True Friendship: Lessons from Sci-Fi TV

God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Genesis 2:18).

Up to this point in the creation account, everything God had made was described as “good.” The light was good. The land and seas were good. The plants and trees were good. The sun, moon, and stars were good. The animals were good.

Then God looked at the man He had created and said, “It is not good that the man should be alone.”

Adam was not alone in the sense that God had abandoned him. God was with him. Adam had work to do. He had a beautiful creation to explore and care for. Yet something was still missing.

God created us for relationship.

We need companionship and friendship. We need people who know us, encourage us, challenge us, help us, and sometimes even tell us when we are making a mistake.

The Bible gives us many examples of friendship. One of the most remarkable friendships is that between David and Jonathan.

Jonathan loved David “as he loved his own soul” (1 Samuel 18:1). Their friendship was valuable to both men. Jonathan was willing to protect David even when doing so put him at odds with his own father, King Saul.

Jonathan also had something very significant to lose. As Saul’s son, Jonathan would have been expected to become king after his father. Yet Jonathan did not allow his position, ambition, or inheritance to stand in the way of his friendship with David. He recognized what God was doing and chose loyalty over personal advancement.

True friendship is valuable.

It is also rare.

I’ve written many times about how we can learn from the things we read and watch. Stories are fictional, but the truths they illustrate can sometimes be very real.

In this blog, I want to look at a fictional friendship from a television show I started watching as a child and continue to watch as an adult in my 60s.

That show is Star Trek.

A Friendship That Has Lasted Generations

Star Trek premiered in 1966, the year I was born.

Sixy years ago on September 8, 1966, viewers first heard those now-famous words:

“Space: The final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.”

The show introduced us to Captain James T. Kirk, Dr. Leonard “Bones” McCoy, and Mr. Spock, among many other memorable characters.

Captain Kirk and the Vulcan Spock were an unlikely pair of friends.

Their friendship provides some interesting illustrations of what biblical friendship can look like.

Friends Have Strengths and Weaknesses That Complement Each Other

The friendship between Captain James T. Kirk and Mr. Spock was one of the enduring aspects of Star Trek: The Original Series and the first six Star Trek films.

The characters Kirk and Spock were very different. Kirk was emotional, instinctive, adventurous, and willing to take risks. Spock was logical, analytical, disciplined, and committed to reason. Kirk often trusted his instincts, his “gut.” He was willing to take chances and sometimes acted before all the facts were available. Spock approached problems differently. His Vulcan training emphasized logic, reason, and emotional control. He would examine the facts, calculate the probabilities, and point out the consequences of a proposed course of action.

One might think those differences would constantly drive them apart. They could have spent their careers frustrating one another or worse been enemies. Instead, those differences often made them stronger together. They accomplished more as a team.

Kirk needed Spock’s logical perspective. Spock benefited from Kirk’s willingness to act decisively and think beyond the obvious. Their differences didn’t have to become a source of division. They became a source of strength.

That reminds me of Ecclesiastes 4:9-10:

“Two are better than one; because they have a good reward for their labour. For if they fall, the one will lift up his fellow.”

We weren’t created to do everything by ourselves. A good friend can see something we don’t see.

• A friend may recognize a danger we have overlooked.
• A friend may have a strength where we have a weakness.
• A friend may encourage us when we are discouraged or slow us down when we’re moving too quickly.

Sometimes the person who helps us the most isn’t the person who is most like us. It’s the person whose strengths complement our weaknesses. That is one reason we should be careful about choosing friends only because they agree with everything we say. A friend who always agrees with us may make us feel good, but a faithful friend will sometimes challenge us.

Proverbs 27:17 says, “Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend.”

Good friends don’t simply make us comfortable. They help make us better.

Friends Know Each Other

One of the interesting things about a genuine friendship is that friends learn to recognize one another.

• They know our personalities.
• They know our habits.
• They know what makes us laugh and what makes us angry.
• They know what we’re likely to say and how we’re likely to respond.

Sometimes a good friend knows something is wrong before we say a word. They know us so well, they can read it our faces or hear it in the words we don’t speak.

We see an amusing example of this in the Star Trek‘s episode “What Are Little Girls Made Of?,”

Dr. Roger Korby attempts to fool Spock with an android facsimile of Kirk in The android looks like Kirk and has Kirk’s memories and personality characteristics.

But there is a problem.

Spock knows Kirk.

As Kirk’s personality was imprinted on the android, the real Kirk imagined himself insulting Spock as a “half-breed”. Kirk trusted that, upon hearing it, Spock would recognize that something was amiss

There is something powerful about being known.

Jesus spoke about friendship in John 15:15:

“Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends.”

Jesus calls His followers friends. Think about that. The God who created us doesn’t merely command us from a distance. In Christ, He brings us into relationship with Himself. Friendship involves knowing and being known. God’s desire is exactly that. He wants a relationship with us where we know Him, and he knows us, intimately.

