Be Your Mate's Best Friend

FAMILY  Season 2, Episode 017  "Be Your Mate's Best Friend" audio podcast by award-winning western author Stephen Bly.  Circa 1990, Maranatha Bible & Missionary Conference Center, Muskegon, Michigan. Sponsored by BlyBooks.com Legacy Series.
6 Ways to be Your Mate's Best Friend" blog post article found here: https://www.blybooks.com/2022/06/mates-best-friend/
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Transcript

BE YOUR MATE’S BEST FRIEND 

Let’s talk about relationships with other people, specifically, that person you live with, your mate.  

I remember the first time I met her. She had long, brown, shiny hair; big smile; and lips that reminded me of a movie star at the time. I remember that she always chomped on gum. She was thirteen-years-old in 1958, when I first met her.  

I didn’t talk to her right away. I was bashful. I came from the country and traveled eight miles to get to school in the city. But in those days, in every high school class we sat alphabetically. And her last name being Chester and mine Bly meant we sat next to each other in Miss Menendian’s Freshman English class. But I didn’t speak to her. I was kinda shy. But rumor had it she had a boyfriend anyway, so it didn’t really matter. By the end of the week, little known to her, she had made the list of one of the Ten Cutest Girls at Redwood High School that I concocted in my mind. 

It took me about six months before I ever spoke any words to her. It took me three years before I ever asked her for a date. Actually, it took me three years and a ’55 Chevy convertible. And to my surprise, she said, “Yes!” And to my continual surprise, she’s been saying “Yes!” ever since.  

Now, I have to admit that when I was thirteen-years-old I was not the most cool dude at Redwood High School. I came from the farm and I tried to dress like a city kid, so I wore a white t-shirt, blue jeans, and high-topped black tennis shoes, which I was told were right in style. I had a short, butch haircut like every other fellow I knew. In fact, I never owned a comb before I was twenty-seven years old.  

To my surprise, this young girl, this young lady, said “Yes!” to not only being a friend, but she also said “Yes!” to being my wife. And we would be married all these many years and become very best friends as well.  

Some young people who aren’t married yet have this idea that, of course, you’re best friends with your mate. It just happens. You get married, become better acquainted, and become closer friends. But those who have been married awhile know it doesn’t just happen.  

Janet and I spent ten years counseling some neighbors that lived catty-corner across a fence behind us. When we moved to the place, I don’t think it was two days before Linda came over and talked to us about her marriage relationship that wasn’t going well. A few weeks later, Bob came over and he also talked about their marriage. This theme and pattern repeated itself for all those years.  

Now, they were active in our church as committed Christians. But there were problems in that relationship. We kept trying to give them advice and praying with them, crying with them, being with them. But then, with all the children gone, after twenty-nine years of marriage, they decided that was it. They got a divorce. We began to realize that after all that time together, raising the same kids, living in the same house, eating at the same table, sleeping in the same bed, they really didn’t like each other. They had never developed a friendship. 

It didn’t just happen. 

Remember back when you first met your mate, all the things you did to build a friendship? You might not admit all the silly things. I remember cruising up and down Rinaldi street many a time just hoping she might be out in the yard, so I could be nonchalantly driving by. I remember telephone conversations that lasted hours. I’m sure there wasn’t much meaningful that we said but we hung on the phone for every word. We were building a relationship. We worked at it. We plotted it.  

You know how I got the second date with Janet, to make sure she’d go out with me? At the first date we’d been at a football game where we needed our student body cards to show as an I.D. I just didn’t give back her student body card. The next week, she asked about it. “I won’t give it back unless you go out with me,” I replied. 

 We worked hard to start a relationship. You might remember right before the wedding, those weeks or months making the plans. There was a lot of hard work, a lot of talk and planning, along with dreaming. Then we have this crazy idea you get married and don’t have to work at it anymore.  

Let’s look at some areas that maybe you’ve forgotten about. You and I need some spurring on once in a while. Maybe there’s an area where you can work a little harder. I know this is a good topic no matter where you are in friendship with your mate because if the relationship’s poor, this hits home, and you know you got to do something. If the relationship’s good, it’s because you’ve been working at it. You don’t have to be motivated to work more, but here might be a few good ideas.  

How To Be Your Mate’s Best Friend 

1.) Fulfill the biblical role for husband and wife. 

There’s no way to continue to grow as friends without obedience to what God says a husband and wife should do. You can find examples throughout the Scriptures. Here’s a couple. 

Genesis 2:18, “The Lord God said, ‘It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him.’” 

Notice that one of the roles is for the wife to be the husband’s helper. God would make for him a personal helper suitable for this one man. There’s not mention of dividing the work load 50/50 and everyone pulls their own shift. For a lot of women, that would be lightening the load. I love how God makes a helper suitable just for me.  

