Many will say they are loyal friends, but who can find one who is truly reliable? [Proverbs 20:6 (NLT)]
A friend is always loyal, and a brother is born to help in time of need. [Proverbs 17:17 (NLT)]
What a person desires is unfailing love. [Proverbs 19:22a (NIV)]
Remember that children, marriages and flower gardens reflect the kind of care they get. [From “Life’s Little instruction Book,” by H. Jackson Brown, Jr.]
In July, I wrote about the weeds that had taken over our long-neglected garden. It wasn’t just the garden that suffered in our nine month’s absence; the beautiful antique silver in the china cabinet had tarnished. Although I pass that cabinet several times a day, I’ve ignored the gradually darkening silver for nearly three months. I had good intentions and meant to get out the polish but other activities kept presenting themselves. Now, with less than a week before leaving again, polishing silver hardly seems worth the effort and the task will be postponed until next summer.
While the silver can wait, relationships with friends and family don’t survive that sort of benign neglect as easily. Unfortunately, we all tend to grow complacent in our relationships, especially the long-standing ones, and we stop making the effort necessary for them to flourish and grow. Relationships, like gardens, need to be watered and fertilized and, like silver, need to be taken out, dusted off and polished on occasion.
My silver has neither feelings nor legs so, whether polished or not, it isn’t going anywhere. Stuck in my cabinet, it will still be there next summer, as will my weed-filled garden. People, however, can leave unsatisfactory relationships to find other, more satisfactory, ones. I certainly plead guilty to being inattentive and careless in my relationships. There were so many friends I meant to call, so many people I meant to see, so many things I meant to do for friends and family, but something else always seemed to interfere and my good intentions remained just good intentions.
Do you have any relationships that could be suffering from benign neglect? When was the last time you told your spouse or a dear friend you loved him or her? When was the last time you did an unexpected kindness or joyfully made a sacrifice for a friend or family member? When was the last time you offered a willing ear or lightened a loved one’s load? When last did your actions say, “You are important and I cherish our companionship?” When was the last time you worked on your relationships, watering and feeding them so they’d blossom? When was the last time you looked at your relationships, savored their beauty, and took the effort to make them shine? I’ve got a few calls to make; how about you?
Love cannot endure indifference. It needs to be wanted. Like a lamp, it needs to be fed out of the oil of another’s heart, or its flame burns low. [Henry Ward Beecher]
Devotions of the Heart 