The Last Gift of Friendship--October 29, 2019

The Last Gift of Friendship--October 29, 2019

"As for me, I am already being poured out as a libation, and the time of my departure has come. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. From now on there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, will give me on that day, and not only to me but also to all who have longed for his appearing. Do you best to come to me soon, for Demas, in love with this present world, ahs deserted me and gone to Thessalonica; Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is useful in my ministry. I have sent Tychicus to Ephesus. When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books, and above all the parchments." [2 Timothy 4:6-13]

Of all the gifts you are given in the course of a friendship, it seems the last one is the lesson of how to appreciate the good in things even when they end.

Let me back up a moment.

I was struck, flipping through the latter letters of the New Testament, at how the apostle Paul is depicted in dealing with the endings in his life, and how often the ordinary and the extraordinary are intermingled.  Here in what we call Second Timothy, we are given a scene that sure presents itself as the Apostle Paul's Farewell Speech.  We are meant to read between the lines that he knows his death is near. And in fact, it is most likely that Paul didn't get to retire on a pastor's pension in Florida somewhere, but rather was executed by the Empire for being a seditious enemy of the state (you can't, after all, call Caesar "Lord" if you have confessed Jesus as Lord already).  So Paul knows his life is near its end, and some of this passage almost has the feel of a Shakespearean soliloquy (I can't help but hear echoes of this passage in Henry V's famous "St. Crispin's Day" speech).  And yet, even though Paul is, at one point, talking about the big, momentous, literally life-and-death turning points, he is also completely immersed in the mundane details of ordinary life.  

While in one breath he talking about going to his death like a runner who has finished the race or a boxer who has fought hard, in the next breath he is rattling off a shopping list to Timothy of things to bring when he comes (a cloak, and books, and parchments--of what, who knows?).  And in the midst of it all, too, we are given a glimpse of Paul as someone coming to terms with that other piece of ordinary life--the coming and going of people in our lives, and the beginnings and endings of friendships.

It's a little bit painful, I find, to read these words from Second Timothy, both because here the Apostle Paul seems so vulnerable, so lonely, and also so wounded, and also because he is coming to terms with the reality that life in the adventure called "Church" will go on without him.  I want to give the man as much credit as I can, because I certainly share a lot of the same insecurities that Paul had, but I can't deny that he comes off as little bitter, too. As the saying goes, hurt people hurt people--and Paul seems to be hurt, which makes him also quick to throw a pity party for himself at losing people he had once relied on. And that's difficult to admit seeing in Paul--both because it means that the same flaws likely reside in me, and because it is never easy to see the clay feet of people you respect.  But having read these verses, I can't un-see it.  Paul is clearly wrestling with what it means to see that life will continue on, as it should, and as it must, even when it continues without him.

You can see a variety of different relationships in a number of different stages in these few verses.  Whoever Demas was, Paul clearly disapproves of whatever choices he has made.  We aren't privy to knowing what Demas had chosen to do in Thessalonica, or why he was going there, but Paul is taking the loss pretty personally--and Paul seems to be convinced that Demas is choosing to leave Paul for selfish reasons rather than Christ-centered ones.  That must feel like a double-loss to Paul--both to feel like he is losing the friendship he had with Demas, but also to feel Demas just doesn't "get it" and has sold out his commitment to Christ to go somewhere else. 

Then there are two others, Crescens and Titus, and we don't know whether it's good or bad that they have gone to their respective destinations.  It's quite likely they are going off to do other church work--to teach and preach, to tend to fledgling congregations, to share the Good News of Jesus. Paul doesn't explicitly disapprove of their going, but again, there's a cloud of loneliness left hanging because these friends have left Paul's side.  Even if they have not had a bitter falling out, Paul knows because of the circumstances that he will not likely see them again, this side of glory, and that the closeness they had once had is now a thing of the past.  Paul has had to say goodbye to them, even while he is still alive, because he knows that they have chosen other paths, and that those paths no longer include "staying here by Paul" anymore.

