A few short weeks ago, Joe and I had the delight of being with our three daughters and their families for a weekend of fun. Along with their husbands and children, yes, there was the chaos, but there was also something that I truly relished─just being with them. Not FaceTiming, no Zoom meetings, no phone calls─just being with them face to face, and all together!

There is no doubt there are moments when I wish I could go back in time when my daughters were young, still living at home. I miss that daily rhythm of life filled with their laughter, their stories of the day, even the tears of disappointment. I miss our times together as a family at church, at the school celebrations, and even at the sporting events where we cheered them on to victory and consoled them in defeat.

But with every season of life that ends, a new season begins, and what I have come to cherish in this season of having adult children is the richness of my relationship with them─a richness that has developed because they are not just my children, they are my friends. And there is something so enriching, so special about having your adult children as friends. I can share with them my celebrations, my sorrows, and also just the humdrum events of life. There is a depth of love and support that we have for each other that was not possible when they were young daughters living at home. There is a maturity to our relationship, a depth to our conversations, because they are both my daughters and my friends.

In the Old Testament, only two men were called a “friend of God:” Abraham and Moses. Abraham, the ancestral father of the Israelites, was deemed a friend of God because of his faith and obedience to the Lord. Generations later the Israelites were called the children of God, but among them only Moses, like Abraham, was called God’s friend.

Being a “friend of God” signified an incredibly special relationship with the Lord reserved for a very few. But when Jesus died on the Cross, not only did he make it possible for us be adopted into God’s family as His children, but also to be His friends─to enjoy a personal, intimate, spiritually mature relationship with the Lord.

On the night before Jesus was crucified, in those final moments with his disciples, Jesus declared a change in their relationship. Because Jesus was their rabbi, their teacher, they were regarded as his “servants.” But on this night he said, “I no longer call you servants, . . . I have called you friends, for everything that I have learned from the Father I have made known to you.” (John 15:15 NIV)

Yes, they were children of God because they were descendants of Abraham, but the intimacy of their time with Jesus deepened their relationship with him, and as a result they were known by the Lord as his children and his friends!

Now please give me some grace as I make this long statement: We can be a child of God but not yet His “friend,” not because His “friendship” isn’t available to us, but because we fail to devote the time to develop an “adult” relationship with Him─a friendship that develops as we mature in faith as we study His Word and gain an intimacy with Him in prayer.

This is the spiritual season that is available to all of us. A blessed relationship with the Lordnas His child but also a rich relationship as His friend!