The Truth About Friendships, Loyalty and Christianity

I have been thinking a lot lately about how it has become so easy to betray people and move on like nothing is happening. It now looks like every week, I hear one story of betrayal or the other and I just cannot understand it. Whatever happened to being there for one another? Whatever happened to loving people irrespective of their flaws and bearing them up when they fall? There’s this friend of mine who taught me a very important lesson about loyalty and unconditional love. We usually tease her because it looks like she knows the whole world. She knows that many people. The interesting thing is that she can be friends with two people who hate each other and she will not say bad things about one person to another. I know because I experienced it. She was friends with someone that I did not really like. So anytime she came over and the girl’s name came up, I’d start ranting about how I didn’t like her and all but my friend would never say a word. She would smile and let me finish ranting. When I was done she would find a way to convince me that the person was not that bad. She hardly says anything bad about anybody; she just chooses to see the light in everyone. Like I said, I learnt what loyalty truly means for her. So I ask again, why has betrayal become so easy? I look at my imperfect family and the truth is no matter how badly I feel my family may have treated me, I will stand up for my family members no matter what. Want to attack my mother or my father? You had better prepare to go through me. I don’t care whether I just finished having a hot argument with my mother a few minutes ago. I don’t care if my dad did something to hurt me yesterday. I stand up for my family when they need to be protected and I cover them when they make mistakes. I don’t even think about it. You don’t mess with my family. This extends to my friends and the people I love also. I cannot count how many times I’ve had to cover my friends when they fell or made serious mistakes. And I also cannot count the number of times they had to cover me when I fell short. Again, we don’t think about it. We just do it. Loyalty to the people you say you love is non-negotiable. I get really sad when stories of betrayal come right from within the body of Christ; the body that ought to be the light of the world. It’s sad because while we are meant to show a united front and win the world over for Christ, we are too pre-occupied with exposing people’s flaws and condemning them. A lot of people have backslidden and turned their backs on God because the very people who were meant to cover them when they fell were the ones who made sure they were exposed. It saddens me a lot because our Father, even though He hates our sin, loves us nonetheless. God is not happy when we fall into sin and He rejoices when we are restored back to Him. Why can’t we do this for one another? The world is the way it is because everyone is pursuing their own agenda. Bringing people down has become so easy to do. It shouldn’t be that way. The next time someone confides in you, instead of telling the whole world, can you please cover that person in prayer? Don’t be the person who goes around spreading bad news about people. Be a light. Choose to say only good things. It is God’s duty to deal with people’s secret sins; not yours. Don’t make it a habit to bring people down. It always has a ripple effect. You get lifted when you lift others up. Never forget that. I look forward to a time when we can truly live selflessly and demonstrate true agape love towards one another. It’s not impossible. Jesus did it and so can we.     About the Writer: Adedoyin Jaiyesimi is a Writer, Media Content Creator and Brand Manager. The various publications she has written for include Y! Magazine (now Y! Africa), Discovery, Pride Magazine Nigeria, Butterscotch magazine amongst others. She currently holds the position of Brand Communications Manager at Victor Adeyemi Ministries and she is also the founder of LRouge Media, an editorial and brand consultancy company which provides content writing and editing services for business websites, magazines and blogs. When she is not creating content, you can find her in church doing the work of her Father. She tweets @msdoyeen and blogs at www.adedoyinjaiyesimi.wordpress.com .   

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This article was first published on 30th July 2015

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