There is hope for Paul, too, that he is comforted by the presence of Luke (quite possibly the same Luke who is associated with the third Gospel and the book of Acts), and he seems hopeful of seeing both the Timothy to whom he is writing, and Mark (this may or may not be the John Mark associated with the second Gospel and with Barnabas).  So Paul is hopeful that he will have the support of new faces--or at least that there will be others who come to support him while he has had to let go of others.  But even at that, the shadow of the executioner's sword is looming in the distance, and Paul knows from having to say his goodbyes to others that the time will come for saying his goodbyes to Luke and Timothy and Mark.

That's so much of what this life is: a constant--and constantly messy--overlap of goings and comings, of goodbyes and good-to-see-yous, of people who leave and people who come.  Sometimes those comings and goings are painful because there is estrangement between those who had been close; sometimes the pain is precisely because there is no estrangement, and you still have to say goodbye.  This, of course, isn't just the case for apostles, but for all of us.  I was just sitting in a hospital waiting room today with someone who was waiting for a friend having surgery, but who is also anticipating a move to another part of the state in the near future, and the overlap of being present and being absent was there sitting in the same chair!  Ordinary life is like that--the comings of new people, the leavings of people we have known and loved, and the changing distance as people become closer or become more distant--whether that distance is measurable in miles or in emotions.

Now, the temptation when you and I live through those comings and goings, is to make the ones who go from our lives into villains, and the ones who come into our lives as good-guys.  Paul seems very, very close to doing that there, by casting Demas as a world-loving apostate who bailed out on him, and pinning a lot of hope on the friends he expects to come to see him.  But in all honesty, the people who had been with Paul were there and gave him important gifts in the time they were with him, and he in turn blessed their lives with his own wisdom and care and love. The difficult--but necessary--thing about this life is that you have to be able to see good (and God-given good, at that!) in the things that lasted only a while.  It is a good and beautiful thing that, for example, Paul had been able to work with Titus side by side.  But now that Titus has gone to do mission work in Dalmatia, it doesn't make the blessings of the past vanish in a puff of smoke, and it doesn't mean that Titus shouldn't have gone to Dalmatia.  He went, we have to trust, where Christ led him.  And Paul had to come to terms with the fact that he might not like it, but he wasn't the boss--Jesus is.

If we can see our lives as part of something God is weaving together, or like a pattern of lace knitted into a blanket, then the comings and the goings that are part of ordinary life can also be beautiful.  I am amazed when I look at blankets my wife has knitted, and the way stitches are intentionally dropped and then picked back up, leaving intricate patterns that are only possible with the letting go and the taking hold of different loops.  If you are the stitch that just got dropped, you feel alone and miserable, but when the whole thing is completed, someone looking at the entire project will come to see beauty and design in what felt like being dropped and forgotten.

It is comforting, in a weird way, for my own insecure heart to see that Paul went through his own heartaches at the loss of friendships--whether it was because some other life-choice came between them, or distance, or disagreement, or all of the above.  It is oddly comforting to know that Christ has never been afraid to work with people whose hearts are afraid of loss, or people who feel exposed and vulnerable, or people who want to throw themselves pity parties.  It is strangely good news for me to hear that Jesus doesn't see my own insecurities, anxieties, and heartaches as disqualifying, but he is willing to keep loving me despite my hang-ups and deep (like Grand-Canyon-deep) flaws.  I need that.  I need to know that I am still acceptable, despite the days I feel beset with bitterness, and despite the days I am tired of saying goodbyes to Demas and Crescens and Titus in my world.

And maybe seeing Paul's struggle here allows each of us to see--and to be grateful for--the gifts of people we have counted as our friends in this life, for as long as we got to have them in our lives, whether they left our lives because of life-choices they made like Demas, or to distance like Titus, or to death like Paul himself.  Any good in a lifetime--and any good in the universe at all--is not in vain in the big scheme of things.  And that means it is worth the effort to love, to be decent, to be truthful, and to be faithful, even if we know that all the relationships of this life will always be marked by comings and goings, and even if they all come with a price tag measured in pain.

The last gift, in the end, of all friendships is in seeing that there was beauty in them while we are together, and that beauty and goodness is not undone by the things that make our paths go in different directions when they do.

We dare to trust that Jesus holds us all, no matter where those paths lead.

Lord Jesus, hold us all.  Hold us always.