(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

I think I'm crazy for turning to John chapter 15 when we're doing the series on John on Wednesday night, but I'm not preaching through this chapter or anything. I just wanted to read this chapter because there's part of it that I wanted to use as the beginning of my sermon. And so, if you would, look at verse number 12. The Bible reads, This is my commandment, that ye love one another, as I have loved you. Greater love hath no man than this, than that a man lay down his life for his friends. Ye are my friends if ye do whatsoever I command you. Henceforth I call you not servants, for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth. But I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard of my father I have made known unto you. Now, what I want to preach about tonight is friendship. And I preached on this subject before, but this is a totally different sermon. I want to preach about what it is to be a friend, and I was thinking about the song that we sang, and that's part of the reason why I requested that song at the nursing home, because I knew that I was going to be preaching this tonight, and so I requested one of my favorite songs, What a Friend We Have in Jesus. Who's heard that song? Put it up your hand. Everybody. What a friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer. Now, that's really the truth. Look, if you would, at Proverbs chapter 6. Turn back in your Bible to Proverbs chapter 6. Elsewhere in the Bible, Jesus says here to his disciples, You're not just my servants. You don't just work for me. You're not just serving me. But he said, You are also my friends. Now, don't you think that's a privilege? To be able to have the opportunity to be called Jesus' friend. God's friend. Remember Abraham in the Old Testament was called the friend of God? And the Bible says, that was not just written for his sake, that righteousness was imputed to him, and that he was the friend of God. But he said, it was also written for our sakes to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. And so, Abraham was the friend of God. The twelve disciples were the friend of Jesus. And now we have the opportunity in 2008 to have Jesus as our friend. Truly what a privilege it is to bring everything to God in prayer. I mean, to be able to get on our knees, open our mouth, and be speaking to the God of the universe, and he hears whatsoever we ask. Isn't that amazing? I mean, what would you, I mean, think about if you didn't have that opportunity. And you needed something. Oh, how you long to have the opportunity to open your mouth and be heard by God. And for God to say, oh, just a minute, my friend is talking to me. Let me see what my friend needs. Let me see what my friend has to say. Hey, that's a privilege. But, in Luke 12-4, Jesus makes a similar statement, you don't have to turn there, but in Luke 12-4 he says, and I say unto you, my friends. And he's speaking to his disciples again. Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that, have no more that they can do. He's telling them, don't be afraid, don't be fearful. He's speaking to his friends. He's calling them friends. He's saying, I want to be your friend. You're never going to have a better friend than Jesus. I've had a lot of friends in my life, let me emphasize the term, had. I've had a lot of friends, that's past tense. I've had a lot of friends in my life. Because friends tend to come and go. Now, some friends are lifelong friends. Some friends you have a lifetime with. That's pretty rare. I mean, I can't think of anybody who's been my friend for more than five years, besides relatives. I don't have a friend that's more than five years old. No, I don't mean that as a child. But, I mean, as far as being my friend for more than five years. Yeah, all my friends are three and four, you know. No, I haven't had a friend for more than five years. I can't even think of one, outside of family. And when I say family, I'm including my wife, my children, and my relatives. But as far as just a friend that's not related to me. You know, I've got some friends, probably listening to the sermon. They're like, how do you forget about me? I don't have one. And so, a friend that'll stick with you. I mean, a friend that'll stay with you, is truly a priceless commodity. The Bible says, are you there in Proverbs 6? Right now, we're talking about Jesus as our friend. And then we're going to talk a little more about friendship. But look at Proverbs 6.20. This is about the Word of God. This is about the Bible. It says in verse 20, My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother. Bind them continually upon thine heart. If you read the context, it's talking about the Word of God that's been talking about his mother and father. He says, bind them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck. When thou goest, it shall lead thee. When thou sleepest, it shall keep thee. And when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. See, this is the best friend you're ever going to get. Your Bible. You want to know who my best friend is? Jesus. You know, I take Jesus everywhere I go. Because I take my Bible with me everywhere I go. And I can open the Bible and read it. I can pop in the CDs of Alexander Scobee reading the Bible. And hey, when I wake up in the morning, Jesus will talk with me. God will speak to me. That's what it says. Look down at your Bible in Proverbs 6, 22. When thou awakest, it shall talk with thee. He says, when you walk down the road, it'll be a companion to you. When you're driving in your car. When you're at work. Hey, you always have your friend with you. Jesus. And the Holy Spirit. And the Bible. And of course, they're all inseparable. You can't separate Jesus from the Holy Spirit. And you can't separate the Bible from Jesus. I mean, the Word of God is God. The Holy Spirit is God. I mean, we're talking about the Trinity here. We're talking about the Father and the Word and the Holy Ghost and these three are one. And so Jesus is the best friend you'll ever have. He's always with you. You can always bring him with you. You always have somebody to talk to. You always have somebody to talk to you. You always have somebody to be a companion with you wherever you go. Jesus is the best friend that you'll ever have. Don't let down your friend. Can you imagine having a friend like Jesus who's always there for you? And then you're not there for him when he needs you. You say, Jesus needs me? Of course he does. You say, what does God need me for? What does Jesus need me for? God can do anything. He doesn't need me. Wrong and wrong again. God can't do anything. You say, oh, I believe God can do anything. Well, the Bible says in Titus 1, 2, God cannot lie. So, that means that anything that God says he's not going to do in the Bible, he can't do it. Because he can't lie. And if he can't lie, then everything he says he's going to do in the Bible, he's got to do. And everything he says he's not going to do, he can't do it. He can't lie. He cannot deny himself. It