completely outmanned and outnumbered by the enemy, where they basically had to rely

fully on God to to see them through that and to be protected. And so they had the shared value of faith, but also they had the shared value of fighting for their country. They were both soldiers, they both sacrificed their lives, laid it down to see freedom in their country and to protect their friends and family.

So all of us have values, what are your values? And do you share those same values with your friends? Because values matter. We head in the direction of our values. And so for some of us, we gotta ask the question, do the people closest to me, do we share similar values?

We don't have to have all of the same values, but we should agree on some of those essentials. Like what we believe about God, right? Is he the uncreated creator who spoke the universe into existence? Do we believe that Jesus is the one true God and the only way to salvation?

Do do we take on a do we share a biblical worldview together where we see the bible being the inerrant word of God that informs our daily lives? Because if not, and our friends don't share the same faith, when we go through the struggles of life, they might give good advice but it's not gonna be Godly advice.

They they might speak into your life but it's not gonna have the level of depth of walking and knowing God truly through his word. And so, and for others too, not just with faith but also with our families and our marriages. Like if you're around someone who just constantly is bashing his spouse

and he roots for the Lakers, you shouldn't listen to a word he says. If they're Seahawks fans, just throw everything that they have to say out, right?

We gotta be careful with who we're allowing to speak into our lives and into our kids lives and into the people around us because John Ron said this, he's a motivational speaker but he famously is known for saying, you become like the five people that you're closest with. Think about that for a moment.

Do I like the direction that my friends are heading in? Because whether you like it or not, they will influence you. You will start to talk like them, you'll start to dress like them, right? You'll start to act like them. And we've got, some of us, this is the reality of check of going, wow,

I don't know if that's the direction that I wanna head. I don't know if this person is helping me become the person that God's called me to be. Scripture puts it like this in Proverbs thirteen twenty, walk with the wise and become wise. Associate with fools and get in trouble. Some of us are going through struggles and battles

and we're trying to fight our old habits and hang ups and who we used to be because we have friends that aren't helping us step into the new creation that we are in Christ. They're continuing to pull us back into old habits and old ways of life. And scripture says, hey if you let that happen, that's gonna end in trouble.

It's not gonna work out for you. But if you surround yourself with the right people that are heading in the right direction, closer to Christ, and you walk with the wise and you're gonna become more wise. You're gonna look more like Christ in every

single way. And this is what happened with Jonathan and David and their friendship, is that they not only had shared interests and shared values, but they also had a shared mission. They were on mission together. To give you an example, did you see that?

Jonathan could have been so angry and bitter at God for taking the kingdom away from him. He could have clawed and scratched to get that away from David and try to make it happen in his own strength, but he didn't do that. Instead he actually did the opposite, which is wild.

It said he took his his royal robes and his weapons and he laid it at the feet of David, basically saying, hey,

I know that I'm not God's choice anymore and you are, and rather than fighting you and making you an enemy, I'm gonna I'm gonna surround you, I'm gonna lay my life down for you in humility. I'm gonna come around you as a friend, support you, and see God's word lived out in both of our lives, even at my own expense.

It's a shared mission. They were committed to living God's word out in their lives. Let me ask you this, who inspires your faith? Who, when you look at them and the way that they treat their family and the way that they treat their spouse, you go, oh man,

I want my life to look like theirs. That's someone who's not just talking about faith, but they're living it out in their daily lives. And when they go to work, they're a light to their coworkers around them. They're sharing their faith and their testimony with the people in their neighborhood. That's

who we should aspire to be around. That's who we should choose to fight beside us in life, those people that are heading closer to Christ. Because we're gonna need those people in the ups and downs of life. But here's here's what we learn though. All of us, we want godly friends to surround us in life,

but we don't attract who we pretend to be, we attract who we actually are. And if we're gonna surround ourselves with people who are Godly and growing more like Christ every day, we've gotta become a friend to those people and fight for them. And that's the second thing that we learned from David and Jonathan

is they fought for each other constantly. They constantly supported each other, encouraged one another, even risked their life for one another. It's interesting in this point in the story, at first Saul really likes David and he keeps him in the palace and he actually makes him a musician for him and everything.

