Finding friends who help deepen your faith
Stacey Lovett spent 13 years mentoring young people at the University of Illinois, served as a missionary in Japan, and now works as a missionary coach for SEND. In this article in our Flourish series, she explores the spiritual significance of friendship.
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“By now we have learned how to wax eloquent about the idea of community, how to cast vision for it and how to help others experience it, but we have lost it for ourselves.” — Ruth Haley Barton, Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership: Seeking God in the Crucible of Ministry
Friendships that are consistent and very honest can help fuel deep spiritual growth, but can be hard to develop on the mission field, where your pool of potential like-minded friends likely will be much smaller than it is in your home country. To find such friendships, you’re going to need courage and patience.
One trick: I “date” my potential confidants. When I showed up in Japan, I had lunch regularly with a variety of women there — some with SEND, others outside of SEND. Some of those friendships quickly grew deeper than others, and eventually a few became so close that we started a women’s group together.
When it comes to spiritual growth, I particularly like friendship groups. Sometimes people get busy and disappear for seasons of your life. But if you have a solid group of three or four friends connecting together, then if one of them can’t attend for a month because she’s in a different country or all her kids are sick, you can still meet consistently. Also, sometimes one of your friends will have something really major happen in her life — unfaithfulness in her marriage, a miscarriage, a scary diagnosis. That’s a heavy weight for one person to bear, but with a small group, you bring different perspectives on how to be encouraging and can help carry that burden together.
How to make friends
Be confident:
I’ve known a lot of people who struggle to believe that they would make a good friend. It’s important for us to realize that we all have something to offer in friendship. It’s as simple as just being people who care about growing in Christ and want to do that with others.
Choose carefully:
I look for people who have the potential to really hear me and not shut me down or communicate quick truths to try to fix me. I don’t want a solid, core friendship where every time I share something honest, I get overwhelmed with advice. Then again, some people that I would call advice driven make great confidants for other people. Find someone that YOU feel safe with, that YOU feel open with.
Make sure it’s mutual:
In the friendships that I’m describing, you should be receiving as much as you’re giving. I’ve been in women’s groups where one person really needs a lot and communicates that well, and then it becomes all about that person. That’s not the ideal.
Get your spouse involved:
Free up your husband or wife, giving him or her time to meet with a tight-knit friendship group. When you watch the kids and send your spouse off to develop these deep friendships, they’re coming back to you hopefully encouraged to love you more and to work through whatever issues are going on with your family. You definitely want to find friends who encourage and support the marriage and you as parents.
Ask God to provide:
Who is God putting in your life to be your good friend? “It is important that we resist the urge to cling or to grasp unwisely at those who may or may not have the spirit to walk with us,” Ruth Haley Barton writes. “But by carrying our loneliness into the solitary place first, we encounter the caring presence of God, who hears our cry, and we open ourselves to receive those whom God is giving to bear the burden with us. These we watch for and welcome as a gift from God, so that together we can be open to God’s life-giving Spirit among us.”
Don’t assume:
When I joined the ministry at the university, there was only one other woman who joined the staff with me, plus we were about the same age — so I assumed she would be my close friend. This caused a lot of tension because she wasn’t at the same place. We have to be careful not to assume where our close friendships will come from, but to keep an open mind and trust that God will provide. Most of the women I’ve been in women’s groups with, I would not initially have picked as my type of friend, yet these have been valuable relationships in my spiritual walk.
What should deep friendship involve?
Consistent connection:
My core group of friends in Japan lived two hours away from each other. We met face-to-face just once a month, but we created a text group to share daily prayer requests, and on rough days we would Facetime.
Accountability:
If we’ve fallen in some way spiritually or we’ve fallen into an addiction, our tendency often is to blame others for not holding us accountable. While we all have a responsibility to ask hard questions, I want to suggest that it should be our
goal to tell people when we need accountability. We have to be honest with our friends, telling them, “I struggle with ______, please ask me every time we meet if I’ve done _________.”
