The Holy Remnant Apostolic Church December 2017

"Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy,
like art… It has no survival value; rather it is one
of those things that give value to survival?
CS Lewis
I agree with CS Lewis that friendship adds value to life because it does in fact add great value.
Friendship allows companionship and introduces relationships in all aspects of life. But is
friendship necessary for survival? If one does not have friends will he/she not survive?
It is important to understand the correlation between friendship and relationship. Having a
relationship with someone does not necessarily mean you have a friendship with that
individual, neither does having a genuinely healthy relationship require friendship. Having a
great relationship with someone can form a friendship but having a good relationship with
someone doesn't mean they should automatically become friends; that's a slippery slope. If one
believes that having friendships is a requirement for survival then how would he/she explain
the life span of a hermit?
I have a relationship with my boss however, we do not have a friendship. So then
are friendships necessary for survival? No, but relationships are. I agree with CS Lewis' claim
that friendship is not necessarily required however, it does add value. Can we live life without
friendships? Of course, having friends may make life more meaningful or add value like CS
Lewis claims. It may even increase one’s life span as having friendships may add joy, laughter
and happiness all of which adds value to life but I don't believe it is completely necessary,
hence having no survival value. I don't believe anyone dies because of a lack of friendships;
having genuine relationships is more important than having friendships.
Camilla Dwyer
My fundamental thought – “If you don’t have friends you learn to live without them.” It means you become fully accountable
for the decisions you make and hence eliminating influential pressures. What happens now when you continuously fall short
and life’s miseries overtake you due to poor judgements? A “God Authenticated Friendship” can be fruitful and essentially
address your shortcomings, which I believe we should all seek as children of God. I believe we as humans don’t need many
friends to survive in this life and that the ONE friendship divinely ordained by God is sufficient – This belief is contrary to the
belief of many. The aim is to seek God for guidance and ask him to position an individual in your life that will bring value to
your life and set loyalty as the foundation of the friendship. In fact, a soul connection to your friend is vital similar to that of
David and Jonathan’s friendship. The Bible says the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as
his soul and ultimately made a covenant with him. It’s important that we are joined to the soul of our friend(s) as well, where
the “heart of Christ” is always active. A true and loyal friend is honest, unbiased and will stand with you for eternity.
Another perspective of how friendships exist not as a necessity to humans, but can add value to your survival lies in the story
of Job. Job’s friends should have been comforting him through his trials, but they became bad advisers and friends.
Nonetheless, they had him talking hence he was able to defend himself and his God. The fact that Job was able to converse
with his friends brought confirmation about who they are and in whom his faith resides – God!
Most of us can relate to the friendships between Job and his four friends, Eliphaz, Bildad, Zohar, and Elihu. In their
discussions with Job, they applied reasoning, estimations and supposed truth to question Job’s standing with God. Their
existence truly added value to Job’s life because no matter how they interrogated him and furthermore determined his
punishment, his faith didn’t waver and was ultimately rewarded by God.
Some friendships are conditional and based on a series of events in our life. When life’s at its worse you’ll realize their opinions
of you differ from those when life’s at its best. It is true today that many friendships are pointless to your survival, you can
testify they were formed to build you into a tower of power that you’ve become. Some of the values learned from your friends
are priceless!
Sister S
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