says in 2 Timothy chapter 2. And so, God cannot, listen to me carefully, and have fun trying to prove me wrong doctrinally on this. God cannot go get somebody saved without you. Oh! He can't do it. You see, I can't get anybody saved without Jesus. You know, Jesus can't get anybody saved without me. When Jesus was on this earth, he won people to the Lord, because he was a human being. And through the power of the Holy Spirit, God in the flesh won people to Christ himself. But now, the Bible says he is committed to us, the ministry of reconciliation. You see, Jesus will not go door to door in Phoenix this week, knocking on doors, coming to people's house, and preaching the Gospel to him, and getting him saved. Jesus will not go out single-handedly, and win anybody to the Lord. His earthly ministry is over. And now he's passed the torch to us, his disciples. He said, as long as I'm in the world, I am the light of the world. He said, walk in the light while you have the light with you. He said, pretty soon the light is going to be gone. But now he says to us, ye are the light of the world. A city that is settled in hell cannot be hid. Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine, that men may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. We're the light of the world, and Jesus needs us to get people saved. You see, God can't do it without us. And we can't do it without God. I mean, we can't go out and get people saved without Jesus Christ, and the power of the Holy Spirit, the Word of God. This is a team effort between us and Jesus. It's sort of like having children. My wife and I have four children. You say, who is responsible, you or your wife? Well, both of us. She can't have kids without me. I can't have kids without her. And it's the same thing. Children aren't going to be born into God's family unless there's a two-part effort between man and God teaming up to get people saved, in the yoke together, with Jesus, getting people saved. You see, Jesus Christ needs us. He's relying on us, if you will. And He's always there for you, every time you need Him. You can get on your knees, and speak to God, and get what you need, and have safety, and have somebody to help you, and to talk with you, and to be with you, when you're struggling with whatever. But are you there when Jesus needs you? When He says, it's time to win souls. I need your help. I need to get the Gospel to Phoenix. I need to get the Gospel to the world. Are you ready to answer the call of your friend, who's telling you, hey, I've died on the cross, I've been buried, I've risen again, and now I need you to step up to the plate, and win souls with me. And you say, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, my friend, Jesus. I'm too busy. I don't have time. I'm sorry, Jesus. There's too much else going on that's just too important. My finances are too important. My sports is too important. Well, aren't you all looking forward to the Super Bowl? I couldn't care less. It means less than nothing to me. All it means to me is that, when we go out soloing on Sunday afternoon, like we always do, we're going to get the door slammed in our face, because everybody's watching the Super Bowl. That's all it means to me. Say, what does the Super Bowl mean to you, Pastor Anderson? It means going out soloing and nobody wants to listen, because everybody's too busy in the sports. That's all it means to you. I mean, it means nothing else to me. It means a bunch of guys in skin-tight pants, running around, throwing a ball around, and millions and millions of people, let's stop everything and watch them do it. How juvenile. How childish. All it means is a bunch of beer ads to me. I'm just telling you the true meaning of the Super Bowl to me. Beer ads. Scantily clad women dancing around on a football field at halftime. Or some pervert, Michael Jackson or something, performing at the Super Bowl. Like ten years ago or something. But you know what? That's all it means. It means less than nothing to me. You going to let down your friends that you can watch the Super Bowl? Jesus says, I want you to come to my house. I want to spend some time with you, friend. I want to spend time with you on Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. Will you come over to my house? And you say, nope. You've got to watch the Super Bowl, friend. See, we've got to treat our friend right, because he treats us right. You've got to think about that. Isn't it great to always have somebody with you, to bring along with you? Listen to this. This is Exodus 33, 11. You don't have to turn there. And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend. And he turned again into the camp, but his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, departed not out of the tabernacle. Turn to the book of Proverbs. I'm going to show you several verses in the book of Proverbs. Look at Proverbs 17, 17. I'm going to show you some great verses on friendship. Because I feel like our viewpoint of friendship has been warped. Yeah, I mean, the world doesn't know what it is to be a true friend. If you want a real friend, you should come and get around people that love God and love soul wanting and love the Bible. That's where you can find real friends. If you go to the bar, if you go to the football game, you're not going to find real friends there. You're going to find users, people who just want to use you as their friend. Kind of like in Judges 16 with Samson. Remember he had a friend that he used for a little while? It actually uses those words. The man whom he used as his friend. You'll find people that like to be with you if you're fun. Right? If you're fun, you know, and they have the same hobbies and interests, or maybe you're good looking and popular, so they want to be associated with you. But when you're in need, that person may not be there for you. They may not be truly your friend. And so, the world knows nothing of friendship. And people choose their friends, what do they choose them based on? Oh, we both like Corvettes, you know. Or, oh, we both like duty invert purses, you know. Or, well, we both like Britney Spears, you know. Or, we both watch American Idol, you know, and 50 million other people in America, you know. So, that's why we're friends. Or, well, I mean, think about it. What good is a friend who's just somebody you just hang out with, have fun with? Is that really what God's talking about when he talks about friends? What I'd like to know. When Jesus said, I'm your friend, does he mean, hey, let's hang out sometime? He said, no, I'm going to be there for you. I'm going to help you. I'm going to be your companion. I'm going to spend time with you. I'm going to talk with you. I'm going to be there when you need me. Look at verse 17, or Proverbs 17. I'll show you some things about friendship. Let's talk about Biblical friendship. Not the world's kind of a friend, which this is a buddy I hang out with, but a real friend. It says in verse 17, a friend loveth at all times. Do you see that? That's a friend. Somebody who's always there