This past week President Obama announced his selection of a nominee for the Supreme Court. In the fourth sentence of the AP news report I read, it said that Pres. Obama referred to Solicitor General Kagan as “my friend.”
Did Pres. Obama need to nominate a “friend”? What sort of friends are they? Did he friend her on Facebook? OK, that sounds pretty ridiculous, but on the other hand have they had deep heart-to-heart talks so that they have a connection of like-mindedness, support and loyalty?
I don’t know how he was using the term in this case, but I’m guessing that even the President of the United States needs friends in the same way that I need friends. Case in point: he has guys that he plays basketball with. And that’s comforting to me. I need to have people that I trust and with whom I’ve shared some of my life to give me truthful critique and caring support, or the weight of my responsibilities as a husband, a father, and a church leader will literally depress me. I doubt if Pres. Obama can share state secrets with his basketball buddies, but I’m sure they help keep him balanced. In fact he may have shared a different kind of “state secret” with them.
What are my “state secrets”, i.e., the secrets about the state of my soul? With whom do I share my state secrets? If I’m to stay internally balanced I need friends who know my state secrets. Those aren’t the sorts of things I’m going to share on Facebook. Those are the things that I’ll share with someone I’ve known for a while, with whom I’ve cultivated a friendship over time so that when the occasion comes s/he can be there for me. S/he will give me insight into the state of my soul, and pray for me and support me as the Holy Spirit does his transforming work (which is often painful).
I’m not great at developing and maintaining friendships. I guess I have a kind of ADHD about relationships. Somehow I let work and other things distract me. But I’m learning that if I don’t entrust my state secrets to friends, the state of my soul is in jeopardy.
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