Building a Circle of Support, Wisdom, and Encouragement

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Becky Harling: Holy Spirit, examine my life. Show me where are my weak spots that I'm not seeing? You know, am I too negative? Am I too busy where I just don't have time for friends? Am I you know so shy that I'm not taking any initiative? Where do I need to change? And then if you have somebody close to you, ask them, where do you see that I could grow in order to be a better friend?
John Fuller: That's Becky Harling and she joins us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller.
Jim Daly: Now John, friendship is one of the greatest gifts that we can have in this life. It's tangible. It's right there in front of us. I am sure even with our spouses, those of us who are married started in a friendship, right? You kind of testing those waters. But we don't spend a lot of time talking about healthy ways to develop friendships. And I think in our culture today, it's really needed because we've just become more distant from one another, right? We always laugh
John Fuller: Mhm.
Jim Daly: about you know putting your garage door up and pulling in. You don't really know your neighbor. Well, as the Christian community, I think it's going to be wise for us to do a better job in that area. But particularly for women, it's so desperately needed. There is a connection there, the way God has wired women. They need it. They need that connection to bounce things off. Men, we can be loners. We're that hunter gatherer kind of mentality, you know? If I don't have a friend, so what? Who needs them? That's not healthy either. It's not a get out of jail card, but today we do want to concentrate about developing friendships within women. And I'm I'm going to confess I'm getting I'm interested in in accomplishing this today, but I'm coming from a deficit.
John Fuller: Mhm. Well, Becky Harling will help us all better understand as you said having these friendships and how to cultivate them. She's a speaker, author, and mom and a grandmother and she's a certified coach with John Maxwell team and is the author of a number of books. She's been here before talking about some of them. We're going to cover the book Friend-ish: Practical Ideas for Richer Relationships. It's a great little read and we'll encourage you to get a copy from us here at the ministry.
Jim Daly: Becky, welcome back to Focus. So good to have you.
Becky Harling: Hey. It's great to be with you guys again.
Jim Daly: Yeah. So I I kind of fessed up in the beginning there and you might say why? Well, because Jean will listen to this program and she's going to say
Becky Harling: You did.
Jim Daly: you've never given any thought to that. Which isn't exactly true, but it's fair. I think we men don't you know it's kind of the thing. You go play golf with a guy and you get home and your wife says, so how's Bob? I I don't know. He's got a new driver, right? We didn't spend 4 hours talking about much and we're completely content with that. There is a difference there. Women tend to be tighter relationally. They're into one another's lives in a different way. Speak to the importance of friendship.
Becky Harling: Friendship is actually really important for both men and women.
Jim Daly: Okay, you got to convince me. No, I'm I'm I get it.
Becky Harling: And you know if you look at the studies, it's really interesting. Did you know that friendship, deep friendship can lower your blood pressure? It helps with anxiety. It lowers your stress level and one research article written and published in Time magazine said that it increases your happiness as much as if you had $133,000 raise a year. Now that would make anybody happy, right? And so friendship is something we really need in our culture. Women definitely need good friends. Although I have to say like in I have some kids that are raising you know kids and so in high school, I feel like sometimes the guys do it better because they go out and they play basketball or soccer together and if there's a disagreement, they're able to say, hey, let's just go pound it on the pavement and they're done. Whereas the girls, they want the relationship and they go in, but it turns into backbiting and gossiping and all of that. You know, so but I think
Jim Daly: Interesting. Okay, that's fair. Yeah.
Becky Harling: friendship makes our lives so much richer.
Jim Daly: Yeah. Spiritually, you know we're Christians. So what does God want in this life for us when it comes to developing friendship? Can I just be a loner?
Becky Harling: No. Um
Jim Daly: Give it to me.
Becky Harling: I mean really to be a loner is unbiblical in my view because God created us for relationship with him and his heart aches with longing for relationship with us. And also it spiritual formation happens best within community. And so you know I think this is something that we sometimes struggle with here in America particularly, you know because we really value our independence. And so it's like oh it's just about me and my relationship with God and then everything else should go perfectly, but that's not God's design for us. You know he has wired us to be in deep friendship, the kind of friendship where you can talk to each other and say, hey, I see you struggling with this. Let's Let's pray together about it. Let's go there, you know? Let's encourage one another.
Jim Daly: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's so good because a good friend is going to do produce good things in your life. In other words, they're going to challenge you with good things, affirm you when they seek something good happening. That's what a good friend does.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Absolutely.
