FRIENDSHIP

PROVERBS 18:24 (MSG): Friends come and friends go, but a true friend sticks by you like family.

Being a pastor and all that it entails, I have come across some of the most wonderful people that I would have never met otherwise.  God has allowed me to cross their paths of life and on occasion, I will share a few of them with you.  

     Early on in my ministry I happened to be a campus minister in a small college in eastern Kentucky.  It was there that we met a wonderfully unique family, who lived right next door in our apartment complex.  She was very vocal and opinionated while her husband was rather contemplative and tech savvy.  They had two children but also had adopted two children of African decent.   They had served on the mission field for many years before arriving on campus to be employed by the college. They saw serving in eastern Kentucky as a mission field not unlike Africa.  The family did not eat chocolate, drank reconstituted powdered milk, ate very little meat, were extremely health conscious, and practiced unique celebrations. Their oldest daughter would come around on Christmas Eve, with a candle lit crown on her head, and handed out tea and a small Christmas gift to the apartment dwellers.  The mother was very strict as you can imagine, but they were probably the most committed Christians on campus and in our local church.  So, when I needed help in campus ministry, I went to the mother and asked her.  And it was through her that campus ministry actually became a ministry.  Instead of the focus being on ministry to the students, we focused on getting students to be in ministry in our small Appalachian community.  She was essential to its success.  We gave it a name: C.R.O.S.S./Campus Registry of Sharing Services.  Through            C.R.O. S.S., students volunteered in the schools and out in the community.  There they found focus beyond themselves, and many began to see how God used them and would use them in the future through ministry and mission.  This would not have happened if God had not allowed me to cross that family's path of life. And as unique as I thought they were at first,  they were one of my greatest blessings.Their presence in our lives as a family was precious and life changing.  But, we did influence them as well.  They now eat chocolate--a lot.  We have remained in contact with each other for 45 years, and they remain God's blessing to us, and because of them many in Appalachia.  

Give thanks for those in your life that have made a difference in yours.  And, I'm sure your friendship with another has had a positive and profound effect on their life. 

Thanks for being my friend and I thank God for allowing my path in life to cross your path in life. What a great blessing you are to me.

Quentin

Sharecropper's Inheritance

Season of Advent,  2024