Friendship on Miscellanea

Smalltalk is Counsel

Fri, 26 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0000

When I use the word counseling I don’t mean a Ph.D. in psychotherapy in an office. I mean the way the Bible talks about counseling, which is the effect of the tongue, and the effect of our lives on each other. We are changed by relating to each other when we relate wisely. And that may happen in an office. Every pastor is going to make appointments and there will be times that you sit down with someone, or you just say to a wise friend, “Can we get together?” You talk and counsel happens. Or it could be just the most casual kind of conversation.

Unmarried in the Church

Sun, 14 Jan 2024 21:04:50 +0000

The church is required to be the body of Christ in which the unmarried may find fulfillment as persons in the fellowship and companionship of the congregation of believers. The church should recognize that being unmarried the single members are free to be ‘anxious about the affairs of the Lord, how to please the Lord’ (1 Corinthians 7:32). Therefore they must be given the opportunity within the fellowship of believers to serve the body of Christ and experience the love and acceptance of the body of the Lord.

Come Soon!

Sun, 12 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

…come up as soon as possible; and may the Lord bless you upon the road, and come himself with you. … I long for the time. How snugly shall we sit and smoke our pipes, while we settle the affairs of the state and of the churches!

Easy to Love in Memory

Fri, 23 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

It is easy to love people in memory; the hard thing is to love them when they are there in front of you.

A Modest Cottage with Books

Tue, 08 Nov 2016 00:00:00 +0000

I had rather be shut up in a very modest cottage, with my books, my family and a few old friends, dining on simple bacon, and letting the world roll on as it liked, than to occupy the most splendid post, which any human power can give.

A House of Rest in a Weary World

Tue, 28 Jun 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Is there no place where two or three can gather in Jesus name, … to forget human pride, to forget the passions of war, to forget the puzzling problems of industrial strife, and to unite in overflowing gratitude at the foot of the Cross?

If there be such a place, then that is the house of God and that the gate of heaven. And from under the threshold of that house will go forth a river that will revive the weary world.

Lincoln’s Best Friend

Thu, 21 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

My best friend is the man who’ll get me a book I ain’t read.

Eating and Christian Friendship

Tue, 19 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Friends multiply their joys by sharing them. One of the most basic ways is by eating together. Don’t overspiritualize Christian friendship; two of its most important tools are a fork and a spoon (or chopsticks for some friends).

As Christ’s ministry shows, eating together communicates powerful messages of love and social acceptance. When we invite others into our homes for a meal, the acceptance, vulnerability, and self-disclosure of hospitality deepens the joy even further. Friends become as family.

Qualifictions for Deacons

Fri, 25 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000

If all there is to being a deacon revolves around flowers and fruit baskets and the quick drop off and pick up of sermon tapes, these characteristics do not have special importance. But if indeed the deacon is going to meet people at their deep levels of need, if he is going to know people who hunger, thirst, who long for friend, who need help of all kinds, then he need special control of his tongue (and his ear) and special sensitivity with regard to money.

All Christians are Brethren

Sat, 21 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

All Christians are brethren. The greatest men in the world, the mountains, if they be Christians, they are brethren to the lowest. And it fills up the valleys. The lowest, if they be Christians, are brethren to the highest; as personal differences, and differences in calling, they all cease in death.

Church Fellowship is Not Optional

Wed, 04 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

The church is not just a religious association formed by saved individuals to give united expression to their faith. Rather, the church is more a people than Israel was under the old covenant. … Church fellowship is not an optional advantage, to be chosen or ignored, like membership in a social club. It is the calling of every Christian. There is a spiritual ’ethnicity’ to the church of Christ; Christians are blood relatives, joined by the blood of Christ.

Sorrows and Joys of One Another

Tue, 30 Dec 2014 00:00:00 +0000

True love will interest us in the sorrows and joys of one another, and teach us to make them our own.

DeYoung on Hospitality

Sun, 16 Nov 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Opening our homes takes time, but it doesn’t have to take over our lives. Christian hospitality has much more to do with good relationships than with good food. There is a fine line between care and cumber. In many instances, less ado would serve better.

Tolkien on Lewis

Thu, 03 Apr 2014 00:00:00 +0000

C.S.L. of course had some oddities and could sometimes be irritating.

Illusion of Liberal Ideology

Sun, 09 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000

It is one of the more facetious illusions of liberal ideology that people will like each other better by getting to know each other.

My Happiest Hours

Fri, 07 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000

My happiest hours are spent sitting up to the small hours in someone’s college room talking nonsense, poetry, theology, metaphysics over beer, tea and pipes. There’s no sound I like better than adult male laughter.

Small Talk and the Heart

Mon, 27 Jan 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Something as innocuous, as seemingly meaningless, careless, casual as small talk, when you take it apart, bears a freight of profound messages that every word you say and don’t say bears the freight of the overflow of your heart.

An Astonishing Dispensation

Fri, 10 Jan 2014 00:00:00 +0000

And truly, for sinners to have fellowship with God, the infinitely holy God, is an astonishing dispensation.

C. S. Lewis on Friendship

Tue, 31 Dec 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Friendship is the greatest of worldly goods. Certainly to me it is the chief happiness of life. If I had to give a piece of advice to a young man about a place to live, I think I should say, ‘sacrifice almost everything to live where you can be near your friends.

Job’s Friends

Fri, 06 Dec 2013 00:00:00 +0000

The best thing Job’s friends did was sit with him, weep with him, mourn with him, and keep silence with him for seven days.

Beer and Reformation

Tue, 01 May 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Drinking beer with friends is perhaps the most underestimated of all Reformation insights and essential to ongoing reform; and wasting time with a choice friend or two on a regular basis might be the best investment of time you ever make.

Is There No Place?

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Is there no place where two or three can gather in Jesus name, . . . to forget human pride, to forget the passions of war, to forget the puzzling problems of industrial strife, and to unite in overflowing gratitude at the foot of the Cross? If there be such a place, then that is the house of God and that the gate of heaven. And from under the threshold of that house will go forth a river that will revive the weary world.

My Greatest Friend

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Plato is my friend, Aristotle is my friend, but my greatest friend is truth.

Book I Ain't Read

Sat, 08 Oct 2011 00:00:00 +0000

My best friend is the man who’ll get me a book I ain’t read.