Bonfires, Brews, and Board Games: Cultivating Christian Friendship

[00:00:00] Look, there's a human. He's weird. So am I and I'm going to look out for him. Right?

[00:00:07] So I'm going to take care of him. So when he's being an idiot, I'm going to tell him he's being an idiot.

[00:00:12] Right? And I expect him to do the same for me.

[00:00:16] At occasionally jump in and write us a bean idiot deal with you. Amen!

[00:00:20] Welcome to Christ In All Things, a conversation about meaning and purpose. It's based on a verse from

[00:00:31] the Bible, Colossians chapter 1 verse 17 which says, Christ is before all things and in him all

[00:00:38] things hold together. Christ in all things is a listening ear into conversations about receiving

[00:00:44] and giving the love and hope of Christ. These conversations are an invitation because as much as

[00:00:50] you'll hear and as much as we enjoy having them, digital media operates from a distance. And that's

[00:00:57] not what's best for us with God or with one another. So thanks for listening. And if you're in

[00:01:03] the neighborhood, we invite you to participate in person in the life that finds its epicenter

[00:01:09] at St. Paul's Lutheran Church, 210 East Pleasant Street in O'Conway, Wisconsin.

[00:01:21] This year our overarching theme is on friendship and it's been kind of my pleasure the last

[00:01:28] almost three years to watch these two as I've told a number of people recently. And as when we

[00:01:35] started this season, we did a little presentation of a short story which was somewhat reflective

[00:01:41] of my own experience like really a majority of Americans now. When I got married, I let all my

[00:01:48] old friends kind of fade away over the last 25 years. And you know that's my own loss and my

[00:01:56] own stupidity. It's been my joy to watch these two interact because friendship is important.

[00:02:03] And so I want to introduce Pastor Jason Shockman and his best buddy Mark Tredray who are going to

[00:02:10] talk to us about Christian friendship and cultivating Christian friendship. Please welcome

[00:02:16] Shockman and Tredray. So real quick, how many people are here just to enjoy beer on a Sunday night

[00:02:26] because you don't have to work tomorrow and how many are like this why is this weird pastor here

[00:02:31] talking to me please get him out of here. How many did not know that this was happening tonight?

[00:02:36] Okay fantastic welcome everybody okay this is super you're all staying here. No pressure. Fantastic.

[00:02:44] Pastor Jason how are we going to handle our little handouts? I'm going to hand these out. Okay

[00:02:47] fantastic so while Pastor Jason is handing those out Chad thank you for the information about the

[00:02:52] red ale. I assume those are all available in in in crawlers and growlers and howlers and cans and

[00:02:58] can be taken to go. Is that right? Not cans, not cans but definitely get your get your favorite to go

[00:03:07] so our presentation tonight is called bon bon fires, brews and board games

[00:03:14] and you'll be surprised you'll be shocked to learn that when Pastor Shockman and I were in college

[00:03:19] together we had a few opportunities to share some beers together. Jason what's the worst beer that

[00:03:27] you and I ever shared together think about that. Just to give you an idea like we graduated from

[00:03:36] Concordia University in Chicago in 1998 and back then I just remember that like line in kugles was

[00:03:43] like the... Yeah that was a thing that was like designer beer and craft small batch beer brewing like

[00:03:51] we had no idea. What's there? Why need was like designer beer back in the day right? Wasn't there

[00:03:58] wasn't there a beer at a woodman's in I don't know if it's Jamesville or West Salem we found it was

[00:04:03] like two bucks for a case of beer. Cool K U L with an umel out over the U. That was good for...

