…we are not stagnant, but rather move with those around us, each one of us melting into the other, becoming one though our bodies separate us. Our hurts and our joys are meant to be shared, the burden easier when another holds your hand. – Sejal Badani from Trail of Broken Wings

For months after my divorce, I would find myself feeling sad and it always caught me by surprise. The cyclical grief was still something I was learning to live with. The duality of freedom and loss. Of having hope for a beautiful future and despair over a failed past.

The reality was that I was more broken than I wanted to admit. In many ways my subconscious had protected me from the wounds of a difficult relationship, but time and space slowly released me from its protective covering. The curtains were being drawn back to reveal the cracks in my self confidence, the questions about my worthiness, and the doubts about my ability to love well. One by one, they came into the light. And like all wounds that require cleaning, the initial consciousness of each individual hurt stung like antiseptic on a raw lesion.

Throughout that time of testing, suffering, and refining, the thing that kept me afloat was community. A tribe of old and new friends who leaned in when they saw me in pain, asking hard questions and breaking down walls of pride that didn’t want them to see my weakness.

They say the average American has only two to three close friends. People who really know them – junk and all, brokenness and all, imperfections and all. I think this is in part because our society tells us to be strong, independent, and suck it up alone. Even if you’re drowning in deep water, you should be able to produce a magical life saver, inflate it with the very lungs struggling to breathe air, and then swim safely to shore with muscles exhausted from wading.

But this is not how we are designed. We are created in the image of a triune God, who is, in his very essence, community defined: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We crave belonging because we first belong to our creator.

And even beyond belonging, I am convinced God uses friends to be agents of healing when we need it most. I can’t count the number of timely texts, emails, calls, and listening ears that came to me in my darkest moments. At times, I felt like the paralyzed man in Luke 5 whose friends picked up his mat, busted a hole through a stranger’s roof, and lowered him down so he could encounter Jesus.

Two years later, I still have a lot to learn about hoisting the white flag when I feel utterly alone, totally overwhelmed, or just need practical help. But one of the few things I have nailed down is immense gratitude that the tribe exists in the first place.

[Pictured: High school BFF’s, Amy, Kristy, and Jessica. A special thanks to every mat-carrying, roof-busting friend who has been part of my community, old and new. You are my saving grace.]