Do You Have a Safe Christian Confidante?

I’m sitting in my home office as I write this. On the wall in front of my desk is a magnetic board I had custom made to fit the space perfectly.

It is filled with magnetic frames with photos of the people I love the most.

One particular photo is of me and a friend I met in college. The photo was taken on a road trip to Colorado less than a year after we met. We were but babes. The photo is 31 years old, but I can remember that day and that trip like they were yesterday.

I’d share the photo in this post, but it feels too sacred. Too sacred to just put out there in the blogosphere—this image when we were just finding our footing as friends. We had no idea what was to come. It’s a good thing we had no idea.

In more than three decades of friendship, we’ve traipsed through it all—relationships, marriages, babies, confusion, struggles, horrendous grief, crazy fun, profound joy, blatant sin, deep faith, indescribable laughter and too many moments to count where we didn’t even need one word… not one word…spoken between us to understand each other completely.

She knows the crevices of my heart and has chosen to stick around anyway.

I know friendships like this can be rare. But deep down I hope they are not. I wouldn’t trade my friendship with this woman for anything. She is a safe Christian confidante. She was instrumental in helping me grow in my faith, even when she didn’t know she was. And for that I am forever grateful.

We all need a safe confidante.

It cost the two of us something to have this kind of friendship. Lots of somethings actually. We had to be vulnerable and learn how to trust. We had to figure out how to be really pissed off at each other at times and still circle back to what we knew to be true about our love for each other.

We had to not flinch in the face of grief and devastation. Presence counts for something. Just the mere willingness to stay.

She has helped me find my bearings on more occasions and in more ways than I could recount. We have been wise counsel for each other, especially when neither of us wanted wise counsel. That’s usually when you need wise counsel the most.

As you read this, I pray that a picture comes to your mind of someone who is that safe confidante for you. If you don’t have that, I pray the Lord would reveal someone to you with whom you could grow in philia love—the love between friends.

Yes, it sure has cost us a lot to have this kind of friendship. But the gains are still leaving me in awe. More than three decades after that photo was taken, the gains are still leaving me in awe.

For more reading, you can cruise through my list of past posts, as well as my page with a bunch of posts on orgasm.

And I have a 5 video series available on building better sex in your marriage. Great way to invest in your marriage!  You can find out all about it at this link:  Better Sex in Your Christian Marriage.

Copyright 2020, Julie Sibert. Intimacy in Marriage Blog. Links may be monetized.

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