[00:04:13] It was like 20 cents a can and it was about good for brats that's it. It was actually it was not

[00:04:20] that bad for 20 cents a beer like it was. It was good for cooking brats in. It didn't make me want

[00:04:27] to throw up in my mouth. That's true. That's the best thing I could say about it. That's the best

[00:04:31] thing I could say. I'm looking forward to trying a chatty o's sorry no I know chats a mico

[00:04:36] o's trumps. Is that cereal or beer? And I by the way I grew up in Chicago. My family is Eurish my great

[00:04:43] grandmother's name was Mary Ellen Finnegan. Gold rester. So yeah I very much looking forward to a

[00:04:52] try and an Irish Redale. Pastor Jason how are you doing tonight? I am here. So we're here to talk

[00:04:58] about Christian friendship. Right. And I have heard now Pastor Lance like beat on himself four or

[00:05:06] five different times for thinking that he doesn't have any friends. It's like he puts a tea it's

[00:05:11] like it's like he puts a tea in the ground and a ball on top of it and expects us not to take us

[00:05:17] away. The word on the street is that anybody who's new to Reformation Tap Society pastor Lance will

[00:05:22] buy you a beer. So I can't think of any way to make friends better than buying people beer. So

[00:05:29] public service announcement if it's your first time at Reformation Tap Society your first beer

[00:05:36] I'll take no chats. Yeah that's right. All right so I promise that we're not going to have any fun

[00:05:45] here tonight. Right. Now Jason here is used to preaching talking to you for 20 minutes but I'm an

[00:05:51] English teacher and we have block schedule so I'm used to going on and putting high school juniors

[00:05:55] and seniors to sleep for an hour and 22 minutes. So I can guarantee we will not run out of material.

[00:06:01] So if you think I'm a long-winded preacher. Hey this is my new best friend over here.

[00:06:11] If you think I'm long-winded, I give you my best friend in the world. Mark.

[00:06:16] Hey there we go. So oh sorry. I'll jump in. As we as we talk about friendship and Christian

[00:06:24] friendship you need to know that we are experts only in so far as we've made a friendship work

[00:06:35] since 1998. Yeah and I mean I'll take it even a step further than that. I feel 100% fraudulent

[00:06:42] standing up here because my college roommate from 1998 texted me two months ago to tell me that

[00:06:51] his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer and I immediately texted him back and said gosh buddy

[00:06:57] let me call you. Let's catch up. I want to hear about what's going on. Have I talked to him in

[00:07:02] the last two months? No. No I have not. Probably not. Oh boy now I'm a trouble. The question was did

[00:07:09] you tell your wife that information? Probably not. Another friend of mine, scout camp friend of mine

[00:07:17] from about the same time frame and he and I had been good friends and keeping up a good relationship

[00:07:22] I thought. And now you'll count back and thinking gosh I haven't talked to Bill in a handful of

[00:07:28] years now almost a decade so it is funny how friendships have a tendency to come and go. So we do want

[00:07:35] to talk about this idea starting friendships and maintaining friendships and sustaining

[00:07:44] and especially this idea of moving from acquaintance to friendship. Now I thought that this would be

[00:07:49] a great because it's going to be my first TED talk basically. I get to lecture to you guys for 20

[00:07:56] minutes and then last night Jason said to me like I don't want it to be like a TED talk.

[00:08:03] I crushed this hopes and dreams it was great. He says he wants it to be conversational so apparently

[00:08:10] we're going to have a lot of back and forth here. Right I'll start with this when we talk about

[00:08:15] friendship it's really not like it's not like God has prepared for you in the world a

[00:08:25] soulmate friend and you have to find that one or those two and then it'll just work right?

[00:08:34] It doesn't work that way friendship is like it's weird. It's like I picked a human

[00:08:43] and you just do stuff with them. I like this one. I like this one. I like to do stuff with it.

[00:08:48] I'll do so we can do stuff together. Like that's a quote attributed to Bill Murray. I don't know if

[00:08:52] he actually said that or not. Correct me if I'm wrong Jason but there are actually people

[00:08:58] all around you is that all the time yeah yeah and welcome to being a human being. And for someone

[00:09:04] like you yeah you look around a room like this and you see a friend I haven't met yet potential

[00:09:11] friends exactly so tell us a little bit about okay so I am not like Mark I am an extrovert right

[00:09:20] I might be if there's a scale for extrovert that has a limit at like 100 I might be an extrovert

[00:09:27] at like 105 right I go to pay for my groceries and I think the teller or the clerk at the grocery

[00:09:36] store could be a friend I go to the gas station and the I see the same lady working at the gas station

