Soul Friend

Scripture: 2 Samuel 11.26-12-13a; 1 Samuel 20.17

David and Jonathan were friends. Jonathan was King Saul’s son, and Saul was jealous of David, and was, off and on, (but mostly on), trying to kill David. Jonathan tried to calm his father, defend David, and when things got really bad, warn David of when his father was about to strike. A close bond grew between Jonathan and David. They were not afraid let each other know that. I told each other, “I love you.”

This may seem unusual to us in this day and age. Mostly, men don’t express their feelings toward other men, even their best friends. Guys are different from girls. (Yes, you heard it here first).

I was reminded of this not long ago watching a girl’s softball game. I was immediately struck by how different the game sounded from a boy’s game. The girls were more chatty and spirited. When their team was up to bat, all the girls on the bench were together and staging elaborate call and response routines. They sang songs to support the girl in the batter’s box. When there was a lull in the action, they started doing major Broadway Shows.

At a boy’s baseball game, things are different. The bench looks like a wrestling match. It never occurs to boys to support their teammate in the batter’s box with “a song.” The best they usually muster is the chant, “We want a pitcher not a belly-itcher.” Not exactly Les Miserable.

All of which is to say, boys don’t express their feelings as readily as girls do. So when we read about David and Jonathan’s friendship, in our diminished age we read all kinds of things into that. Don’t. Rather, listen to these words:

“And Jonathan made David swear again by his love for him; for he loved him as he loved his own soul.” 1 Samuel 20.17

The Christian Celts used to talk about “soul friends.” David and Jonathan were soul friends. What I mean by that is not that they had everything in common, the same hobbies or liked the same sports teams, but that they opened their souls to each other and didn’t hide important things. They told the truth to each other and found that the truth brought them closer.

Jonathan dies. David no longer has his soul friend. He may have friends still, but nowhere are we given any indication that David has anyone in his life nearly like Jonathan. What happens in David’s life is not coincidence. As David becomes more powerful he also becomes more isolated. No one questions his decisions anymore. David’s relationship with God also suffers. God stops questioning David, maybe because David stops listening.

We have heard the David and Bathsheba story. David tries to cover up adultery with murder. The sin is pretty brazen. But I bet that as David is going through that descent into temptation and evil, he doesn’t see brazenness, he sees subtle distinctions. He tells himself that Bathsheba is too beautiful for Uriah; she deserves to be with the king. David tells himself that he deserves whatever he wants. He doesn’t, at first, intend to kill Uriah, but he does try to “manage his temptations” and that’s where it leads.

In other words, David has an excuse for every bad and sinful decision he makes. David is virtually alone with his excuses. Maybe sin, and our excuses for them, are the only things that grow in isolation. David is alone with his sin and excuse because he has no soul friend. He has no friend to tell him the truth.

Up to this point, God has been pretty quiet about the whole affair. But there is this:

“When Bathsheba heard that Uriah her husband was dead, she made lamentation for her husband. And when the mourning was over, David sent and brought her to his house, and she became his wife, and bore him a son. But the thing that David had done displeased the Lord.”

That last sentence should give us pause. David was doing what he wanted to do. No one, not even God, was interfering. David was king – he was managing his temptation as he saw fit. No one was going to question him. No one was going to stop him. Maybe, he thought, it didn’t matter to God.

That’s the danger of managing temptation. We tell ourselves that one more step doesn’t matter. The fact that we’re not struck down immediately by bolts of lightning confirms for us that it’s not really that bad. “See, even God must not think so.”

There’s a scene in the move, “O Brother Where Art Thou” where the three companions pick up a hitchhiker, a young black man carrying a guitar by the name of Tommy Johnson. They ask him what he is doing out in the middle of nowhere. He tells them that he had to be at those crossroads last midnight to sell his soul to the devil in exchange for a special talent on guitar.

“Oh, son, not your everlasting soul!” Delmar exclaims to Tommy.

“Why, I wasn’t using it,” Tommy says in explanation.

That pretty much sums up our approach to sin management. Our indifference to sin is explained by our indifference to eternal consequences for sin. When we shut down our souls by not listening to the truth, then we’ve no use for them really. Sin, Hell, eternal souls- is that even real?

But remember, God thinks all these things are real. He worries about our souls. He doesn’t so easily leave us to our foolish indifference. He doesn’t give up on us. God didn’t give up on David. He sent a truth-teller, a prophet, to David. Nathan described how things were to David in a story. Through this story Nathan is able to open David’s eyes to the depth of his wickedness and the consequences that entails. And by doing so, Nathan saved David’s soul. There would still be consequences in David’s life for his sin, but the weight of eternal consequence was lifted. “You shall not die,” Nathan tells him.

We don’t easily tell the truth about ourselves to others. I mean, what will even my closest friends think of me if they know the truth about me, my wicked thoughts and selfish attitudes? How could they still like me? Will they yet love me?

But I can tell you the joy and freedom of bearing your soul to a friend is worth any embarrassment or shame you might feel. It’s like a great weight is lifted off your shoulders. Your soul becomes lighter and yet more real to you. You feel right again.

“So that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro. . .by the cunning of men, by their craftiness and deceitful wiles. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, in to Christ. . .” Ephesians 4.14-15


What good habits must we form in our lives so that “speaking the truth in love” becomes habitual? What friends do we have in our lives today? What is the depth of these friendships? Do our souls at least occasionally touch as we live our lives together?