Janet is the perfect helper for me. Around our house, we’ve been doing some remodeling and hanging a lot of wallpaper. Here’s how we do it. Janet goes to the store and picks out the wallpaper. Sometimes that takes a long time. But she finally says, “This is the one” and brings it home. Then, I prepare the walls.  

I take all the pictures down. I put all the sizing on the walls, clean the walls. I cover up the furniture, put the newspaper around the base. I get out all the tools, cut the paper, measure it, soak it up. I hang it and brush it and sponge it. I do all that as Janet sits on a stool in the middle of the room and she watches. Now, you say, “That’s not the way we do it at our house.” You see, I have a helper suitable for me. When I start hanging wallpaper, nobody should get in my way. It doesn’t work to do it side by side. We’ve figured out the roles we like.  

Genesis 2:24, “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife, and they will become one flesh.” 

What does cleaving mean? You hold onto tightly, to grasp and not let go. There are times we understand that and have to creatively think, “How can we do that?”  

A couple summers ago, when I pastored in southern California, we had a home in Idaho. Janet decided she and Aaron would spend some weeks earlier there so she could get some writing done and have a little vacation and I’d join them later. That meant separation for about forty-three days. We’d been married about twenty-five years and been apart other times, so it wasn’t a life-crushing idea. So, she did that two different summers. She and Aaron went north and I stayed to do my ministry duties. So, how do I cleave to my wife when she’s 1,200 miles away?  

I decided to write her letters to let her know what’s happening. Now, I’m not a letter writer though I write books and articles. But I thought that would show her I’m thinking of her. So, I began to write long, newsy letters. I pulled out a sheet of 11”x8½” paper and stuck it in the typewriter and filled it up every day she was gone. She’d find a letter every day in the mailbox from me.  

Now, there wasn’t always a full page’s worth of wonderful news. Some of those letters sound like our old phone conversations in the 1950s. But it was my way of cleaving to her.  

2.) Find new ways of expressing your love. 

Philippians 1:9, “This I pray that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and discernment.” 

I think Paul was writing to the most loving church he ever pastored. They loved and supported him. They weren’t fighting each other. It was a good church. Yet, Paul said, “Love more and more.” Why? Love needs to grow, whether in a church or marriage relationship.  

Notice that love is something you can command. Jesus and Paul commanded people to love. And we sit around saying, “Well, it’s a feeling that either grows or it doesn’t.” But no. Love is something you do. So, we continually look for new ways to show love.  

One way is a verbal, “I love you.”  

However, some find saying the words hard. In Fiddler on the Roof they sing the song, “Do You Love Me?” And the response? Of course, I do! Haven’t I been married to you all these years? 

I found a new way to say, “I love you”, that husbands could try. Say you’re talking to your wife on the telephone. Maybe you’re down at the clubhouse at the golf course. 

She’s at home and can hear a lot of noise in the background. The guys are talking and laughing and putting up clubs. You finish the conversation, and she says, “Well, hurry home, honey. I love you.” And you mumble at best, “Me too.” But what if you said as loud as you could, “Honey, I love you too!” What would that do for her? She heard it said loud and clear in front of others. 

Sometimes love is giving quality, uninterrupted time.  

How does that work? Well, this is a little easier. Wife comes in with something really important. “I’m really troubled about this,” she says. “I’m not sure what to do with this situation. It has to do with one the gals I know. Things aren’t going good and I want to talk to you about it, honey.” 

And you’re sitting in front of the TV watching football on a Monday night. And what do you say to her? “Wait for a commercial and I’ll talk to you.” But what would happen if you got right up and said, “Yeah, we need to talk about that.” So, you turn of the television, sit down close and look her in the eye. “Go ahead. Tell me all about it.”  

Can you imagine what you’re saying? That’s sacrificial, uninterrupted time. Look for new ways of expressing love. 

Show love with touch. 

My Janet is a very loving, affectionate wife. But she’s also a private person. Out in public, hand holding is okay, but that’s it. But one day, I headed out to the car and she met me at the driver’s door from the back of the open garage. And as I turned to get in the car and leave, she leaned over and kissed me on the lips. Now, we have neighbors all around and they could have seen her. You might think, “That’s no big deal.” But for Janet, it’s a big deal.  

No matter how many years you’ve been married, try looking for new ways to show your love.  

3.) Accept mate’s spiritual differences.  

Paul said, “But one and the same Spirit works in all these things, distributing each of these gifts individually, just as he wills.” 

Our mate’s may have different spiritual gifts than we do, and we should give them opportunities to use them. Sometimes there’s a difference in intensity of worship. Sometimes there’s a difference in theology. Sometimes there’s a difference in what kinds of things they want to do for the Lord. When we realize that, we should try to accept and encourage them. 