[00:09:42] or the same gentleman behind the counter at the gas station every time I go in and I think hey

[00:09:48] I could be friend Bill I see him here every time I come into Quickchip he could be a friend of mine

[00:09:52] right Mark I went to a different church this morning I sat in the balcony and had to go home and

[00:09:58] take a three hour nap afterwards and yet there was three part harmony coming out of that balcony

[00:10:06] thank you so the point is you're you're gonna make you've got people all around you and they can

[00:10:14] be friends so Lance it's not too late for you to make a friend okay all right you had a little

[00:10:21] Christopher walking on by the way now you want now I'm gonna try to do it on purpose and it's

[00:10:29] not gonna work I love messing with him so yeah you might not you might not walk you you might not

[00:10:39] walk into Quickchip and and buy your morning cup of coffee and ask the lady behind the counter

[00:10:45] you know how her son's college interviewer job interview or how the baby's doing because

[00:10:50] you've built that relationship with him you might not be that kind of person and that's okay

[00:10:56] you might be the person who builds relationships slowly one on one

[00:11:02] that that's fine too these people can be friends so if you're one of those people though that

[00:11:07] requires time and one on one attention in order to build that friendship what are you gonna

[00:11:13] that's you I want my little you were little thing yeah what are you gonna have to put into it

[00:11:18] you're gonna you're gonna have to find a a needed external structure right a reason for you to

[00:11:27] get together and and this could be lots of things um you know parents I think this is this is the

[00:11:34] big reason that we have things like mobs mothers of preschoolers right you have other parents

[00:11:39] of kids your age that you can get together with and I this has got to be a reason that our families

[00:11:44] have combines kind of so easily together like here are oldest in their year apart

[00:11:50] and our middleists are well my youngest in your middle so you're apart we have kids the same age

[00:11:54] am I littleist in your littleist or a year apart it works so it works really well uh here is a

[00:12:00] here's a a piece in common that we it's kind of built in that we automatically have um your co-workers

[00:12:10] I'm not gonna hear you sit here and suggest that every single one of your co-workers

[00:12:14] uh becomes a friend but here's this automatic built-in thing uh that you share with another person

[00:12:21] an obvious thing that probably pastored Lance and Jason want me to to bring up is the fact that

[00:12:27] if you are going to church every week and you're sitting in bible study again here is a whole covenant

[00:12:32] community of people um who you know god is literally calling you to to reach out with and be in

[00:12:40] community with and be in fellowship with and I think I would hope that that's part of the one

[00:12:45] of the best parts about going to church is is participating in fellowship yes it's receiving word

[00:12:50] and sacrament and uh being forgiving for your sins and I mean that's the best part

[00:12:56] all the other good stuff yada yada yada whatever whatever pastor pastor something I don't know

[00:13:00] I didn't go to seminary so you teach English and uh oh boy uh theology right

[00:13:09] old test old testament yeah no that was super that was burr kowski that was last month

[00:13:16] so when it comes to these when it comes to the the network of people that you are

[00:13:23] surrounded by from which you could choose one of those humans to be a friend right no no this um it's

[00:13:33] mayor lukin it needs you need to focus on more than just the event right it can't be a focus that

[00:13:42] we work in the same place by the way we worked for campus security at concordia university and river

[00:13:49] forest it's still in river forest dammit um right kerf so now they call it concordia university

[00:13:57] Chicago I'm not bitter maybe a little um right but so we worked together you're hardly Lutheran at all

[00:14:06] we worked together don't go there we worked together uh we had we had zero classes together while

[00:14:15] we were there yeah we didn't live in the same dorm uh we didn't sing in the same choir we weren't in

[00:14:20] the same shows no i wasn't in any shows we didn't even work the same shifts except for one summer so

[00:14:28] when it was when it was literally six of us six of us on staff for the entire summer with security

[00:14:37] so i guess the the takeaway here is that these this commonality uh this doesn't need to be anything

[00:14:45] that's anything profound i guess is what i'm saying right but that commonality and that proximity to

[00:14:51] another person uh is really only the first step that only brings us to i would say the level of

