November 27, 2017
Proverbs 27: Sharpen Yourself.
"Iron sharpens iron,
So one woman sharpenes another."
Proverbs 27:17
(Pronouns changed. Bless it.)
Friendship is a blessing.
Friendship is work.
Friendship is worth it.
It's effort and listening and rapid fire text messages and making prescheduled weekly phone calls because two households with half a dozen kids between them thrive on chaos and without a reserved time slot the conversation would never happen. It's brutal honesty and unflattering selfies as you discuss age spots and stress induced balding. It's true confessions about how much cookie dough you binge ate or how you hid the good snacks from your kids in the back of the icebox. It's knowing how much each other weighs.
True friendship is laying yourself bare and not worrying about rejection or judgement. It's sharing your cyclical insecurities and chronic character flaws and having someone call you on them. It's tough love. Pep talk love. Word vomit love. Hard love. Sin identifying love. Ugly haircut love. Sacrificing love.
It's easy to have "yes" friends. It's easy to be a "yes" friend. Anybody that's ever had an unfortunate hair cut knows exactly what I'm talking about. You know it's ugly and they know it's ugly- but they'd never admit it. Real friends knit you a headband to cover it.
Being a "no" friend is hard. Especially if you hate conflict as much as I do. And I LOATHE IT WITH ALL MY BEING. But the "no" friends are worth infinitely more because they care more about your spiritual condition than your feelings.
Let that sink in for a minute.
I've been blessed with a "no" friend. She is a jewel. She's my person. My own Ann Perkins! We're so close in fact that we have matching sterling silver bracelets with this very verse on them. She calls me out for being a meddling gossip and I tell her when she's being overly dramatic.
But the thing that makes our friendship so solid is at the heart of this verse: WE ARE MAKING EACH OTHER BETTER VERSIONS OF OURSELVES. She is such a strong believer; her faith is so strong that she can't help but make me realize my own faults because her Light shines so brightly.
And that's what God wants for us. He loves to see us building one another up through our relationships. When we take the time to suck it up, to tell the hard truth no matter how nauseated it makes us, to help a friend refine themselves through our example- we are blessed. Likewise, when we swallow our pride, drop our defensiveness and listen to loving rebuke when it comes from a true friend- we are also blessed.
So take a minute today to think about who sharpens you. Thank them for it! And work to keep your own example one that will help to sharpen the people that see it.
Proverbs 27: Sharpen Yourself.
"Iron sharpens iron,
So one woman sharpenes another."
Proverbs 27:17
(Pronouns changed. Bless it.)
Friendship is a blessing.
Friendship is work.
Friendship is worth it.
It's effort and listening and rapid fire text messages and making prescheduled weekly phone calls because two households with half a dozen kids between them thrive on chaos and without a reserved time slot the conversation would never happen. It's brutal honesty and unflattering selfies as you discuss age spots and stress induced balding. It's true confessions about how much cookie dough you binge ate or how you hid the good snacks from your kids in the back of the icebox. It's knowing how much each other weighs.
True friendship is laying yourself bare and not worrying about rejection or judgement. It's sharing your cyclical insecurities and chronic character flaws and having someone call you on them. It's tough love. Pep talk love. Word vomit love. Hard love. Sin identifying love. Ugly haircut love. Sacrificing love.
It's easy to have "yes" friends. It's easy to be a "yes" friend. Anybody that's ever had an unfortunate hair cut knows exactly what I'm talking about. You know it's ugly and they know it's ugly- but they'd never admit it. Real friends knit you a headband to cover it.
Being a "no" friend is hard. Especially if you hate conflict as much as I do. And I LOATHE IT WITH ALL MY BEING. But the "no" friends are worth infinitely more because they care more about your spiritual condition than your feelings.
Let that sink in for a minute.
I've been blessed with a "no" friend. She is a jewel. She's my person. My own Ann Perkins! We're so close in fact that we have matching sterling silver bracelets with this very verse on them. She calls me out for being a meddling gossip and I tell her when she's being overly dramatic.
But the thing that makes our friendship so solid is at the heart of this verse: WE ARE MAKING EACH OTHER BETTER VERSIONS OF OURSELVES. She is such a strong believer; her faith is so strong that she can't help but make me realize my own faults because her Light shines so brightly.
And that's what God wants for us. He loves to see us building one another up through our relationships. When we take the time to suck it up, to tell the hard truth no matter how nauseated it makes us, to help a friend refine themselves through our example- we are blessed. Likewise, when we swallow our pride, drop our defensiveness and listen to loving rebuke when it comes from a true friend- we are also blessed.
So take a minute today to think about who sharpens you. Thank them for it! And work to keep your own example one that will help to sharpen the people that see it.
Have a Christ-filled day, y'all! And thanks for stopping by~ Katie.
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