A Difficult Lesson On Forgiveness In Lost Friendships

Friendships. They can be so incredibly rewarding. But at times they can also be the source of pain or frustration. Learning to navigate friendships healthily should be a top priority in our lives if we are going to try to live as a light for God in a dark world. This is not all that easy to do in a world and a culture that is constantly telling us that our individual self is all that matters. That how we feel about something is all that matters. In a me-centric world it can be difficult to re-wire our brains to become others focused. To truly adapt to a lifestyle of loving others even more than ourselves.

If I’m going to live a pretty transparent life, I feel like I should share the negative along with the positive and lately I have found myself struggling to forgive someone who seems to chronically self sabotage close relationships. Learning to react to pain and hurt in our friendships is important. This is definitely an area where an opportunity for growth exists within me.

I have found this even harder to process as I often love deeply…. I trust deeply…. It’s rare that I’m not willing to go to extraordinary lengths to make someone feel seen, appreciated, valued and loved. It’s important for me to realize though that not everyone prioritizes their relationships over almost anything else in life. And honestly it’s not fair of me to expect the same relationships first mindset from others. Some are career driven. Some are learning driven. Some unfortunately are motivated primarily by their own success.  Some are in a different season of life and focused on different things.

My automatic response to friendship is to invest quality time and effort into supporting them to achieve their goals. There are positives to this as I find true joy in their successes and often have a large circle of close friends. But I often forget that not everyone is driven by those same things.  And if I’m completely honest with myself, that’s okay. Not everyone is wired the same way.

The downside to approaching life this way is that when I am hurt by someone I have come to love, I am clueless in how to respond. The thought of hurting someone I love on any level baffles me. So instead of taking the time to process the reasoning behind the persons behavior, I instead react in extreme offense. I often fail to take the time to consider the pain in someone’s past that may have driven them to act the way in which they did. I fail to consider the possibility of others violating their past relationships that may have lead them to negatively impact the friendship, maybe even in protection of themselves.

If I’m going to be completely honest, prior to finding a real relationship with God I had a pretty good track record of sabotaging friendships at times myself. I spent most of my life pretending to enjoy a me centered life. You could have easily and correctly stated that I acted in a way that the world revolved around me. I was the poster child for what culture seems to push us to believe. I was all that mattered and my response to things and how I felt was all that was needed to calculate my decisions.

I have found that once we repent and we begin to truly seek Him, we quickly learn that a self centered approach to life is not the most rewarding. Instead loving and supporting others along the way is much more beneficial to our own happiness. So truthfully if we want to be selfish and have the best possible outcome for ourselves we should put others first anyway. Ironic huh?

There is risk in approaching life with an others focused, relationships first mindset though. The risk of being hurt by those you love and trust is at the top of that list. Thankfully I’m stubborn enough not to let the negative outcomes stop me from loving and trusting just as deeply with others going forward. I also feel God called us to love Him and love others above all else. So I keep loving and I keep trusting.

I have a lot to learn in navigating friendships healthily. That I can easily admit. Most of my friendships prior to the last few years have been built and maintained in bars under the effects of alcohol. Some friends I rarely ever saw outside of a bar. So building healthy relationships outside of family is still somewhat new to me. Thankfully it’s a lifelong journey that I just need to commit to getting better and better at.

I feel like the Bible is clear in telling us how to move forward though:

“But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees with his reply, they met together to question him again. One of them, an expert in religious law, tried to trap him with this question: “Teacher, which is the most important commandment in the law of Moses?” Jesus replied, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.””

‭‭Matthew‬ ‭22‬:‭34‬-‭40‬ ‭NLT‬‬

And we are also challenged in Ephesians to forgive others just as Christ has forgiven us.

“Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.”

‭‭Ephesians‬ ‭4‬:‭32‬ ‭NLT‬‬

If that’s not a gut check moment for me, I don’t know what is. God has forgiven me of so much. In fact God has forgiven me of countless violations of friendships throughout my past. So how is it fair for me to hold a grudge against someone else for the same thing. What a tough reminder.

Today I pray specifically for this friendship that was lost. That He continues to soften my heart so I can look past the actions, and truly forgive.

I think sharing situations like these from a place of influence is extremely important. None of us are anywhere near perfect. We all struggle with very similar things. To act like we don’t would be a facade. So I hope you will join me in prayer as well. Prayer that we constantly strive to be better, to do better, to keep loving and to keep trusting.