God seeks out relationship in any form possible. God the friend is the sort who is comfortable in both groups and individually. What would God's Myers-Brigg personality be, I wonder? Either way, I sense that God's idea of friendship is lasting. As Christians, we believe that through the waters of baptism we are re-born into a new life in Jesus Christ. We are bound to him as he is to us. The Body of Christ, the Church militant on earth, is where we strengthen those bonds as we move through the process of life. That friendship is a bond that sustains heartaches, peer-pressure, and all the anxieties of social life in community.
God is the chief friend, the "best" if you will. The model is forged throughout the whole of Scripture. As it is, God acts first and always first and relieves us of any anxiety of acceptance. God's will is to bind us into the common humanity in the life of the Kingdom. There is no pressure from God to buy certain labels or behave differently in or around certain people. God's will is to be the friend who frees us up to be who God wants us to be--who we were created to be.
I doubt there's any double-crossing, gossiping, or even the ultimate betrayal with God as friend. If anything, we're quick to claim that God has disappeared or somehow abandoned us--Our Lord's cry of dereliction from the cross, for example. The reality is, and proved only by one's own journey of faith, that God is present in the darkness too. It is easy to see and feel the presence of God in the good things of life, blessings are always nicer than pain. Yet my own experience has shown that the pain of life we sometimes experience leaves wounds that are transformed into blessings. Henri Nouwen's "wounded healer" concept nails this down succinctly. God is in the darkness and sometimes so close to us that we believe we've been left for dead. Friendship, relationship, and covenant are bonds that bind and last forever. God as the instrument in forging such bonds reveals the powerful love that links us to our creator.
I need God as my friend and confidant. I need to know that someone cares for me while catching me every time I fall down. God never seems to grow weary of me and all my peculiarities, much less my poor decisions and sin. God never gives up on me while I have given up on God at certain times in my life. It is when I discovered God quietly in the darkness that I learned God's deep well of mercy and grace. How often have we heard that when really bad things happen you discover who your true friends really are? Enough said.
