Some of God's Greatest Gifts...Are Friends

Friends are friends forever

If the Lord's the lord of them

And a friend will not say "Never"

'Cause the welcome will not end

Though it's hard to let you go

In the Father's hands we know

That a lifetime's not too long

To live as friends

The chorus from Smitty's song 'Friends' has been going through my mind as I got off the phone with Kasey. We have known eachother since it was my first semester in college. We roomed together and have been great friends since. I received an e-mail today from Candace, a friend of mine who is a former XA Girls House roomie. I was blessed to have had her as a roomie as her relationship with God is partly the reason why I became so passionate about mine. As I sit here and write, I think of just how blessed I am to have the many friends that I do.

I have many a friend I have lost contact with. But just because I don't see or hear from them anymore, doesn't stop me from saying a quick prayer for them every now and then. There was a girl named Melanie I knew wa-a-a-a-y back when we were eighteen months old and in the same hospital room (not that I remember, but mom has told me about when we first met.) I lost contact with her shortly after she had moved to Grand Junction, Colorado and I to Corvallis, Montana. I still think of her, and miss her terribly.

There s a friend whom I met my junior year of highschool and whom also talked, no, more like forced, me into joining the GHHS swim team. I have great memories of that today. We lost touch for three years anf it scared me. Didnt know if something bad had happened to her. Our friendship is a long story. To this day, however, she credits our frienship to her staying out of trouble. She just recently became a Christian, after being raised Catholic.

I stayed in touch with an ex-girlfriend of my brother's. We both are so close that we think of ourselves as sisters. We still talk on teh phone, or over e-mail, giving encouragement to one another.

If I could list the many friends I have now or have had over the years and how we met, I could give my self a headache from looking at the computer screen for so long, and you'd be bored to death after sitting here for hours reading about a bunch of people you have never met, or are already familiar with. (If you are reading this it's bnecause you are one of my many friends)

A great scripture in the book of Proverbs of the Holy Bible states that "No greater love has a man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. I look at this scripture adn think of teh times I have come to the defense of my friends, or vice versa. It doesn't matter to me if I met you just five minutes ago, or that I have known you for almost 25 years.