[00:14:56] acquaintance right um and so the the key here then gosh it i sound like an expert and again i feel

[00:15:04] 100% fraudulent um is how to move from acquaintance uh to friendship i think the answer is uh probably

[00:15:15] what we see reflected in the opposite of canes answer in genesis chapter four right god comes to

[00:15:22] cane and says cane where's your brother abel and cane says oh no wasn't my day to watch him am i my

[00:15:30] brothers keeper am there it is am i my brother's keeper and the answer is yes yes you are your

[00:15:38] brothers keeper 100% right a hundred percent of the time you are your brother's keeper and so

[00:15:43] part of moving from acquaintance into friendship is taking the responsibility to say

[00:15:50] i am my brother's keeper i'm i'm look there's a human it's he's weird so my uh and i'm going to look

[00:16:00] out for him right so i'm gonna take care of him so when he's being an idiot i'm gonna tell him

[00:16:05] he's being an idiot right uh and and i expect him to do the same for me at occasionally jump in

[00:16:12] right next to be an idiot with you amen we got lots of stories about that most of which we will not

[00:16:19] share tonight i do remember like one and i don't remember when this happened we went to a cubs

[00:16:25] twins game we did at the metradome we did and it was terrible was were we living in illinois at

[00:16:31] that point you were yeah we were in the twin we were living in the twin city you were

[00:16:36] really the idea why redeemer lutheran church and wise that uh and we were down in illinois

[00:16:41] and the cubs were playing the twins and so we came up to watch a twins game and i didn't

[00:16:46] watch a cubs game yeah and i uh didn't have gas money to get home uh i needed to i needed to borrow

[00:16:55] 20 bucks from from Jason to get a home uh because like right check our check in again i was over

[00:17:02] drawn and uh i think that's a super embarrassing awkward thing um and he didn't think twice about it

[00:17:09] maybe it's 50 bucks gas is cheaper than it was 20 he didn't have a lot of money either they don't

[00:17:15] pay dc's very well um but little things like that wasn't even a question right what for me

[00:17:23] that wasn't even a question because i'm my brother's keeper so i just jumped in thank you big

[00:17:28] so little gestures uh meeting the need meeting meeting your acquaintances where they're at i think

[00:17:36] these eventually develop into friendship but i also don't think that this is a thing that happens

[00:17:40] overnight right i left a uh a left a teaching job teaching sixth grade where i'd been uh for six

[00:17:47] years previous and it developed a lot of relationships um i was good friends with a lot of the

[00:17:52] teachers on staff there because my kids had gone to that school since they were three years old

[00:17:57] and because my wife has now been teaching there for 20 years uh and i left those friendships and

[00:18:02] went to a new job and kind of expected that i'd be able to make those same connections at my new gig

[00:18:09] and you know six months in like that hasn't happened yet well that's because he didn't bank on the introvert

[00:18:15] part kicking in right it probably would help if i would go eat lunch in the lunchroom instead of

[00:18:21] sitting in my classroom and just eating lunch quietly so so why are you laughing at me

[00:18:32] they're the cool kids though okay uh so again so that that proximity uh

[00:18:40] it's important need you need to be i guess you need to be putting yourself out there a little bit

[00:18:45] but but while work friends are great right work friends are great you if if you want to move

[00:18:53] beyond acquaintance you kind of you kind of have to find a way to connect with those people outside

[00:19:00] of your work environment as well happy hour happy hours a great way to do it um but again keeping in mind

[00:19:08] is that how Dutch armistice aren't Dutch armistice stay Nick came into the picture that's true i

[00:19:14] a former friend i'm not going to tell the whole story but yeah my friend Nick and i that you know

[00:19:19] it was cold worker and happy hours turned into uh uh you know watching NCAA tournaments or whatever

[00:19:25] it is and hanging out and playoff games and going to the bar and turned into Nick writing a Wikipedia page

[00:19:31] about the Dutch armistice day so he could get a national holiday in a day off of work

[00:19:35] no that's that's not the story anyway you're ruining the story um and yet we call him Dutch armistice

