A Theology of Friendship: Holiness, Connection, and why we like to be called “friend”.
It was a short text. It said, “Thank you, friend”, and my heart was warmed.
While it may seem simple, I take so much pleasure in being called “friend”. I might argue that it is one of my favorite things to be called. Maybe even more than my actual name. Perhaps you feel this way, too? But why? I have a short and simple thought on why I believe we might love being called “friend”, as opposed to other terms of endearment.
First, our names are important. They are one of the most personal things about us. They're not just things to jot down on legal documents, but they are an overflow of love from our parents. Before we came about, God knew our name. I think that is really special. But I think we can hold that while also carrying this. That our lives are not private, therefore, neither are our names. Just about anyone who knows me in my community, classes, church, or workplace knows my name. Because of social media, the pool is even larger and easier for people to know who I am, even though they might not know me deeply.
I am reminded of one thing Jesus says that strikes me. “No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I call you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you.”1
When it came down to it, Jesus called his disciples “friends”. I would imagine this would be one of the many ways Jesus was set apart from every other Rabbi.
My theology is this: We ache to be called “friend” by the ones who really know us because Jesus did it first. To understand this, I would like to paint a picture of holiness and joy as connection. I believe these two are essential to knowing how to be a friend in a world of servants.
To be Holy.
If we were to be honest with ourselves, I believe we would come to see that there are a lot of misconceptions surrounding holiness. Is it a lifestyle? Is it a standard? Is it be be set apart from the world? In some ways, yes, but I believe these are effects of holiness. They flow out of the identity of holiness. There are many wonderful and lovely theologies of holy out there. I only scratched the surface in my research. To simplify is holiness means to be whole and pure. When we look at it this way, it takes the weight off our shoulders and draws us into the heart of the gospel. That Jesus is whole, and He came to make us whole. Holy is healing.
A.W. Tozer writes of the Great Mystery found within the holiness of God.
He writes, “Holy is the way God is. To be holy, He does not conform to a standard. He is the standard. He is absolutely holy with an infinite, incomprehensible fullness of purity that is incapable of being other than it is. Because He is holy, His attributes are holy; that is, whatever we think of as belonging to God must be thought of as holy.”2
From Tozer’s statement, I’ve gathered that holiness is the lens through which we see. It’s the one where we see the ordinary and the miraculous. It’s the one in which we see that we were always called friends and beloved. It’s how we receive joy, because it is the string that connects glory to presence and love to faithfulness.
Connection Through Presence
In a series of lectures at Azusa Pacific University, Dallas Willard speaks into holiness, saying, “ The fine texture of holiness is nothing else than the presence of the Trinity in our lives”3. In saying that, Willard emphasized two things.
One: there is a groove, or a way to holiness.
Two: that it is baked into communion with the Triune God of love. Holy is holy because it is present.
The most vital thing we can learn in our apprenticeship to Jesus is his presence. I would argue that Jesus spends holy week and again, post-resurrection teaching and preparing his disciples about the importance of his true presence through the Holy Spirit. Here is where we find our pure joy.
In his book, Marked by Joy, Jarod Mitzelfelt presents his findings of joy as connection and reunion. He writes, “We were all created to have happiness and joy, but we can only experience them to the fullest by being deeply connected to God and others.”4 Joy is communion and the way of joy. It’s here where we are found as friends and beloved. Christ’s holy joy has invited us to be- to be loved, to be with, to be partners.
This is the essence of your belovedness.
We have become like John the beloved, laying our heads on the heartbeat of the Lord Jesus.
How to Be a Friend in a World of Servants
Spiritual director Strahan Coleman wrote this prayer:
“ I begged you for employment;
You offered me friendship.
I assumed Your distance;
You presumed our intimacy”.5
How often do you feel these words? When I first read them last summer, something deep within me settled. It spoke into something that I felt in my own story. Through this revelation, Jesus brought awareness to min mind, and presence into my heart. I really do love serving and doing good with others, and that’s the key. Servanthood implies a communion with others. Serving is nothing without the joy and connection with others, especially Jesus. It’s a beautiful thing when we find such a gift in the mission.
Holiness of friendship
What I hope to bring into my daily awareness is the holiness of Christ. Not as a moral standard, but a wonder-filled adornment. A vine of uniqueness that makes his love extravagantly faithful, and his presence in our lives adds an incredible joy and peace that is hard to come by. I love Tozer’s language of the Great Mystery6. Great Mystery says “abide in me, as I am in you”7. These words are so often spoken as a means to remain holy. However, we have forgotten one thing: that is, we have already been made holy. We cannot serve our way into holiness any more than we can try to be one’s friend. Holiness is identity, just as friendship is.
