The Doctrine of Friend, Friendship with God
August
2010 -
I. General Definition:
The
Complete Biblical Library Greek-English Dictionary notes that in Greek culture,
“The supreme duty of a friend was to sacrifice himself for his friend”, and
examples of sacrifice are highly extolled in Greek literature (Stählin, “philos,” Kittel, 9:151-152).
1. First, friendship could only exist between good
men, men who lived pure lives, free from greed, lust, and violence.
2. Friends had complete agreement on all subjects and
good will toward one another.
3. Friendship was based on love.
4. Friends would not ask one another to do what was
wrong and only did good to one another.
5. Permanence and stability in friendship were the product of mutual loyalty.
6. The golden rule for a friend was to put himself on
the same level as his friend (De Amicitia 5,6,8,12,13,18,19).
Greeks
believed that “a man could have only a few real friends and that a pair
of friends was the true ideal”.
II. Etymology - Word Study
1. Greek:
a. PHILOS,
is a primary adjective translated “friend(s) that means, “beloved, dear, friendly or friend(s).”
It is a term of endearment. Although it
is primarily an adjective with the meaning of “beloved, friendly,” or “dear,” PHILOS came to be used as a noun
meaning “friend.” Neither Greek nor Hebrew tradition requires a distinction
between a relative and a friend; a PHILOS
may also be a relative.
1) Thayer
defines its use in Scripture as “friend, to be friendly to one, wish him well,
a friend, an associate, he who associates familiarly with one, a companion, one
of the bridegroom’s friends who on his behalf asked the hand of the bride and
rendered him various services in closing the marriage and celebrating the
nuptials.”
2) Liddell and Scott
define PHILOS in the Passive Voice as “loved, beloved, dear”, which is equivalent to the Latin AMICSU, CARUS. In early
Greek writings it was used for “a
friend, a dear one, an object of
love, one’s nearest and dearest,
(such as wife and children).” Of things it was used
as, “dear, pleasant, or welcome.” In Poets
PHILOS is used of “one’s own
limbs, life, etc.” And finally in the active sense it meant, “loving, friendly, or kindly.”
3) BAGD defines it as having two primary definitions:
a) Pertaining to having a special interest
in someone. It was used this way in Greek writings to mean in the Passive
Voice: beloved or dear, and in the Active Voice loving, kindly, disposed or
devoted.
b) One who is on intimate terms or in
close association with another. In Greek writings is
meant friend.
b. HETAIROS (het-ah’ee-ros), from HETESETES
that means clansman or cousin is another Greek word translated
friend(s). HETAIROS means, “a comrade, mate, partner, fellow,
friend, (my good friend) or even a concubine. It is used as a kindly address. It contrasts PHILOS that was used as a term of endearment.
HETAIROS is used in Mat 22:12;
2. Hebrew:
The Hebrew equivalents to PHILOS include:
ĀHĒB,
in the Qal stem: friend, loved one (Esther
ALLÛPH, Close friend, intimate friend (Prov
YĀDHA,
Know; in the Pual stem: intimate friend (Job
MĒRĒA, Neighbor (Prov
MODA, Kinsmen, intimate friend (Prov 7:4)
RĒA,
Friend, neighbor (Job
SHĀLÔM, Peace, prosperity; friend (Jer
3. Friendship. Friendship is the word PHILIA in the
Greek that comes from PHILOS and is a hapaxlegomena, (that
is, it is used only once in the New Testament and that is in
III. Corporate Friendship with God
This means that friendship with God is the
same between true
John the Baptist is calling himself a friend of the Lord Jesus
Christ who is the bridegroom of the Church, His bride, (compare with
IV. Biblical Applications for Being a Friend of God:
The
New Testament employs PHILOS about 30 times, often to indicate “a friend to
whom one is under a basic obligation”, (Günther,
“Love,” Colin Brown, 2:549). Although friends and relatives are
sometimes differentiated,
1. Friends of God have no
fear other than the fear (awe or respect) of God in their lives,
2.
