Proverbs 27:10 Your own friend, and your father's friend, forsake not; neither go into your brother's house in the day of your calamity… The Lord Jesus found strength and consolation in the love of human friends. That He should not only have pitied men, and loved them, but should have found here and there men and women whose presence and affection were a relief to Him, under the burden of His griefs; men and women who gave Him rest when He was weary, and joy when He was troubled; this may seem surprising to as. Christ Himself, the Son of the Eternal, had His human friends. He loved all men well enough to die for them, but there were some whom He loved more than others. 1. Some men are so happy as to inherit friends from their fathers. The love of our father's friend is worth having. If he is a good man, there will be a certain power in him that will be a restraint to keep now in the good way your father would have approved. Your father's experience of life survives in him to give you counsel. If he should ever be in trouble, pay your father's debts in friendly attention to him. 2. "Thine own friend forsake not." There are friends and friends. Most of our friends are acquaintances, and nothing more. Friendships of the perfect and ideal sort are necessarily rare. By friends we mean those for whom we have a strong affection, and who have a strong affection for us. A wise man said, "I want my friends to stand by me when I am wrong; other people will stand by me when I am right." When you have friends of that sort, forsake them not. Keep them when you have them. 3. Friendships which fall far short of this ideal are also worth keeping. For the most part our friends must be people whose circumstances and education and history are very much like our own. There are people who drop a whole set of their "friends" whenever they get a considerable rise in their income. For the most part, close and real friendships must be formed early in life. When close friendships are formed after a man has passed middle life, it is usually with much younger persons. 4. Of the place and power of friendship in life, only those who have had and retained loyal and worthy friends, can have any real knowledge. Bacon says, "Friendship redoubleth joys and cutteth grief in halves." Friendships assist to check and to subdue that selfish absorption in our own successes and in our own sorrows which poison the very springs of life and brings paralysis on all its nobler powers. Our confidence in their goodness and our delight in their affection save us from cynicism. We think the better of the human race because we think so well of them. When we do not absolutely accept the judgment of a friend, it clears our mind to discuss a difficult question with him. Our friends take the side of all that is best in us against whatever is mean and cowardly and dangerous; they serve the purpose of an external conscience. Our friends see us, not merely as we are, but as we might be. 5. The Christian will form his closest friendships with men who share his faith in Christ and his hope of immortality. Such friends will continue to be our friends in the realms that lie beyond death. (R. W. Dale, LL.D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Thine own friend, and thy father's friend, forsake not; neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity: for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother far off. |
    |