What a Friend and Lord We Have in Jesus: Challenging the Common View of Divine Friendship

What is your primary definition of your relationship with Jesus? Is He your Friend or your Lord? You might think your answer is simply reflecting your theology, or even the “truth” of the Bible. However, perhaps this is just reflecting your cultural values deeply rooted in your society. “Friendship over lordship” is a common pattern that I see among my Western Christian friends. On the other hand, the pattern is reversed amongst my Eastern Christian friends back home. Easterners tend to place “lordship” over “friendship.”

There are only seven passages that describe the relationship of God/Jesus and His people as “friends” (from Hebrew ahab/rea and Greek philos). When we stop looking at these verses through our cultural lenses but instead read them in their context, we start to see a commonality: a focus on the “lordship” of God/Jesus i.e., continuation of our subordinate role. We are indeed “friends” of God but in the biblical sense of the word.


When we examine these seven passages, we see that we are friends of Jesus/God if we are chosen and appointed by Him (John 15, Isa 41), obey Him (John 15), believe Him (James 2), do not fear men (Isa 41, Luke 12) but instead fear Him (Luke 12), have had His will revealed to us (John 15), are completely dependent on Him (2 Chron 20, Exod 33:11), have found favor in His eyes (Exod 33), and revere Him (John 11).


These descriptions may be uncomfortable for those who were raised in egalitarian values. However, countless other passages also describe and depict the relationship between God and His people as Lord and His servants (including at the time of the Second Coming). This is the picture of the “friendship” between us and God described according to the Bible.