Eugene Peterson so beautifully says, “Like the sacramental use of water and bread and wine, friendship takes what’ common in human experience and turns it into something holy.8 Peterson is writing about the friendship of King David and his friend, and son of his respected enemy, Jonathan. Friendship seems to be something we take for granted, but when we’re in the wilderness, nothing compares to the presence of a friend. In the ordinariness of everyday life, nothing grabs our attention like being called “friend”.
Peterson speaks to friendship as a sacrament. The best way I know how to describe sacrament is the means by which Christ intends to bless through. Most of the time, in church traditions, we attribute this to things like baptisms, the act of communion, or marriage. All incredibly beautiful things. I think friendship easily holds the same importance. I have found something profoundly beautiful and edifying in friendship. And in my friendship with Jesus, even more so. I have been given the gift of pure presence, love that meets me in the dark, and a peace that renews the mind.
The journey of our lives is to befriended and learn to be a friend. I know of no better means of that than through prayer. In Jesus’ discourse with his disciples, before he calls them friends, he says this, “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.”9 To me, complete sounds a lot like whole, or better yet, holiness. Our friendship with Jesus confirms our holiness, just as the Father confirmed him.
Later in his book, Mitzelfelt makes an observation that I think is crucial to how we build friendships with each other, as well as with Jesus. “What’s important to note is that friendships are formed not just by the quantity of time spent but also the quality of time spent… Again, proximity doesn’t equal intimacy.”10 I say to make the point that befriending Jesus isn’t about the routine. As much as I love studying scripture, it wasn’t what brought me into a place of understanding my own identity. It was an invitation and a series of moments that I just was. It was the joy of his presence. It was moments like sitting under the stars in silence at a camp for when I was 16, it was mornings where I sat out on the parkway, it was moments of Emmanuel prayer with my coach, and it was the moment of being baptized by my first pastor, and dear friend, who lead me to Christ. The holy and joyful presence is woven throughout these and every moment.
The key to understanding presence is understanding present-ness. And like my own friendships, it was doing things that built memories and bonds, like concerts, day-trip adventures, weekend camps for my Young Life buddies, graduations, and ordinary meals where listening was the absolute best we could offer each other. It’s reciprocal, and on a baseline level, I think that’s at the heart of what Jesus wants with us and for our friendships with others.
Transformation
Like baptism, friendship marks our identity, just as it did for Jesus! And again, this identity says who we are not because of the things we do, but the person we are, and are becoming. To put all this into perspective, John Mark Comer observes discipleship in this way:
“It is about transforming relational presence, first of all to the Trinity, and then through one another. It is in deep loving relationships of trust and vulnerability and fidelity that we are formed to be like Jesus. And apart from these types of relationships, we do not grow much at all”. 11
A sobering thought. As we have been made holy through the connection of Christ, our friendships also flourish through the joy and vulnerability shared with each other. Along the way, I started noting this one thing that transforms all life experiences: Listening is way more important than doing. The moments I chose to sit with and listen have built some of the most foundational and joy-filled friendships that I have in my circle.
Nothing will transform and change us the way pure friendship will. We won’t always be perfect, but we will always be changed.
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1 John 15:14-15, NIV
2 Tozer, A.W. The Knowledge of the Holy: The Attributes of God, Their Meaning in the Christian Life. Cambridge: The Lutterworth Press, 2022. Ch.1-3,21
3 Dallas Willard Ministries. “Dallas Willard- Holiness, Divine Presence, And Divine Power-John 14”, Aug. 31, 2023. YouTube video 1:30:58.
4 Jared Mitzelfelt. Marked by Joy: Discovering the Joy that Defined the First Believers, Houston, TX: LucidBooks, 2025. p.56.
5 Strahan Coleman. Prayer Vol .2, Commoners Communion, 2020.
6 A.W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy.
7 John 15:3-4
8 Eugene Peterson. Leap Over a Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians. HaperOne of HaperCollins Publishing, 1997.p.53.
9 John 15:11
10 Mitzelfelt, Marked by Joy, p.159.
11 Practicing the Way. 2024 Pastor’s conference. Instagram post on May 5th, 2025. Accessed on May 20th, 2025.
