Or more importantly, have you ever needed just one caring friend
or loved one who would hear you and help you: a friend who would
invest honest input—no backing up, no cover-up, just plain talk,
lovingly stated—into your life?
All around us people are needing that kind of friend: the friend
with ample time for love and zero tolerance for lies—not even little
white ones. The friend whose life reveals the qualities of love that
Paul wrote about in 1 Corinthians 13: patience, kindness, a lack of
jealousy, envy, boastfulness, or pride.
Everything else in this world will disappear. Even God’s great spir-
itual gifts will dissolve into mist and lift like a vapor, but love like
this will last—strong and sure and powerful.
When I was a child, my thoughts were childlike. Now that I’m an
adult, God is giving me grown-up thoughts. When I was a child I
longed for a perfect friend, just as David did. But God is showing me
now that all along Jesus was the perfect friend for whom I had
longed. All along my yearning for a perfect relationship was a desire
for a love relationship with him.
If I look to human beings, I’m destined to be let down. Everyone
from the most crooked politician to the closest human friend will fall
short when compared to the perfect one for whom my heart was de-
signed. So the Lord is whispering to me today to stop looking in all
the wrong faces for perfect love, and to look to his Son.
Lord God, I thank you that you have set a longing for pure love in
my heart, and all along you have planned to fulfill that longing with
your own friendship. I come to you today, empty and needy, and I
ask you to be the friend I’ve always needed. Fill me with the love my
heart desires and requires. Amen.104 CLAIRECLONINGER