Having friends is a great blessing. Friends multiply our joys and divide our sorrows. Friends walk in when the rest of the world walks out. Friends know all about us, and they still love us anyway. Proverbs 18:24 notes that “a friend . . . sticks closer than a brother. In other words, a true friend can be relied upon and is always there for us.

The amazing thing is that Jesus, the Savior and King of creation, calls believers his friends. As believers in Christ, we are not just subjects or servants of the Lord of the universe; we are his friends. And he is loyal and true, sticking closer than a blood brother. In John 15, Jesus explains that, like a true friend, he is transparent and open with us: “Everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.” No secrets, no deception, no masks—just an open heart entrusted to his friends.

The truest sign of friendship is sacrificial love. Jesus says, “Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” Jesus demonstrated this when he went to the cross to pay the price for all our sin. He considered friendship with us so important that he surrendered his very life in order to secure it.