Karen and I are back from Orlando. Over the last 20 years, we've watched Daniel Watson go from toddler, to little boy, to adolescent, to grown man.  So it was wonderful to watch just one more stage - Daniel becoming a husband. His new wife Sally matches him well - it was great to be at their wedding.

One of the blessings of our lives is to have old friends.  Back in the late 80's and early 90's, a bunch of us were in a small group together at a church in Wellington, FL.  We all had little children and we were scrambling to keep up with them.

The Watsons, Hitchcocks, Van Lentens, Simons, Finneys and Lorenzes grew to be special friends during that era.  We met weekly for praise and worship in homes. Rosie regularly made us jerk chicken when we got together at their place. They helped Karen and I maintain sanity as I was starting AIM and regularly working crazy hours. When I needed to do a mail out, all the kids pitched in and stuffed envelopes. And when late August came, we'd vacation together in the north Georgia mountains.

Aristotle said, "Without friends no one would choose to live, though he had all other goods." People make a lot of tradeoffs in life. They live in places they don't like to boost their career. They hang out with people they don't enjoy.  But one of the saddest compromises I watch people make is the decision to not invest themselves deeply in lasting friendships.  We need people who get us - who know us at our worst, but love us anyway. We need lifelong friends who, when the chips are down, know how to help us find our way to blue sky again.

The body of Christ manifests itself in many ways, but the way I've seen church in its truest form is in my lifelong friends.