Friends with the Universe and Everything...Are You Serious?

💫Hey Friend, You’re Doin’ Great!💫

House Keeping Moment

I had a bad response to medication changes this week and I could not finish editing the Friendship Audit. I am doing much better as I write on Saturday and should be back to normal next week. One more week of waiting and thanks for your patience and understanding.

This coming we will try something new—short newsletters. We’ll start with a Monday, Wednesday, and Friday post. Each edition will be between 250 – 500 words. The goal will be to raise an issue during the week and give bite-sized practical insights and tips. Maybe we will call it “Friendship Notes” or something like that. Sunday will be a recap of the week with a very short reflection on what I’ve learned writing for you during the week.

Why make the change? Two reasons: I think shorter could be better but the big reason is the reader and friend who mentioned it.

So keep telling me what works and doesn’t work for you. We can build something special together.

This Week’s Men’s Friendship Factor Newsletter:

• Friendship and God—What’s Going on Here?

• Two Reasons the Spiritual Realm is a Rational Concept

• Spirits, Gods, and Archetypes

• Four Sample Stories of the Gods and Myth Relating to Friendship

• Jesus, Friend of God and Man

• Action Corner

• Resource

Friendship and God—What’s Going on Here?

You need to talk about spiritual beliefs with your friends. Friendship is a special place for us to discuss all our values. Kicking ideas around with our friends helps us think of new ways to integrate values in every part of life. You will hear more about this in future issues, but poverty is about broken relationships.

One of those broken relationships is our personal relationship with the metaphysical or spiritual realm.

Humanity has messed up relationships at every level and we have friends who can help us become healthy and connected. Don’t buy the lie that money is the ultimate measure of success.

News Flash: You did not choose to be born into this world. However, you were born, like me and every friend reading this newsletter, into a web of relationships. You are connected to the reality of the universe and you have no choice in that matter. How you interact and make meaning within the universe, now is the stuff friends should be talking about and working on together.

The rest of this newsletter is a place for you to begin such a discussion with your friends. If you don’t feel comfortable talking spiritual stuff with another buddy, shoot me an email and we can talk.

You may like everything I am going to say in this newsletter and want to tell your friend about it. You may hate every word and want to tell your friend about it. No problem.

My goal is two-fold. First, talk to a friend about your spiritual beliefs.

Second, I’m modeling my ideas to you as a friend. Talking with other guys about spiritual issues and how they turn into healthy actions should be normal.

Ready or not, here we go!

Two Reasons the Spiritual Realm is a Rational Concept

Physics/Science can’t explain the stuff that made the Big Bang.

For too many years materialists, those who only believe physical material exists, lauded the Big Bang as the answer to everything. Except then there was the problem of where did the stuff for the Big Bang come from? Many answers were given, but this one by Stephen Hawking before he died in 2018 may be the most haunting.

The universe was created out of nothing.

Materialists may say God could not have been in time and space to create the universe. Of course, this presupposes a spiritual realm measured in time and space. Moreover, it keeps pushing back the answer to the question, “Where did this universe come from?”

The Big Bang does not explain the origin of the universe—only the spread of matter and energy. Nor does physics have a rational explanation of where the stuff for the universe came from.

My friend, it is rational to describe the origins of the universe, life, and everything as a spiritual reality. I believe a Creator God made the universe. I have friends who think there is no God. We talk about human ethics towards each other and the environment.

Unrealistic Logic

Stephen Fry noted actor and humanist, was asked what he would ask God if he could. His response was the classic problem of evil, ”Why do children have cancer?”

No one thinks kids should have cancer, nor should there be physical deformities or evil people ruining good people’s lives. The question presupposes God would, should, and could take away choices and consequences of evil, death, and decay to make people happy.

Here’s the problem. If God exists and sets natural laws into motion and allows humans to choose their destiny and the natural physical order to exist according to laws, how is it okay for God to step in and change all laws of nature to fix what a single human, in this case, Stephen Fry, believes to be a massive failure of all nature?

In other words, what Fry is asking is for God to change the natural order.

To be fair, polytheism with a pantheon of weak gods is a nice answer at this point. Spiritual entities have limited power and do what they can to help humans who are in sync with a single spiritual power or all spiritual powers.

Monotheists have a bigger problem. All claim that God can and will make the world fair, just, good, and healthy. But when? And for whom?

I would suggest that the question Fry raises would require a power such as one that could make something from nothing. I would further suggest that such a change to the nature of the universe would be just as big and shocking if not bigger than the Big Bang. Lastly, I would offer that if such a power exists, there must be a set of reasons why it likes order rather than creating chaos by changing natural systems and why it lingers for such a time to make a change.

