my incredible best friend.

so, i want to take a few minutes to brag on God's crazy goodness. i would like to share a piece of my life-that piece being my best friend. i have three absolutely amazing, really close friends (and many other good friends), but tonight, i'd like to talk about Katie and how awesome Jesus is!

Katie and I don't have a normal story...we don't have a normal friendship...and hey, i don't think we're normal. haha. God had to teach us a lot before we could have the incredible friendship we have now. We spent two years frustrated with each other, getting on each other's nerves, driving each other crazy, basically. Things progressively got worse...and worse...and worse. To make a very long story short, we hit a point where we were totally nasty to each other. I mean, NASTY. Had you saw us about a year and a half ago, you would NEVER imagine we could have the friendship that we do now. There is no natural way that our friendship even exists. We treated each other like crap and both acted in a way that was a far cry from the way Christ would ever treat anyone. We eventually hit a point where Katie was feeling God telling her she needed to step back from me. We spent the summer not talking to each other....and learning...learning many things God had to teach us both about finding everything we are in Him. It was not easy. But it was necessary.

When God redeemed our friendship...yes redeemed...that's the word I'm using. We used the word restored for quite a while. But restored doeesn't fully explain it. See, to restore something is to make it like new again. To make it was originally. You restore an old car and it looks like it did when it first came out. I don't think our friendship was restored because God did not make our friendship like it once was. It is far better than that. No, God redeemed our friendship.

Redeem: 

to save from sin or error, to do something that compensates for poor past behavior or perfromance, to make up for faults

God totally saved our friendship and helped us to talk through things, to pray together instead of fight, to love unconditionally...not dependent on any circumstances or situations.... to forgive and not hold offenses. And don't get me wrong, we're still learning. But God is soooooo good.

And I wanted to tell you that my best friend is INCREDIBLE! Do I need her to survive? No. Do I need her to live and function? No. But let me tell you this:

I value Katie.

I value our friendship.

I love praying with her.

I love hanging out with her.

I love walking life with her.

She is so much fun to be with.

She is such an encouragement. 

She has such a heart for the Lord and people. 

I am completely blessed that she is my friend.

I love sharing with each other about what the Lord is doing.

She has tremendous value and God has such an incredible plan for her life! 

I love Katie

&

I thank God for our friendship!

Thanks for reading about my incredible best friend and the awesome testimony we have because of what God has done in both of our lives.

“No distance of place or lapse of time can lessen the friendship of those who are thoroughly persuaded of each other's worth.” ~Unknown