Friends of God have humility from a faith rest life,
Luke14:7, “And He began speaking a parable
to the invited guests when He noticed how they had been picking out the places
of honor at the table, saying to them, 8“When you are invited
by someone to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for someone more
distinguished than you may have been invited by him, 9and he who
invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this
man,’ and then in disgrace you proceed to occupy the last place. 10But
when you are invited, go and recline at the last place, so that when the one
who has invited you comes, he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher’; then
you will have honor in the sight of all who are at the table with you. 11For
everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be
exalted.”
3. Friends of God have a mental attitude and actions that are
filled with righteousness,
4.
Friends of God have a servant’s heart,
5.
Friends of God are persistent in their prayer life,
6. Friends of God will be
resurrected,
7. Friends of God will have
tremendous blessing for time and eternity because of His Word resident in their
souls,
8. Friends of Jesus Christ
keep His mandates,
In
the New Testament the supreme example of a friend was Jesus. His example of
love crosses all cultural boundaries. To the Jews he represented one who loved
His disciples as He loved himself; to the Greeks and Romans He was the one who
laid down His life for His friends. In
Being
subservient is not the intent here or the qualification for friendship, see
verse 15. Keeping his mandates means you have the mind of Christ and have the
same type of thinking as Christ which is the qualification for friendship.
Compare with
9. Friends of Jesus Christ
have an admiration for Him as his bride, Song of Solomon,
Song 5:16, “His mouth is full
of sweetness and he is wholly desirable. This is my beloved and this is my
friend, O daughters of
10. Friendship with the Lord
Jesus Christ is based on having His Word metabolized in your soul,
This means that you have
Occupation with the Lord Jesus Christ who becomes your best friend.
Occupation with Christ is
attained through post-salvation epistemological renewing of you mind,
Occupation with Christ provides
a new focus in life away from eyes on self, on people, and on things. How you
are treated and loved by people is no longer an issue once you have reached
Spiritual Self-Esteem and have cognitive self-confidence.
It is your fellowship with God that counts and
consistent fellowship leads to friendship with God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Likewise, this is the only way to execute God's plan, God's purpose, and God's
will for your life.
V. Principles of True Friendship with
Fellow Believers
1. Your fellow believers
should be considered “friends”, (loved ones),
2.
True friends are not wishy-washy, or Johnny-come-latelies.
A true friend is a consistent companion,
3.
True friends do not hold back punches. In a loving way they tell it to you
straight,
4. Believer friends should
be an encouragement and uplifting to one another, especially when one is going
through various difficulties or trials,
David said to his friend Jonathan in
5.
Believer friends should not cause trouble or dissentions against fellow
believers,
6. Believers lay down their
lives for fellow believers,
Conclusions:
If you have fellowship with
positive believers who have virtue, integrity, and who recognize the privacy of
your priesthood, you will have a wonderful relationship with them and you will
make some of the greatest friendships in this life.
The advantage to such
friendships is that you are not depending on them; you are depending on the
Lord.
When you are not depending on
people and have relationships with them, then you are in Spiritual Self-Esteem.
As a result, you never feel threatened by them.
Likewise, you do not get upset
when they turn nasty and sarcastic and turn sour. Because you are depending on
the Lord and not them, and your fellowship with the Lord takes care of that.
If you enter into Christian
fellowship with unrealistic expectation, you will never grow in grace and you
will never have the type of friendship God desires for you.
VI. Prosperity and Friendship
1. The
appropriate application of prosperity blessings is to use that wealth to make
friends with the lost and dying to win them for Christ,
Warren Wiersbe commenting on
Jesus did not
commend the steward for cheating his master, but for making good use of his
opportunity. The people of this world are much better at seeing opportunities
and profiting from them than are the children of God (Eph
The key is
faithfulness (vv. 10-12). The unrighteous mammon (money) is the least, but the
eternal riches are “the most.” If we use God’s wealth as He wills, then He will
give us true riches which are our own. Jesus did not see a “great gulf” fixed between
the material and the spiritual, for one of the most spiritual things we can do
is use material things to the glory of God in the winning of the lost.”
2.
The fool with his money thinks he has many friends,
yet he does not,
3. All believers (friends)
will rejoice together in heaven with the knowledge of those who were lost that
have been saved,
1. We should not be friends
with the world, Satan’s Cosmic System,
2.
