Carrying

“Four of those who came were carrying a man who could not walk.” Mark 2:3

Dale was my best friend throughout High School. We met our freshman year and both went to First Christian Church in Concord, CA. We were not at all alike. I was an artsy hippy, involved in drama and music. He loved tech work and cars. But, what bound us together initially was a girl. We both had crushes on Sheri. Also our same age, she attended another are High School and went to the same church we did. We both had huge crushes on her.

Sheri was one of those girls that every boy liked. She was outgoing, had sea blue eyes and a beautiful voice. Her brother David, a year older than us three, became a close friend as well. More on David another time; he was the best man at my wedding. What brought Dale and I together was our mutual infatuation over Sheri. We could have become rivals except for one fact; Sheri never dated either one of us.

Oh, there were the “friend” dates where you attend a movie, walk her to the door, and chit chat about the other boys in her life. Dale and I consoled ourselves over our shared loss of Sheri’s attention. All of us, though, stayed good friends, and get in touch occasionally even now.

Life would be shallow, dried up like a desert wadi, without the understanding of close friends. Many words and phrases have been written trying to describe the special nature of two people who have chosen to walk together in friendship. Friends are “Two persons in one body” and “someone who walks in when the world walks out” One of my favorites is, “A friend is someone who can see the truth and pain in you even when you are fooling everyone else.”

Even Scripture speaks of the intimacy of one who is “closer than a brother” (Proverbs 18:24). It has often been said that we don’t get to choose our siblings, but we do choose our friends. I am one who is fortunate to count my brother and both sisters as very good friends. Depending on time of life and geography, I have been closer with one than the other at times, but we all share a deep commitment to each other.

The story of four men carrying their disabled friend all the way from home to see Jesus should move us to think about not only the value of friendship, but its responsibility. They had a friend who had been unable to walk for years. Without modern conveniences of an ambulance, motor car or even a wheelchair, they carried him to the Healer themselves. Because there is no mention of using a donkey, I imagine these friends to have been quite poor. But, between the four of them, they would get their friend to Jesus, no matter what.

If we are familiar with the story, we know they found the house crushed with a crowd, affording them no way inside. Perhaps one of them could have squeezed through the maze of bodies, but four carrying an unwieldy friend could never make it. Instead, they carried him up the outside stairs to the roof immediately above where Jesus was speaking. Tearing into the tile and thatch, the eventually dug a hole big enough, and lowered their friend on a blanket, into the crowd and right in front of Jesus.

I could go on and on, I suppose, on what it means to be that sort of friend. We all hope to have them, and perhaps desire to be the kind of friend. We want the person who will listen to our needs and refrain from giving instant advice. We desire relationships with friends who have no agenda other than friendship itself. They love us when we disagree politically, when our tastes in music differ and are quick to smooth over rifts caused by either one.

But, beyond that, I see four men who took it all one step further. They loved their friend so much that they took out precious time to get him to Jesus. They cared about His welfare so much they risked being the laughingstock of the town, hauling their invalid friend between the four of them. And, they took the chance on taking him to Christ. What if, for some unknown reason, Jesus couldn’t heal him? They were not stopped by their schedule, the possibility of ridicule or even the uncertainty of what Jesus might do.

I mentioned David, Sheri’s sister. We both came to Christ about six months apart from each other. Now that he is nearly 60 and I’m only a year away as well, our age difference means little. But then, when I was 19, he seemed so much older. And, having said “Yes” to following Jesus a half year before me, I usually deferred to his wisdom. He was, and has been the sort of friend who took me to Christ in many ways.

Perhaps today is the time when someone within your circle of friends is ready to meet Jesus. Or, maybe you are still building trust, creating an atmosphere of acceptance for someone who truly needs it. May we always, in our own meek human efforts, be ready to bring our friends to Christ, trusting He can heal and forgive, just as He did for this small group of friends.