Facebook has tweaked the meaning of the word "friend" somewhat.

Just yesterday I "blocked" two "friends"--two people who are among those on Facebook I am connected to. I didn't "unfriend" them. We are still technically connected, but I adjusted my settings so that I couldn't see what they were saying--because what they were saying made me not want to consider them as friends. One is someone I've known for almost 50 years. The ubiquitous nature of Facebook can make it hard to hang in there with people when the forum seems to allow for unfettered thoughts to be stated without consideration of how they come across, what they do to relationships--things we would most likely never say in person; things that we wouldn't generally say to friends.

And yet, as I've said before, because of Facebook I have reconnected with friends from college. I count as a good friend someone I've never met, but have grown to really appreciate from Facebook conversations. I am friends with authors whom I have never met in person, but I have opportunity to interact with them about what they have written through this fascinating forum. And when something happens that calls for prayer, putting in on Facebook reaches many people all at once, and prayers rise from multiple friends in multiple places. And how else do we get so many friends wishing us "Happy Birthday"?

We have usually distinguished between friends and acquaintances (although, again, Facebook has blurred some of those lines). I have heard it said that "a true friend is someone who'll help you move"--and even those who can't are still those we know we can trust when life challenges us. Some friends we connect with often; other friends it's less often, but the passage of time doesn't change the connection when it rekindles. Friends are important for our well-being. They are those who can say the hard things to us, the things that we don't want to hear, but know we need to hear--because we know that they do so out of supportive, caring concern.

Jesus, in John's version of the Last Supper, says to his disciples, "I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father." Jesus, in enlisting them in his program to transform the world by transforming lives, tells them that they are friends. Being friends with Jesus involves being in relationship with him, and on board with his purposes. And that is an active thing.

Job had three friends who didn't always get it right, as they tried to convince him that he was responsible for the miseries he was going through. But when they first heard of his horrendous misfortunes, "They met together to go and console and comfort him. When they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him, and they raised their voices and wept aloud; they tore their robes and threw dust in the air upon their heads. They sat with him on the ground for seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great." Sometimes the most supportive thing a friend can do is just BE with you. That, too, is an active thing. That, too, is fulfilling Christ's purposes of relationship and transformation.

OLD TESTAMENT Judges 5:31a

31 ‘So perish all your enemies, O Lord!
But may your friends be like the sun as it rises in its might.’

OLD TESTAMENT Job 2:11-13

11 Now when Job’s three friends heard of all these troubles that had come upon him, each of them set out from his home—Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite. They met together to go and console and comfort him. 12 When they saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him, and they raised their voices and wept aloud; they tore their robes and threw dust in the air upon their heads. 13 They sat with him on the ground for seven days and seven nights, and no one spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great.

GOSPEL Mark 5:18-20

18 As he was getting into the boat, the man who had been possessed by demons begged him that he might be with him. 19 But Jesus refused, and said to him, ‘Go home to your friends, and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and what mercy he has shown you.’ 20 And he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him; and everyone was amazed.

GOSPEL John 15:9-17

9 As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. 10 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. 11 I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

12 ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. 13 No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15 I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. 16 You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. 17I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.