Jim Daly: And that's invaluable and we don't have enough of those key relationships like that. Let me ask you about this. I mean I think there's plenty of articles about toxic friendship.
Becky Harling: Oh yeah.
Jim Daly: So boundaries are kind of important too. Um how do you manage that and what does a healthy boundary relationship look like and what does an unhealthy relationship look like?
Becky Harling: So toxic friends are friends who always want to take from you or injure you and they're not offering anything in return. And honestly, sometimes as Christian leaders, we're all Christian leaders, we have to be careful about this because we can use people as our friends because they can accomplish our vision, right? But that's an example of a toxic friendship, you know? Or where one of the friends has all the power and the other doesn't. Uh a healthy friendship includes boundaries. Boundaries make good neighbors. And so you know notice in the Lord's prayer where Jesus teaches us to pray, forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Well, when people trespass against us, they're breaking our boundaries. So when you have a good healthy friendship and you say, I'm so sorry, I can't do that right now, your friend doesn't push back on your boundaries and push and push for more and more then you're able to give. They they respect your boundaries and they allow you to live within those boundaries.
Jim Daly: Yeah. You know and that's so good. I mean even think I'm just playing out in my mind as you say that what it's like to sit to have coffee or whatever with somebody and you know we've really developed a good friendship. Let's talk about those boundaries in our relationship. I you can play that out. It It's a very respectful thing to do. Here's where I can show up for you or I want to show up for you. Here's where I might struggle.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Yeah.
Jim Daly: Um speaking of that, that vulnerability in friendship can be really dicey
Becky Harling: Mhm.
Jim Daly: um because if you have a good and true friendship, you can share things that are going on in your own life, your thought life, maybe in your marriage if you're married.
Becky Harling: Yes.
Jim Daly: And those things have to be handled very carefully by the friend. And it does give you power that you better control cuz when you get uh informed about somebody's quiet life, their secret life, you need to respect that and not share that with other people.
Becky Harling: Mhm. Yeah.
Jim Daly: But something in the human heart, it's like oh I know something about Becky. Hey John, you know Becky? She likes steak. But whatever it might be, speak to that importance though of guarding confidentiality and vulnerability.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Yeah, if you don't guard confidentiality, you're going to lose the friendship. Uh let me give you an example from my own life. Um probably 10 or 15 years ago, I had a friend and I kind of jumped into the friendship because I thought oh we both have a heart for prayer, both have a heart for ministry. I thought this is going to be great, you know? But and I shared really vulnerably with her about a lot of my backstory, about a lot of the things I currently struggle with and things like that. Then after several months in, I began to realize that this friend was sharing what I had shared with her with others. And what it did is it severed the trust.
Jim Daly: Absolutely.
Becky Harling: And I needed to back way up from that friendship and I did because it wasn't healthy for me anymore. You know she didn't respect my boundaries. She didn't respect my confidentiality. If you're going to be vulnerable with a friend, you have to feel safe. It comes down to safety.
Jim Daly: Right. Yeah. And that's on all of us in our friendships to make sure that we're handling those things correctly. You know I'm thinking of so many business guys we get to meet supporters of Focus on the Family. And even outside of my circle, uh you know you talk to a business guy and he'll say, yeah, I'm never going to do business with a Christian again because of how they
Becky Harling: Sure. Yeah.
Jim Daly: didn't perform somehow. They didn't pay me what they owed me. They did It's so heavy. It It really is heavy on my heart, especially in this area of friendship where you can hear somebody saying, yeah, I'm not going to trust that Christian anymore cuz I shared something with them and they ended up sharing it with others. We don't want that as a community of believers. We need to hold each other accountable, ourselves accountable, that we're behaving correctly in these relationships to honor the Lord first and foremost, right?
Becky Harling: Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And you know the way I look at it is when somebody shares something with me in confidentiality, I view that as a treasure. They're sharing something with me that's really a treasure about them. And I don't have the right to tell somebody else that. So I have to hold that confidence.
Jim Daly: Right. Mhm.
John Fuller: This is Focus on the Family with Jim Daly and our guest today is Becky Harling. We're talking about her book Friend-ish: Practical Ideas for Richer Relationships. And we'll encourage you to get a copy of the book from us here at the ministry when you stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. Becky, on on this broad term of friendships, you had a family situation, kind of an emergency with one of your daughters that led you to some real insights about a friendship. What was that story?
