Friendship Series - Part III

Today is going to be my 3rd and final post on my friendship series. I am going to talk about friendship within the Bible along with how social media has changed friendship.

::::yellow roses symbolize friendship::::

 During the session at church they started off by saying, “Model your friendships by scripture and apply it to the 21st century.” Here are some scriptures I really liked- in regards to friendship that the speaker shared with us.

• Proverbs 17: 17 - A friend is loving at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.
• James 2: 21-23 - Was not Abraham our father justified by works, in that he offered up Isaac his son upon the altar? Thou seest that faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect; and the scripture was fulfilled which saith, And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned unto him for righteousness; and he was called the friend of God.
• Psalm 25: 13-14 - His soul shall dwell at ease; And his seed shall inherit the land. The friendship of Jehovah is with them that fear him; And he will show them his covenant.
• Psalm 55: 12-13 - For it was not an enemy that reproached me; Then I could have borne it: Neither was it he that hated me that did magnify himself against me; Then I would have hid myself from him: But it was thou, a man mine equal, My companion, and my familiar friend. (This refers to the topic in my 1st post – no one can love you like a friend and no one can hurt you like a friend)

The meaning of friendship has def. changed over time and especially now more than ever with all of the social media outlets. Social media is defined as people having conversation online. Plain and simple – just that – conversation.

 

The big one I will focus on today is facebook. There are def. more out there – twitter is the other big one I think about. Some people hate fb and some people love it. I personally love it and use it for its true meaning – connecting with friends! Obviously everyone on my facebook are not considered real friends, some just acquaintances. But I love keeping up with people! Some people could care less and that’s fine too! (example – my hubs) You can craft your facebook account into what you want it to be. Just family, ok! Just co-workers or colleagues – ok! Just close friends – ok! Whatever you want… and there are privacy settings that can be as “open” or “private” as you want to be with your information.

 

I have heard all the horror stories about facebook – ruining relationships, creating drama, blah blah blah – but, here is what I always say – if you have drama in your real life, you will have drama on fb. It is just another outlet for you to express yourself. People will take advantage of it and use it in the wrong way, but isn’t that true with everything in life?

 

So friendship in regards to facebook – I think there is def. an etiquette that should be followed on facebook to some degree. But on top of that learn about your friend’s views on fb before just posting something on their wall, etc. Perfect example – my best friend hates facebook! So guess what? I don’t keep up with our friendship through that outlet. If I post pics, she is not going to see them unless I tell her to go on and check it or send them to her. If I depended on fb to keep up with our relationship, we would never speak to each other. However, I have other friends that we can totally keep up with each other’s lives through fb and that is great too. I would just say – don’t depend 100% on fb for any meaningful relationship. You still need to have that face to face conversation, that phone call, etc. to keep a good friendship thriving.

 

Well, that wraps up my friendship series. I was so touched by this session at church that I had to share some of the really great things I heard. I hope you have enjoyed them as much as I have.