for you when things are bad, when things are good, when you have something to offer them, when you have nothing to offer them. The friend will love you at all times. When you mess up and you do something wrong, your friend still loves you. Even if you do something wrong, you make a mistake, you commit sin, whatever, your friend will still love you and still be there. That's what friendship is. It says, a friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. Flip over, if you would, to Proverbs 18.24. Proverbs 18.24, the Bible reads, a man that hath friends must show himself friendly, and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. Now, what's the Bible saying here? If you want friends, you say, oh, I'd love to have a friend like that. Somebody that's there for me, somebody who loves me at all times, somebody who cares about me, somebody who's always there when I need them, that would be a blessing just to know, it would just be a comfort just to know that I have a friend like that. Well, you have one, Jesus, okay? But you say, well, I'd like to have some earthly friends like that also. I'm going to tell you how you're going to do it. You're going to do it by being a friend. That's what it says here. It says, a man that hath friends must show himself friendly. And again, we're not talking, I remember my whole life when I was growing up, I thought this verse meant show yourself friendly. My parents would say, oh, man, I have friends, but show them so friendly. I thought to myself, I need to go to church and go to school and go to my neighborhood and be like, hey, how you doing? My name's Steve. Like being friendly, like we think of friendly. Like when you go to In-N-Out, hi, how you doing today? Can I take your order? Oh, that was a very friendly checkout line or McDonald's if they're friendly. Like, hi, hello, how are you doing today? Would you like that? Supersize. Okay, oh, wow, that was a very friendly cashier. But when the Bible says friendly, it's saying you behave as a friend toward that person. It's saying if you want friends, be a friend. Watch out for your people that are in need and help somebody else. That's how you're going to make friends. When you see other people that need something and you help them, hey, you just got yourself a friend. You see somebody who's lonely, who's sad, who's friendless, who needs help, who needs help, hey, if you'll be there for them and be the comfort to them and be a friend to them, that's where you're going to get friends. That's the biblical way to get friends. How to make friends, and I'm going to write a book about it, How to Make Friends and Influence People. Okay, or isn't that a book? How to Win Friends and Influence People. That's what it is. How to Win Friends and Influence People. It's called Being a Friend Yourself. Let me tell you a funny story, okay? And it wasn't funny at the time. And some of you, I think I probably told this story, so I'm going to keep it short in case I've already told some of you this story. When I was in junior high when I was 13 and I got attacked by these two big Rottweilers, okay? And I'm not going to go on and on about it, but we were jogging to the park for school, for P.E., and here's these two Rottweilers. They're digging a hole in the ground, and there were two guys across the street from me, and I was by myself. And then the whole rest, everybody, was way, way back behind us. We left a little bit early. And we're running to the park to play baseball. These two big dogs, Kane and Zeus, were their names. What kind of person names their dogs wicked names and expects them to be a little happy puppy dog? And these dogs were part German Shepherd, part Rottweiler, and they were huge, 150 pounds each. I didn't weigh 150 pounds. I was 13 years old and I weighed like 120 or something, okay? And these two dogs just chews me off. They start circling me, growling at me, and I'm saying, you know, nice doggy, good boy, you know, and then trying to be nice to them. One of them jumps and bites me on my elbow right here. The other one jumps and bites me right here. And they start attacking me. I run down the street back toward the school. They're biting me. They're jumping on me, knocking me down. I mean, I thought they were going to kill me. And later on, I counted the bites. I mean, this is how I counted, just by looking at the bloody tooth marks on my body. I mean, this is how hard they were biting me. I was looking at the sets of fangs and I counted 21 bites. Twenty-one times they broke my skin to where, you know, a half hour later I could sit there and one, two, three, four, five, six, and count these bites. Twenty-one times. And I would be bitten, knocked down to the ground. I'm getting up. I'm running and running. And my two friends, okay, that were across the street, they didn't see what happened. They just kept running. They were on the corner. They didn't see it. Everybody else hadn't come around the corner yet. They were way back there. And I was about, probably about, I want to say about an eighth of a mile from the intersection where the school was located. I had a little further to go to the school, but it was about a city block. And so I'm running, being attacked for an eighth of a mile, just being bitten, and I was getting away, but then they run up and get me again. And so I finally get to the corner. I run across, or no, I'm sorry, before I get to the corner, I'm running toward the corner. All of a sudden, a crowd of twenty guys comes around the corner from the PE class, and they're jogging, you know, toward us. And three of them had baseball bats. Two of them had aluminum baseball bats. One of them had a wooden baseball bat. They jog around the corner, and I start screaming, Help! Help! Help! Right? I'm running toward them. I'm screaming, Help! Help! Help! And they just all stopped, because they were jogging toward me. They all just stopped. I didn't really notice if they talked to each other, or what. It just seemed like they all just stopped and just stared at me. And I'm running toward them, and these dogs are attacking me. I'm just screaming, Help! Help! Help! And the whole crowd just turned around at the same time, just turned around and just ran away. And just ran the other way. And I mean, three of them had baseball bats. And there were twenty of them. And these dogs are big and mean, but I'm sorry. If you've got two baseball bats, and a third baseball bat, and twenty guys, they could have saved me, you know? And so I'm still being bitten and attacked. I mean, I could have been killed. And so I run up to the corner, and I cut across the corner, just to shorten the distance. I cut across this guy's lawn, and the guy sitting in the lawn chair, he curses at me. Black, black, black, running across my lawn. And I'm thinking to myself, do you see what's happening? You know, he probably thought I was playing with these dogs. And so he curses me, and I run across the lawn, and I just ran out into traffic. Because I just didn't know what else to do, you know? And so there were cars coming and