5 Trusted Tips to Build Friendships That Last Decades

There is a simple principle we find in Scripture: that of sowing and reaping. If you want to grow corn, you plant corn seeds. If you want to grow carrots, you plant carrot seeds. Well, if you want to grow friendships, you must plant friendly seeds.

Part of making friends is being the type of person people would want to be friends with. This does not mean you have to behave outside of your personality, but it means you must present yourself as friendly.

What does a friendly person look like? I’m glad you asked. This could mean simple things like smiling, greeting someone and introducing yourself, asking their name and remembering it the next time you see them. These are things that make you appear friendly to the person you are engaging with. Trust me, this matters because no one wants to be friends with someone who is grumpy, unpleasant, or not nice to be around. So, be friendly; that is the start of building lasting church friendships.

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One of the best ways to make new friends is to find people who like the same things you like. I remember when I left a previous church and started going to a new one. This new church had over 8,000 members, so it was easy to get lost in the crowd.

To meet new people, I looked for things I was interested in and decided to join those groups. Here the church had a basketball team, so I joined the team. This was a great way to meet people because we had practice and games, so we spent about four hours each week with each other. In fact, this is how I met one of my best friends.

What are the things that interest you? Finding people in the church who share those interests creates an easy way to connect and form the foundation of a friendship.

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As great as it is to find people with similar interests, that is not enough to build a friendship that lasts. Even if you sit in a community group, Bible study, or play on the same sports team, that is still not enough. To build church friendships that last, you must focus on connecting outside of church.

If your connection and engagement with this person only happens when you are engaged in activities at church or around church, that is not a friendship. That is an acquaintance. There is nothing wrong with having acquaintances, but recognize that the relationship does not go beyond the activity you are both engaged in.

It’s like people who are friends at work. You get along well and can have great conversations, but the tie that binds you is work, and when that tie is broken so is the relationship. That is not a lasting friendship. I am not saying it is not a worthwhile relationship, just don’t think it is more than what it is.

True and lasting friendships are not limited by the activities you share but by the connections you have made outside of those activities. I mentioned earlier that I have had close friends for decades. While those relationships began because we were in the same church, they survived even when we all went to different churches. In fact, of all my closest friends today, none of us attend the same church and they all live over an hour from my house in different states. The reason this works is that we connected outside of church, and that is where the friendship deepened.

One last note on this point. Connecting outside of church means not only for spiritual things. It can mean getting together to watch football, to eat, to play games (spades is one of our favorites), go bowling, go to the movies, or doing any activity that allows you to connect with them on a personal level. I know this works, and when you relate to each other outside of the activity, you are on your way to building friendships that will endure.

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For you to build church friendships that last, you must go beyond the surface of your life. You must be willing to trust people with your stuff. Now, I am not saying you trust everyone because they must earn that right, but if you are going to develop deeper relationships, you must let people into the uncomfortable and challenging places in your life.

Ask yourself this question. Is there someone in my life with whom I can share my greatest weaknesses, fears, temptations, or even failures, and they will still be there for me? Hopefully, the answer is yes.

The friends I have mentioned are all people that are my yes. Granted, we didn’t start there the first day, but as we connected both in church and, more importantly, outside of church, we formed a bond of trust that led us there.

These things don’t happen on a Sunday morning, and they cannot go one way. There must be mutual trust and respect for each other in order for the friendship to grow. If you discover that only one of you is sharing the issues of their life, then that is not a friendship. That is a counseling session. Be willing to share from your life and make sure they are sharing from theirs, and you are moving in the right direction of building friendships.

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The last key to building church friendships that last is to make sure you are building each other up. The friendships I have, we joke around about a lot of things. We laugh a lot. However, at the same time, we always bring it back to our relationship with Jesus and how we can spur each other on to becoming better followers of Christ.

This means we talk about our highs and lows. It means we offer encouragement and correction when it is warranted. It also means we hold each other accountable. Our friendship allows us to tear down any pretenses and get to the heart of the matter. I cannot tell you the number of times one of us was struggling with something and the other was there to listen, pray, help, and just be there for each other. That is what true friendship looks like.

One Final Tip

I don’t know where you are in your friendship journey, and maybe you don’t have any close friends. Well, I know what that feels like too, because I was in that place before. Here is one more thing you can do. Pray and ask God to bring friends into your life.

Remember when you pray, these people are not going to show up in your life as friends. They are going to show up as strangers, and from there you must be friendly, look for common interests, connect outside of church, be willing to go beyond the surface, and focus on building each other up. If you do these things, I can’t promise you when it will happen, but it will put you on the pathway to building those church friendships that last through the decades.

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