How to be Friends with Jesus

I feel really connected to someone when we're riding in the car listening to a song we both know. We start to sing it. The chorus comes and the gusto ensues. There's head-bobbing and fists for microphones. Creative hand movements emerge as well as attempts to make instrumental sounds with our mouth. We serenade each other and if we're feeling really audacious, we sing to the person in the next car.

Maybe we're off key, mumbling through words, and the back seat friend is shaking their head, but we don't care. We are vulnerable and free in that moment and that's the way we like it. 

Something crazy to think about is that you can have that kind of friendship with the Creator of the universe. Yes, you can. It seems impossible, but that's the very reason you're alive right now. God wants you. It's like the lame kid at school hanging out with the popular kid. It's like the poor man and the rich man sharing a meal. It's beautiful.

It's also simple. It might seem complicated, but it's not. A friendship with Jesus looks more like singing in the car and less like fancy, distant prayers and lofty speech about the Bible.

But let's not get crazy. You've gotta pray and read the Bible. How can you be friends with someone if you don't talk (pray) or know about them (Bible)? If you're pursuing a friendship with Jesus and you're not doing those things consistently, then that needs to change. You also need to be friends with his friends (church). Yep, you outta go to church, too.

But on the other hand, let's do get crazy. Tell him everything you wouldn't tell anyone else and say it the way you need to say it. Honestly, Jesus isn't impressed with cute prayers. No lip service here. He wants you to be real. Once, I was talking to him about something frustrating. I said "bull crap" over and over again while I ground my teeth and punched something. Why? I was being honest in front of my friend. I can boldly talk to the King in all His glory, still revere him, and be utterly vulnerable all at once.

When I mess up, yeah he's not happy about it, but he's forgiving and patient. He never nags and will never condescend. He usually says "You know, that's okay... you're more than that and you'll make it next time." If I don't realize that I'm messing up, he kindly lets me know and encourages me to step up my game.  I don't perform in order to be accepted. I'm accepted already, so I perform. He gives the power to overcome things that distract and trip me. Little by little, I'm changing and my new DNA I got when we first became friends is beginning to show up in my character. That's what happens.

"If anyone is in Christ they are a new creation. The old has gone and the new has come." 2 Corinthians 5:17

The bottom line is we work so hard at our relationships with people. Text messages and phone calls, likes and retweets, lunch dates, movie nights, jam sessions, book clubs, fist bumps and bear hugs. What about Jesus? He's like the friend we invite to our house who awkwardly sits on the couch while we're consumed by life on a screen. We need to realize his presence. Realize that he speaks your language. He laughs at that YouTube video with such vivacious laughter. He coaches you while you're running up that hill at the park. He compliments the way you look while getting ready in the morning. He reminds you to pay that bill. He gives you strength to keep going during an ugly, confusing time.

You can be someone and do things beyond what you'd ever think.
Jesus loves you and he paid for your freedom with his life.

He wants to live with you in this life and in eternity.
Friendship with Jesus is the only life that will fill the emptiness that the greatest things on earth could never fill.

"This is the way to have eternal life--to know you the only true God and Jesus Christ, the one you sent to earth." John 17:3