everything. I just ran across the busy street, Garfield Avenue. I ran across the busy street. People were slamming on the brakes, spinning out and stuff. And the dogs just stopped. They didn't run into the street. I ran out into the street, avoided getting hit by a car, got across the street, and the dogs, you know, stayed on the other side of the street because of all the commotion. It scared them. I walk up to the school, you know, and all the guys are crowded behind the glass doors looking out at me. And I walked up, and they parted like the Red Sea when I got there. They just parted just silence as I walked in the door. And they were just silent. Didn't say a word. And then the principal or the, I think it was the PE teacher or somebody, said, oh, man, what's, you know, you see the blood and everything. He rushed over to me, oh, man, let's get you some help, everybody. And took me to the office. They cleaned me up a little bit, bandaged me up, and took me to the hospital. And it wasn't like I was dying or anything. I mean, I just was bit up and bleeding. And it was somewhere pretty deep. I mean, one of them bled. It was still bleeding a little bit, like three days later. Okay, one of them. And so it was just, you know, it wasn't anything terrible, but it was just bites, 21 bites all over. And I remember talking to some of those guys afterward, and I said, you know, why didn't you help me? I said, you had a back. Why didn't you help me? I mean, why didn't you come and help me? I mean, I could have done it. I mean, these dogs could have bit my neck or something. And if they would have knocked me down, because they were trying to knock me down and jumping on my back and everything, I said it could have bit my neck and just would have been all over. They said, why didn't somebody help me? And I remember talking to one in particular, and he just said, I don't know. He said, I wish I would have helped you. He said, I feel like an idiot. He said, I mean, I had a back. I mean, I could have just come up and just, you know, could have been the hero, he said. He said, I don't know what came over me. He said, I don't know what came over us. We just all just ran away. You know why? Because they weren't my friends. You know, I mean, I thought some of them were my friends. But do you really think that any of those 20 people really loved me? I don't think so. I think he thought later it would have been cool to be the hero, you know, in front of his friends and beat the dogs in with a baseball bat and save me. But you know what? I don't think that any of those guys really, you know, it's funny. I don't talk to any of those guys today. I mean, I don't know where they are or what they're doing. I don't care about me. I don't care about them. Why? Because they weren't my friends. They didn't love me. You see the difference between somebody that you hang out with, somebody who's your acquaintance, and boy, me and those guys, man, we'd go out to pizza. We'd go out and play games. We'd go out and do this and do that and do that. But they weren't really my friends, were they, in the biblical sense. They didn't love me. They didn't protect me. They weren't there for me. My life didn't mean anything to them. I mean, they wouldn't have been risking their life by coming with 19 other people and a baseball bat. But they wouldn't even risk anything. They wouldn't even take care of anything. They would just as soon leave me there being mauled by two dogs and go run and hide behind a glass door just to see how it's going to turn out. You see the difference? I'm not ripping on them or criticizing them. I mean, they're just kids. You know, we were all 13 years old. But do you see what I'm trying to illustrate here? I mean, the difference between an acquaintance, a buddy, a pal, and a friend. A friend, the Bible says there in Proverbs 17, 17, a friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity. Proverbs 18, 24, a man that hath friends must show himself friendly, and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. He's saying, you could have friends in your life that will stick closer to you than your own brother. I mean, you could have a friend in your life that'll love you more, care about you more, do more for you than your own brother, than your own mom and dad. God's saying, hey, there's friends that you could have that would care about you as much as if you were their own brother or more. And then also, you could take a secondary application there and say that there's a friend that sticketh closer than a brother. Jesus will stick closer to you than your own flesh and blood brother. Look at Proverbs 27. Turn more toward the end of Proverbs there. Proverbs 27. We'll see some more about friendship. Proverbs 27, look at... Let's start reading here. I'm trying to see what... I have these verses written out. There's so many other good verses in this chapter, but I'm just going to stick with what I have here in my outline. Look at Proverbs 27, 6. The Bible says, faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. See, God's saying a friend is somebody that you can trust. Now, can you fully trust any friend? No. I mean, the only person you really trust is Jesus. You'll learn that in your life. But a friend is somebody where, let's say they wound you. You'd have more confidence with your friend wounding you than the enemy that kisses you. Now, you remember Judas Iscariot, who kissed Jesus? Remember? And what did Jesus say to him? Friend, remember? He walks into the garden of Gethsemane, and Jesus says to Judas, he says, Friend, wherefore art thou come? What are you doing here? Judas comes up and kisses him on the cheek, which was the sign of his betrayal, because, you see, Jesus didn't have long hair. You know, everybody thinks Jesus had this long hair like a girl, like a homo. But the Bible says that it's a shame for a man to have long hair. And so, that's why when the soldiers came to the garden of Gethsemane, they didn't say, Get him! He's the one with the long hair! You know, or the historian Josephus, who was not around for Jesus' life, he claimed that Jesus was like six foot six tall. You know, people come up with all this weird stuff. You know what? You wouldn't have known Jesus if you saw him. Because Judas Iscariot said to these people, who'd even known about Jesus, and they'd probably even seen him before. He said, It's going to be the one that I kiss, so you'll know who to give. Because Jesus was there with eleven of his disciples. There's twelve men walking together, and the soldiers could not tell them apart. Like, they couldn't tell which one is he. Oh, get the one with the long hair. Get the one that's, you know, six inches tall, and everybody else. You know, he said that he's going to have to give them a kiss, so that they'd know who he was. Okay. And so, that was a, that was, sometimes people that seem like they love you, they seem like they're good to you, are actually the people who are trying to hurt you. And sometimes, people will do something to you that hurts a little bit. But, you know