Well there, that didn't last long because they were coming back from this big military feat against the Philistines and the people were out in the streets and they were celebrating and they were singing this song, Saul killed his thousands but David killed his 10,000.

Celebrating David basically above Saul, oh, Saul hated that, hated that. And scripture says from that moment on, Saul kept a jealous eye on David. And it's interesting because we see David's one day playing his harp in the, probably free falling in the palace.

And Dave, or in Saul's jealousy gets the best of him and he picks up his spear and he hurls it at David. And from that point on, Saul just repeatedly

tried to take David out. Saul gets a little bit smarter though and he's like, okay, I can't kill David with my spear so I'm gonna have to get a little bit more strategic and so he sends them out to war and try to fight these impossible battles, which God makes David victorious

and David comes back fine from these victories. So then Saul finally goes, okay, gotta take matters into my own hands and I've gotta recruit some help. So he gets his servants around him and his son Jonathan and he goes, okay guys, it's your turn. You guys need to assassinate David.

And for Jonathan it'd be so easy, he had the most to gain of having David dead because he could have taken the throne, but he was committed to this Godly friendship with David that he refused. And not only did he refuse,

he could have just sat back not said a word but he doesn't do that, he steps up boldly and defends David to the king, his dad. Which this wouldn't have been the first time in history that a dad would kill his son for defying his orders. And so Jonathan risked his life to defend David's

character. We see this in first Samuel 19 verse four. Says this, the next morning, Jonathan spoke with his father about David saying many good things about him.

The king must not sin against his servant David, Jonathan said. He's never done anything to harm you. He's always helped you in any way he could. I love this, he almost turns into a little bit of a lawyer. Have you forgotten about the time that he risked his life to kill the Philistine giant and how the Lord brought a great victory to all Israel as a result?

You certainly were happy about it then, case point. Why should you murder an innocent man like David? There's no reason for it at all. So Saul, because David or because Jonathan spoke up for David, Saul listened to Jonathan and vowed, as surely as the Lord lives, David will not be killed. Jonathan risked his life,

his reputation, his relationship with his dad to defend his friend's honor. I think that one of the true tests of friendship is what you speak about your friends when they're not in the room. Do you sit back when other people are talking poorly about your friends and just listen? Or worse, do you jump into that conversation

and continue to gossip about your friends behind their back? I think too many of us as Christians, we almost play this chameleon game where we shift and we become different people to to others just to please them and stay in good graces with them, but we're making the situation worse with our friends. We're talking poorly,

we're speaking death instead of life over our friends when they're not around. One of the things that we learn too is, I mean, I call this friendly fire, is the enemy if the enemy can get us to fight each other, we lose sight of fighting the real war out there and we look dumb to the world around us. And I thought

Christ followers were supposed to be loving and kind but the way that they speak about their coworkers when they're not around, if that's what following Jesus looks like, I don't know if I'm in. Where are the friends

that are gonna stand up and actually speak highly of their friends, defend their character? When there's issues

between friends, where are the peacemakers that come over here and go, hey, I know that they said that and that wasn't right, but I know their character, I know their heart and they weren't intending to to hurt you that way. So what I think needs to happen is you guys need to get in a room together and have a face to face conversation so we can resolve that.

That's what it looks like to fight for Godly friendships and that's exactly what Jonathan did for David. The story goes on and he preserves David's life for a little bit and temporarily saves it but then Saul, and it gets actually David reinstated back in the palace, but then Saul again gets jealous of David, gets frustrated

and you know what he does? He picks up his spear again to throw it at David and hurls it at him, misses. But number one, who's giving this man his spear back? Like,

take that thing away from him. And the other thing that we see too is he's either intentionally trying to miss or he's just got really bad aim. Either way, he shouldn't have a spear. But he throws it at David and this launches David to go on the run for his life, to be a fugitive actually for the next ten years.

And so he's at one of his lowest moments and in some of the hours right after that happened where David's in hiding,

he meets up with Jonathan and things are pretty tense, but they have such a crucial conversation that gives us another insight into Godly friendship. And we get to get to take a look at this in first Samuel 20 verse one. It says, David now fled from Nath and Ramah and found Jonathan.

