Get Interested in the Interests of Your Friends by Rick Warren

“Some of these people have missed the most important thing in life — they don’t know God” (1 Timothy 6:21 TLB).

The key to a friendship with God is deciding whose friendship you want most.


You don’t have time for everybody to be your friend. You’ve got to decide who you want most to be your best friend.

The Bible says in 1 Timothy 6:21, “Some of these people have missed the most important thing in life — they don’t know God” (TLB).

They know all the baseball scores. They know the stock market quotes. They know the top 10 songs. They know who’s in and who’s out in every soap opera. But they don’t know God. They missed the most important thing in life!

If you’re not a friend of God, it means you care about something else more. James 4:4 says, “You should know that loving the world is the same as hating God. Anyone who wants to be a friend of the world becomes God’s enemy” (NCV).

When James writes, “loving the world,” he means loving the value system of the world. God wants you to love people, but that doesn’t mean you have to love the world’s value system. We get so caught up in the distractions of life that we tend to do just the opposite. We love the world’s value system, but then we don’t love people. We love materialism. We love pleasure. We love popularity. We love prestige. We love passion, possessions, and position.

But God loves people, and he wants us to love them too. One way we show our love to others is to show an interest in their interests. In other words, what is important to you becomes important to me (always within the context of biblical truth).

If you’re going to be a friend of God, then you’ve got to care about what God cares about and stop caring about the things God doesn’t care about. God doesn’t care about your image. He’s not interested in your status. He’s interested in your character — not how you look but who you are. An essential step toward friendship with God means choosing to value what God values.

Talk It Over

What gets in the way of you being a friend of God? What kind of adjustments could you make in your thoughts or behavior?
Is there something more important to you than knowing God? What is it? Why?
Describe the relationship you have with your best friend. How does it compare to the relationship you have with God?
What are some things that you know God values? How important are those things to you?