what? You can trust your friend more than the enemy. What do I mean by that? Sometimes, if you have a true friend, they might tell you something like, You're wrong. Like, you're in danger right now. You're hanging around with the wrong friends right now. Or, your job that you're working at is not the right job. You shouldn't be working there. You know, they might tell you things that are mean. Don't you hate it when people are mean? I'm just never mean to anybody. I just love everybody. But, you know, you know how it is. Sometimes, you gotta be a little bit mean to people, because you love them. You know, somebody's hanging around with the wrong crowd, like a child or a teenager. Somebody's doing things that are dishonest or illegal. You know, and sometimes you have to come to them and say, No, you listen to me. You're wrong. You need to change this. You're in danger. What you're doing is not right. The path that you're going down is dangerous. Sometimes, a true friend is the one who tells you, Hey, look, you've got something on your face right here. You know, wipe it off. Right? They'll point that out to you. They might be a little bit rude to you sometimes, if they have to, because they love you. And, they're going to tell you that you're wrong sometimes. They're going to tell you what's right. They're going to tell you that you're doing something that's dangerous or wrong. But, sometimes people will just flatter you with their tongue all the time. You know, you can't trust people like that. But, you can trust the right kind of friends. Look at verse number 9. The Bible says, Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart, so does the sweetness of a man's friend by hearty counsel. Thine own friend and thy father's friend forsake not, neither go into thy brother's house in the day of thy calamity, for better is a neighbour that is near than a brother that is far off. He's saying, don't forsake your friend. Don't let down your friend, because one day you may need a friend. And, if you want to have friends, you've got to show yourself friendly. If you'll be a friend to somebody, then in the day of your calamity, when your brother's far from you, your mom and dad are far from you, you don't have anybody to help you, you can rely on that friend to help you. I've got a few friends myself. And, I know that my friends, I can rely on them and trust them that if I needed something, they would be there for me. That I could pick up the phone and say, I need help. And, they say, I'll do anything I can to help you. I'll be there for you, friend. That's what being a friend is about. You need to learn this. This is Bible doctrine here. Jesus said, I'll be your friend. Jesus said, I want you to be my friend. He said, be friends among yourself. Hereby, shall all men know that you are my disciples. When you have love one to another, friendship is what we're talking about tonight. Look at verse number 17. Iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend. See, the right kind of friend is somebody who's going to sharpen you up, strengthen you, build you up, make you a better Christian, a better person. Not somebody who's going to make you duller. Now, think about this. If I took iron, like a sharp piece of iron, like a sharp iron dagger, and then I took something like a piece of wood, that wood is going to make the iron dull. If you take an iron ax, and you take an iron ax head, and you swing that ax into a tree, every time you hit that tree, that ax is becoming more dull. And a woodsman knows that he has to continually be sharpening his ax all the time. Daily, weekly, monthly, whatever the case may be. He's got to keep it sharp. But what does he use to sharpen it? What is a knife sharpener made out of? Metal. You know, if you see these, and you know there are wet stones and so forth, but have you ever seen these knife sharpeners women sometimes have in their kitchen, and they've got the little wheels, the little sharp wheels, and you go zzz, zzz, zzz, zzz. Put up your hand. You're using iron to sharpen iron. Iron sharpeneth iron. He says if you get a strong friend, a strong Christian, a spiritual friend, and then you're spiritual, and you're righteous, you're going to build each other up. You're going to help each other grow. You're going to sharpen each other up. When you start hanging around with these dull friends, you say, I'm going to sharpen them up. You might sharpen up that piece of wood, but you're going to get dull in the process. Maybe you'll go like this. I don't want to go like this. I want to stay up here. In fact, I want to go higher ground. I'm not going to hang around friends that bring me up. Well, you can help them a little bit. You may be able to help them a little bit, but they'll pull you down a lot. Don't have ungodly friends. The worst thing you could do in your life is have ungodly, wicked friends. The Bible says you are right now, or the Bible says this is what I say. You are right now, or you soon shall be what your friends are. If I want to know your future, I can look at who you're friends with, and I can see that's your future. That's what you're going to be. If all your friends are godly, soul winning, righteous, separated, soul winning Christians, I can tell that's where you're going. But if I look at you and all your friends are on drugs, all your friends are drunk, all your friends are partying and idiots, I'm going to say, you know what? You're on the road to becoming an idiot just like they are. You see, it's this simple, and I've used this illustration before, but it's such a great illustration. Come here, Brother Dave. I just love to have these wrestling matches with Brother Dave, is what it's really about, because I just like throwing them around. Stand up on that chair. This is Brother Dave. Man, he's a great Christian. I mean, look at what heights he's reaching in his spiritual eyes. Look at the growth. I mean, he's head and shoulders above anybody here. This is a spiritual guy. This is somebody we can really look up to as a leader. Now, here I come along, all the way down here. I'm a very weak Christian. See the difference? Big difference, huh? I'm a very weak Christian. I'm worldly. I'm ungodly. I'm into sin. Whatever. And so I say to Brother Dave, let's be best buddies. Let's be good friends. And Brother Dave says, okay. He says, I'll be your friend, Pastor Anderson, because I think I can help bring you up to my level. I'm going to help you grow. Okay. Now, Brother Dave, bring me up to your level, please. See, this is you when you're at school, right? You hang around with all the drug crowd and all the weirdos because you're going to make them righteous. Go ahead. Come on, Brother Dave, you wimp. Come on. Do I need to pick somebody else? Alright. Now, let's see if I, the sinful, you know, worldly, ungodly guy, let's see if I can do anything about bringing him down to my level. How hard was that? Well, that was tough. Pretty hard, huh? Actually, I'm a lot stronger than him, so that was a bad illustration. No, I'm just kidding. Just kidding. You see my