Text: Vesa Kum­pu­la

Trans­la­ti­on: Sirk­ka-Lii­sa Lei­no­nen

I was re­qu­es­ted to send a vi­de­o­ta­ped birth­day gree­ting to a mu­tu­al friend. The birth­day was ce­leb­ra­ted wit­hin the im­me­di­a­te fa­mi­ly, and the vi­deo gree­ting was to be a surp­ri­se to this friend of mine.

While plan­ning and re­cor­ding the vi­deo, I be­gan to think more deep­ly about the sig­ni­fi­can­ce of friends­hip, and who I would call my best friends. I conc­lu­ded that I have many dif­fe­rent friends, and they are all im­por­tant.

The best desc­rip­ti­on of friends­hip can be found in the Bib­le. In his fa­re­well speech to his dis­cip­les, Je­sus said, ”Gre­a­ter love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.” (John 15:13). The Bib­le al­so tel­ls us about the friends­hip bet­ween Da­vid and Jo­nat­han and bet­ween Ruth and her mot­her-in-law Na­o­mi. Those Bib­le por­ti­ons show that friends­hip is ba­sed on love and mu­tu­al trust.

The fol­lo­wing Bib­le por­ti­ons al­so pro­found­ly ref­lect the na­tu­re of friends­hip:

” Any­o­ne who with­holds kind­ness from a friend for­sa­kes the fear of the Al­migh­ty” (Job 6:14).

” I am a friend to all who fear you, to all who fol­low yo­ur pre­cepts” (Ps. 119:63).

” A man of many com­pa­ni­ons may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks clo­ser than a brot­her” (Prov. 18:24).

”Trus­ting in a tre­ac­he­rous man in time of troub­le is like a bad tooth or a foot that slips” (Prov. 25:19).

Here are some of the things I said in my vi­deo gree­ting:

”He­art­felt cong­ra­tu­la­ti­ons to you, dear brot­her, now that you ce­leb­ra­te yo­ur 70th birth­day. I am gra­te­ful for the many pro­found dis­cus­si­ons we have had over the de­ca­des. I es­pe­ci­al­ly re­mem­ber two mee­tings that took place in the ear­ly 1980s. We were… - - Our paths in life have mi­ra­cu­lous­ly cros­sed time and time again, and we have been ab­le to sup­port each ot­her. Thank you for ha­ving con­si­de­red me a friend.”

I sent the vi­deo, which las­ted for one mi­nu­te and 41 se­conds. I had been re­qu­es­ted to make a vi­deo las­ting for one mi­nu­te. I said in my mes­sa­ge that I had not been ab­le to keep the vi­deo so short, but I would be hap­py to try to shor­ten it, if ne­ces­sa­ry. I got this he­art-war­ming res­pon­se: ”No need to shor­ten the vi­deo. Warm thanks for this vi­deo and the me­mo­ries you sha­red.”

It is not ty­pi­cal of Fin­nish pe­op­le to show their fee­lings open­ly. We sel­dom ver­ba­li­ze wha­te­ver we think about anot­her per­son. It of­ten hap­pens that we can free­ly exp­ress our fee­lings and thoughts about a per­son on­ly af­ter they have pas­sed away. Yet we all have me­mo­ries of si­tu­a­ti­ons where so­me­o­ne has come close to us and told us how im­por­tant we have been to him or her.

I have warm me­mo­ries of si­tu­a­ti­ons where a friend has as­ked me how I am doing or where I have been af­ter I have been away for a while. Such qu­es­ti­ons show that they care about me and find me im­por­tant. Even a simp­le brush on the shoul­der may ref­lect sin­ce­re af­fec­ti­on.

Friends­hips that have las­ted for de­ca­des are like won­der­ful pre­sents. Alt­hough the friends may not meet very of­ten, they can al­wa­ys con­ti­nue their dis­cus­si­on and com­pa­ni­ons­hip qui­te na­tu­ral­ly where they left off a long time ago. We should che­rish such friends­hips like great tre­a­su­res. So­me­o­ne has said that tri­als and hards­hips are a test of friends­hip: on­ly the true friends who re­al­ly care re­main with us.