5 Ways To Be A Good Friend

So are you a good friend? Well, how do you know you're a good friend? Do you know that you're a good friend to those that are a good friend to you? How do you even define what it means for someone to be a good friend to you? Well, I want to talk to you exactly about how you can be a good friend and how people can be a good friend to you today. Hi, my name is Chrystal Hurst, and I come to you every week to talk to you about practical everyday things from the perspective of a girl who loves God. So faith-based practical principles for living is what I'm all about. And today I want to talk to you about how you can be a good friend and what you can look for in people who say they want to be good friends to you. But first, I want to tell you that if you're watching this, that I would love for you to subscribe to my YouTube channel or follow me on Facebook. So that way, whenever I share videos like this or go live, that you'll be notified because I share videos like this all the time., and I like to pop up every now and then live as well. Now, what does it mean to be a good friend? Before I get into some bullet points that I have to share with you today, I want to give you a little story that reminds me of why this is so important. Now, you may be living under a rock and not know who Ms. Tabitha Brown is. However, I'm not. I'm totally not living under a rock, and I know exactly who she is. I've actually said for some time that I would love to have her on my podcast. And so as a podcaster, I did all the things that I know to do. I reached out in her DMs, I sent her a comment, I went on her website, did the contact form, and also sent an email to her PR agency. But she's Tabitha Brown. She's busy. She's getting lots of interviews from lots of great places, lots of great media outlets. And I'm willing to keep doing the work to be seen and heard. I know you have to ask sometimes a million times to get that one interview. I'm okay with that. However, I did do all I could do and did do it again and still had not heard back. But one of the women who is a part of my membership, the Inner Circle, emailed me and said, hey, Tabitha Brown is going to be in Dallas. I bought a ticket. I want you to use it. You can take a friend. Take your shot. Now, I didn't even know Tabitha Brown was going to be in town. And I have to be honest, had I known, I don't know that I would have bought the ticket to be that person who shows up with their book in their hand and says, hey, Hey, I listen to you. I love you. I'm a podcaster. I'm an author. I would love to have you on my show. I just don't know that I would have done that. And one of the women in our membership did that for me, bought the ticket, sent it to me, hounded me, actually sent multiple emails, multiple DMs to make sure, to make sure that I saw her offer and that I was willing to take advantage of it. She was so excited that I did. Now, y'all, I have to tell you,. I was trying to figure out who should I take with me, and then I thought, I've got to take my sister. She might think I'm taking her like as a play, like Tabitha Brown, see, I'm her sister. But really, the only reason why I knew who Tabitha Brown was is because Priscilla introduced her to me. So I called and said, Priscilla, can you come? She was out of town. I went to the airport, I picked her up, and then we went to the line, the back of the line that was apparently going to be like a 4 or 5 hour wait because Miss Tabitha was taking the time to look each person in the eye. That she would meet and to take her time to make sure everyone was seen. Y'all, we were standing in line having a good time chatting and doing our thing, and I had the opportunity to meet Miss Tabitha Brown, which was a great experience for me. But here's what struck me in my opportunity with meeting Tabitha Brown: everything that you think she would be after watching her online, she is in person. She truly did take her time. Now, I was extremely conscious of the fact that there were lots of people in line and lots of people people waiting, and I didn't want to take up too much of her time. I know what it is to be the person in line. I also know what it is to be the person signing the books and needing to get through the line. She had her person take a picture, and I raised my camera— this is the shot that you're looking at right here— to take a selfie, just trying to get out of her way as quickly as possible. And she looked me in the eye and she said, the selfie is great, but if you want him to take a picture— one of the guys on her team— give him the camera. We have time. So I gave him the camera and we took a picture. And then she walked to the side, gave Priscilla a hug, and Priscilla said, now we're here though because one of Chrystal Hurst's girls, one of the girls who loves Chrystal Hurst, bought a ticket so she could come and invite you to be on her podcast. And she looked at Priscilla and said, well honey, you just could have DM'd me. And I was like, you just could have DM'd her. But when we end— we ended the evening, I made sure she had my contact information. And by the next morning, she had reached out to Priscilla and then found me on Instagram