Finding Your SisterhoodSample

In high school, there’s such a high priority on getting ahead of everyone else. So much of girls’ time is spent obsessed with being the girl who has the most—the most friends, the most boyfriends, the most awards, the most As, the most extracurricular activities, the most clothes, the most parties to attend, but all that does is lead to competition, comparison, jealousy, self-doubt, impersonating, posing, pretending, pushing people down to get ahead, aaaaand (drumroll please) drama. So much stinking drama.

We have allowed too much of this immature mentality to spill over into our adult lives and into our adult friendships. It doesn’t work. It doesn’t fuel us, and at the end of the day, it doesn’t feel very good either. It doesn’t fill us. It doesn’t serve us. It doesn’t serve others, and it sure doesn’t serve Jesus.

He didn’t love others so that he could get ahead. He didn’t live so that he could beat out everyone else. He didn’t surround himself with his disciples so that he could look “cool.”

He surrounded himself with them so that he could pour into their lives, so that all the goodness he held could spill into them, and so that everyone could rise higher. He surrounded himself with them so they could learn together and pray together and go out into the world hand in hand and make meaning from the madness; so they could encourage one another when things got tough and remind one another of the call that had been placed on their lives.

When we get our minds right, and we get into a secure, mature rhythm, the people around us rise right along with us—and that is the goal. That’s the whole point of it all, the entire meaning of friendship: that we do it in a way that lifts everyone in the group. That we leave better off than we came and we are capable of showing more grace, more compassion, more love in the end than we did in the beginning. That we shine a little brighter out there in the world because of the people right here in our circle.

Prayer

Lord, I confess that I don’t always build up or encourage those around me. Please forgive me, and please use me to encourage others so that I can be your light and goodness in the world. Amen.