Long-time Friends

I could have attended a large university like many in my family did.  I could have attended a medium sized university where I had a baseball scholarship offer.  I chose to attend a small, Baptist college in a small west Texas town.  Having grown up in Houston from the third grade through High School graduation, everything at Howard Payne College in Brownwood, Texas was new to me, including my second semester roommate, who was a pre-Agriculture major from “out of Lometa, Texas.” From living in a dormitory, to eating in a dining hall, to making friends with students with whom I had almost nothing in common, I was on a steep learning curve.  In my pre-college days, I had attended eight schools in twelve years, living in six towns.  When I married my college sweetheart, only three non-family members, who were friends before college, attended the wedding. So, transition was not entirely new.  What was new was making acquaintances who would become life-long friends.  It was an unadvertised benefit of our small college, where “everybody was somebody.”  I thank God for men and women with whom I have been friends for six decades. If there are university reunions in heaven, ours will certainly not be the largest, but it might be the sweetest.  “The Message” paraphrases Proverbs 27:9 as, “A sweet friendship refreshes the soul.”  Give thanks today for long-time friends.