Wisdom in Your Friendships | Chris Lynch

Sunday, July 26th, 2026

This week in our How Life Actually Works series, we continued through Proverbs by looking at the people we allow to shape our lives. Proverbs reminds us that we don’t become wise in isolation—we are formed by the people we walk with, listen to, and let close.

We talked about the difference between being surrounded and being truly known. Real community helps carry our burdens, speak truth when we need it, and point us back to God when life gets heavy.

The invitation is simple: be intentional about who has access to your life. Because who you walk with shapes who you become.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

I want to start by talking about two of the great theologians of our time. Kevin Hart and The Rock. That's right. If you don't know who these two are, they're not actually theologians. They're actors and they co-star a ton of films together. They're also really good friends. And so this scene is from Central Intelligence, the movie where The Rock is uh like swaddling Kevin Hart. Uh it took them so many takes because they couldn't stop making each other laugh. Uh I'll just like the the bloopers for the movie are longer than the movie, so that should tell you everything you need to know. Uh and in other interviews, they always go completely sideways, so they're making fun of each other, bannering, joking back and forth. And you just know underneath all the jokes, all the laughter, is a true friendship. I mean, they're so close that they even begin to dress like each other from time to time. It's a crazy photo. And in some other recent photos that are definitely not AI, it's getting kind of hard to tell the difference between the two. It's good. But in all seriousness, those are some of the signs of a close friendship. You begin to talk like them, you begin to joke like them, you begin to dress like them. Have you ever noticed that you start to become like the people you spend the most time with? And if you still don't believe me, walk into any middle or elementary school right now and say six seven. Every parent and teacher should know what I'm talking about. And it's funny and it's innocent when it's just a phrase. But what happens when it becomes more than that? What happens when you spend so much time with certain people that you need them to pick up their habits? Or their perspectives, maybe their view of God or of themselves. Whether we realize it or not, who we walk with, it shapes, who we become. And as you continue in our series today, how life works, as we're going through the book of Proverbs, we're gonna see that who you walk with. You know, who's who you surround yourself with matters. We live in the most connected generation ever, and yet statistics also show us that we live in one of the most involved generations ever. So what that tells me is it's not just about the amount of people in your life. It's about who's in your life. And it matters because you could be a young adult with a phone full of contacts and a calendar full of plans, and maybe you don't know who to call when you're struggling. You could be married, raising kids, falling asleep next to someone every single night, and maybe you feel like nobody really knows what's going on inside you. Maybe you're retired, or you're an empty nester, or maybe you're divorced, or you're widowed. You know, maybe the house got quieter, the rhythms changed. Somewhere along the way, your circle got smaller than you expected. So the question is not just do I have people around me? It's do I have people that know me? You know, who is shaping me? Who would I call when I'm struggling and I need it the most? It can be easy to think that wisdom is having all the right answers, making all the right choices, and figuring out life all on our own. But the truth is that wisdom is an understanding that God has the right answers. We need to lean on him to make the right choices. And it's wise. Figure out life with other God-fearing people. People who, when life gets heavy, they know more than just their needs. Let me start by praying for us. Father, would you open our hearts, our eyes, and our ears to what you have to say to us today? Allow us to be receptive to your message. Remove me from the equation. Would you let your will be done today? Amen. If you got your Bibles, you can open up to Proverbs chapter 13. In verse 20, it tells us, Walk with the wise and become wise. For a companion of fools suffers harm. King Solomon, he frequently uses this term, walk with, as a synonym to living one's life with. It's less, you know, a physical action of walking, and it's more so a picture encompassing direction, influence, formation. You could say, do life with the wise and become wise. Because if you do life with a company of wise people, you will not be able to help but pick up on some of those experiences and the knowledge that they have. So what this verse is telling us is do all you can to walk with the wise. Get in their life, you know, not just know of the wise, not just observe the wise from a distance, waiting for them to come into your life, walk with them. Because, uh, and if you're taking notes, you can write this down. Proverbs tells us that wisdom is contagious. But it also tells us so is foolishness, for a companion of fools suffers harm. Jim Moroni famously said, you are the average of the five people that you spend the most time with. Now, whether or not that's you know mathematically true or not, what he's saying is that the people you led have the most access to your life, whether you like it or not, they will influence you. So, for example, if you hang out with people who are very disciplined, you know, they are consistent in their routines, they wake up at the