I think one of the greatest privileges of my life will be the moments where my phone rings a familiar personalized ring tone and I answer to hear the words "I just need a friend."
Last week, a friend of mine Maureen lost her battle with cancer and although we know that she has fought the good fight and is now with the Lord, it was a heart-breaking event to know that she was no longer with those she dearly loved in body. I did not know Maureen very well, we shared the same group of friends several years back. We shared one very good mutual friend and I got to experience Maureen's kindness and warmth through Hannah as well as when we would share watching church softball games and eating pizza afterwards. Her love for life was unique - she was a beautiful woman inside and out, she was quiet and kind but her love for her Lord, her husband and her son was large and loud. Although Maureen is in Heaven - she leaves a legacy. A legacy of friendship that is told through the friends that sat by her bedside in her last weeks on earth, that support her husband and her son in their loss, and rejoice in their grief that she is not in pain.
Maureen's legacy of friendship reminds of the friendships that I hold closest to my heart. It makes me realize what a great privilege friendship is. I remember back to the winter of 2007. I was working a 24 hour shift, it was Wednesday night and my roommate called me. She was just leaving a young adults event that both usually attended weekly and she had called me tell me to pray. She was with my friend, the Adventurer; No one had seen or heard from his father and things were beginning to look worrisome. I remember the phone call an hour later saying that his father had died and I needed to get on the road. When I arrived, I found a house full of my closest friends and we stayed for hours. We were there when his siblings arrived and as the Adventurer told them the news. We prayed and cried until finally exhaustion set in. The next few days were a blur of activity. Out of the group of seven of us, we were rarely alone; we found we were most effective in a minimum of at least two - although we all had separate responsibilities we banned together while some planned a funeral other made meals to feed a large crowd for weeks. And when there was nothing else left to do, we played poker, ate John Hardys late at night and laughed amongst the tears - trying to make sense of the hurt that taken us all by surprised.
Just last month, tragedy struck again. This time - it was much more quiet, much more private, but the feeling struck the same way as I again answered my phone and was the words echoed through the air "I need you, please come."
Although my heart fills with ache for my friends who have loved and lost; and I would do anything to remove that pain from them if I could... these are the times I treasure most in my life. God has given me the opportunity and the ability to grieve along side the ones that I love and I do so in hopes that my support will bring comfort to them and absorb some of the blow of the pain they are feeling.
So whether its the Roommate calling to share the things I can so easily relate to, the Adventurer who lost his father, the Rockstar calling asking if he can vent, the Travel Companion wondering how she will survive until the test results are back, the Amish Army wife who needs a friend she can trust, the First Lady sharing her frustrations of "this too shall pass", or the Good Witch of the East telling me about decisions revolving around car payments and storage units... these are the times that I realize that one of the most honored titles of my life will the title of "friend."
One of my favorite Bible verse is Proverbs 27:6 - "Faithful are the wounds of a friend." I am so blessed by the ones I love and the ones who have poured into me even when it was difficult for them. I grateful for those who continually speak truth in my life, even when that truth in painful.
Thank You, God, that you did not intend for us to walk this journey alone.