to make sure I knew how to get a hold of her. So hopefully she will be on the podcast soon. But why am I telling you all this? Because this morning I got up and watched Miss Tabitha talk about, um, what it means to be seen, and that everybody really just wants to be seen. They want to be included. They want to be known.. And it made me think about how I feel totally seen by the woman in the, in that I say in the membership, but really it's not. She, before the membership, she has been here cheerleading me in the comments on social media, just letting me know she's for me. And I thought, she's a friend. She's a friend because she has done some very specific things. Met her in person a couple of times, 2 or 3 times. She's done some very specific things to let me know she is for me. And as a friend, she made sure that I took the opportunity to take my shot. So this is my experience this weekend when I want to talk to you about what it means to be a friend. And I want to— I wanted to tell you that story because listen, y'all, yes, I'm on YouTube and yes, I'm on Facebook and yes, I have a few books out there and yes, I speak and I write, but I'm still the girl who stands in line, who feels sometimes like, oh my gosh, I'm going to meet so-and-so today, who still fangirls and who knows what it is to be seen, to be included and to be befriended by people who know me dearly, like my sister, and people who I've met 2 or 3 times but who make it their business to be for me. And I wanted to share some of these principles with you because one of the things I hear most often is women struggling with friendship. So I want to give you 5 ways you can be a friend, and then for those women in your life who are friends to you but aren't the best friends to you, for you to have language to give to them to say, this is what I need. From you. The first thing that you need to understand is that friendship should always be friendship in action. My sister did not have to, um, and I never hold her to the position of just because you know them, you should introduce me. Okay, so she was a friend to say, hey, I'm here, it's so nice. She never met Tabitha either. It's my pleasure to meet you, but I want to tell you, we're here because she wants to invite you on her podcast. She has a great podcast and blah blah blah blah. In action, it was, I'm gonna promote this person. I'm going to share about what this person is doing. I'm going to stand in line with you for 4 and 5 hours if that's what we have to do. We're going to do what it takes for me to, in action, in motion, be a friend to you. But I also am thinking about Melanie, the friend who has been following me for forever and who is so supportive in our inner circle, who hunted me down to say, you need to do this. Are you going to do this? I'm not going to force it down your throat. If you I really don't want to, but I really want to encourage you to do this. This is for you. This is for you. And who believed in me enough to take action? She bought the ticket, y'all, before I agreed to do it, or before I said I even could. Action. I can't tell you how many people, you know, that have known maybe difficult things that I'm going through in my life who didn't wait for me to tell them what I needed. They just went into action. They were like, I know that in this season of grief you're going to need to feed your family, so I put a gift card for you in the mail. I know that in this season of craziness that you're going to need some basic things in your home, so I dropped you a gift card to Walmart or Sprouts in the mail. I know that you mentioned on something, I heard you say that you're trying to make sure that you're celebrating the seasons, so a good friend of mine dropped off some, um, some fall mums in the front yard. Now y'all, this is not like all the time, every day. It's when you're moved and when you know that you can do something, you know that it's in your power to do something, instead of thinking about it or not even feeling the need— if it's a good friend and you know them— to ask about it, just get into action. Just do the thing. Or reserve in your heart, if you know what you want to do and you can't do it today, to write it down so that you do it tomorrow. I can't tell you how many times what we give our friends is our intentions and not our actions. And we ask for permission to honestly do stuff we don't need permission to do. I want to encourage you to think about what you know your friends need that you could do just by springing into action and not waiting on them to open the door. Now, you have to know your friends, right? Because you can also, like, stalk somebody and that not be okay. But it is also fully appropriate when you know someone, when you do know them in their real life, and you you are aware that there's a need or that they've mentioned that they wanted, you just do it. So my friend Michelle recently heard me say that I wanted to treat Dallas like I was a tourist because there's lots of stuff to do here. And when you live here, you kind of take that for granted. So for my birthday back in July, she bought a ticket to go see Van Gogh. It is a kind of an immersive artistic experience, something I