These are questions that have some long answers and debate and that is not the point of this little piece of a newsletter.

My point is that there are rational reasons to believe in a metaphysical reality.

And there are a lot of things to talk about with your friends.

Spirits, Gods, and Archetypes

“How do we become friends with the gods?”

I have been reading and learning stories from a number of religions and regions and that question kept popping into my mind. Spirits are made happy with everything from pouring out water or other drinks in the form of a simple libation to complicated sacrifices and even human sacrifices in some cases. Placating the gods, making the spirits happy, protecting one’s family from evil, calling the spirits against someone, seeking a blessing, naming a child, and just about every other part of life finds humans giving something to the spirits.

I come from a spiritual tradition where the opposite is true. God gives something to humanity to make humanity placated and blessed.

So, I started looking for other stories of the gods making friends with humans. To qualify, I am looking for friendship with all humanity, not just picking a favorite person. I did find some stories and I’m sure there are more.

But what I found is interesting.

Four Sample Stories of the Gods and Myth Relating to Friendship

Greek mythology tells us of Prometheus, a Titan who helped Zeus come to power by overthrowing his father Kronos. Prometheus stole fire from Olympus and give it to humans. Zeus is angry the power of the gods has been shared with humanity and has Prometheus tortured until he is rescued by the demigod Perseus.

Kronos, the same one overthrown by Zeus, stole the knowledge of agriculture from the smaller realm of the gods overseen by his father Uranus (Heaven), and his mother Gaea (Earth), and shared it with humans. He was not tortured but was not trusted by his father.

In short, it took lies and thievery among the gods to share good things with humanity.

Krishna is a historical Indian prince and king living around 1,000 AD and also a major deity over love, compassion, protection, and love. He is also regarded as the eighth avatar of Vishnu. Hinduism regards the way an individual reaches into the spiritual realm to become part of the gods.

One example of Krishna’s goodness is with his friend Sudama. Sudama is destitute and takes three handfuls of rice as a gift to his friend King Krishna. Krishna rushes to see his friends, puts him on his throne, washes his feet, and eats two handfuls of rice. Sudama returns home to a magnificent palace with the riches of two kingdoms.

Friendship and betrayal between King Arthur and Sir Lancelot give us insight into the Norse, Danish, and Angle ideals. Arthur’s generosity builds the strength of Camelot. The same generosity is abused by Lancelot when he takes Gweynevire as a lover and eventually his wife. The betrayal wrecks Arthur and Camelot.

Many, many more tales that we love are told about friends. Spiritual life is how we connect with the divine and humans. We learn more about human connections in friendship and marriage than in any other relationships.

Now, that’s something to talk about with a friend.

But it does not answer my question about being friends with the gods.

Jesus, Friend of God and Man

Jesus calls anyone who would live like him his friend.

Jesus’s statement as a god-man is astonishing for many reasons. I want to briefly highlight two implications of his proclamation.

First, Jesus removed the barriers between the divine and human realms and declared equality. The Bible passage I’m referring to is John 14:9-17. In calling followers friends he notes they are “no longer slaves” and that he chose them to be his friends by sharing everything God had given him.

So God sends Jesus to make friends with all humans who will choose the path of sacrificial love. Now that’s crazy.

The gods of Western mythology, spirits among traditional religions, and monotheism systems fight against humanity gaining equal standing with the gods. We read about Prometheus and Kronos who are outcasts because they shared knowledge with humans. While Krishna stands as a person who gains deity by loving friends—but it is not offered or bestowed by the gods themselves.

And that is the second result.

God forever chooses love over hate and violence.

If you read through this passage below you will see Jesus is hyper-focused on love. That his friends remain in love with him, each other, and all of humanity—Jesus makes it a command!

In this context of love and God giving people a forever status as “friends” that Jesus gives these famous words, “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”We know Jesus is then going to be killed in just a few hours and is making the explicit point that his friends must choose to love like him.

The unnegotiable item for Jesus is sacrificial love.

I ask you to consider that Jesus makes friendship with God real. Certainly, there is the cost of loving humanity no matter what, but there is friendship with God offered. Not working for God, but with God to make the world better.

Action Corner

No matter your spiritual leanings, meditating on being on friendly terms with the spiritual realm is important.

I invite you to read this passage (I put it below) and consider how love, friendship, and being willing to die for one’s friends are the highest callings of what it means to be a man.

Resources

The Book of Virtues has several stories and poems I’ve been reading about friendship. The old tales still stir our hearts.

New Living Translation John 15:9 - 17

⁹ “I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. ¹⁰ When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. ¹¹ I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! ¹² This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. ¹³ There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command. ¹⁵ I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. ¹⁶ You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. ¹⁷ This is my command: Love each other.