point, though? I mean, that's not hard to take somebody down a notch. Now, I'm not saying that you should never be around anybody. I'm sorry. I am holier than thou. I cannot be your friend. But I'm going to tell you something. Your best bet would just be to gravitate toward the more spiritual and righteous people and just get around them and be their friend. You know what? You say, well, what about the drug crowd? Doesn't somebody need to reach them? Amen and amen. And here's what you do, teenagers or whoever, adults. Here's what you do. You open your Bible and you say, do you know for sure if you died today that you'd go to heaven? Can I show you the plan of salvation? You say, well, I wouldn't listen to that. Then what good are you going to do them anyway? You know what I mean? If they won't listen to that, how are you going to get them saved anyway? Well, but if I be their friend, if they won't listen today, they won't listen tomorrow. And so if you go to them and say, I want to preach the gospel to you, you may get them saved. I mean, you'd be surprised. Sometimes the people that are the most weirdo people and you think this person would never listen to the gospel, you'd be surprised. They'll listen. They'll get saved. Their whole life could be changed. Preach the gospel to every creature. Don't just write people off and say, well, you know, I'm not even going to mess with them. Hey, get them the gospel. And it's such hypocrisy, the person who says, well, I got all these unsaved and ungodly friends that I'm buddy-buddy with and we go hang out together, we go play pool together, we go to the bar and I just drink ice water and they drink booze and I eat a sandwich and a Coca-Cola and they're drinking, but I don't drink. It's funny. How many of those people are really going to win to the Lord? Maybe one, maybe two in the course of months. But how many people do we have saved today out soul winning? A lot, okay? A whole lot. One after another after another. You see, buddying up to and being a friend of the world is not the answer to getting people saved. The answer is to preach the gospel. And you know what? If they're willing to listen, take somebody out to eat. I'm not saying not to take somebody out to eat and give them the gospel, take out your coworker out to lunch, give them the gospel, try to be a friend to them. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about being a companion and a buddy of the world. And if you'll give them the gospel, chances are either they'll get saved or they won't want to be your friend because you're a holy Joe or a Bible thumper or whatever. And so they'll move on to somebody else and that's just all fine and dandy because you don't want them pulling you down all the time, taking you down to their level. Pretty soon they'll have you drinking. Pretty soon they'll have you watching movies with them. Pretty soon they'll have you telling dirty jokes with them. That's just the way of the world, my friend. You start to act like your friends. I have friends and you know what? The more I hang around with them, the more I start to act like them. That's why I try to be careful about who I hang around. I find myself acting like people that I interact with. I find myself acting like coworkers or acting like my boss at work or acting like my friends. I find myself acting like all kinds of people. Because I'm around them, you're going to start to act like them, no matter who you are. Oh, I'm immune to that. No, you're not. Nobody's immune to that. You're going to start hanging around. So iron sharpened with iron. If you're iron, get around a friend that's iron. Don't get around old Mr. Woodhead, not Head. Get around the Iron Man. You don't want to get around the wrong friend. That's the worst thing that you can do. Look at Matthew chapter 25. Matthew 25. I'm talking about being a friend. Look at Matthew 25. The Bible says in Matthew chapter 25, and let's begin reading in verse 42. It says, For I was in hunger, this is Jesus speaking, and you gave me no meat. I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink. I was a stranger, and you took me not in. Naked, and ye called me not. Sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not. Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee in hunger, or a thirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, do not minister unto thee? Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, and as much as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. Jesus is saying, if you want to be my friend, be a friend of my people. Be a friend to your fellow brother in Christ. You say, how am I going to be a friend? He outlines it for you right here. When they're hungry, feed them. We live in the United States, that's not really something that we deal with much. If they're hungry, feed them. Thirsty, give them a drink. Stranger, take them in. Sick, in prison, visit them. Love them. Send them a card. Give them a phone call. Show them some love. Hey, that's how you can show Jesus love. That's how you can be a friend to him, by helping and ministering to your fellow brother and sister in Christ. And he said, do unto the least of them. You say, well, I'll do it for the pastor, because then I can get some glory for it. Hey, do it for the least person in this church, or in any church. Do it for the person that's never going to pay you back. Do it for the person that can't do anything for you. Do it for the person that nobody will even know about it. And Jesus is going to say one day, thank you, thank you for visiting me in the nursing home. Thank you so much for visiting me in the hospital. Thank you for visiting me in prison. Thank you so much for feeding me when I was hungry. Thank you for giving me something to drink when I was touching you. You say, Jesus, when did I ever do that for you? Well, remember you did it for so and so. When you did it for them, you did it for me. But what else, what are some other characteristics of a friend? Look, if you would, at 2 Timothy, chapter 1. 2 Timothy, chapter 1, toward the end of the New Testament. 2 Timothy, chapter number 1. What are some other characteristics of a real, true friend? 