"Now Jesus loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus." Here, in the eleventh chapter of the fourth Gospel, the beloved disciple gives us a glimpse of a beautiful friendship in the life of his Master, sealing, with the sanctity of the Christ, a place for true friendship in human relationships.
By friendship we may understand the feeling between friends that unites them in confidence and unselfish desire for each other's welfare; that affords mutual joy in the sharing of good.
In "Retrospection and Introspection" Mrs. Eddy writes (p. 80), "There are no greater miracles known to earth than perfection and an unbroken friendship." Why is it that such friendship seems so difficult to attain that our inspired Leader classifies it among miracles? It is because material sense, the belief of life, substance, and intelligence in matter, seems to oppose the unfolding of the spiritual facts, the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man—the understanding of which establishes trust and friendly human relationships.
