Michael Kelley, Guest Contributor

“Therefore, encourage one another and build each other up, just as,
in fact, you are doing.”
1 Thessalonians 5:11

Friendship is work.

The older I get, the more convinced I become that it’s true. That’s because when you’re younger, you have natural and regular points of personal connection with the same group of people. You see them every day at school; you play beside them on the court or field and sit next to them at lunch. These are friends, sure, but they are friends by association. Or, if you’re a little more cynical, they are friends of convenience.

But as you get older, you become more established. You acquire more and more responsibilities. The schedule gets busier. As a result, friendships are affected. You no longer have as many of these natural and regular connections, so you have to work at friendships. Every relationship has a cost, and you have to subconsciously weigh the value of that relationship against the cost of time, resources, and energy it will take to maintain and grow it.

I suppose it’s natural that real friendships get smaller in number the older you get. It’s natural, but still a bit sad. Perhaps that’s one of the many reasons why moving into the empty nest phase of life is so difficult – it’s because parents center their lives around their children, and with the children moving out and moving on, they find a lack of shared interests and a lack of other relationships.

Friendship is also costly. 

And to that end, there is one simple question you can always ask a friend:

How would you like me to pray?

This isn’t a statement like, “I’ll pray for you.” Nothing is wrong except that such a statement often becomes an empty promise. We intend to pray, we think about praying, we mean to pray, but we often don’t. 

This question is not just a statement; it’s a commitment. It’s not just a blanket statement; its specificity indicates a firm conviction. What’s more, it’s a question that invites a greater level of disclosure.

When we say, “I’ll pray for you,” it can also become a way of exiting the conversation. When someone shares too intimate, uncomfortable, or painful details, we can extricate ourselves neatly with a statement like that.

But when asking, “How would you like me to pray?” we are pressing in. We are inviting more disclosure. More knowledge. More intimacy. We step closer rather than away, which a true friend does. A true friend presses in. And when we press in as friends, we might be surprised at the answer. Though we might have assumed we now know how our friends feel, what they desire, or what they’re worried about, we still assume those things.

This question is an opportunity to know.

Is there someone in your life in pain this week? Someone in need? Someone you are intending to pray for? 

Then why not take the opportunity to take a step closer? 

Ask them the question, and then make good on the commitment. 

Don’t just pray generally. 

Pray specifically, as a friend should do.

DIG DEEPER
Read “The Essence of Friendship” also by Michael Kelley