Because you want to work with junior high kids doesn’t mean you’re mate feels called to. Though they have a special kind of music ministry doesn’t mean you have to be involved in choir if that’s not your ministry. Sometimes it costs us something to encourage our mates. 

In 1976, Janet decided she wanted to explore some other avenues of ministry. She said maybe she was interested in writing. And I said, “Fine, as long as it doesn’t involve me, because I’m not interested.” And so, we saved a little money. I sent her over on a bus to a Christian Writer’s Conference Center. She went a couple years and still wasn’t writing much of anything. But she was very interested, so I encouraged her. What did it cost me? 

Well, that writers’ conference happened Easter week and I was a pastor and we had two children at home. That meant I babysat during a busy Easter week. But I wanted her spiritual gifts to develop.  

One fall we experienced a tense moment. While in Idaho, Janet received a call from a church in Lake Jackson, Texas near Houston. They wanted her to come down and speak at a big women’s retreat. And I said, “That’s great!” I knew speaking is one of her gifts from the Lord and I could encourage my wife.  

Then after she told them she was coming, I asked her, “When do they want you?” She said, “The last week of October.” In northern Idaho, that happens to be elk hunting season. And I had a friend with a string of horses and a plan to go up to the North Fork of the Clearwater and had imagined a spot in the den where that big old buck head with a rack of wide horns would be. But I babysat that week and didn’t go hunting. Sometimes love costs us. 

4.)  Show strong, public support when bad things happen.  

Our mates will go through tough times. They may experience health struggles, financial difficulties, disastrous relationships, and horrible mess-ups they brought on themselves.  

What I see with counseling is that a lot of mates find it a challenge to hang in there when tough things happen. It has to be learned. One of the worst examples in Scripture of not hanging in there must be Mrs. Job. When Job lost everything—flocks, fields, servants, and children--and he sat on an ash heap, what did Mrs. Job do? “Why don’t you curse God and die?” Not a supportive mate.  

We should be better than that.  

5.) Call our mates to spiritual account. 

Luke 17:3, “Be on your guard. If your brother sins, rebuke him. And if he repents, forgive him.” 

It’s interesting how we look out for each other on a physical level. You’re sitting at a restaurant, talking, and your wife leans over and says, “Honey, you have some spinach on your teeth.” She doesn’t hesitate to warn you and you figure a way to take care of that.  

Your wife walks out the door on the way to church and a dryer cloth hangs from her dress. You definitely mention it. “Here, let me grab that for you.” We need to take care of each other spiritually in the same manner. It shouldn’t be offensive or picking on our mate. We want them to have their very best appearance. We know how good looking they can be.  

In the same sense, we know how strong spiritually they can be. We want their best spiritual appearance. At times, we call each other to account. How do you do that? 

Be open to their response to you. Also, agree ahead of time, the two of you will live by God’s standard. So, you call them to Scriptural account. Our behavior needs to be different. You open up the Word and show them. 

6.) Demonstrate uncompromising loyalty. 

Jesus said, “Therefore what God has brought together, let no one separate.” 

That’s not a wise saying like Ben Franklin in The Almanac. Jesus said that. This kind of loyalty says, “I’m on your side, always and forever, amen and amen.”  

I saw this demonstrated during a visit to south Florida. I really enjoy going there because I feel so young. Out by the pool, I feel like a hunk. As several of us speakers ate at a restaurant, a well-dressed elderly couple entered. The man with a walker wore a suit and tie and she had on a nice dress. They sat at a table across from us.  

While we waited for our food, I noticed she stood and waited while he shuffled around to hold her chair before she sat down. He helped her slide it forward and then sat down. Then the waitress bounced over to them. “Well, how are you two today?” They smiled and said, “Very well, thank you.” She looked at the man. “My, you look handsome today.” His wife didn’t bat an eye. “Why yes he does, doesn’t he?” He smiled again. “Today’s our anniversary.” The waitress asked, “How many years?” He said, “Sixty-eight.” And then he turned to his wife. “You know, she just gets prettier every year.”  

During the mealtime I noticed a time or two she leaned over with a big, red linen napkin and brushed his chin. They took care of each other as they ate. The meal over, they got ready to leave. He got up and with gnarled hands from arthritis, he took his walker and scooted around to hold her chair. She took his arm and they slowly headed to the cash register to pay.  

Halfway there, he reached around the walker, and patted her on the bottom. And she said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear, “Now, you cut that out!” The same cheery waitress took their money. “You two have a good year!” and the wife said, “I’m sure we will.” 

That’s what loyalty looks like after sixty-eight years. You couldn’t even imagine one of them without the other. We have to keep working to build a friendship like that. It doesn’t happen automatically. Look for new ideas to continually grow. Maybe you found a few here.   

Stephen Bly

Circa 1990

Maranatha Conference Center, Muskegon, Michigan