would never look for or spend the money to go do. But she bought the ticket and she put it on my calendar. And it was for months later, but she still took care of it and made sure that we went. Not only did we go and see the Van Gogh exhibit, but then we went out to eat. We drove through a couple of places in Dallas, just neighborhoods, just hanging out and having fun, doing something I normally would not have taken the time to do. So instead of hearing me say I wanted to treat Dallas like I was a tourist and make room to do some fun things, she bought the ticket for my birthday. Picked me up and made sure we did something different and had a good time doing it. Simple ways that you can be a friend are taking action in the small ways that you know your friend either has a want or has a need. Instead of saying, girl, one of these days I'm going to come over and I'm going to grab your kids so you can rest, or go— just, just do it. On Friday, October the 92nd, I am free and I want to come over, watch your kids, and make sure you have some time to get out the door. You know, or instead of saying, I know that you have this need or this desire, here's how I can meet it. Now, it's not always in your power to do everything. I don't want you to make— I don't want you to feel guilty if the action that's needed you can't take. What your friend really needs is a job, and that's not in your power to give her. What your friend really needs is a bailout of her debt or her financial burden, and that's not something that you're supposed to do. But what I am saying is, instead of speaking your intentions when action is in your power, Just do the thing. Just do it. There's so much power in just doing the thing that you know needs to be done. The second way that you can be a friend is to be encouraging, to share the gift of encouragement. Proverbs 18:21 says that the power of life and death is in the tongue. And oftentimes what your friend will need, what you need, is someone that believes in you, someone that is for you, someone that speaks life over you, and that is willing to say the thing that you don't believe about your life. My mom had the gift of encouragement. I don't think that's because she's a natural, natural encourager. I think that's because she understood the power of encouragement, the power of speaking life into someone's life, and was determined to do that and to be the voice of encouragement for many people, but especially her children. If she heard me saying something that I didn't believe could happen in my life, she would be the person who would make sure that I knew what could happen in my life and kept after that for me. That is so important that you as a friend, or that you have people in your life who are willing to speak over you what they believe can happen. And, and, you know, the word these days is manifest, and it's a scary word, but it's the truth. It's what that means is that what you don't see can actually become. And a lot of the encouragement that you need to bring your dream to fruition, to bring that hope into the present, to work for what you want to see exist, comes from having people that are in your corner and who are willing not to just believe in you but to say out loud what they believe in you and to go to bat. And when you're feeling down and discouraged, that they know you and see you and will say what you need to hear. Not necessarily what you want to hear, but in an encouraging way say what you need to hear. One of the blessings I believe that is, um, my lot, and I'm so grateful, is how you all are for me. The Inner Circle, many women who are not in the Inner Circle but who are you know, a part of that social media sister circle that we have and show up and watch the podcast or watch the videos when they're on replay, or I show up to an event, um, you all are for me. You know, there's always going to be haters, but I think that's the funny thing too about watching the Tabitha Brown effect. What is it, the cabbage patch? Is that there are women who are like, do not come for her, do not come for her. She has people. She has people that have, because of her encouragement and how she has poured out to them, because of how she has spoken life to them, because she shows up and says, this is what you need to understand about your life, because she's willing to share her life. People are for her. And when there have been little rifts online, they come for whoever is coming for her. She has been encouraged, and in turn, they are willing to encourage her. And I feel the same way. I feel like you are really a circle of sisters, by and large, a majority of you who are for me and who know that I'm out here, yes, doing all the things, shooting the videos, um, speaking from my heart, sharing with you what I'm learning. You know, I don't have a, uh, you know, I don't have an ongoing— what do they call it— a glam squad. I barely get dressed every day. Half the time I don't even want to comb my hair. I'm sitting here trying to figure out what mic to choose, but in the middle of me figuring things out, in the middle of me needing a lot of grace to do what I do, you all are for me, for me. And that encouragement from you all— some of