same time every day, you will begin to pick up on some of those habits and become more disciplined yourself. If you hang out with people who, you know, they they like basketball. Every time you go over to their house, the game's on, or you know, when you guys hang out, they're playing at the park. You will inevitably start to watch and play more basketball. Just how it works. You guys are gonna say this one with me. If you hang out with people who are joyful, you will become more. That was really weak. Let's do it one more time. If you hang out with people who are joyful, you will become more very, very good. And I'm so sorry for this person wearing the jersey in the back. But if you hang out with Chargers fans, you will become sad and discouraged. It's just, I don't make the rules. I'm sorry. I'm joking, I'm joking. Kinda. Make it past the first round of playoffs, please. And on a more serious note, I just I want to gently say this. If you hang out with people who are constantly cutting corners, compromise might start to feel more normal. If you hang out with people who are consistently talking about men or women in derogatory ways, your view of men or women will begin to change. If you hang out with people who have their back turned to God, you will begin to walk away from God. If we connect this proverb to another verse in the Bible, in Amos 3:3, it says, Do two walk together unless they have agreed to do so. In other words, walking with someone, it's not accidental. It's an act of agreement. It's a choice. So begin choosing today who you let have the most access to your life. Because wise people make wisdom feel normal, and foolish people make foolishness feel normal. Is there someone in your life that maybe you need to give less attention to? Are there people in your life that you just feel maybe exhausted around? Or that, you know, when they come around, your anxiety levels rise. Think about the person that you'd like to become one day. Think about who God's calling you to be, and then think: am I surrounding myself with people who are bringing me closer or further away from that? So now you know why you need it. Let me tell you what it looks like. Let's be honest. There are levels to friendship, right? Like you'll have the people who like your post on Instagram or they'll uh they'll send you memes, they'll watch the game with you. And there's nothing wrong with that. But then there's a different category of friendship. I'm talking about the people who will help you move, right? Like they'll they'll show up to your house and they'll help you move a 500-pound dresser, or they'll help you carry your oddly shaped couch down a spiral staircase. Or, you know, maybe you forgot to pack and so they're helping you sort through your underwear. You know, like that that's a that's a true friend right there. And this is because, watch this. Friendship isn't revealed when life is easy or when it's fun. It's revealed when life gets inconvenient. Proverbs says it this way. Chapter 17, verse 17 says, A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity. Let me give you an example. Jesus, the guy who had the greatest mission there ever was, ever will be, it literally commissioned to save the world. You know what the first thing he did was? Get 12 guys around him, three of whom were part of his inner circle, Peter, James, and John, guys who were closest to him, guys who were most connected to him, guys that when Jesus was about to face the masses and be crucified, he asked them to come with him to the garden and pray for him. And so if Jesus had people around him to pray for him when he was at his lowest, to help him when he was struggling, why do we think we shouldn't have that? If Jesus lived intentionally with his relationships, why do we think we can live casually with ours? We need friends who will walk with us when life gets hard, you know, who won't leave when you're struggling, or when it's maybe inconvenient to love you at the time? People who are connected to your life and will pray for you when you're at your lowest. So my question to you is could you name three people right now that know the real you and would stay if life got heavy? Proverbs 1824, it says, One who has unreliable friends soon comes to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. Now, this is interesting. The ESV version of this verse says, a man of many companions may come to ruin, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. Can we switch to the next slide? Yeah. It's interesting to me here. The unreliable friends and many companions, they're interchangeable. I'll tell you why. I don't got time to go into the full origins of each word, but it's actually very interesting what it says. Basically, a companion is someone who accompanies you or who you share time with centered around a specific task, journey, or circumstance. A friend is centered on the relationship that you have with that person. So what I'm saying is, don't confuse proximity with friendship. You can be in 30 group chats, you know, you're gonna have plans every weekend, every surrounded by people all the time. You know everybody's business, everybody knows your name, and still not be known. So here's the second thing that you can write down. It's that a crowded life and a connected life are not the same thing. Think about the story of the prodigal son. If you haven't heard it, it's about uh the son, he takes his inheritance early from his father, basically saying to him, like, I want you to die so I can get the money that's coming to me. And he takes it and he goes off into a far-off country living lavishly and wild. And it doesn't say specifically, but I imagine that when he had all these people around him, or he had all his money around him, he