Friendship in Marriage

Then the LORD God said, “It is not good for the man to be alone; I will make him a helper suitable for him.”

—Genesis 2:18

Do you need friendships in your life? Perhaps you’re saying, “I want somebody to offer me assistance and protection and accountability and emotional support. But where do I go to get those kind of friends?”

As I look at God’s Word, I see that God has given us three realms of relationships to satisfy the need we all have for companionship. Perhaps the most foundational relationship is marriage.

After God’s crowning work of creating man, Genesis 2:18, God said, “It is not good for a man to be alone.” When you think about it, that is a strange verse. Adam wasn’t alone. He had a wonderful relationship with God that had not yet been tainted by sin. He had a spiritual relationship with God because he was a spiritual being. Yet God said, “Adam, a relationship with Me is not enough to satisfy your every need. You need a companion, a help mate. It is not good for a man to be alone.” And so God created Eve to satisfy the void in his life that even God Himself couldn’t satisfy.

By the way, that need for companionship in marriage wasn’t just limited to Adam and Eve. In Genesis 2:24–25, Moses gives this principle that applies to all of us: “For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother and shall cleave to his wife and they shall become one flesh. And the man and his wife were naked and were not ashamed.” God’s plan for most human beings, unless He’s given you the gift of celibacy, is that you have a mate to meet your most basic need for friendship and intimacy.

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Today’s devotion is excerpted from “Living with Loneliness,” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2008

Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.