Do you treat your friends better than a baseball?

Success and positive thinking gurus have warped our thinking in more than one corrosive way, but some of their greatest damage is teaching us to elevate self to being our main focus and that any other people in our lives should be supportive cheerleaders or else jettisoned immediately.

Treating people that way is little different than how we treat a baseball. One writer commented on our use of baseballs …

The average life span of a Major League baseball is only seven pitches. In tennis, balls are changed out after every seven games. The reasons are similar for both. Dirt, moisture, the oil from the players’ hands all serve to effect the way the balls handle and perform. Seems some things in life lose their usefulness pretty quickly.

Sadly, the same can be said for people. As soon as they fail to perform to our specs we quickly toss them aside. Don’t treat the people in your life like a baseball, discarding them after just seven pitches.

In stark contrast to cheap friendship and teaching us that people are supposed to come and go in our lives like seasons on a calendar, scripture tells us this:

“Loyalty makes a person attractive …” Proverbs 19:22a.

A truly loyal friend is, indeed, a beautiful thing!

Loyal friendships aren’t people who just come and go, but instead are those people we intricately weave deeply into our lives. Mitchel Dillon draws from scripture to describe how a loyal friendship is built:

In Ecclesiastes 4:9-12 Solomon gives us three unifying cords that build a friendship that cannot be broken:

“Two are better than one, because they have a good more satisfying reward for their labor; For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up! Again, if two lie down together, then they have warmth; but how can one be warm alone? And though a man might prevail against him who is alone, two will withstand him. A threefold cord is not quickly broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12).

1. Cord # 1 Is to be this kind of friend. We can’t expect to have a loyal friendship if we are not committed to being a loyal friend to others.

2. Cord # 2 Is to seek this kind of friendship through an active social life. This involves a social investment on our part. As Solomon suggests, “woe to him who is alone.” Friendship involves an investment of time.

3. Cord # 3 is the presence of Christ. Mysteriously, Solomon concludes that two dedicated friends become a “threefold cord,” which is not “quickly broken.” How do two become three? This happens when they are both dedicated believers who bring the strength of the Lord to their friendship.

But to have loyal friendships, we must be a loyal friend.

If we hold people at a distance, we shouldn’t be surprised if they don’t draw close. Military-History.org tells how it is common knowledge that Russian dictator Joseph Stalin prohibited his guards from entering his private bed chambers “on pain of death” …

One day, in a test of their resilience, Stalin decided to scream as if in great agony. When his loyal guards came to their master’s aid, they were duly executed for failing to follow orders.

When Stalin did actually endure a paralyzing seizure, whilst alone in his bedroom, none of his guards dared to come to his aid, on the fear of very tangible reprisals. He was later found semi-conscious by Peter Lozgachev, Deputy Commandant of Kuntsevo, on the floor of the room. He died within a week.

If you want loyal friendships, you must treat people better than a baseball. You’ll have to weave people into your life in a personal and vulnerable way, with Christ at the center of each of those relationships. And you can’t do any of this by keeping people at a distance. To the contrary, the Apostle Paul instructs us to develop devotion for one another:

“Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor,” Romans 12:10 (NASB).

Such a devotion to one another means we are loyal to our friends:

“A friend is always loyal, and a brother is born to help in time of need,” Proverbs 17:17.

“Never abandon a friend — either yours or your father’s. When disaster strikes, you won’t have to ask your brother for assistance. It’s better to go to a neighbor than to a brother who lives far away<" Proverbs 27:10.

Are you a loyal friend? Who, in your life, would say they could count on your friendship in any circumstance? Or are you holding people at a distance and testing them to see if they’re adequate cheerleaders?

Scotty