A Jordan Peterson comment caught my eye last week. It begins with a question: ‘What do you want to tell a young person?’ Option 1 is the following: ‘You’re 17 years old. You’re okay the way you are.’ Option 2 is this: ‘No, you’re not. You’ve got 60 more years to be better, and you could be way better.’ For many, the second response is abrasive. It almost sounds hurtful. That, of course, is part of the point being made by Peterson. One of the problems with our culture is that we are obsessed with affirmation. We have mistaken affirmation for love. We have come to believe that the only way to love someone is by constantly endorsing their decisions and validating their character. But, in truth, this is not love at all. Of course, as human beings we need a baseline of affirmation. We need someone who does indeed confirm to us that our persons have worth and dignity. Yet, real friendship demands that we love the latent potential of the self even more than the bare existence of the self. A real friend is someone who not only sees who I am, but who I have potential to be, someone who has the courage and resolve to assists the process by which a better ‘me’ comes into being.
In the premodern world, people thought more carefully about friendship than we do today. Thinkers like Aristotle and Cicero took time to identify different types of friendship so that their disciples could understand how friendship connected to the good life. The highest form of friendship that they described was friendship based on the pursuit of excellence. This was a unique type of relationship whereby people banded together, not simply to have fun, or get a project done, or reminisce about the past, but in order to pursue some object of supreme worth. In a sense, such friendship was similar to the way in which two athletes might train together in order to perfect their skill in a given sport. The difference between spiritual friendship and athletics, however, is that spiritual friendship was based a horizon of fulfilment much wider and more satisfying than athletic prowess. Not a minor good (like running a 5k), but the greatest good (what people used to call ‘virtue’) was in view. Samuel Johnson, the great poet and critic of the 18th century, had such friendship in mind when he said, ‘The greatest benefit which one friend can confer upon another, is to guard, and excite, and elevate his virtues.’ Note the difference between Johnson’s understanding and the therapeutic culture of the 21st century. In Johnson’s thinking, friendship is not just a booster-shot for self-esteem. The aim of friendship is nothing less than to become a better man.
From this we can outline a critical trait of a spiritual friend. A genuine spiritual friend must be someone who has distinct kind of vision. On the one hand, this friend must be able to see the same horizon of excellence that I see. If we aren’t ultimately headed toward the same vision of the good life, we cannot help each other grow in virtue and character. But equally, this friend must have insight into my person in particular. He must see something latent in my soul that – in all likelihood – I cannot see myself. Tim Keller makes a point very similar to this while discussing spiritual friendship in the context of marriage. He says, ‘What, then, is marriage for? It is for helping each other to become our future glory-selves, the new creations God will eventually make us. The common horizon husband and wife look toward is the Throne, and the holy, spotless, and blameless nature we will have.’ This quotation can be recast in terms of spiritual friendship between Christian men. They, too, must share a vision of the Throne of God and be committed to helping one another grow into the completeness of what Keller calls ‘our future glory-selves.’
One of the distinct joys of heaven will be to see the finished product of friends that we have journeyed alongside in this life. The character that was barely visible – like a gemstone trapped in granite – will be cut and displayed so that the brilliance of God’s glory will be reflected from the distinct face of each one of His children. Keller notes the excitement we will feel at seeing this revelation. Before the Throne of God, as the mature character of each Christian is unveiled, old friends will exclaim, ‘I always knew you could be like this. I got glimpses of it on earth, but now look at you.’
This is what spiritual camaraderie is about: catching glimpses of what God is doing in another person and committing through friendship to traveling together to the ultimate horizon of life, the Throne of God.