Listening and empathy:
Because our tendency is to fix people and give advice, we must intentionally prioritize listening and empathy. The Book of Job is like a men’s group gone wrong. Job’s friends have some theological misunderstandings, some unfounded assumptions, and an absence of patience. They grow particularly impatient when Job starts to share with them about his frustrations with God. But I’ve had things that I’ve struggled with for years. Our role in Christ-centered friendships is to listen, encourage and pray for each other in empathetic ways, even over long stretches of time.
God doesn’t intend you to do life alone. Deep and consistent friendships are critical to your spiritual health. It’s important that we be humble, realize that we need others and allow others into our lives.
Additional Posts
Choosing a Missions Organization: Why SEND International Stands Out “Why should I be a missionary through SEND International?” Jenna, a new missionary in Eastern Europe, shared with us what she appreciates about working with SEND. The highlights for her are: - Devotion to prayer - Diligence in communication - Commitment to development - Intentionality in accountability Prayer “Back in September of 2022, the Lord reconnected me with SEND after I had met them a year prior at the Moody Bible Institute. However, before he would sign me up for anything, my Missions Coach encouraged me to pray. He said something to the effect of, "I know that you've been praying on your own for a long time. But as the Church, we are not called to walk alone. So, you and I won't talk for about a month unless you have questions. I want you to go pray with 5 or 6 others from your church about where God is calling you." That October, more than 10 friends prayed with me and we saw God answer as He directed me to Romania. From February 2024 to November 2025, I had the pleasure of being a part of team meetings in Romania with my SEND colleagues. Our meetings were four hours long, two for prayer and two for business. This has been the minimum for our team. There are also prayer meetings with the local churches we partner with, among smaller groups within our team, of course prayer with many of you across the pond, including those at our US office. The organization was built, has been sustained, and continues to run on prayer. This is my favorite thing about SEND. Communication As I mentioned above, we have a two hour block for business / ministry details in each of our meetings. This provides consistency across our team which works alongside three different churches and in a variety of ministries. It also helps us to communicate about the need for change or growth, alongside what is working well. In addition, my team director also meets with each of us, allowing us to communicate needs, considerations, and prayer requests. I've also enjoyed getting to work with SEND workers outside of my immediate region . We receive emails with the minutes from the Europe leadership team, Friday communications from our international director, and information regarding projects that affect our work among the unreached. In December of 2024, our international director at the time wrote a note to my parents for the first Christmas that I was gone. If nothing else had convinced my mom yet, this did. He took the time to care for me, but also to care well for the parents that were sending me (What it meant to my dad and mom for him to do this well has been one of the greatest ways I've been supported.). I also have some pretty wonderful regional directors. These people have prayed alongside us (while also serving in their own countries of service), they have taken time to come visit and encourage our team, and they have also taken the time to encourage the people in our churches. Development SEND has provided much in the area of development and care (spiritually, physically, mentally, and emotionally). At our regional conference (every three years), there have been medical check ups available, counseling options, and time for connecting with others on the field with similar experience. At our conference last October, I connected with a missionary who served overseas for many years, and is now serving on the administrative side of SEND. She has met with me since then for mentorship and has also invested much of her time recently in preparing a retreat for the singles across Europe. Accountability Over the years I have read and heard amazing stories of how God has worked through missionaries. God has done great things and great things He is still doing! However, people who have committed their lives to the Lord in this way are not “super Christians”. We are still humans with the same struggle against flesh that others have . A major challenge is in being isolated -- living in areas with little to no presence of other believers to sharpen them can cause many difficulties. SEND has been a great resource in this area too. Through my team, I have an accountability partner that I meet with monthly. When my regional director came to visit, he and his wife spent a day with me and asked intentional questions about how I lead, handle conflict, and how I am growing in general as a Christian. In addition, my teammates share their wisdom with me on a regular basis. These things and more have assured me that SEND International is a highly valuable organization and I'm excited to partner with them in service to, for, and with our great God! Interested in being sent by SEND?
Learn about the spiritual harmony in Vietnam & how missionaries engage with college students. Join us in sharing the gospel!
Explore Georgia's spiritual heritage and the impact of SEND International's mission. Join us in fostering authentic relationships today!
