Why Can't We Be Friends?

Nina isn't charismatic.
Few people even know her since she's nearly a recluse.
She's a creature of habit down to the food she eats,when and how much, her afternoon naps, her daily toilet, including the fastidious care of her nails, and the time she spends just looking out the window at life.
She's a vain thing, always washing her face, like she thinks one speck of dust or dirt would mar her perfect look. Like anyone's going to see her anyway.

I got to know her four years ago. Call me crazy, but one day I invited her to come and live with me. She didn't seem to have anywhere else to go and I'm such a pushover.

You would think that in four year's time I'd have made some progress with her.
After all, I'm a pretty social person. I love to entertain. And with all the kids and parents who come each week for music lessons, you'd think she'd follow my lead and gain some social skills.

It's very hard being the only person Nina connects with. If I dare go away with my husband for a weekend she whines and carries on for days. Bruce warned me that she'd be like that but I wouldn't listen.
We introduced her to Tidus, a very handsome fellow. He likes lots of the same things. Even looks like her except he's got darker hair.
He took one look at her and fell in love.
Nina hated him right off.
But that charmer, he set right about to woo her. I thought it was hopeless and I told him so. But Tidus wouldn't listen to my pessimism.
Each day he made his tender advances, only to be met with a sharp rebuff.
He wouldn't give up. He was smitten.
I don't know why Tidus loved Nina with her nasty personality, snobbish, unsociable, selfish, self-absorbed nature.
I only took her in out of a sense of duty.
But Tidus. . .
One day Nina responded to Tidus' sweet nature. Just a little thing, really. She let him sit nearby.
Days later, more signs of the first tentative steps toward a relationship. Like the unfolding of a rosebud, Nina began to trust Tidus enough to let him into her sad, self-absorbed world.
What I could not do in four years, Tidus did in just a few weeks of persistent, gentle, daily reminders of his attention.

I thought about it this morning. How our natures are bent, perhaps distorted by harsh memories, abandonments, insensitivities.
God never forces Himself on us. Patiently, over time He reminds us how He longs to be close. How He yearns to draw us tenderly into His arms, soothe our hurts, calm our hearts, encourage, counsel, say "I love you."
Nina loves Tidus now. I see it clearly every day as a blur of gray stripes, and black and white fur streak by my office chair and my slippered feet. Claws retracted, rolling and wrestling, chasing and swatting, meowing and purring.

This is what Tidus longed for: someone to share his toys, his sense of adventure, the world of chair legs, cushions, and birds just outside the window.

God longs for us in the same way: to partake in His sense of adventure, to share His enjoyment of created things, to sense His pleasure when we say "I love You," back.
I'm so glad we're friends.