Beware of Fake Friends

Daily Scripture Threshing for Wednesday, April 20, y2022

Today Text: Proverbs 27:1-8

Key Verse: Proverbs 27:5 (ESV): “Better is open rebuke than hidden love.”

Friendship is taking quite a different face today for obvious reasons: Our generation prefers flattery and settles for deceit instead of truth. We prefer things or people who stroke our ego than those that confront us with truth. This has made our idea of friendship to almost totally lose its meaning. And unfortunately, social media has made things worse. It’s so easy for people to get soaked and swallowed in common social interest, believing a lie that they are in friendship. We feel connected to people we perceive as friends only because it feels pleasurable to interact with them online—and before we know it, we are already swallowed in a superficial or pseudonymous relationship.

True friends are those who take the pain to watch our backs, tell us of our faults, and rebuke us in love when need be. They don’t talk behind. They talk to our face. Those are our better and more valuable extended selves. They are God’s blessing in our lives. Fake friends are pretentious folks who stay sweet like sugar—and keep back truth from us—for the sake of their benefit off of our loss or our lives. They are ghost friends except they need a favor from you. They smile at your wrong because they are seeking to laugh at your fall. Be wise: Just because someone agrees with everything you do doesn't make him your friend. The wisdom from today’s text is that it is better a friend rebukes you openly than pretend to love you. I have no doubt that the world needs to learn how to trust the sincere wounds from our friends who are not afraid to tell us when we are wrong.

Quote for the Day: “A real friend is the one who knows your uprising and your down-fallings, and still loves you anyway.” (Simon Olatunji)

Prayer: Dear Lord, I entrust all who are dear to me to Your never-failing care and love. Lord, please surround me with treasured friends, and surround my treasured friends with Your love and blessings without end — in Jesus’ name. Amen.

With all my love and prayer,

Rev Simon Wale Olatunji, Ph.D.

Your Darling Bishop (DaBishop)

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[Daily Scripture Threshing is a devotional guide of The House of Prayer Evangel Church USA distributed for free use by individuals, small groups, families, and Christian churches]

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