Sometimes even believing friends will turn on you, especially in the
Tribulation,
3. Intensive Divine discipline can result in the loss of friends,
4. Self righteous legalism
falsely projects sinfulness in terms of friendship onto the Grace Oriented
believer, Mat
Mat
5.
Wrong friends stab you in the back, gossip about you, slander or malign you,
6. True friendships can be neutralized or destroyed by any of the following.
a.
Mental attitude sins,
b.
Verbal sins,
c.
Overt sins,
d. National
disaster,
7.
We should not make friends with those who are prone to anger,
8.
Friends who are in it for the money are not true friends,
9.
Those who have common enemies become friends,
This is the concept we have from the
ancient Arabian proverb, “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
VIII. The Biblical applications of other Greek words for
“friend”:
1. In
Mat 5:25, we are command to reconcile with those who take us to court.
Mat
“Make friends”
is the Greek verb EUNOEO from EU that means good or well and NOEO from NOUS
that means to
perceive, think , So EUNOEO
comes to mean, “to think kindly of, i.e. to be favorable, that is make
friends.”
2. In
Mat 20:13; 22:12; 26:50, the Greek word for friend is HETAIROS and is used in
regard to the unbeliever in relation to Jesus Christ. HETAIROS means, “clansman, cousin, a companion, or friend.”
a. Of
those who reject Jesus Christ and their fate at the Great White Throne
Judgment.
Mat
b. Of traitors such as Judas Iscariot.
Mat 26:50, “And Jesus said to him,
“Friend, do what you have come for.”
Then they came and laid hands on Jesus and seized Him.”
c.
HETAIROS is also used in describing the sovereignty of God in relation to
saving both Jews and Gentiles and has application regarding rewards at the BEMA
seat of Jesus Christ, Mat 20:8-16.
Mat 20:8 “When evening came, the owner of
the vineyard said to his foreman, ‘Call the laborers and pay them their wages,
beginning with the last group to the first.’ 9When those hired
about the eleventh hour came, each one received a denarius.
10When those hired first came, they thought that they would
receive more; but each of them also received a denarius.
11When they received it, they grumbled at the landowner, 12saying,
‘These last men have worked only one hour, and you have made them equal
to us who have borne the burden and the scorching heat of the day.’ 13But
he answered and said to one of them, ‘Friend, I am doing you no wrong; did you
not agree with me for a denarius? 14‘Take
what is yours and go, but I wish to give to this last man the same as to you. 15‘Is it not lawful for me to do what I wish with
what is my own? Or is your eye envious because I am generous?’ 16So
the last shall be first, and the first last.”
This parable also tells us that one believer who has more Divine
Good production than another will receive the same amount of rewards at the
BEMA seat of Jesus Christ if they both have fulfilled God’s Plan for their
lives.
Compare with
3. In
This is an incorrect translation because the Greek word is
ANTHROPOS that means “man, human or mankind”. It should be translated “man, your sins are forgiven you.” As it is in the
IX. Abraham is our example of being a Friend of God, 2 Chron 20:7;
2 Chron 20:7, “Did You
not, O our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before Your people
This was part of the great public prayer of King Jehoshaphat to our Lord for guidance and protection from
the invading armies of
Here our Lord is speaking to His chosen people
to comfort them reminding them of His power, love guidance and protection, in
comparison to the dead and dumb idols of foreign gods. Yet again, we only have
an acknowledgement of friendship, but no reasons for it.
Then we see in
Finally we are given some reasoning as to why he was considered a
Friend of God, it was his faithfulness which means his consistent application
of Bible Doctrine resident in his soul.
Now, in regard to the works verses faith discussion, see also
Roman
Now back to our topic of Abraham’s friendship with God.
Why is Abraham called “the friend of
God”? Well our first two passages do not expand as to why he was called the
friend of God, but the third passage,
Was he called the friend of God because of his sinlessness?
Or his good looks? Or personality? Absolutely Not!
He is called the friend of God because of his faithfulness to God.
Now it is interesting to note that his faithfulness was not 100%.
Yet it was consistent.