[00:19:42] my friend stop talking about him um but it doesn't automatically happen i guess is the point of

[00:19:54] this you're welcome right mark mark is a a linguist an english teacher so here's the word

[00:20:03] it doesn't automatically happen friendship just doesn't go does take work it does take effort how

[00:20:12] many married folks have got here okay so i don't like so i got to watch my turn of phrase here pastor

[00:20:22] but back pastor Donald right don't sleep on the fact that you've got a friend in your wife i didn't

[00:20:28] say don't sleep on your wife that's now what i said um um you're and this is something that's

[00:20:34] taken me quite a bit of time to learn is that my wife can be my best friend my good friend Jason

[00:20:42] i think has talked about his wife about in that way for a long long time pastor Donald sermon

[00:20:47] today uh talked about and i don't know if this is actually where it sounded like the general

[00:20:52] satisfaction survey uh where um people are at this has been going on for 30 40 years people are

[00:20:58] asked how satisfied are you with your life you're either extremely satisfied somewhat satisfied or not

[00:21:02] at all satisfied and the people who are the most satisfied with their lives are married to people

[00:21:08] um and it's almost like the secret to happiness isn't to be wealthy it isn't to find your perfect

[00:21:13] vocation it isn't to find isn't having children uh it isn't having a big house the secret to

[00:21:18] happiness seems to be getting married and think about all the things all the benefits that a marriage

[00:21:24] ought to kind of brings into your life all the structure and form that it brings in your life here's

[00:21:29] someone who will make me go to the doctor if i'm sick here's somebody who will cook a meal for me

[00:21:36] here's somebody who will um drive me home from the bar if i am overly intoxicated right um

[00:21:44] it's not why we have kids here that takes a lot so that's the long view because it takes a long time

[00:21:52] for them to get to that point um here's somebody uh who i can talk to about my work problems um about

[00:21:59] my questions about my dreams about my goals i've got this built-in person who's always there that

[00:22:04] i can always talk to um and and because it's marriage and it's this legal contract um it's it's

[00:22:13] it's this great structure well friendship can be like that not that you should be sleeping with your

[00:22:21] friends okay don't do that um we never slept in the same bed but you did sleep over like you did

[00:22:29] stay at my house in number and lived in your house for like three months uh your dog got to know

[00:22:37] that i was coming in and daisy was about a ninety pound rot wiler and she yeah she's a big girl

[00:22:45] she big girl and she slept at the top of the you walked in the door of the house on the

[00:22:50] the split level thing we're like yeah right the whole lower level was like baseman so you had to go

[00:22:54] up a whole flight us well then do that again to begin out you had to go up the stairs to be in

[00:22:59] the house and daisy slept at the top of the stairs so you would i would never lock the door see

[00:23:04] you just open the door never had to and you just look up and all you could see was his head about

[00:23:10] this big and she she'd pick herself up and look down the stairs and you'd hear her go

[00:23:16] and it got help you if you were wearing any kind of like a tool belt if you were an electrician or a

[00:23:25] gas someone to check the gas bands with a plumber or something bad i don't know what had happened

[00:23:30] we adopted her i don't know what happened to her in her past but she would like go nuts when

[00:23:34] any kind of working or work her person came to the house but Jason was okay but she and it was

[00:23:40] kind of from day one right i walked in the door day one daisy sitting at the top of the stairs laying

[00:23:46] there at the top of the stairs and she looked down the stairs at me and then put her head back on the floor

[00:23:52] i guess i was okay in the house but going back to this idea of how friendship can be like marriage

[00:23:58] and how marriage is like a friendship right i i can my friendship can end a lot easier maybe than

[00:24:05] my marriage can because i don't have to legally get divorced from my friend or anything like that

[00:24:10] but if you're not actually communicating with your friend like if you're not actually

[00:24:16] communicating with your spouse what happens to that relationship rather quickly

[00:24:24] is the same thing that happens to your friendships rather quickly

[00:24:29] right so that that communication is important whether you're in proximity or not and that takes

[00:24:35] effort it does right and i guess that's that's the whole point of this right is that marriage