What have I done? He explained. What is my crime? How have I offended your father that he's so determined to kill me? Jonathan responds, that's not true. He's like basically like, relax,

you're not gonna die. He tells me everything he's going to do, even the little things. I know my father wouldn't hide something like this from me, it just isn't so. And David took an oath before Jonathan. He's basically now gonna point out a blind spot in Jonathan and says, your father knows perfectly well about our friendship.

So he said to himself, I won't tell Jonathan because why should I hurt him? But I swear to you that I'm only one step away from death, I swear to it by the Lord and your own soul. And so Jonathan goes, no David, or David goes, Jonathan, no you're wrong, like you're missing something so huge here.

The reason, you think your dad's gonna tell you everything that he's gonna do but he knows about our friendship, don't be naive basically. Calls him out. And then Jonathan responds and realizes, oh David, you're right. I didn't see that. And he says, tell me what I can do to help you. Jonathan explained.

So one of the things that we learn from Godly friendships if we're gonna fight for our friends, is we gotta learn to say the hard thing. We've gotta learn to have tough conversations with our friends. When they have a blind spot in their lives, and what a blind spot is, it's something that I can only see if you tell me.

And all of us have blind spots, areas that we fall short, the things that we do or say that we don't even realize it. And so as godly friends, the way we fight for each other is we call those things out in love. Do your friends, do your friends that call you out and call you higher?

Or are they just allies and just tell you what you wanna hear? I think too many of us care more about what our friend thinks of us than what God thinks of us and it holds us back from actually helping our friends develop and look more like Christ in their lives. So you've gotta ask yourself, am I people pleasing

or am I pleasing God in my relationships? Do you say the hard thing when it's needed the most because you can continue to help your friends grow. I I remember I had a situation like this, I had a friend that had the boldness to call me out. We were on the phone together and the subject of me taking feedback came up.

And I basically, he's like, I was telling him, I'm like, yeah it's ridiculous, people say that I can't take feedback. And he goes, well you can't take feedback. I'm like, yes I can, how dare you say that Michael?

Like no, I can take feedback dude, like you don't know what you're talking about. And I started to get frustrated and upset with him. Eventually I got so upset that I'm like, know what, I don't even need you and I hung up the phone. And later

I was thinking about it and I'm like, what is he talking about? I can't take feedback, I can take feedback. And then it hit me, oh, I can't take feedback. Dang, he's right. So I humbly got back on the phone with them, a little bit embarrassed and I just called them and said, hey,

thank you so much for having the boldness. I know how hard that could have been for calling me out and calling me higher when it came to taking feedback. I realized that I was wrong. This is what Godly friendships do guys. We fight for each other to become better in life, to be more loving like Christ,

to take steps forward in life. If you have no one that is speaking the truth in your life, how are you gonna take that next step in your faith? Cause this is what Jonathan and David were committed to. But they didn't just say the hard thing, Jonathan followed it up by doing the right thing.

He stepped past just right, they just stepped past giving advice to each other and they said no, actually how can I support you? How can I have your back? And so David you know being on the run for his life, they basically conjure up this plan with to test Saul's anger and basically there was this big festival happening

and everyone was expected to be there in the palace and you know Saul's family and David and everyone there and David goes, what if I don't go to that and we tell King Saul that I asked you Jonathan for permission to go home and that's the reason why I'm not there and we'll see how he reacts to it. And so they

cook up this plan, they they execute it and in the moment Saul realizing David isn't there, Jonathan steps up risks his life again, Saul gets so angry that this happened. Angry at Jonathan and says some pretty choice words to him. And then, you ready for this? Guess what he does? He picks up his spear

and throws it at Jonathan, like really, who has given this man his spear back? Throws it at his own son now because he's so frustrated with how Jonathan has defended David. But Jonathan, he didn't have to do that.

He didn't have to agree to that. And he goes out and he lets David know, hey, my dad's serious, it's time for you to go into hiding, it's not good. But he risks his life and does the right thing to support his friend David and preserve his life. How are you doing the right things in your friendships?