2 Timothy, chapter 1. Look at verse number 15, the Bible reads, This thou knowest that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me, of whom are Phygelus and Hermaznes. He's saying basically they've forsaken me. They've not been there for me anymore. I did everything for them, but now they've just forsaken me. Of whom are Phygelus. Let me tell you a few of them, Phygelus and Hermaznes. They're gone. Verse 16, the Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus. Here's the good example of a good friend. For he oft refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain. Have you ever had friends that were ashamed of you? You know how it is, this is more like junior high and high school, these kind of politics. But you'll be around your friend, right? And then some other cooler crowd shows up, and it's like, Oh well, I gotta go be with them. Be ashamed of your friend. That's not a real friend, that's pretty sad, isn't it? Can you imagine if you were out in the grocery store in Tempe, and Pastor Anderson shows up, and I said, Hey! Amanda, how you doing? Good to see you! And she's with some of her friends, and she's like, I don't know who that is. I've never even seen him before. Hey, Amanda, over here! Oh, maybe Amanda doesn't see me. Hey, Amanda, over here! It's your friend, it's Pastor Anderson! And she's like, Oh, let's just go, I don't know who that is, let's just go. Let's just go, I don't need to buy this stuff, let's just go out in the car. And she's like, Man, I don't want to be seen in the grocery store. Pastor Anderson, you know, they're gonna think I'm some kind of a weirdo or something, you know? Or kind of a fanatic, you know? How do you think that would make me feel? You say, is Amanda your friend? You know, Amanda is my friend. You say, would you and Amanda get together and hang out? Yeah, yeah, we go out to lunch and hang out. Of course we don't. I go out to lunch and hang out with my wife. Thank you. But you know, Amanda is my friend. Because Amanda was here when it was just Amanda. And my family, of course, was here. But it was me and my wife, and my three kids back then, and Amanda. Hey, she's my friend, because she was there for me. And so I'm gonna be there for her. And others in this room, of course, that have been there for me. Hey, I'm gonna be there for you. I'm your friend. Pastor Anderson's your friend. You say, why? I don't even know if I have a friend like that. Hey, you come to this church, you stick around, you run with this church and be with me. Hey, I'm your friend. Go soloing with me, I'm your friend. You got a friend, Pastor Anderson. But you see here, being ashamed of your friend. Boy, that's terrible, isn't it? And not only that, but he says he often refreshed me. And was not ashamed of my shame. But when he was in Rome, he sought me out very diligently and found me. He's in prison, in Rome. He's sitting around in the jail cell. Everybody's forsaken him. Nobody cares about him. And his one friend, Onesimus. Back then, you didn't just get on the internet or get in the yellow pages. It's probably a little hard to find your buddy in prison. And he searched and searched and searched Rome. Because he said, my friend's in prison. I'm going to be there for him. I'm going to refresh him. I'm going to bring him something. I'm going to bring him a gift. I'm going to spend time with him. I love my friend. I'm going to be there for my friend. What a great friend. Why is Onesimus here being mentioned? Or, I'm sorry, Onesi... Onesiferus, there we go, I'm sorry. I know how to pronounce that, I don't know why I'm... I'm trying to mix it with Onesimus from the book of Philemon. But, the Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiferus. You say, Onesiferus? You know, people love to name their kids Bible names. When was the last time you knew somebody named their kid Onesiferus? Oh, it's a boy. His name is Onesiferus Fidellus Hermogenes Anderson. People don't use this name. I mean, who out in the world has ever even heard of Onesiferus? But, why did God take three verses from the Bible just to exalt this man? Because he was such a good friend to Paul. That's all that we know that he did. The only mention of him in the Bible is just he was there for Paul when Paul named his friend to him, Onesiferus. It says, the Lord grant unto him that he may find mercy of the Lord in that day. And in how many things he ministered unto me at Ephesus thou knowest very well. Three verses devoted to... Well, I would love to have three verses in the Bible about Stephen Anderson. Now, it's too late. The thing's done. But, I'm going to tell you something. I would love that. To be honored in the Bible. I've never read anything negative in the Bible about Onesiferus. Just read three verses about him and it's all positive. Lifting him up as the example of a good friend. A great friend. A positive friend. You see, a friend is somebody who is there for you when you need him. Jesus said it this way. He said, Let your conversation be without covetousness and be content with such things as you have. For he had said, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. The ultimate example of a friend is the person who will never leave you and never forsake you. They're always going to be... And by the way, your spouse should be your friend. The Bible says in Song of Solomon, chapter 5 verse 16, you don't have to turn there. This is a wife talking about her husband. His mouth is most sweet. He is altogether lovely. This is my beloved and this is my friend. O daughters of Jerusalem. She said, My husband is my friend. If you're a man, your wife should be your best friend. Not your bowling buddy that you go bowling with. And that's to him. Your children should be your friend. Your husband should be your friend. And you know what? I'll say this to my wife. I'll never leave thee nor forsake thee. And she ought to say the same thing to me. Because that's what marriage is supposed to be. And that's, by the way, what friendship is supposed to be. You'll never leave, never forsake. Like my friends forsook me in that story. You know, when you're going through a tough time in your life sometimes, whether it be emotionally, a death in the family, whether it be an injury that happens to you, whatever the case may be, you want somebody to be there when that happens. The best thing that you can have is a friend. I was reading a story this week, and it was the most fascinating thing that I've read outside of the Bible. It was fascinating. This is weird, but it was 30 pages that was typed out. And it was typed out by my grandmother's aunt. And it chronicles the history of my family on my grandmother's side from 1875 to 1940. It just tells the story of their whole life, 30 pages. And it's written like a novel, but it's a true story. It was the most fascinating thing I've ever read. I was reading about all my ancestors, and some of them were bootleggers, and they were running from the law. It was crazy. But it was all just a true story. It was written by my grandmother's aunt who lived during that time. And it was all just laid out. I just sat down and just read it in one sitting. It was the most interesting thing. It was unbelievable. But there was this one story in there, right? Let me tell you this story. It was interesting. This blew my mind, but my great-grandfather's, he had these two older brothers, and their names were Monroe and Steven. And they went out hunting, and they were kids. Maybe one of them was a young teenager, and the other one was an even younger teenager or adolescent. And they were out hunting together, and they were in an unfamiliar area, and they were coming down this hill, and they had dogs with them, and some animals came out of the bushes and starved. And they went running after these animals, and they slipped and fell down this steep, not really a cliff, but just a really steep slope, and they were tumbling through the rocks. And as they're tumbling and