This Sunday Eben spoke to us on the topic of friendship from the book of Proverbs. He wove the lessons of Proverbs on friendship into his own life story of finding God as a friend and in turn learning to befriend others. I encourage you to listen to the podcast if you missed it. I asked him to write down a shortened version of his story which he has kindly done.
I hope this inspires, humbles and challenges you to allow others into your life so that God can change you. What he shares beautifully describe what Life Groups are about.
Hello, everyone. I have a confession to make. My name is Eben Gourley and I’m a friend-aholic. You heard me right. I’m addicted to friendship. Most who know me are aware that I have a love for people, and I have made friends all over the world.
But what you may not know is that being a friend has not always come naturally to me. There was a time when I had no friends; not even one. This is the story of transformation that occurred in my life which has given me the power to not only be a friend, but to see a friend in everyone I meet.
So, just a little backstory of how my life was transformed by friendships:
My parents took me out of formal schooling at the age of five, along with four of my other siblings to try to teach us at home. Not only was I too rebellious for my parents to be able to teach me reading, math and writing, I was also secluded from children my age. See, I lived on a 600-acre ranch in a small part of Texas. I lived in what we call “the country”. For the next twelve years, I was removed from mainstream society, and never really had someone I could call a “friend”.
By the age of twelve, I had become frustrated and angry at the world. I was trapped in a hopeless circumstance where I had very little education, no friends, and was becoming extremely afraid that others would realise how stupid I was. Most of my family saw me as a troublemaker and a brat, and I always felt like I was blamed when anything went wrong.
By homeschooling me and keeping me out of mainstream society, my parents had done what most parents strive to do in some form or fashion—protect their child from the dangers of the world. For that loving desire, I am grateful.
However, changing my environment and the influence over what information I learned did not protect me completely. Negative temptations found their way into my life, no matter how carefully my family tried to keep them out. True, I didn’t have access to all of the troubles and pressures many kids face. However, I was placed on the fringe of society; which, in effect, caused me to struggle and strive to fit in and to be accepted by my peers. In a sense, my upbringing had the exact opposite affect my parents wanted it to have on me. Instead of being repulsed by negative behaviors, I became very susceptible to what they were trying to protect me from.
I basically had a huge target on my back saying, “Please accept me! Please be my friend! I’ll do anything … anything to fit in!”
This was an uphill battle on many levels. I was socially awkward, but didn’t realize it and so blamed my lack of friends and acceptance on the fact that we didn’t have a lot of money and couldn’t afford the fancy brands that everybody was wearing. I tried to get some name brand clothes through a sad story involving a pair of children’s designer secondhand jeans and an unfortunate cut and sew job, but no matter how hard I tried, I just didn’t fit in anywhere. I was either too wholesome for the rebellious kids or too rebellious for the wholesome ones. So basically … I was too weird for everyone.
I didn’t even feel like I fit in with my own family. Both of my brothers were into ranching, but it never fit my personality. My life was a mess and I had no idea where who to turn to. The last place I was going to turn was to God, since I was under the impression that He was an angry guy who was mad with me for not obeying His or my parents’ rules. He wasn’t a personal God as far as I was concerned, and was pretty out of touch with my situation, and ultimately just wanted to judge me.
Most people probably can’t relate exactly to my circumstances, but they can relate to my feelings of inadequacy. Or about the hopelessness felt after God and everyone in the world has seemingly turned their back on you?
Everything changed late one night after God revealed His saving love and grace to me in a unique and spectacular way. I surrendered my life to Him and asked Jesus to be Lord over my life.
I didn’t become perfect and full of friends overnight, but one of the biggest changes that began taking place in my life over time was that I began to love other people, and could truly identify with those who were hurting or were sad. In the past, I had only been worried about myself and my own circumstances. Now my focus was changing to others. It was a subtle, yet profound paradigm shift.
College would force me to face my greatest fears—my own peers. My social dilemma continued, and it was never more apparent than on Friday nights. I would look out my dorm window and see people buzzing everywhere until slowly, one by one, they would get into cars and head off to somewhere fun. The dorms would became eerily quiet, and the campus a ghost town. I had made many casual acquaintances but none of them had gone beyond that.
I remember one night, falling on my knees and asking God, “Why can’t I make friends? What’s wrong with me?”
Suddenly, it was as though God had pulled back a curtain in my mind and revealed issues hidden deep in my memory. Truths about why I was not finding meaningful friendships. One of the things God showed me is that I was afraid of a deep friendship because I was worried if people really knew who I was they would not like me and would not want to be around me.
He showed me that if I were trying to be something or somebody that I wasn’t created to be, people would see right through me. In spite of my showing love and kindness, I was not truly being transparent with people, and my lack of genuineness was keeping me from building meaningful relationships.
God showed me that I was keeping everything surface level. I was causing my own frustration and anguish. If I was going to change this predicament, I would have to open myself up to people where they could truly know who I was and not worry about rejection. I could not do this on my own. I just didn’t have the confidence.
So, I asked God to help me and to show me how to love people, and how to love myself enough to open up. It was yet another layer that God was working through in my life to transform me into who he created me to be.
This transparency is the kind of friend Proverbs talks about—a friend who is honest and trustworthy.
“Better is open rebuke than hidden love. Wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses.” Proverbs 27:5–6
“Oil and perfume make the heart glad, and the sweetness of a friend comes from his earnest counsel.” Proverbs 27:9
Like so many times before, God amazed me. The process didn’t happen because I consciously made myself change. It was as though God began to hear my prayers and answered them by allowing me to entrust people with more of who the real Eben was.
To my surprise one of the guys I really looked up to started to become friends with me. He invited me to hang out and play a video game. I would go to his dorm and we would have a competition with each other. He loved playing me, because I was very expressive while playing and would often make up words that were unique to my vocabulary. Soon we began to hang out more and more. He had a group of friends that I considered to be awesome, cool, and a lot of fun. The fact that this one friend liked me opened the door wide for me to meet many new people, and start friendships that I still have to this day.
By trusting God and opening up my life to others, I saw a transformation which has allowed me to experience the kind of friendships God intends everyone to have with Him, and others, on this Earth.