When your friend gets out of the hospital, are you the type of friend that shows up at their house with a meal ready to go for them? When your friend is struggling in their marriage, how do you rally around and get them a gift card to go out and have a date night together?

For others that are struggling at work and the stress of it or maybe a loss of a job, how do you get together with them for a burger and just talk life with them?

Can we be the type of people that fight for friendships, means showing up when they need us the most? Can we be the first to lend that helping hand and show them that we're the hands and feet of Jesus? This is what it looks like to fight for our friends. But the best thing about Jonathan and David's friendship,

and the and the way that they bonded the most is they continued to point each other to the Lord in trying times.

That's the best thing that we can do in our friendships. And we finish here in in our story in first Samuel twenty three fifteen, David's on the run from King Saul, he had to be in hiding, he's out kind of in the wilderness trying to hide from Saul and I love this, look what Jonathan does.

Verse 15 it says this, one day near Horesh, David received the news that Saul was on the way to Ziph to search for him and kill him. Jonathan went to find David and encouraged him to stay strong in his faith in God.

Says, don't be afraid, Jonathan reassured him, my father will never find you, you are going to be king of Israel and I will be next to you as my father Saul is well aware. So the two of them renewed their solemn pact before the Lord and Jonathan returned home while David stayed at Horesh.

You see what Jonathan did, he found David in one of his lowest moments when he needed him the most and it says that Jonathan encouraged David to stay strong in his faith. Now that phrase, what that phrase means, it means to help him get a tighter grip on the Lord. What a beautiful picture of friendship.

When some of your friends are losing

their grip on the Lord and maybe they're doubting God, man this looks rough, this doesn't look like God's gonna come through for me. The loss of the job or my kids aren't acting the way that I want them to, I don't know if God's gonna this isn't looking good. We need to be the type of friends that remind our friends who God is in those moments.

Maybe you have a friend and the kid is starting to walk away from the faith. Where are the friends that are gonna show up and say, hey, I know you're overcome with fear right now. But do you know who our God is? If he's faithful back then, he's gonna be faithful again.

For those struggling through the addiction, I don't see the light of day. I don't know how I'm gonna get through this. Well, as long as you have breath in your lungs, we serve a powerful God that can break the chains of that addiction. Come on somebody, can we be the friends that encourage one another of who God is and who

they are in Christ? When our friends fall on their face and they mess up, can we remind them that there is no condemnation for those of us who are in Christ? Remind them that God has given you a new identity, that you're forgiven, you're loved, you're chosen. Godly friends show up when our friends need it the most.

So that's what godly friendship looks like. We fight beside each other and we fight for each other. Here's where I'm gonna challenge you, is look at the five people that are closest to you right now and ask yourself this question.

Are these people helping me become more like Christ or are they pulling me away from the Lord?

Some of us we need to check our circle and make some changes and I'm not saying that you need to completely cut these people out of your life, but what I am saying is what does it look like to prioritize the friends that are heading in the right direction closer to God? Because those friends

will change your life. I remember I had a period of time where I didn't have the right influences in my life and I was struggling, I was heading down a path that I didn't wanna go. And I remember, this is a little embarrassing, but I prayed for friends. I prayed for godly friends. I don't have any.

And it didn't happen right away, but I think it was maybe a year later where I met my best friend Austin. And I just wanna give you just a glimpse of who this man has been in my life. Couple weeks ago, we got back from high school summer camp. It was incredible. It was unbelievable. We saw,

I think it was a 100 youth respond to the gospel, somewhere around there. Isn't that amazing? Like, come on. Unbelievable what God's doing. But camp is a different experience for the leaders than it is for the youth. Like for the leaders, it's basically like Navy SEAL training mixed with youth ministry.

Like my average bedtime is 02:30AM at camp and I get up at 6AM every day. You're dehydrated, you're sunburnt, you're running around all day, you're going delirious, I'm telling you, it's not for the faint of heart and you do this for four days straight. So all that to say, when I get home from camp,

I'm just trying to stare at the wall and do nothing all day and watch the World Cup, okay? And so I'm in the day after, I'm just hanging out, just trying to relax, to recover with sleep and my wife walks in to our room and goes, hey, you're gonna wanna see this. I'm like, what is it? Did someone die?