probably had people around him, right? But then the money ran out. The party ended, the famine came, and the crowd disappeared. He ended up eating with the pigs because it's literally said no one would give him anything. Maybe some of us have had that moment. You know, probably not in a pig pen, but in our own way. Where we thought we were surrounded, and then something happened. Life got heavy, and we looked around us and we realized you know, I got all these people around me, but does anybody actually know me? Companions can share your fun. Friends can share your burden. So don't confuse a companion with a friend. Don't confuse a crowd with connection. So now you know why you need it, what it looks like. You might be wondering, well, how do I get it? I'm gonna dive into some history first and some biblical context. It's gonna set up what you have to do to get it, so bear with me. Proverbs 27, 17 says, as iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. Now, sharpening iron, it's no easy task. You know, it's strong enough to break through rocks. And so when I think of someone who sharpens iron, my picture, uh, my mind immediately goes to a blacksmith. And in the movies, the picture of a blacksmith is someone who's, you know, super big, strong, huge muscles, right, long beard, carrying a bunch of tools. That's because sharp watch it, sharpening iron or changing iron is not easy. You know, hammers pound and sparks fly, and the iron is heated up and then it's cooled down and then it's twisted. It can be really loud and uncomfortable to get rid of its rough edges. That's because change isn't easy. Think about some examples of change with me, right? Getting physically fit. You know, it's not an overnight process, it's a continual process. Going to the gym, consistently running, learning a new language that takes time and perseverance. In the same way, becoming more like Jesus takes effort to let go of who you are and to step into who he's calling you to be. And what Proverbs is telling us here is that other wise Christians, the people around you, can it can provide the friction and the accountability necessary to build you, to sharpen you into a wiser person. If nobody in your life can challenge you or correct you or call you higher, I hate to break it to you. You're not surrounded by friends. You're surrounded by a bunch of fans. Can I just say, fans will be quick to cheer you on when things are going really, really well, and just as quickly turn their back on you when things aren't going so well. So our final point, if you want to write this down, is seek out friends, not fans. I mentioned before how you're the average of the five people that you spend the most time with, and I'd like to take that a step further and say, you're the average of the five biggest influences on your life. The average time spent on social media in the US is two hours and 16 minutes per day. Magnifying that scope to ages 18 to 24, that number jumps to three hours and six minutes daily. That's about one and a half months out of the 12 that you live in a year spent with your best friend social media. Can I just say that the algorithms on social media they show you more of what you're already thinking? It's an echo chamber. For example, if you watch a video on dogs and you you like the video, double tap, the algorithm will take that and give you more videos on dogs. If your watch time goes up on sports, you know, baseball, basketball, whatever, your watch time it goes up. Algorithm will take that, give you more videos on sports. That's how it works. Now, say you watch a video on you know moving in silence or playing mind games with the opposite gender. Or maybe a video pops up that you shouldn't be looking at. And instead of scrolling away, your watch time goes up. The algorithm, it's not gonna move you away from isolation, toxic relationships, or lust. It's gonna give you more and more and more. And so I just this is this is heavy on my heart. I just want to gently speak, but also very firmly speak to the people whose age start with a two or end in teen. And I'm including myself in this. I'm not saying, you know, social media is evil or that you gotta burn your phone or throw it away. Here's what I'm saying. If you're not careful, you could spend hours, days, weeks, months being discipled by a screen that will never challenge or correct you towards wisdom? So my question is this Who or what has been discipling you lately? A person? A screen? Is it making you wiser or just more convinced that you're already right? And can someone who will something like that that will cheer you all the way down to destruction is not your friend. It's not your friend. So during the Iron Age, when Proverbs was written, uh back then when you wanted to sharpen iron, one of the tools that you could have used, it was called a file. I think we have a picture up here on screen. Now, if the file was made of identical iron to the piece that was being sharpened, it would result in the two pieces wearing each other down. In order for the file to be effective, it had to be placed in a furnace to become harder and stronger than the piece it was working on. The wisdom that you're looking for in life, you know, how to follow Jesus, how to build a healthy marriage, how to parent, how to handle money. It can be found in the Word of God, but also in the people who have been through the furnace of life and are mentally stronger and wiser than you are. I'm talking about people who can mentor you through different seasons of your life. And I want to make a distinction here. Not every friend is a mentor. Not every mentor has to become your best friend. Some of you don't need more friends. Some of you need a mentor. Look around you for a second. Look to your left and look