The Friendzone

This is real love – not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.

1 John 4:10 (NLT)

There is a phrase in our culture today that makes the hearts of many young men (and a few young women) plummet to their feet. No, it’s not “I love you.” That particular phrase generally makes the heart fill with joy. The phrase I’m talking about is “You’ve been friend-zoned.” Allow me to take a minute to describe this concept to those that may not be familiar with it. Being friend-zoned means that the person you desire, have a crush on, are infatuated with, tells you that they only like you as a friend. Nothing more.

Generally, when a young man is friend-zoned, they try to play it off as if they never wanted anything more than that, even though their insides were being torn apart by grief and angst. It’s an attempt to save face. But, everyone knows that it’s no fun to be friend-zoned.

I think often times we have a fear that God only wants to keep things on a friendship level – that He somehow doesn’t want a deep, meaningful relationship with us. In fact, I’ve heard this concept expressed far too many times. It often comes out like “God doesn’t like me,” or “God wouldn’t like me.” And, to a degree, they’d be correct. God doesn’t just like them, He loves them (you and me too, BTW).

In fact, God didn’t just leave His confession of love at mere words. God always backs up His words with action. Instead, as our verse for today says, “He loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.”

Dying a criminal’s death in our place was the ultimate act of love. We deserve death, a horrible miserable death. But God, out of His extreme love for you and me, left Heaven, to come to this earth, live among us, and suffered a horrible, painful, death in our place.

God wants to be so much more than just friends. He doesn’t desire to leave us in the friend-zone, not matter who we are. God wants an eternal, loving, joy-filled relationship with each one of us.

Now it’s our turn. Have you put God in the friend-zone, or are you all in with your relationship with Jesus? Don’t turn away the best thing that could ever happen to you.