rolling down the rocks, the older brother's gun went off. He had it on safety, but it was just a freak accident. His gun went off, just BAM! And they hit the ground, and he got up and looked, and he had accidentally shot his younger brother, just in a freak accident, tumbling down the hill. He had accidentally shot his younger brother. And so his younger brother's there, and blood's coming out, and it looked like he'd shot him right near his heart even. He'd shot him right around the head. And he's gushing blood and hurting, and the brother says to him, he said, I've got to go get some help. You know, I can't carry you up this hill. You know, I've got to go get some help. And the younger brother's saying, don't leave me. Please don't leave me. I mean, blood's coming out, and he didn't know what to do because his brother's begging him not to leave him. I mean, he's accidentally shot his own brother, and his brother's begging him not to leave him. But he said, I've got to go get a doctor, get some help. I don't know what to do. And, you know, of course, his brother died. But his brother just passed out, just saying, don't leave, don't leave, please don't leave. And I can remember I didn't have that kind of experience, but I had a similar experience in a way. One time when I was 12 years old, I was riding my motorcycle, and I was with my dad and some other guys, and we were riding our dirt bikes, and I was riding along. I was going about 45 miles an hour, and I hit a rock on my dirt bike that just sent me flying from the dirt bike. I mean, it just launched me from the dirt bike. And I went flying, I mean, many feet, hit in a pile of other rocks, and just bam, bam, bam, you know, just rolling, you know. And I didn't really have a good chest protector like I should have had. Because most of the time when you ride dirt bikes, you have a chest protector that goes over your collar bones and your shoulders. This one protected your chest, but it was completely exposed in the shoulders and collar bones. And so I had a rock just slam into one of my collar bones and break it in two places when I hit the rock. Well, my grandfather had just died just, I believe it was, let me think, I was born in 1981, so he passed away like maybe one year before this, right about one year before this event. And I remember hearing about how he passed away, and he punctured his lungs and this and that. And when I hit the ground, when I flew off that motorcycle, I hit the ground, I thought I was going to die. And here's why. I didn't know what was happening, right? I'm launched from a motorcycle, and I could not breathe at all for over 30 seconds because the wind was knocked out of me so bad. Have you ever had the wind knocked out of you and you can't breathe? Well, the wind was completely knocked out of me. I could not breathe at all, and I had this sharp, excruciating pain in my chest. I mean, it was very, very painful, and I thought I punctured my lung. I'm going to die. I can't breathe. I'm never going to breathe again. I mean, I'm in the middle of the desert. We were hours from anything. No roads, nothing. And I could not breathe. I was just... You know, and just sharp pain in my chest. I didn't know what was going on. I was going to die. And then slowly, after 30, 40 seconds, I started being able to get a little bit of air, and I realized that maybe I just had the wind knocked out of me, but just sharp, excruciating pain. And, you know, at this point, I realized I wasn't going to die but that I was just severely injured. And so I remember just laying there, and I remember my dad coming over, and he was trying to help me a little bit, you know, and kind of prop me up, put a rock under my head like a pillow, you know, a real nice pillow, kind of like Jacob. You know, Jacob in the book of Genesis used a stone for his pillow. And so I put my head on a pillow. You know, he was trying to take care of me and see if I was all right. And I remember he was saying, you know, we got to go and get help. You know, we got to get some kind of a jeep or a truck over here, so that we can take you out of here. And I remember just saying, like, Dad, don't leave. And that's when I was 12, and I was just like, I didn't want to be left alone. Because, you know, when you're in pain, when you're suffering, it's comforting for somebody to be there, like your dad or your mom, your brother, your sister, your friend, to be there for you when you're in a position like that. You want somebody there. You don't want to be left alone. You want to have a friend there by your side when you're going through the death of a loved one, when you're going through, you know, adversity, when you're going through whatever. You want to have somebody there with you. And my dad stayed with me, and he sent, you know, a couple other guys. And it was very comforting just to have my dad there. And we waited for, I believe it was about, I want to say it was about two hours it took. Because it took an hour to get back to a vehicle and an hour to get back with the vehicle. We were out in Nevada in the middle of the desert. Two hours later, somebody came, and they came to my rescue with some pain pills. And guess what they had? Three Adbills. And I took them, and I said, that didn't do anything. Because you know, when you're in that kind of pain, three Adbills is like nothing. They gave me like three pain pills, then they put me in a jeep. We're driving in the dreep, and every bump is like, oh, oh, ee, oh. Because, I mean, we're out in the wilderness. It's the desert, but it's buh-buh-buh-buh-buh-buh. And every bounce was just ouch, ooh, ah, ee, ah. And so we got all the way back to the camp, and we got in the truck, and we went and found the doctor. The doctor was another hour or whatever. Then they put me on so much dope, I passed out. And then they put me in a sling and took care of everything, and everything lived happily ever after. But I'm going to tell you something. When you're going through it, you want somebody there with you, just the comfort of somebody being there. You say, am I going to have somebody to be there like that when I need it? Well, let me ask you, who are you there for when they need it? Do you forsake your friends when they have any kind of trouble or any kind of problems or any kind of a pain that they're going through? Or are you there because I'm going to tell you something. What goes around comes around. And whatsoever a man soweth, the Bible says, that shall he also reap. And if you'll sow friendship, you'll sow being there, caring about other people. Don't live your life just self-centered, self-absorbed, self-conceited. Hey, care about other people. Love other people. And you say, well, I'm not related to them. That's not my family. Are they your friend? Are they your fellow church member? Are they your brother and sister in Christ? Be there for them. Be their friend. And if you sow friendship, one day you're going to want to have a friend. You're going to be able to reap that friendship. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much.