What a friend we have in Jesus
Minister’s Letter – 16 July 2026
Image courtesy Pinterest
Dear brothers and sisters. For those of you who missed our Sunday services this past weekend I wanted to let you know that my husband Ben and I have accepted a ministry position for 2027 at Lower Mountains Anglican Parish. This means we will be leaving the Cathedral community at the end of this year. Thank you to those who have already sent words of support and encouragement. We are looking forward to these remaining months of fellowship together, but we will miss you all dearly. We have been so thankful for your friendship in the Lord Jesus Christ these past few years. Speaking of friendship, let’s reflect on that word a little more...
You might be familiar with these words from the famous hymn.
“What a friend we have in Jesus
All our sins and griefs to bear
What a privilege to carry
Everything to God in prayer”
They are such comforting and wonderful words. But what do they mean? What does it mean that Jesus is our friend?
John 15:14-15 gives us an insight into Jesus’ heart on this question. He says to his disciples,
“14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.”
There are a few important truths here that help us answer the question.
First, we need to do what Jesus commands (15:14). This is (hopefully) different to our experience of earthly friendship. If a friend commands obedience from you, they are probably not a very healthy friend. But, when Jesus is our friend, obedience to him is the right response because he is all loving and he only ever seeks our good.
It is easy to read verse 14 as being purely conditional. That is, that doing the right kinds of things will impress Jesus enough for him to call us his friends. I think what this verse is saying is that obeying Jesus doesn’t make us worthy of being his friends, rather obedience is the marker of being his friend. If we are truly his friend, then we will then obey him because we trust that he knows what’s best for us.
Second, Jesus calls us his friends (15:15a). In other words, he makes the first move towards us and declares us to be friends with him. When we are friends with Jesus, it’s only because he has sought us out, pursued us first and enabled us to accept and embrace him.
Third, Jesus invites us to know him. He has made known to us everything that he has heard from his Father (15:15b). He does not hold us at a distance, but he draws us into his own heart in an intimate way and delights for us to know him personally. The friendship he calls us to is so close that he lets us into God’s heart and makes His plans known to us.
The friendship we have with Jesus is richer and more beautiful than any other friendship we experience. We honour and obey him as he invites us into his very heart.
We all carry different experiences of painful or strained friendships. But, in Jesus, we have a friend who doesn’t withhold any part of himself, whose love for us is completely pure, who never lets us down and who wants our friendship so badly that he went to the cross. He is our closest companion. What a friend we have in him.
Your friend in Christ,
Clare Gibson
Assistant Minister