you who I will never meet, many of you which I— who I hope to meet— matters. But the encouragement from my sister It matters. The encouragement to say, you know, I literally was in the car like, okay, Priscilla, this is what I'm going to say. Like, when we meet her, this is what I'm going to say. And she's saying, that sounds great. That sounds great. Just relax. It'll be fine. Like that encouragement, it matters. So I want you to know that even the people who you think don't need encouragement, they do. We all need encouragement and your willingness to show up and speak life matters, but it especially matters to you when you're in the life of your friends. Because, um, your willingness to show up and be with, uh, in with an encouraging spirit and encouraging mindset, encouraging words can make or break someone's willingness to keep going. Literally, it can make or break someone's willingness to keep going. The third thing that you need to understand that's super important about having friends, keeping friends, and making friends is that you need to be honest and authentic. You need to be able to process with that friend, because if you have a good friend or you're trying to develop friendships, at some point, because we're people, you're going to have moments where you misinterpret what she's saying, she misinterprets what you're saying, you're not quite on the same page, you could be misunderstood. And while in, you know, in friendship, you do want to assume the best about people and assume they have the best motives, sometimes you're going to have to be willing to have that conversation. You're going to be willing to have that conversation. One of the things my sister and I have grown to do is to have real conversations. It's like to say, you know, like I literally said to her, listen, I hesitated on inviting you to come and see Tabitha with me because I thought she's going to think I'm inviting her so that I can have the Priscilla effect and that I can have more attention to hopefully have. And I said, I'm not going to lie. I'm not, I'm not, I'm not going to lie. I'm— that would be great, but that's not why I invited you. I invited you just in case it's in the back of your head, because I know you love her and would love to meet her. And I know that you're always looking for adventure and fun and me swiping you up from the airport and bringing you with me to stand in line is fun. So if that entered your head, I just want to be honest and tell you exactly what I was thinking, exactly what my motives are, um, just to get that out of your head if that's in any way a part of the deal. And she said, girl, I wondered about that. I'm glad you said that. But even if that had been the case, that was fine. Like, these are the, like, and you would think we know each other. We've been sisters our whole life. We're friends, obviously, too, that these are the things we wouldn't have to say. But listen, y'all, one of the problems with friendship is that we make assumptions about the things we don't need to say. We don't— we think we don't need to say it because they already know it. We don't need to say it because they know I already believe in it. You know, it's like when kids say to their parents, you know, you never do such and such, and the parent will say, well, why do you think I work so hard? I do it to provide for your dreams. Or Why do you think I do this? I'm doing this for you. But what they needed to know and see and feel is encouragement. Not just that you're checking the box off with your action, not just that you are encouraging me by showing up to stuff, but that you are authentically honest. And that requires communication that I can process through you without assumption, what you mean by what you do and what you mean by what you say. I had to tell my sister because she will notice that something's wrong with me and she'll say, what's wrong? And she wants me to talk at that very moment. And I had to say with her, so here's the honest truth. Sometimes at my most vulnerable, I don't, I don't want to be rushed into sharing what you want to know. Now you want to know because you love me, but I feel rushed into sharing that. And I need to know that you care. And then I need to have the room to share with you what I'm ready to share when I'm ready to share it. And I don't want you to take that as a sign that I'm not talking. I just need to talk in my time. So now she has learned, because of my honest communication and my authentic, like, just because you're ready for me to talk doesn't mean that I'm ready to talk. Now she's able to say, hey, I can tell something's wrong. Um, if you're— whenever you're ready, I'm here. That enabled her to be a good friend to me because I was honest. Instead of just saying, I don't want to talk about it right now, I explain why. I need to process it. I may need to deal with it first. I may need to figure out what's wrong with me. I mean, I'm— I don't wear my emotions on the top shelf of my life, so I may need to take a moment to figure out exactly what it is that I'm feeling or how I want to communicate or what I need to communicate. And we had to have an honest conversation about how even she shows up for me, um, and what I need. So your willingness to be honest and say, just because I'm hurting doesn't mean I want to talk about it right now— your knowledge of yourself and you're willing to be authentic And to say, you know, I had to risk being authentic to say, yeah, my mom died and, you know, a week later I was jumping online. You know, my authentic truth is people say, Chrystal, you need to take time. You need to do this. You need to do that. Well, my authentic truth is I am doing it. Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not happening. And there are also other reasons for me to continue doing what I do. And I've explained those along the way. So even for people in my life, my real life, who were concerned, I had to authentically say, this is my why. This is— this— I understand your concern and your encouragement. This is my why. So I'm going to tell you, and I'm going to be honest with you because I want you to be understood. I want to be understood, and I want you to understand me. Sometimes when friends hurt us because it requires revealing of ourselves in order to be honest and authentic, we don't tell them. So they continue hurting us because they never knew they were hurting us in the first place. So I want to encourage you to be honest and authentic in those relationships that you want to pour into. People need to know who you are. They need to know why you do what you do. That requires being revealing, but that deepens the friendship. And the same is true if you have a friend and they're not being authentic and honest. You being authentic and honest and saying, listen, I just feel like you're giving me the top shelf and I want to be a friend to you, but in order to do that, I need to understand who you are and where you're at. And it's okay to go through levels of honesty and authenticity gradually as a person earns your trust. So take action, be encouraging, be honest and authentic. The fourth thing is to be present. When you say you're going to do something and you don't do it, you're not dependable. When you say you're going to do something and you can't do it because you have limited bandwidth, then you're teaching someone that you can't actually be present for them. And when you are present, not being on your phone, not doing 10 million things, but focusing on the person that you're with in the moment that you're in is super important. I can't tell you how many people are having physically present with me, but mentally not present, emotionally, emotionally not present. And that makes me feel that while I know they want to be my friend, that they don't have the bandwidth or the room to actually be a friend when they say they're going to be. And that means I don't feel seen, I don't feel understood, and I don't feel included, even if they're physically there. Your friendship, it matters if you're physically there, but it matters more if you're mentally and emotionally and even spiritually available. So your friendship presence matters, but fully presence, full presence and being fully present matters too. So when you are intentional about seeing someone, and that's what Tabitha was doing, the reason why the line took so long is because she was intentionally giving everyone their moment. Asking them questions, knowing that they were starstruck to meet her, knowing that they were freaking out, that their palms were sweaty. She looked him in the eye, just like she looked me in the eye, and she said, "He can take the picture. We have time." Time. Your presence, the gift of your time, is one of the best ways for you to be a friend, to show up and actually have the time to look someone in the eye and let them know that not only are you a friend via text, via social media, via a phone call, but that you're actually willing to put your phone down, to pause and look them in the eye and listen. You don't want to show up in someone's life to make yourself feel better. Well, I stopped by there. If the whole time you were there, you weren't present. People do want to be seen and they want to be understood. And one of the best ways for you to be a friend is to be there. There so you can see them with your own two eyes. There so that you can understand the context of their emotion or their situation. Physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually tuned in. And in this busy world, and honestly, in this world where we have learned to not be with each other, but be passing each other, to be virtually with each other, your physical in person, in your eyes, attention. It matters. And if you can't be physically present, but setting that time, being on time for that weekly Zoom call with a friend or the book club that you're doing and being there, there, it's important. It really is. What does it say to someone when you show up in their space, but you don't have the bandwidth or the time to be there? You're telling them you were enough for me to make some time for you, but not enough for me to be fully present with you. It doesn't just communicate I only gave you a little, it also communicates that there's a lot that's still on reserve, or that you're not deserving of me giving you that time. So yes, take action. Yes, encourage. Yes, be