[00:24:40] takes work what what joke did i make the first 25 years of marriage with the hardest

[00:24:45] how many years you've been married 24 almost there i was there okay

[00:24:53] first 25 years of marriage with the hardest it it takes effort it take again i hate to

[00:25:01] use my favorite word too many times it's going to get stale but it doesn't automatically happen

[00:25:08] um so if you want to sustain a friendship maybe it helps to think of it in that context of like

[00:25:15] sustaining a marriage yeah and there's not a magic pill for this folks on the hand out that we

[00:25:21] gave you on the back of it i want to point you to something here um he he ruse chapter one verse three

[00:25:29] says sustaining all things that christ is sustaining all things by his powerful word

[00:25:39] christ is sustaining all things by his powerful word then collotions one seventeen in him

[00:25:46] all things hold together right as we as we talk about this communicating that we need to do

[00:25:53] as we talk about whether it's with your wife or your your husband or your friends this communication

[00:26:00] is the key knowing that it's not us who makes all this work right it doesn't automatically happen

[00:26:10] and yes you have to put in a little effort more than maybe a little but ultimately it is

[00:26:17] it is god in christ who holds you together and it's certainly easier when you are

[00:26:25] just when you're thinking of another person's needs like when you are when you're just having that

[00:26:30] basic human empathy to give another person what they need so the reason jason was always hanging

[00:26:35] over my house is because i happen to live fairly close to his fiance and her parents were fairly

[00:26:40] traditional and uh jason's not just going to be jason's not just going to be sleeping over a

[00:26:45] colette's house um before they were married so he needed a place to crash because he wasn't going

[00:26:50] to be driving all the way back to college it took me half as long to get from her parents house to

[00:26:56] where mark lived as it did for me to get from her parents house to the university and i had a

[00:27:01] weird work schedule and i wasn't married yet and so like i just had this kind of house i was

[00:27:05] rattling around and so sure yeah i'll leave the door open the dog is there security system built in

[00:27:11] you need to get in that you know how to use a direct tv whatever um and so good times good times

[00:27:18] that that became sort of jason's crash pad um and then you got married and then you well then we

[00:27:27] got married and you got married yeah um you moved to menisota we moved to menisota we moved back

[00:27:33] to Wisconsin right as as we were moving to menisota like oh yeah you were moving to menisota as we

[00:27:38] moved to st. Louis right um how did we end up giving you our washer and dryer how did we took them

[00:27:45] we took them to st. Louis right because you had yeah so right because we were moving into my mother

[00:27:52] laws so we didn't need him yep and we're like what are we going to do is washer and dryer well you

[00:27:56] were moving to seminary yep and you needed a washer and dryer so my father-in-law drove to mark's house

[00:28:02] in Chicago land and picked up the washer and dryer and then my father-in-law helped us move from

[00:28:08] the twin cities down to st. Louis so he just trucked the washer and dryer along and then you had

[00:28:13] that dryer for like what a year in our apartment in st. Louis from Chicago to the twin cities to

[00:28:20] st. Louis just so we could have a washer and dryer yep thing last i think was it lasted a long time

[00:28:27] was awesome it what it what it died when we lived in west Salem that's right you still you learned

[00:28:33] to do the wash what's that we asked for this is where friendship is so we're getting the

[00:28:40] style just about a dryer you wanted a secret pill here it is uh transferable warranties extended

[00:28:47] warranties on appliances that's it that must be it no that's not it so so here's the thing right

[00:28:55] i said this before i'll say it again really it's only god in christ it's only his grace

[00:29:04] it's only his forgiveness that makes this work

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[00:30:17] your chosen location within reason of course all post-production surplus supports youth minister

[00:30:23] at saint pauls thank you for your support christinol thanks is a production of saint pauls

[00:30:28] Lutheran church two ten east pleasant street in ocanama walk was constant for more information about

[00:30:34] saint pauls visit splco.org email us at info at splco.org or the old fashioned way give us a call

[00:30:44] two six two five six seven five zero zero one intro and outro music setting by Joseph hurl copyright

[00:30:51] nineteen ninety eight concordia publishing house used with permission