Becky Harling: Yeah. So our youngest daughter has asthma and she was getting ready to um she was actually starring in a play where she was Cinderella. And it was I think it was the second night. It wasn't opening night and interestingly enough, but she started to panic about some of the role and as a result, her asthma took over and she couldn't breathe. And for whatever the reason, we didn't have her inhaler there and her other sister, her older sister said, Carrie, look at me. And she put her hand on her chest and she put Carrie's hand on her chest and she said, we're going to breathe together and take deep breaths together. And you know I she got Carrie's breathing slowed down. She got Carrie's slowed down. And it was such a beautiful moment to think about the fact that we have to be attuned to one another. And attunement means that we're we're living in sync with one another. And sometimes in families, that's hard, right? I mean sometimes we have really messed up families or toxic families and there the friendship is really perhaps challenging. But where we're able to develop those deep friendships in family is really a treasure.
Jim Daly: Becky, you know we've kind of talked about the negative side of those relationships, but the positive side, let's make sure we mention that. You have a dear friend Margaret who embodies that it sounds like.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Margaret is amazing. Um
Jim Daly: Yeah, I mean you're smiling from ear to ear just hearing her name.
Becky Harling: I know. She's She truly is amazing. She's much older now and but you know there was a season in Stephen my life where there there were really hard things going on. I was still recovering from cancer. He was pastoring a really large church that was very messed up. And Margaret just we really got close to her and her husband Dan. And Margaret was so encouraging, you know? And she would call me and she would say, oh Becky, you do such a great job with Sunday dinner and you know you're doing such a great job with your kids. And I would go out to coffee with her and I would leave feeling like a thousand bucks, you know? And I said to Steve, everybody needs a friend like Margaret where you call her and you just say, I need a little encouragement today and she brings it. She's still like that.
Jim Daly: That's beautiful. That's great. Yeah. You know let me ask you about that, that desire to have a friend like Margaret.
Becky Harling: Yeah.
Jim Daly: You you know I am trying to think of the profile of the women seeking that. And you've got the person who almost is so desperate
Becky Harling: Yes.
Jim Daly: it's you you respond with caution, right? They're so desperate to have the friend like Margaret. Can you be my friend like Margaret? And you And you start backing up because it feels smothering. And then you have the other which is very natural. It develops naturally and you end up with the encouraging friend like Margaret. There's probably two or three others examples. But speak to that. How do you discern like what is this person needing rather than just giving? Like it sounds like Margaret is. She's just a delightful person to hang out with.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Yes. She is. And I before I get into discerning what a person needs, I think there's something like if you want really good friends, be a really positive person, you know? Because if you're always like a Debbie Downer, if you're always complaining, if you're always seeing the bad side of things, it's really draining to be your friend, honestly, you know? So bring the positivity
Jim Daly: Right. Yeah.
Becky Harling: and let the relationship
Jim Daly: Yeah.
Becky Harling: progress slowly and naturally.
Jim Daly: I'm thinking of those um situations where it really matters, you know? Where difficulty has struck, whatever that might be. Could be health. It could be emotional issues with your children. There's a whole you know host of things that we experience in this life where friendship, deep friendship shows up and it's such a comfort on our you know well-being that they just bring the soothing capability. You know don't be too upset with your teenager. Bob and I went through that. Here's how it ended up. We need to look at the long haul here and not the short run. It's going to be okay because we're frantic.
Becky Harling: It's going to be okay. Yeah.
Jim Daly: And uh you know something like that. What what are some of those experiences that you and your husband had? You mentioned the church difficulty, but we're couples. It wasn't a light touch. It wasn't just we 'll be praying for you, which is nice. And we say that to one another and hopefully we followed through with it. But showing up at your home or doing something that demonstrates this relationship means a lot to us. Give us some examples of that.
Becky Harling: Yeah. So I think of our friends Greg and Jill. You know we met them during just it was just rough. You know the church was exploding. I think death threats were coming to the house to my husband. I mean it was just all manner of chaos in the church. Meanwhile, I was still recovering from cancer and going through just a lot of extended family issues. And both Stephen and I just felt like we were completely drowning. And we have four kids and um so Jill and Greg just came alongside of us, you know? Whenever our youngest daughter would have a concert, they would show up. They'd say we're here with you, you know? The nights that we were like where it had been a horrible meeting or whatever where we had gotten bad news, they're like you know what? We'll just bring pizza over. We'll eat dinner together. And they mentored our kids. They you know went to their different school activities. I remember one night Greg sitting at the table cuz Steve was so exhausted. Greg was sitting at the table helping our daughter with her homework, you know? And just doing things like that for them. And those are good friends. They're the kind of friends that show up. They don't care if your house is a mess. They don't care if you're just completely overwhelmed with life. They're going to come alongside of you because they love you.
