What happens when you hurt your friends.

I know it has been a while since my last post, but I want to share briefly some thoughts with you all the way from England. It's one of those times where I just need to share.

I have a friend who really makes me think.

We should all friends like that. Maybe my blog makes you think, and if so, that's good. Well, this friend - the one who really makes me think - is a person I have hurt very deeply. I'm still trying to wrap my head around all the stupid things I did to hurt this person - the older you get the more complicated it gets! - but I really know just one thing: I hurt someone I care about deeply. So much so that they really don't want to have anything to do with me. Now I have never really been in that position. The position where someone was so upset with you that they don't want to have anything to do with you, except maybe an ex-girlfriend, but this is not an ex-girlfriend.

So I've apologized, I've tried to reconcile and its just not happening. I think any sane person would just let it go; but I'm having a hard time with that because this person is someone I care about. You could even say love. I love my friends: Scott, Dave, Mel, Fran, Chris, Jo, Carol, Ken, Chuck... I hope I love them like Christ loves me; you know, the whole, "No man has greater love than this, than he lay his life down for his friends" kind of love. That's who I am. At least, that's who I hope I am and who I want to be...

Nevertheless, I hurt them and I know I hurt them. I had no desire to hurt them, but I did. I also know that they don't want to hurt and the best way not to hurt is to simply avoid me. I can't help that, can I? Its just the way it is. So I should move on. I know. But why is this pain still so deep, if I know that I've done all I can do?

My guess is that to "hurt" a friend is to break a trust, to betray the love that I say I have for my friends. You know, that selfless love Jesus proclaims. My love had become self-ish, not selfless. I needed my friend to be there for me and I wasn't there for them, listening like I should have. And so I said and did thoughtless things and now I am paying the price. But again, why the deep pain?

I can only guess. To have cared so deeply for someone and then to have that relationship destroyed is tantamount to having a piece of yourself destroyed too. I have lost something of me in them and I can never get it back. I can only learn from it...So that love, that friendship and now that pain is a part of me. Will it be a burden I always bear? I don't know. Maybe after a while the pain will dull, but it will never be forgotten. Love leaves a scar. Just ask Jesus.

So my friends, as someone on the journey let me say this: love your friends; listen to them, listen to their hearts; give them the space they need and forgive them generously when they err. Do all you can to be the love Jesus wants you to be for them.