honest and vulnerable and authentic and be present. Do what you say you're going to do. Be present when you say you're going to be there. Make sure that you are managing your life so you have the bandwidth to do what said you were going to do. And then at the end of the day, when you show up, be focused, be as present as you can. And I know we can't always do this perfectly. I understand that sometimes we're waiting on an important phone call from a doctor and you need to answer it, or— but I'm saying even the gift of saying before you arrive, hey, I'm not with my kids, they may call me 3 times, but I wanted to talk to you. But if I'm answering my phone, looking at my phone, that's why. That even shows the respect and the kindness to say, I'm giving you deference, before I know an interruption is coming. The fifth thing is celebration, that you actually celebrate your friends when they have something good going on in their life. One of the major reasons why we can't do that often is because we're jealous, we're upset they're experiencing something that we want or that we desire that we don't have. Um, well, you're gonna have to talk yourself out of that and up from that. You're going to have to think, in 20 years, how do I want my friend to remember me? And when God gives me whatever it is that I'm jealous that I don't have, how will I look back at this moment and be glad that I was a good friend, even though I was in the waiting friend, even though I was in the struggling friend, even though I was, um, in the hope and prayer friend situation? In this moment, what will I be glad that I did? And sometimes you force it, you know, but you, you literally have to say, how do I want to be remembered? How do I want her to feel in this moment? Priscilla is so— and was and is so very excited that Tabitha reached out to her for me and then reached out to me. And it's really fun. It's really fun. But to me, this story is not about, um, meeting Tabitha. It's about a member of my audience who is for me who took action, who encouraged me, who said, "Take the shot," and who said, "Listen, you are a great interviewer and you deserve to have that woman on your show. Take the shot." And then after I went into my DMs and replied back and said, "Listen, I gave her my book. We took a picture. She said she's going to reach out." Melanie's celebration was like, "I'm so happy." And then she said, Mission accomplished. Because the whole time, the whole reason why any of this happened was because she was for me, willing to take action, willing to encourage, willing to be honest about herself and me, willing to be present, to like be in my DMs and in my email to make sure I was seeing what needed to be seen, and then willing to celebrate. My sister, the same way, took action to not only get with me in the car, but make sure every step along the way— I didn't even tell y'all, uh, when they came through the line with a video, a camera, to get B-roll of the audience. At some point they stopped at my sister, and she's— and he said, can't you know, she's Priscilla Shire, can you say a word to Tabitha? We'd love to have you on film. Sure. And she said the thing about Tabitha and how she really respected her willingness to be committed to her faith even in the midst of so much notoriety. And she said, but I have to tell you, Tabitha, as excited as I am to be here, I'm here because of my sister. Even on video, She was like, she wants to have you on her podcast and we're here to make sure you know who she is. So encouraging me all along the way, our honest and vulnerable conversations along the way about how we feel when we're with each other. I know that there have been many times online when we've shared our feelings about being sisters and what it is to occupy the same space, speakers, writers, um, and, and what that feels like to notice our differences and support one another, being present with each other, being willing to sit in the line with me for hours and hours and hours. And, um, and then to celebrate, to celebrate me and to say it's so exciting. It's so exciting. When you think about what it means to be a friend, I want you to keep those 5 things in mind. Don't just intend, act. Don't just use your words any old kind of way, encourage. Don't shy away from hard conversations, be honest and be authentic. Show up, but show up fully there. And if you can't be fully there, explain that and acknowledge that on the front end so that there's an understanding. And all times, at all times, celebrate her wins. Life is full circle, you know. What you put in honestly is often what you get out. Not always, but often.. And if you want a friend, the Bible tells us you need to be a friend. Ecclesiastes 4:9 says, two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. In other words, when they both put their hands on the plow, they'll get more out of the work done together than separately. If either of them falls down, one of them can help the other up. Now I know that many of you are struggling with friendship, and female friendship is a whole situation because hormones and attitudes and emotions. But what I want to challenge you to do is be the friend that you want to have. Ask