She goes, there's water coming from our walls. I'm like, what?

Oh my goodness. Okay, let me go see it. So I I walk over there, I look at it, Sure enough, there's water coming out of our walls. We turn the emergency water off. We call the emergency plumber. He gets there, and he looks at it for a couple of minutes, and he turns to us, and he gives us the look of brace yourself.

He goes on to tell us, he's like this is pretty bad. It's a water heater pipe that bursts and this is gonna be months and months of work, we're gonna have to tear your walls apart, we're gonna have to rip up your shower, basically your house is gonna be unlivable for

a month at least a month and a half, so you you should probably get an Airbnb. And I was like, oh my gosh. Just in one moment it felt like our whole life got flipped upside down. And he's like, you're gonna wanna get on the phone with insurance. I'm dealing with insurance. I'm dealing with these contractors.

And I just went into this place of loneliness and discouragement and defeat. I just can't I just felt like the enemy was attacking me. And I just kinda shut everyone out, and I was struggling. But then the phone rang. It was my friend Austin who called.

And I didn't tell him about anything that was happening going on. My wife told his wife, and that's how he found out. But he called me and he goes, how you doing? I'm like, not great. He goes, I I get it. But I also wanna remind you that you're not in this alone.

That we're gonna walk through this together, and whatever you need, I'm right by your side. He said, even if you need a little bit of money, he goes, no one has to know, except all of you know now.

But he said, we're gonna see this through. And he goes, I just believe. I know it's scary right now, but God's gonna come through for you. He's gonna provide. He's got this. This isn't a surprise to him. And man, in a moment, encouragement just filled my soul, and I I I got wind in my sails to go, okay, you know what?

I'm gonna be alright. This is the picture and the fruit of godly friendships, guys. When we step out of isolation and into relationship with each other, we've got people that have our back, that support us in life's worst moments. For some of you, if if you're not in relationship,

biblical relationship with people, I wanna challenge you today. We have our life groups, you can sign up today, where you can be known, accepted, supported, and developed. Step, don't stop doing life alone. Stop fighting the battles by yourself. You're not strong enough.

Step into biblical community and watch how God works through your life. He'll bring such fruit and beauty out of it. But our our godly friendships are just a reflection of our friendship with our heavenly father. Scripture says that by our nature, by our sin and rebellion, we became enemies of God and we've walked away.

But through the person of Jesus, his life, his death, and his resurrection,

he has restored the friendship with our heavenly father that we can be saved. And so some of you in here, you've never accepted Jesus, you've never accepted that friendship,

To have right relationship and be restored back to the father. I wanna give you that opportunity right now. So would everyone, would you just close your eyes and bow your heads? And I'm gonna pray with those people that you know. That you need forgiveness of sins, you need to come back

to loving arms of the father. You can simply pray this, Jesus, I've walked away. I've gone my own way. I've sinned and rebelled against you. I was deserving your wrath and punishment, but Jesus, thank you for dying on the cross for me. Fulfilling the penalty,

dying in my place, and raising to life to give me new life in you and forgiveness for my sins. And you can just simply pray this, Jesus, I give my life to you. Jesus, I give my life to you. If you pray that, would you just be so bold and shoot up your hands so we can see it really high up in the air?

There's hands going up. I see you. Keep holding them high. Keep holding them high. You're making the best decision that you can make to step out of your sin and into freedom with Jesus. Anyone else? Jesus, I give my life to you.

God, I just I thank you for these people that are giving their lives and putting you at the center of their lives, Lord. Receiving that friendship that changes everything in our lives, Lord. God, I thank you for the beauty that's gonna come from you, Lord. As you continue to mold and shape them into your image. God, thank you for the gift of friendship that you've surrounding us with. The body of Christ, that in life's toughest moments, we don't have to battle alone, we can battle together. And so God, help us to go out and be the friends that are captivated by your love, and we're allowing that to overflow into lives around us. God, we give you all the glory,

honor, and praise, and everyone said, amen, amen. Thanks for joining us online this weekend. You can stay connected with us through rockwind.io or our social media.