Friends: one who sticks closer...

Proverbs 18:24 Some friends come and go, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

John 15:15 “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master's business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last.”

Be intimate with a few, but know many. Be welcoming & not condemning. Be available to all but keep your boundaries. Make time for the least & the lost. Give your best even when it’s inconvenient.

Be intimate with a few, but know many

John 21:12 Jesus said to them, "Come and have breakfast."

Be intimate with a few, but know many How many friends does the average person have?

Be welcoming & not condemning

Matthew 9:12 Jesus heard them and answered, "Healthy people don't need a doctor, but sick people do. Go and learn what the Scriptures mean when they say, `Instead of offering sacrifices to me, I want you to be merciful to others.' I didn't come to invite good people to be my followers. I came to invite sinners."

Be welcoming & not condemning John 3:17 God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

Be available to all but keep your boundaries Mark 3:20 Jesus entered a house, and again a crowd gathered, so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat. When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him, for they said, "He is out of his mind."

Be available to all but keep your boundaries Mark 6:30 So many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat, he said to them, "Come with me by yourselves to a quiet place and get some rest." So they went away by themselves in a boat to a solitary place.

Make time for the least & the lost Luke 8:2 Some women were with him who had been healed of evil spirits and all sorts of diseases. One of the women was Mary Magdalene, who once had seven demons in her.

Give your best even when it’s inconvenient

Philippians 2:5 Your attitude should be the same as that of Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be held onto, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross!

Give your best even when it’s inconvenient Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

John 1:16 From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another.