You see Abraham failed many times, for example:
1) The
conception and birth of Ishmael with Hagar,
2) 13 years
later at age 99 he laughed in disbelief of God’s promise of a son, Isaac, with
Sarah,
3) In
4) In
Yet even though he had failures, he always
picked himself up, rebounded and got back to his relationship with God. This is
noted by his inclusion in the “Visible Hero” hall of fame listing in
Notice what it says in verses 1-2 and 6.
So there are two aspects to hall of fame faith.
1)
Believe in God, that He exists and is the savior of all men (“he who comes to
God”).
2)
Believe in God’s promises of blessing for time and eternity.
Faith here, and throughout this chapter, generally refers to Bible
doctrine or what is believed that is followed up by actions of faith. Therefore,
it begins with the function of the Grace Apparatus for Perception, (GAP), of
Bible Doctrine and leads to divine good production.
The noun here in
The word PISTIS has three different meanings in the Greek
language.
1) That which causes trust and faith,
therefore, translated faithfulness, reliability, proof, and pledge. This is a
very common word in the New Testament. It means that which causes trust and
faith.
2) Faith in the active sense of believing,
and it is always translated, “faith”, “trust”, and “confidence”.
3) The third use of the word which is
quite common and never correctly translated throughout the New Testament is
“that which is believed, the body of faith or belief”, and therefore translated
it should be “doctrine” or “Bible Doctrine.” In other words he was oriented to
the Word of God that led him in all aspects of his life.
In verse 1 we have “doctrine is the assurance of things hoped
for…” And all the way through we are going to see, for example: Verse 4, “By
doctrine Abel offered”; verse 5, “By doctrine Enoch was translated”; and verse
7, “By doctrine Noah, being warned”. Noah was not warned by faith,
he was warned by God’s Word – Bible doctrine. Faith doesn’t warn you, Bible
doctrine warns you.
So when we read about Abraham in verses 8-19 we note that it was
by means of the application of Bible Doctrine resident within his soul that led
him to serve God (produce Divine Good), in fantastic ways.
Note that 12 of the 40 verses in our Hall of Fame list are devoted
to Abraham, that is 30%, not to mention Sarah’s,
Isaac’s, Jacob’s and Joseph’s production that was the result of Abraham’s
influence.
So what where the Doctrinally Oriented based works that gained
Abraham the title of being a friend of God?
1) Verse 8, he obeyed the Lord’s calling of geographic location,
without knowing where that location was at the outset. He followed God’s Plan
for his life.
Are you in the right location where God wants to use you? Or are you
trying to find the land that best pleases you, as his nephew
2) Verse 9, he did not have a lust for material possessions and
act like he owned the place even though it was promised to him as an
inheritance. He demanded nothing and humbly lived as God would provide.
3) Verse 10, he did not look to the world or his possessions to
save him, but looked to God and trusted in God’s promises of the eternal state.
4) Verse 11, He managed his wife well, nurturing her own
faithfulness in God.
5) Verse 12-16, He trusted in his heavenly citizenship as a member
of the family of God,
6) Verse 17, He faith rested through adversity, disaster testing.
7) Verse 18, He trusted in the promises of God.
8) Verse 19, He believed in the resurrection of the dead to
eternal life.
9) Verses 20-22, He passed down his faith in God and His Word to
his children, grand children and great grand children, etc.; his spiritual
heritage.
X. Summary of Friendship with
God, adapted
from Oswald Chambers, (My Utmost for His Highest), “Friendship with God.”
This verse is exactly what our Lord states in our passage of
Our friendship
with God is based on hearing Him by means of His Word, Bible Doctrine resident
within your soul.
When you have His
Word and then faith rest, trust, and rely upon it, you will be a friend of God.
There
are two aspects to our friendship, the difficulties and delights of friendship.
1) The
Difficulties of His Friendship
In
Whenever
you stop short of your true desire in prayer and say, “Well, I don’t know,
maybe this is not God’s will,” then you still have another level to go.
It
shows that you are not as intimately acquainted with God as Jesus was, and as
Jesus would have you to be, “…that they may be one just as We are one …”,
Think
of the last thing you prayed about, were you devoted to your desire or to God?
Was
your determination to get some gift of the Spirit for yourself or to get to
God?
