Friends of God

"No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you" (John 15:15).

One is timorous about thinking of himself as God's "friend." Though Facebook has debased the term, it yet retains a sense of intimacy and privilege. One scurries for disclaimers to this verse:

But he does say "friend" after all, and makes a point to distinguish it from a "servant." A servant is one who obeys the master without much interaction. A friend discusses the plan in the secret counsel of the privileged.

Abraham was a "friend" of God:

"Did you not, our God, drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel, and give it forever to the descendants of Abraham your friend?" (2 Chronicles 20:7).

"But you, Israel, my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the offspring of Abraham my friend" (Isaiah 41:8).

When God has seemed to decide Sodom's fate, Abraham discusses the matter with him (maintaining the respect appropriate to the status differential), and by the end of their little walk, God seems to have changed His plan: He will not annihilate the town if he can find just 10 righteous men in it (Genesis 18).

Oh well, that case is not so clear-cut, you say---maybe the Lord was planning to do it that way anyway. But the incident with Moses is harder to wriggle out of. The Lord says to Moses: "How long will this people despise me? . . . I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them, and I will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they" (Numbers 14:11-12).

Moses quickly interjects---as only a friend would to where he is strongly opposed to his friend's plan: "Then the Egyptians will hear of it. . . ." (Numbers 14:13ff), and that will be bad for your reputation, Lord.

Now you may say the Lord was testing Moses here, and surely this is true (the Israelite leader passed the test with flying colors). And you may say that the Lord knew what Moses would say and how it would turn out and that the Lord never really planned to start over with a new people. But that's speculation beyond the text and misses the point.

The point is that God allowed Moses to talk to him as a friend. Indeed, in this passage He verily seems to egg on Moses to discuss the matter with Him. He seems to encourage the interaction, and is pleased with the conversation.

Moreover, God changes his mind! The Eternal and Immovable One changes His mind because of a man. I am stunned by the implications of this for "seeking the will of God." I had thought the will of God was something fixed, set, unchangeable. What I did not understand was the part you and I can play in the unfolding of His will. Does this threaten the doctrine of God's sovereignty? It would appear that God is secure enough in His sovereignty that He is not threatened.

How can we be friends of God? Abraham, Moses, and the Apostles show the way: Friendship is the fruit of abiding. Friendship is nothing if not communion. And where there is communion with someone (whether it is God or the devil), there will be a natural conforming of desires. Fellowshipping with the devil produces evil desires, and fellowshipping with the Spirit produces the Spirit's desires in us.

So on the one hand we enter into the counsel of God's will with our prayers in order to bend it ("Lord, please heal Aunt Betsy"). And at the same time, our wills are bent to His. When that happens, even the commands of God don't feel like the commands of a master to a servant. They feel like our own ideas. They feel like the agreement reached by two friends walking together down the road.

To hear commentaries by Andrée Seu, click here.