Of course, no human friend can know us completely. Even our closest friends cannot see everything happening inside our hearts.

But God does.

Psalm 139 reminds us that God knows when we sit down and when we rise up. He knows our thoughts. He knows our words before we speak them.

Human friendship gives us a small glimpse of something wonderful: the blessing of being known and loved anyway.

Friends Sacrifice for Each Other

Perhaps the clearest test of friendship is what we’re willing to sacrifice for one another.

Kirk and Spock repeatedly put themselves in danger to save each other.

In “The Apple,” Spock pushes Kirk out of the way of poisonous thorns launched by a mysterious plant. Spock takes the attack himself and is seriously injured. The sacrifice is not merely theoretical. Spock sees his friend in danger and acts.

The most famous example comes in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. When the Enterprise needs its warp drive restored, Spock exposes himself to a lethal dose of radiation to save the ship and its crew. Kirk tries to stop him, but Spock understands what must be done. As Spock lies dying, he tells Kirk: “I have been and always shall be your friend.”

Those words resonate because they express something deeper than casual companionship. Friendship involves sacrifice.

Jesus said in John 15:13: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Jesus didn’t merely teach this principle. He lived it. Jesus laid down His life for us. His sacrifice on the cross was not an illustration of friendship. It was the ultimate expression of love and the means by which He accomplished our redemption.

Our sacrifices for our friends cannot compare with Christ’s sacrifice for us. Yet His example teaches us something about how we should love others.

Sometimes laying down our lives for our friends doesn’t mean dying.

• It means giving up our time.
• It means listening when we’d rather be doing something else.
• It means helping when it is inconvenient.
• It means sharing our resources.
• It means showing up when someone is hurting.
• It means forgiving.
• It means keeping a confidence.
• It means making a phone call.
• It means sitting beside someone who doesn’t need advice but needs someone who cares.

Sometimes loving a friend costs us something. That’s part of what makes it love.

Friends Remain Loyal

Another characteristic of a true friendship is loyalty.

David and Jonathan demonstrate this beautifully. Jonathan’s friendship with David cost him something. His father, Saul, wanted David dead. Jonathan could have protected his own position by distancing himself from David. Instead, Jonathan repeatedly warned David and helped protect him.

That kind of loyalty is increasingly difficult to find. Our culture often treats relationships as disposable. When someone disappoints us, we can simply move on. When a friendship becomes inconvenient, we can stop answering the phone, returning texts, or “unfriend” them.

Social media can give us hundreds or thousands of “friends” while leaving us with very few people who actually know us. On social media, we can paint an artificial picture of ourselves that looks great while hiding the real difficulties.

Biblical friendship is different. A true friend doesn’t disappear the first time things become difficult. Proverbs 17:17 says: “A friend loveth at all times, and a brother is born for adversity.” Notice that it doesn’t say a friend loves when everything is going well. It says a friend loves at all times.

Adversity reveals friendship.

Anyone can celebrate with us when we’re successful. A true friend will also sit with us when we’ve failed. One of the things Job’s friends did well was to sit with him during his most difficult time. Job 2:11-13

Anyone can laugh with us when life is easy. A true friend will stand beside us when life becomes painful.

We Need Friends—and We Need to Be Friends

Genesis 2:18 reminds us that our need for companionship is not a defect. God designed us this way.We need other people. But there’s another side to that truth. If I need friendship, then someone else needs me to be a friend.

It is easy to spend our lives asking, “Who will be there for me?” Perhaps we should also ask, “Whose life has God placed me in so that I can be there for them?”

• Who needs encouragement from you?
• Who needs someone to listen?
• Who needs a helping hand?
• Who needs you to forgive them?
• Who needs you to tell them the truth lovingly?
• Who needs a friend?
• Kirk needed Spock.

Spock needed Kirk and Kirk needed Spock.

David needed Jonathan. Jonathan chose to stand with David.

And we need one another.

The Greatest Friend

The best fictional friendships can point us toward something real. Kirk and Spock remind us that friends can complement one another. David and Jonathan remind us that friends can be loyal to one another. The examples of sacrifice remind us that friendship involves giving, not merely receiving.

But ultimately, our greatest example is Jesus Christ. Jesus calls His followers friends. He knows us completely, he loves us despite knowing everything about us and he doesn’t abandon us when we fail. He demonstrated His love by laying down His life for us.

There is no better friend.

So perhaps the question for us isn’t simply, “Do I have good friends?”

Perhaps the better question is:

“Am I a good friend?”

• Are we willing to know others?
• Are we willing to be known?
• Are we willing to encourage?
• Are we willing to forgive?
• Are we willing to sacrifice?
• Are we willing to remain faithful when friendship becomes difficult?

God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone.” He created us for relationship—with Him and with one another. So let’s treasure the friends God has given us. Let’s invest in those friendships. Let’s be the kind of friends who make one another stronger. And above all, let’s remember the Friend who said:

“Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Jesus didn’t just tell us what true friendship looks like.

He showed us.