The Difference Between "Friendly" And "Friendship"

By Tosin Ojumu

A short ebook from my relationship series and blog: "Finding Mr Huggie-Wuggie" that is all about building an outstanding foundation for an outstanding Christian marriage. This ebook contains 7 articles:

What is Friendship?
"...The likelihood is that we share different values with different people to different extents. Stronger friendships will be possible with people who share the same central values, and who place the same emphases on these values, whereas it is still possible to be friends with someone whose outlook in life is quite different, it is just that the friendship will naturally not have the same potential..."

The Difference Between “friendly” and “friendship”
"...As Christians, I’ve recently come to see that association is EVERYTHING. Seriously. This isn’t anything weird or complex. When I say “association”, I simply mean the people we spend time with, the people we hang around with. The people we choose to spend time with can either make or break our lives – no kidding. There could be times in our lives – there probably will be times in our lives – when this could be a matter of life and death – perhaps for our own selves, or perhaps for people close to us..."

Joy and Sadness!!!
"...And then reflecting on it, it occurred to me that God has been so unspeakably good to me, and blessed me with such an amazing life! I have so much to be grateful for. His provision, His protection, His love, my great family, peace, joy – so many things! Dear Lord, please help me to stop complaining! Rather, please help me to see Your grace and Your love in every situation, and to celebrate the goodness that happens all around me..."

Struggling against an Overactive Imagination!
"...By the grace of God, God has blessed me with a very strong imagination. This is possibly the single biggest gift that God has given me, and is at the root of absolutely every skill in my life that I am grateful for. As a child I read and read (and read and read and read!) and that was mostly to feed my imagination. All my ambition, all my yearnings, even this blog itself is largely a product of my imagination..."

Obsessed!!!
"...I was thinking away on these issues as always: marriage....husband...how to know and evaluate someone’s character... and then a worrying thought darted across my mind.
“Oh no, Lord, I honestly think...I might be....a little obsessed!” The thought initially came with some fear –
“Oh no, that would be dreadful!”
Immediately the machinery of my mind automatically started moving to reassure myself that
“No, I am not obsessed...it’s fine...”

Moving Back to London?!
"...Whenever I am discussing with my Uncles and Aunties and they ask me “How is the husband thing” (which African Uncles and Aunties will invariably ask), and I say “I am still trusting God...still praying...” or whatever else I can think of at the time, these Uncles and Aunties will almost invariably recommend that I should move back to London. And in a way it seems to be a pretty obvious move to make, even though I’ve resisted it all these years. That is because there are more and bigger churches, with more young people, more men, more Nigerian men, a bigger Nigerian community, a better social life..."

Further Thoughts About Submission
"...I honestly don’t know what thoughts young men learn to cultivate about women, which might leave so many of them thinking that we women are all going to be hanging eagerly and adorably on each of their words, or that we are waiting impatiently for their male (and therefore inherently superior) wisdom to direct our lives... Yeah, I might have expressed impatience myself once or twice on this blog, but it has been impatience for hugs and holding hands, not because I feel lacking in wisdom to live my own life..."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tosin Ojumu
• Release date: Jun 20, 2019
• ISBN: 9780463898420

Tosin Ojumu

Hello, my name is Tosin and for many years I have sat down and thought through questions about how to have an outstandingly successful marriage, and what I need to do before I get married to best ensure that successful marriage. Over the next few weeks and months I aim to publish a new ebook everyday from my blog and relationship series "Finding Mr Huggie-Wuggie." Visit my blog address listed here to see the full list of ebooks as well as video excerpts for each ebook :)

Book preview

The Difference Between friendly and friendship

Copyright 2019 by Tosin Ojumu

Published at Smashwords.com

Thank you for downloading this ebook. This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial or non-commercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy from their favorite authorized retailer. Thank you for your support.

Table of Contents

What is Friendship?

The Difference Between friendly and friendship

Joy and Sadness!!!

Struggling against an Overactive Imagination!

Obsessed!!!

Moving Back to London?

Further Thoughts About Submission

Cover image by JUAN FERNANDO YECKLE from Pixabay

The ebook summary is available on my website at https://huggie-wuggie.com/excerpts/ebook-the-difference-between-friendly-and-friendship/

**********

What is Friendship?

This ebook was previously posted on my blog "Finding Mr Huggie-Wuggie" on 11 May 2014.

To see this ebook in other formats please check out my website at: https://huggie-wuggie.com/excerpts/what-is-friendship/

**********

I must admit that it is somewhat embarrassing for me to have to write this post. After all, this concerns something that is so obvious, that we have all had to negotiate since childhood. And yet, reflecting on the issue a couple of day s ago (or was it yesterday?!) I was thinking to myself that I've never really had a clear grasp on this issue - and that has been one of the big issues in my struggle to understand marriage - and even life itself.

Over the course of the week, I came across a useful formula about love which got me thinking about this subject. (It also got me thinking about the word love itself, and the fact that it is used for two different things: Christian Agape - unconditional kindness and grace - as well as romantic love. This causes so much confusion, at least to me - but I hope to write about that in a later blog post.)

So this is the formula that I found - edited with a little addition of my own:

Friendship + Attraction + Intimacy + Commitment = (Romantic) Love.

I pondered on it, and I thought - hmm, yes, that's true! I thought on all the other aspects, and it occurred to me that I pretty much understood everything else, and I was confident in my understanding of all the other aspects. The only one on which I was hesitant was friendship. As I am writing this, I feel as if my mind is going off in two directions. Yes, I will think a little on what friendship is, however, the point of all my relationship writings is that romantic love itself is not enough to sustain a powerful marriage. So I will quickly add a further addition to represent what could be the basis for an excellent marriage, before resuming the analysis of friendship itself.

Mutual Commitment to Christlike Character: to grow, to listen, to keep pressing forward as hard as you can =MCCC

Mutual Commitment to Groundedness in Christ and God's Priorities=MCGC

Mutual Commitment to Fervent Prayer=MCVP

MCCC+MCGC+MCVP+Friendship+Attraction+Intimacy+Commitment=

Potential for a Great Marriage

It is even a little more complex than this, because I believe that friendship should in some respect arise out of observing these first three characteristics. Perhaps it would be useful to find a different term to use than friendship, something that is more specific to the issue of finding a spouse.

At any rate, back now to the analysis of friendship! One of my big issues regarding marriage has always been "How do I know whether we are friends?!" This is especially thorny as a Christian, because we are supposed to be friendly and loving to everyone, especially other Christians. Thinking on it, reflecting on