Mat
6:8, “For your Father knows the things you have need of, before you ask Him.”
The
reason for asking is so you may get to know God better.
Yet if
you have a lack of faith in Him you still have a ways to go before you can know
that you are His friend. So keep praying to get a perfect understanding not of
your wants, needs and desires but of God Himself.
2) The
Delights of His Friendship
This
friendship means being so intimately in touch with God that you never even need
to ask Him to show you His will.
It is
evidence of a level of intimacy which confirms that you are nearing the final
stage of your discipline (education) in the life of faith.
When
you have a right-standing relationship with God, you have a life of freedom,
liberty, and delight; you are God’s
will.
And all
of your commonsense decisions are actually His will for you, unless you sense a
feeling of restraint brought on by a check in your spirit.
You are
free to make decisions in the light of a perfect and delightful friendship with
God, knowing that if your decisions are wrong He will lovingly produce that
sense of restraint. Once he does, you must stop immediately.
XI. Slavery versus Friendship
In
1. Our first
clause is, “No longer do I call you slaves.”
Principles of Being a Slave:
1) To the Greeks a slave was
to be subject to an utterly debasing social and anthropological position. To
them freedom and individuality was the goal of life. Autonomy was the highest
prize of the Hellenistic world; thus servitude was the absence of any such
freedom.
2) The slave is:
a)
Limited in personal rights and privileges.
b)
Limited in thinking and actions.
c)
Carries out the will and purpose of another.
d) Depends on others to provide protection and sustenance.
e)
Has turned his freedom over to someone else.
f)
Does not know what his master is thinking or planning.
3) In our relationship with
God, these are emphasized in a positive way to protect us from sin and evil.
4) DOULOS in
the New Testament plays a major theological role. Apart from the use of DOULOS as a character in a parable,
(e.g., Mat 25:14ff.;
5)
This figurative use covers three basic areas: a) The Christian as a DOULOS of God; b) The Christian as a DOULOS to other Christians; c) Christ
as the DOULOS of God.
a) The Christian as a “DOULOS”
of God.
John’s
Gospel and Paul’s epistles agree that people are either “slaves” (DOULOI) of sin, or they are slaves of
righteousness, (i.e., they are obedient;
Believing
in Christ’s atoning work makes it possible for people to be freed from their
enslavement to sin and to enjoy a new status as sons and daughters of God,
The believing community is God’s/Christ’s DOULOI,
b)
The Christian as a “DOULOS” to other Christians. Believers are to model the servant-hood of
Jesus.
Mat 20:27, “Whosoever will be chief among you, let him
be your servant.” cf.
Service to one another is an expression of love (AGAPE,
c)
Christ as the “DOULOS” of God.
The servant-hood of Jesus is capsulized
in
Christ’s role as DOULOS binds Him solidly with humanity’s condition. He
identified with mankind’s subjection to the Law, sin, and death,
Servant-hood to God is uniquely expressed in Christ’s
obedience even unto death,
6) Our Lord distinguishes a
friend from a servant, who might also be loyal but would not share intimate
secrets.
7) Therefore, our Lord is
saying we are much more than merely slaves to Him.
2. Our next clause is, “For
the slave does not know what his master is doing”.
Principles:
1) A slave does what he is told without understanding his master’s mind or business.
2) Yet to the contrary, our true relationship with God
and The Lord Jesus Christ is based on knowing who they are, how they think and
what they are doing.
3) This can only be accomplished through the
consistent intake and application of God’s Word / Bible Doctrine by the power
of God the Holy Spirit.
4) As the saying goes, “knowledge is power!”
Therefore, the more knowledge you have of God and His Plan for your life, the
more power you will have over your own life, your sin nature and Satan’s Cosmic
System.
5) You have only two choices in life; to be a friend
of sin and Satan’s Cosmic System, or to be a friend of God,
3. Then we
have, “But I have called you friends.”
Principles:
1) The slave simply receives the command of his master
without knowing the reason why this or that thing is ordered. It is one of the
conditions of slavery not to be let into the counsels and plans of the
master. Yet, it is the privilege of
friendship to be made acquainted with the plans, wishes, and desires of your
friend.