God to lead you and guide you to the people who are supposed to be your people. Take the risk, because without the risk of love and friendship, there is no love and friendship. Open yourself up and know that God can guide the right people into your life. Take the chance to be honest, authentic, and vulnerable. To take the action that other people aren't willing to take, to be the encouragement that other people need but aren't giving to you, to be present even though other people aren't doing that for you always, but always, always, always celebrating her wins. And know that the world really does run full circle. Seeds planted usually sprout up some kind of plant or fruit. And if you are faithful to know what it is to be a good friend and show up as a good friend, then that will pay off for Let me also say this: you don't have to be a great friend to people that you know. I saw this photo floating around on the interwebs. This is a man who had determined to kill himself and was gonna jump off a bridge. And at some point, someone intervenes and says, "This is not your day. This is not your day to die." And you see these people, they're not just stopping him from throwing himself over the bridge, they're holding him. They're holding him with their hand. They're holding him with rope. They're holding him at his knees. They're holding him at his neck and encouraging him that his life is worth living. You can show up with action for people that you love and know. You can also show up with action for people who need you and your presence in a moment. In an important God-centered, purpose-filled moment is an opportunity for you to spread love. You don't have to save your love for the people that you know well. You can give it to the people that you don't know at all, but who need you in a moment. The other day I missed a flight. Try my best to get on that flight, try my best to get to the next destination, but I missed it. I don't normally fly Delta because I'm in Dallas, and so American for the win. But I was coming out of Atlanta and Delta was the latest flight out. We missed it. Went to a hotel, got on the first flight out in the morning.. And, um, when we got off the plane, a girl greeted me and it was a shy Chrystal day. So I kind of had that look on my face like, okay, okay. Cause there's a shy Chrystal and a confident Chrystal. This was a shy day. Wasn't expecting anyone to see me. So she starts telling me and she starts crying about, um, this book and how it's been a blessing to her and this experience and how she's been reading the blogs and watching the videos and how it's gotten through one of the hardest seasons of her life. And then she tells me her name. I think we met once before, but very in passing. And then I understood why I'd missed the flight. Number one, it was a wonderful opportunity for me to be encouraged by somebody who has been encouraged by me over the last 3 years. Number two, It was an opportunity to connect with someone. And I actually happened to, in another crazy circumstance, uh, went to dinner with her on Sunday afternoon with my father and with another family friend. But in that moment, I just thought— she said, I've thought many times about reaching out and emailing you or messaging you to let you know how much your ministry and your encouragement has meant to my life. And here I am on a flight with you, getting the opportunity to tell you face to face. Action, encouragement. She was crying in the airport, honesty and vulnerability. Presence. I had a book in my hand, y'all. And I noticed because I was reading, waiting on the person I was traveling with to come off the plane. I had a posture when she first started talking to me that was like, okay, I'm in the middle of reading my book and I don't know who you are. And I caught myself and closed the book and put it down. Presence and celebration. Celebration for her having the bravery to introduce herself to me. Celebration for her to me letting me know how much the, um, the content has been a blessing to her. Um, celebration of me being able to realize how I knew her, uh, how we'd met and how we actually are connected in many, many different ways and excitement with an exchange of a phone number to stay connected. Listen, y'all, this can work itself out in many different ways in your life, but what I want to encourage you to remember is is this one thing. To whoever, whether it's a stranger that you meet and an opportunity to speak into someone's life, to save them from themselves, to whoever, to a person that you have the opportunity to meet and that day your words bring life, to whoever, your sister, a friend that you've known for 40 years, but a person that you can grow and develop and go deeper, being a friend, acting as a friend, Being a friend, showing up as a friend is a wonderful gift to give. And you have the opportunity to not only to receive that gift of friendship from someone else, but to be a friend as well. So don't forget, you can be a friend many, many ways around and over, and someone else, probably if you will allow them to, is waiting to be a friend to you. Hope that's been helpful. I hope that you share it, and I will see you here next week.