Good morning…
This morning I wake pondering the song “Make new friends but keep the old.” So I write to my friend of twenty-something years, a friend with whom I share a two or three hour meal most every month. She keeps in good touch with old friends and family while remaining openhearted to the new friends God brings into her life.
I emailed her these thoughts: “I recognize that you ‘Make new friends but keep the old’ so much better than I do. You keep in touch with your face to face people as well as your dad and sister in Indiana, your aunt and friends nearby, and your kids and grandkids, some near, some far. How do you do that? The heart to heart connection I have with people keeps expanding, adding ‘new friends’ every semester, but I fear I am losing touch my ‘old.’ I am praying about what that means and how I might gain balance between new and old, silver and gold. Contact with my parents, siblings, and old friends in Ohio and Pennsylvania, Connecticut and California is minimal, very minimal. I want you to help me learn how to ‘keep the old’ as I make a plethora of new friends during this phase in my life.”
I send off my email then God joins our chorus.
Most people do not “make new friends” month after month, month after month like I am blessed to do in my role as Women’s Ministry Director at Northside Church. Every semester, God brings a large handful of new, Spirit-filled women into my life through my Bible studies; their joys and their sorrows add meaning to my life. If life is a seesaw, then I am top-heavy right now in the “making new friends” department. Saving space in my life to keep in touch with “the old” is challenging for me, very challenging for me. But maybe God is singing this song collectively among us, singing this is song year after year, generation after generation. Maybe God designed me to belt out the blessing of “making new friends” right now. “New friends” are shining silver for those who cling to the gold, just as “keeping the old” is grounding gold for those of us who spend our days “making new friends.”
So he (Jesus) told them, “Every student of the Scriptures who becomes a disciple in the kingdom of heaven is like someone who brings out new and old treasures from the storeroom” (Matthew 13:52, CEV),
…Sue…
