Phil,
Are they really friends? Perhaps they are not, but you were given the
opportunity to befriend and help them along the way!
I have often heard it said that the Lord works in mysterious ways!
The important thing is that you were their friend.
It hurts when you think someone is your friend and then, you are
disappointed because they do not respond to you in the same way.
You are very blessed because you did what the Lord wanted you to do.
Huggs and blessings.
Virgie At 11:17 PM 7/17/2005, you wrote:

>In recent years, I have lost a number of people I considered close friends.
>A man I considered to be my best friend has not had contact with me for at
>least two years and perhaps longer.  Others were school friends who suddenly
>passed away, or who slowly passed away, but I never heard about it until
>they were gone.  My roommate in school growing up, for example, died an
>alcoholic.  For years I called him on his birthday just to catch up on
>things.  Once and awhile, I called him more often because he meant so much
>to me.  I got to thinking one year, as his birthday approached, that he
>never ever called me for anything.  I wondered, therefore, how much I meant
>to him so I stopped calling.  Three or four years passed and then I heard of
>his death.  The pastor I mentioned in my earlier post last talked with me in
>August of 1992.  He was never a man for writing and he rarely called.  If I
>told you some of the things I did for this pastor, you would probably find
>them hard to believe.  For example, one day, many years ago, during the late
>eighties, the Lord told me to call him and talk to him about his finances.
>I did and discovered he was three months behind on his mortgage and about
>ready to lose his home.  He had not told anyone.  I hung up that day and
>called a man I knew in the church and explained the situation.  The man was
>horrified that his own pastor was that bad off financially and never once
>told anybody in the church.  They not only caught up his payments, but
>filled his house with groceries and gave him a raise at the church.  Yet, as
>I said, the only time I heard from him in five years or more was when he
>drove to Denver to meet with several friends to try and get them to sign up
>with his multi level business he was in part time.  Was that a friendship
>which worked both ways?  For the passed two or three years at least, I have
>begun evaluating what a friendship really is.  If it isn't both ways, that
>is, mutual, I now questions the reality of such a friendship.
>
>Phil.
>
>
>
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