Jim Daly: That's horrible. Yeah, that's so so good. You mentioned in the book too about shared joy and humor and how important they are to lasting friendship. The you know humor is a great bond. I think that's where we're we're going to connect as men cuz you know and sometimes that's sarcastic. I mean we're on each other. Almost the formula is the the closer you are as as men, as buddies, the more ribbing we do to each other cuz we can trust each other. And I know some people are going to say that's really unhealthy. It It there is kind of a guy code to that. There is a line you don't want to cross, but ribbing each other is just part of what we do. And it starts about oh in third grade. But it's just how we communicate. But speak to that importance of joy and humor in relationship. And I think you had a friend that had gum in her hair or something.
Becky Harling: That's where Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Oh okay. This is the best story ever. I'm a big believer in humor. I use it a lot when I speak and I just enjoy friends who have a great sense of humor. So my friend was telling me about this time. She was at a women's conference, you know? And all the women that needed prayer went down front and they ran out of prayer counselors. And so she volunteered and went down front and she you know she was kind of hugging this woman who had long hair. And my friend had gum in her mouth. It came out of her mouth and got stuck in the lady's hair at which point my friend panicked. So she was like trying to work it out of her hair while still praying. And she's saying, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. And you know the other person still has her eyes closed. So finally my friend gets the gum out of her hair and then popped it back in her mouth which was just a little gross, but she was desperate and then said, amen. And then the woman never knew.
Jim Daly: Yeah. Oh no. Help me, Lord. That's friendship. Oh my goodness.
Becky Harling: But we died laughing, you know? Because it's like you have to make fun of yourself sometimes. And I think that's a way to bring humor into your friendships. I mean my friends know that I have done some bizarre things, you know? And we laugh together over it because you know I I really I don't have my act together all the time. I don't have my act together probably 70% of the time.
Jim Daly: Right.
Becky Harling: And you just have to laugh.
Jim Daly: I think it's a great medicine for the soul in this life. You know it it it is hard. You know someone listening is going, yeah, I've never really had that sense of humor. What What do you suggest with a friend that you know humor is not a natural thing for them? They look at the world very straightforwardly, scientifically you might say. It's black and white. What What do you say to them to encourage them to look at things with a little lighter spirit?
Becky Harling: You know you have to learn how to make fun of yourself. I I think that's where I would start. You know when was the last time you tripped down the stairs and made fun of yourself for being clumsy or when was the last time you said something completely awkward to somebody and then you had to laugh about it afterwards? You know you just kind of have to start by not taking yourself so seriously.
Jim Daly: Start there. Yeah. That's so true. Well, but those of us in faith
Becky Harling: Yeah.
Jim Daly: this life is serious, Becky.
Becky Harling: Well, sometimes.
Jim Daly: No, but you you know what I'm saying. And I think the Lord is the source of humor. It doesn't come from the the other guy.
Becky Harling: Yeah. It is. No.
Jim Daly: I don't think. And I think the Lord can do a belly laugh. I think he laughs with us.
Becky Harling: I think too. If in fact if you read through the Gospels, you realize how much sarcastic humor Jesus uses. It's amazing, but sometimes you have to dig deep to figure that out, you know? But like building the house on the rock or the sand, he was being funny.
Jim Daly: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, even the Lord when he blinds the army
Becky Harling: Yeah.
Jim Daly: in the Old Testament, right? The army against Israel is blinded and they're out there in the field knocking into each other. I mean that there's a level of humor to that. Like wow, Lord, that's funny.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Yeah.
Jim Daly: Yeah.
Becky Harling: And so any anyway. Um you also encourage not to overlook and I I put this in the context of adult children. And it was so warming to my heart not long ago Trent, my oldest son said to me, Dad, what I really love about our relationship right now, he's in his mid 20s, is it's like our friendship developing in a different way.
Jim Daly: Yeah. Yeah. And it's just great to hear from your children that they see the relationship. They still know your dad or mom, but there is something different and it you know we're not controlling their lives. We respect them and how God has created them and they respond to that to say, I really enjoy just spending time with you as a friend. Now isn't that awesome?
Becky Harling: Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah, it is awesome. And you know in so it's important to develop the skill of not over functioning, you know where you try to just do everything for them, you know?
Jim Daly: That is a great point. That might be the gold nugget of the program here. Avoid over functioning in the parenting role. Wow, that's a neon sign.
