Friendship {Inside the Church}

Talking about friendships often has me humming the old Girl Scout Friendship Song I learned in first grade. “Make new friends/But keep the old/One is silver/And the other gold.” Both gold and silver are valuable, just as friendships both inside and outside your church are important.

Friendships inside the church are important in order to connect with other believers and have a finger on the general pulse of your church. If you have no social relationships inside the church, your church family may struggle to see you, their pastor’s wife, as human and may assume you are proud, unsociable, or reserved. We are doing everyone in the church a disservice if they only see our sunny, Sunday selves and fail to see us as the broken but redeemed people Jesus has made us.

Friendships between PWs and church members have long been cautioned. I have repeatedly heard seasoned pastors’ wives caution younger ones against developing relationships inside the church, claiming it causes jealousy, heartbreak, and discord. This leads many PWs to a deep loneliness. Statistics show that 56% of PWs feel they have no close friends in the church. (www.soulshepherding.org)

Often PWs feel like their church doesn’t offer anyone with whom they may connect on a deeper level beyond prayer requests and potluck recipes. But look for friendship in unlikely places.

I found friendship in an older woman who was part of the original 8 couples who founded our church over 50 years ago. She understood the people in the church and its history in a way that I didn’t, and it turned out we both had a love of modern fiction and period dramas on PBS.

The idea of intergenerational friendships, such as between Ruth and Naomi, is strange and foreign to most of us. Ruth and Naomi found friendship and family when they were open with each other and committed to faithfulness in their Lord.

On the other side, many PWs believe they must be friends with everyone in the congregation, being overly friendly and completely transparent with everyone. However, healthy boundaries in relationships make for smoother relationships.

Remember, you don’t have to extend your friendship to everyone, and they also don’t have to extend it automatically to you. There’s a large difference, and rightly so, between acquaintances and friends.

Even Jesus had circles of relationships and friendships. He had Peter, James, and John. He had the 12 disciples and the masses. He loved everyone but also really lived life with a select few.

As we pursue a few close friendships, a word of caution is needed: Don’t talk to friends inside the church about problems inside the church. We are supposed to be above reproach, specifically when it comes to gossip. (1 Tim 3:11) As PWs we are often aware (or assumed to be aware) of private information and asked to share. My favorite response is “I can’t speak on that right now.” It allows me to continue in the truth that I know and won’t gossip, or for the possibility that I don’t have any information (which I often don’t).

We do need to have someone in our life whom we trust, who is honest as well, and with whom we can share the pain or hurt we may experience within the church. For most of us, we find that kind of friendship with our husband. He is in the church and often feels the same victories and frustrations we do (or can relate to them).

Sometimes relationships hurt us. Things are misunderstood; feelings are hurt; words left unsaid fester and cause people to leave the church. Hurt happens on this side of eternity.

You, an imperfect pastor’s wife, are called to serve, love, and work alongside your church family (also imperfect) to further the gospel.

Often, I must remind myself of the ultimate goal within a ministry, worship service, or rough relationship. Each relationship, each ministry, is for God’s glory. It’s not for my comfort or worship touchy-feelies or to make more of myself; it is for the glory and pleasure of my Lord.

The most important thing to remember about friendship is that it takes time. It takes time to walk life with each other and to stay connected within each other’s daily routines. It takes cultivation and care. Friendship between two imperfect people doesn’t often “just happen.” When we want something, we work at it; we pursue it; we treasure it.

{Part 1 of 2}
Go here for Part 2