2) The traditional Greek concept of friendship
emphasized equality among companions.
3) The main ideals of friendship in ancient literature
included loyalty (sometimes to the death), equality and mutual sharing of all
possessions, and an intimacy in which a friend could share everything in
confidence.
4) Friends love each other and help each other.
5) The obedience that Christ asks from us is not that
of the slave, but of the friend. Because we are His friends and abide in Him,
we know His will and share His secrets.
6) Jesus called His disciples friends because He had disclosed His
Father’s revelation to them. This designation of friendship He gave to them was
the result of making them acquainted with the reasons why He was about to leave
them, and with His secret (mystery) doctrines for the Church Age. As He had
given them these proofs of friendship, therefore, it was proper that He should
not withhold from them the title of friends.
4.
We complete verse 15 with, “for all things that I have heard from My Father I
have made known to you.”
Principles:
1) In essence Jesus is saying to them, “I have
admitted you into a state of the most intimate fellowship with Myself; and have made known unto you whatsoever I have heard
from the Father.”
This is similar to what is said of our Lord’s
relationship with Moses in
2) The disciples
were, (and you and I can be), friends of Jesus Christ, because of our Lord’s
discloser of the thinking of the Father.
3) Jesus Christ has
communicated to them Bible doctrine and also desires to communicate His
doctrine to us.
4) The Grace
Apparatus for Perception (GAO) was designed by God so that Jesus Christ could
communicate His thinking, His Word to us,
5) The reason why He called them friends was that He
had now treated them as friends. He had opened to them His mind; made known His
plans; acquainted them with the design of His coming, His death, His
resurrection, and ascension; and, having thus given them the clearest proof of
friendship. Therefore, it was proper that he should give them the title.
Likewise, He desires the same for you and me.
6) Knowing the will of God is a tremendous privilege;
with it comes great responsibility.
a)
Knowing God’s plan and will, whether it be for your own life or someone else’s,
means you need to be a part of His will and align yourself to it. That is,
voluntarily be His servant to accomplish His will.
b) This
also means that you should not get in the way of or frustrate His will in any
given situation.
c) If you know His will,
you operate in conjunction with His will and you do not get in the way of His
will. (Note Balaam,
7) Knowing His heart as His friend you take on the
heart of being His bond-servant.
Our complete translation of
Principles:
1)
Jesus declared that His followers were His friends not merely His servants (DOULOS).
a) The positive, (supergrace),
believer is more than a servant
of God, (i.e., one who ignorantly obeys orders under fear of punishment),
rather, he is a friend, and one who knows the Lord’s will and follows Him out
of love and desire.
2) The difference between DOULOS and PHILOS: DOULOS is
ignorance; PHILOS is cognisance.
a) That is the whole story of the Christian life. The
issue after salvation is cognisance versus ignorance. Ignorance leads to
reversionism; cognisance leads to supergrace.
3) This tells us that our friendship with God is based on hearing Him by
means of His Word, Bible Doctrine resident within your soul.
4) When you have His Word resident in your soul and then faith rest,
trust, and rely upon it, you will be a friend of God.
5)
Being subservient is not the intent here or the qualification for friendship.
a) Keeping his mandates
means you have the mind of Christ and have the same type of thinking as Christ
which is the qualification for friendship. Compare with
6) The Lord elevated His disciples to a higher position than that of
servants.
a) The slave is told and expected to execute
the master's commands while often remaining ignorant of his reasons.
b) Yet, the level of friend is one of equals in
some respects.
c) A servant is not told his master’s mind,
purpose, or plans; a friend knows his friend intimately.
7) Friends inform each other and trust each other.
a) Jesus had been teaching His disciples, and
in these verses He introduced the friendship relationship with them.
b) Those who treasure His Words and abide in
His love are His friends.
c) By His grace, those who grasp hold of His
teachings are enlightened as His friends.
8) In the New Testament the supreme example of
a friend was Jesus.
a) His example of love crosses
all cultural boundaries.
b) To the Jews he represented one who loved His disciples as He
loved himself.
c) To the Greeks and Romans He was the one who laid
down His life for His friends.
9) Christians will always be the Lord’s servants, but when they love as
He commanded He shares with them as friends.