I was blessed to receive "The Gift of Friendship" from Dawn Camp in the mail this past week. With the book was a beautiful note letting me know that Dawn was blessed to call Sara friend. It is humbling to hear from so many people who were blessed by Sara and I want each of you to know what a true blessing you were to her as well.
Sara was a true friend to others. She blessed others by being fully present with them and making their needs and desires her priority. Sara wholly cared for people.
Her friends included people she had known since childhood, as well as people she had never personally met. Below is an excerpt from the book, Choose Joy: Finding Hope and Purpose When Life Hurts, talking about how God blessed her with the right friends at the right time...
I never cease to be amazed how, in every stage of my life, God has opened my heart to so many friendships. I love that I have friends who make me laugh until I cry. I love that some of my friends are so shy, until they get comfortable, and then they shock the life out of me with things they say or do. I love that some friends are intellectual and planners. I love that other friends go totally on emotion and spontaneity abounds. I have friends who are so much like me I think we may be the same person, and I have friends who are so opposite of me they keep me looking at life from different angles. I love that God knew I needed all of it and placed me right where I needed to be to find each and every one of them.
Here's a cool thing about my life... at every stage I have met great friends, the kind that are life-long, even-when-you-haven't-talked-in-a-year kind of friends where things are natural and you always wish the best for each other. I am crazy blessed with a lot of those kind of friends.
But I also have a number of people in my life who are soul mate kind of friends. These are the people that I can maybe remember the first time I met them, but have no idea how we got from saying hello to knowing each other backward and forward because getting to that point usually took only one conversation.
But I also have a number of people in my life who are soul mate kind of friends. These are the people that I can maybe remember the first time I met them, but have no idea how we got from saying hello to knowing each other backward and forward because getting to that point usually took only one conversation.
Each of these friends are such an essential part of my day-to-day life. They are the ones who so effortlessly let me live vicariously through them and their families, making my life feel absolutely whole and complete. I've not only been welcomed into their families but their extended families as well. I get to be a part of their kids' lives, but more importantly they don't mind that I love their kids like my own. They put up with the crazy dog and come hang out at my place with me anyway, and the ones who live far away keep in touch like we live just down the block.
I am blessed, people.