Becky Harling: I I mean we're we're famous for doing this, you know? You our kids confided us and we over function cuz we don't want them to feel sad or lonely or afraid. We don't want them to struggle financially, so we over function. You know, but we have to rein that in. It's interesting cuz our son now
Jim Daly: Yeah.
Becky Harling: works with my husband. And about 5 years ago, they switched roles. So our son is now the CEO and my husband reports to him. And so it's it's very fun hearing their banter back and forth.
Jim Daly: Wow. There seems to be a little back at you in your voice there toward your husband. I see it. Look at this.
Becky Harling: It's just not really. It's just humorous to watch, you know?
Jim Daly: It's got to be though. We'll pay back for you. Hey honey, won't you ask your boss if you can get time off this weekend? That's pretty good though. Becky, right at the end here as we've run out of time. This has been really fun, but at the same time some people again uh struggle.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Yes. I know, right?
Jim Daly: And you know we don't always look in the mirror to say why would it be that I don't have deep friendships? And that like you said is a great place to start. Maybe you just take things too seriously. You're the Debbie Downer. All the things that you've alluded to, you don't make a very good friend. How do we if we're in that spot, but we're not self-aware yet that maybe that's the vibe we're giving? How do we assess that and then change the direction all in the hopes of meeting that need that I would love one or two really deep friends? What do you do?
Becky Harling: I you know I love to talk about the principle of taking a little self-management meeting. You know you have a little self-management meeting in front of the Holy Spirit and you say, Holy Spirit, examine my life. Show me where are my weak spots that I'm not seeing? You know, am I too negative? Am I too busy where I just don't have time for friends? Am I you know so shy that I'm not taking any initiative? Where do I need to change? And then if you have somebody close to you, ask them, where do you see that I could grow in order to be a better friend? And people are usually willing to help you there.
Jim Daly: That's a great question. Yeah. Now that's so good and I you know this has been helpful. I came into this a little like okay, how to develop friendships, right? I even told you John I said okay, this one's going to be interesting. But you've really shed some great light on the need to have friends and the need to be a good friend. So thank you for being with us. It's been good.
Becky Harling: Yeah. Thanks for having me. It's always fun with you guys.
Jim Daly: Yeah. And let me turn to the listener. God designed us for relationship. We've talked about that throughout the program. Good friendships are worth cultivating. Here Focus on the Family, we want to help you do that to build strong relationships, healthy connections with people that God has placed in your life. And to not only be a receiver, but to be a giver. I've heard Becky say that very clearly. And we have lots of resources to help you do that. Our website is filled with articles and programs like this one, practical biblical insights to help you strengthen your relationships, not just with friends, but with your spouse too, which is important. Another outstanding resource is Becky's great book Friend-ish: Practical Ideas for Richer Relationships. It's that practical guide to becoming the kind of friend you'd like to be and you'd like to have, frankly. And if you can make a gift of any amount, we'll send you a copy of it as our way saying thank you for being part of the ministry and helping other people. Let me give you an example of that. We received a note from Ray, a donor who said this. I've been listening to Focus on the Family since I was a young mom. Now I'm a grandmother and you continue to minister to me. My husband and I are facing a difficult new season after his stroke left him paralyzed, but God continues to show us the way. Focus has been there to help us along the journey. Thank you for faithfully supporting families through every season of life. Be a part of it.
John Fuller: Yeah, what a wonderful note. And we encourage you to join us in ministry when you make a donation of any amount today.
Jim Daly: And John, let me remind everybody we're coming into 2027 which is Focus's 50th birthday.
John Fuller: Pretty amazing.
Jim Daly: Yeah, the whole year we were started in 1977 by Dr. Dobson. So we're going to celebrate that through the whole year. And we would love for you to participate with us. Let's reach more marriages for Christ. Let's encourage and help more families in crisis and uh really uh save children in foster care, save babies from abortion. Does it get any better than this? And I'm looking forward to a wonderful celebration.
John Fuller: Yeah. Well, as we enter these last couple of months of this year, it's a perfect time to deliver hope and joy to families uh through your support and focus on the family. So please call today and know that your gift will be doubled dollar for dollar through a special match opportunity. God will use your gifts to make twice the impact today. So donate when you call 800, the letter A in the word family, or stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. And coming up next time, how Christian families can and should approach the topic of foster care and adoption.
Guest (Female): Adoption is because children need a family. It's taking care of the need that a child has, but if we're always thinking that it's taking care of a need that we have, then we're going to be in a crisis mode when things don't go how we had thought it was going to be.
John Fuller: On behalf of the team, thanks for joining us for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once more help you and your family thrive in Christ.