The Economics of Friendship

This has been a topic that has been on my mind over the last several days, especially with the events as of late going on in my life, and I'm just not sure that I've come to any reasonable or foundational conclusion that will allow me to make a decision one way or the other.

There comes a time in all things in life where crossroads are reached and paths must be chosen. Often we find these crossroads facing us in the assessment of right and wrong, better and worse, hot or cold, or any dilemmas which may come upon us that illustrate two distinct conflicts playing against one another. It is in these situations that we should feel most grateful that we have the choices so clearly defined before us allowing us to choose one distinct path over another.

Another type of crossroads enters into scenarios in our lives which prove to be more difficult than any crossroads previously - because they neither offer the correct path to take, offer too many paths to choose from, or rather necessitate the following of one, only to possibly take a tangent to another road fairly quickly if necessary. This is the type of crossroads that is sometimes faced in relationships in our lives.

Now, having not excelled superbly in the Economics courses I took once upon a time, I may find myself inadequately qualified to reference my thoughts to this discipline, however, I believe that economics provides probably the clearest medium by which I might translate my thoughts into the written text.

There are in economics two major schools of thought - supply-side economics, and demand-side economics. The school of supply-side economics allows the people to make the bulk of the decisions - allowing their freedoms and flexibilities to dictate the supply of the market and subsequent drive of the economy. Demand-side economics suggests that a stronger central power is necessary to regulate the market to make it efficient for the maximum amount of people possible. These two schools of thought constantly work against the other and generally makeup the mixture that is the economy.

I believe that in large part friendships work the same way. There are in friendships two major players in the relationship (in deeper relationship, one should acknowledge the presence of God in the relationship and His hand in its efficiency and perpetuation). Unlike the two schools of thought of Economics - where one school advocates the use of itself over the other, friendships are intended to be equally driven 100%. In fact, if the friendship skews too far one way or the other - the relationship is more or less akin to a parasitic relationship instead of the symbiotic intention of the relationship.

Do the scriptures offer any insight to us on the subject? Well yes...and no. We are commanded to love everyone, and "love [our] neighbors as ourselves", but they do offer some counter-arguments for the other school of thought also. While Christ was a friend to all, even He drew lines at times - casting out the money changers from the temple, and even casting our the adulterous woman from his midst. Its true! Christ's message to everyone was to follow Him, and he didn't mean that just metaphorically or spiritually either, he in many times commanded men to cast down their nets and physically follow Him.

What does he do with the woman caught in adultery however? For one, we know that he does not forgive her - he states that he will not condemn her, but he does not specifically forgive her. Further, he commands the woman to "go thy way and sin no more." He doesn't beckon her to follow Him, either because she was not truly penitent or because she was unfit to follow Him and he needed to "distance Himself from the presence of sin." Either way, we know that He had the gift of friendship within his heart, but he did not choose to try and further the relationship into a symbiotic friendship.

Thus, this translates into our lives - because on one hand, we have those relationships in our lives where those people need us in their lives to give them that extra push to move forward or just some kind of abrasion to rub against so that they might grow. On another hand we perhaps need the companionship of specific friends in our lives in order for our personal growth and discovery or because there is something they have to offer us that we can benefit from. If however, the sum of the parts on both sides is not relatively equal, then the friendship becomes a strain on one side or the other, and it is weakened to the point of extinction in many cases.

Does this really offer me any conclusion to anything? No, but it has been what's on my mind lately...