1 Samuel 20:32-42

And Jonathan answered Saul, his father, and said unto him, Wherefore should he be slain?

David’s friend, Jonathan

“There is little friendship in the world,” said Lord Bacon. “O friendship,” wrote the author of Endymion, “of all things the most rare; and therefore most rare, because most excellent.”

1. Friendship means more than affection. Strange to say, greater friendships exist than in the family circle.

2. Again, friendship is not identical with the religious hope. The well-meaning, but ignorant, have beheaded the saints.

3. But while friendship is by no means involved in the family or the church affection, it yet remains true that the purest religious hope is the basis of the highest friendships. Great deeds are never done by those whose belief cuts off immortality.

I. True friendship is based on righteousness. Friendship is the outgrowth of righteousness. The most hallowed relationships afford no ground for unjust deeds among friends. The child’s love for the father is no excuse for wrongdoing at that father’s command.

II. True friendship makes no account of personal danger. The world is slow in learning that there is a greater existence than self.

1. We turn from majorities and minorities to observe that personal comforts and discomforts are no criteria of action. The question is not as to pleasure and pain, but rather as to the highest obligations.

2. The true friend is never afraid of danger. The son may die by the father’s javelin, but Jonathan’s friendship is true.

III. True friendship rejoices in others’ prosperity. (Monday Club Sermons.)