to your right. The wisdom that you need in your life that you're looking for, it's not on TikTok. It's not on Instagram reels. It's sitting in the minds and the lives of the people around you. But you gotta seek it out. You can't just wait for it to come to you. If you come across a wise person, walk with the wise, you gotta do everything you can to get in their life. Obviously, not being overbearing. But for example, I had a friend and a mentor who I wanted to get advice from in a specific area, too. So here's another key point is that the person that you're looking for wisdom in or where you're seeking wisdom in, they don't gotta be better than you at everything in your like, you know, they just maybe they're just better at you than you at that one specific thing that you're seeking wisdom in. And so he had already done something that I was about to enter into and I wanted to get advice from him. And he said, he's like, I got 45 minutes in the morning when I walk my dogs. He's busy, as most wise people usually are. Everybody wants their time. And so I literally asked him, I said, Can I bring you coffee and walk your dogs with you and ask you questions? That's literally what I did. What I'm trying to say is, you know, don't let inconvenience stop you from seeking out wisdom. I feel like some of us think that wisdom's gonna one day just magically fall into our laps, like, God, give me wisdom. It's just gonna, you know, in your brain, right then and there. It's not how it works. What Proverbs is telling us is that when you need sharpening, you gotta seek it out. You walk with the wise, you invite correction. And here's the thing: you might not like what they have to say. It might be uncomfortable, maybe loud, to get rid of your rough edges. That's how growth happens. That's how sharpening happens. If you're in high school, you know, you need wise people around you to help you figure out who you are before the world tells you who to be. If you're in college or you're starting your career, uh, you know, a new career, you need people, wise people around you who can help you make good decisions based off of wisdom and not off emotion. If you're a newly married couple, seek out the older married couple who you look up to. If you're raising kids, seek out the people who've been through that season. And once again, if you're an empty nester or retired or divorced or widowed, you still need people walking. With you because watch this. New seasons require new wisdom. And for those of you who might be in that last category, or you're you're just further down the road, would you allow me to say to you that you're not done? We've talked a lot about seeking wisdom from the older wiser person. And maybe you are the older wiser person. You follow Jesus through the storms and you raise kids and you've stayed faithful through suffering and loss. You've made a lot of mistakes. You've learned from them. There is wisdom in you that people here desperately need. I heard a pastor say this one time, and I really like it. He said, if you've got a pulse, God's got a purpose. I believe that. There are many sports where the game is decided in the final minute. For those of you who watch the World Cup, if Spain just you know gave up and all their players decided to sit down in the last five minutes, they would have lost that game. So some of the greatest impact you might have in your life, it might not be what you accomplish next. It might be who you strengthen next. So for some of us, you know, the next step is finding someone ahead of us. For others of us, it's finding someone behind us and helping them get up to where you are. But for all of us, it's choosing the people who walk beside us. Because when life gets heavy and you feel like the weight of the world is against you, you're gonna need people who can speak wisdom into your life. I want to share a story. It's from uh September 17th, a little over 10 months ago. Um I was a new grad, I was back in San Diego. Uh, and honestly, life felt wide open. You know, I I had these dreams and a couple opportunities I felt like God was really calling me into. Um that night I went to uh the young adults group here at Create. Uh it was great. You know, it was my first real experience with the people at this church that were my age. And people were kind and some awkward conversations, but come on. I'm awkward, you're awkward, we're all awkward. I remember thinking to myself, man, these are people that are really seeking after Jesus. I'll take the awkward to be part of something like that. As I was driving home, I started to feel my my hands shake, my my vision got blurry, and I got home and I had one of the biggest anxiety attacks of my life. And my lungs closed up and I couldn't breathe, and I ended up crippled on my bathroom floor because my room felt too big. And I I needed somewhere small. To give you some context, uh, I've suffered from anxiety attacks my whole life, and as a kid, I'd be, you know, I'd be like pounding on my heart, saying, It hurts. It hurts. And so there I was, I was on my bathroom floor, same thing, pounding my heart, trying to get air. My first thought was I need to call someone who could be there for me. I need to call a friend and not a fan. For me, that was my parents, and so I picked up the phone and I hesitated. I lived on the East Coast, and so that's where they are, and it was 3 a.m. their time, and so uh I didn't think they would pick up. So I didn't. And in that isolation, in the silence, I heard a voice in my head say, How are you gonna do all that God has called you to if you're still dealing with this? You dealt with it then, you're dealing with it now, you'll probably deal with this forever. How are you gonna do it? And for the first time in my life, I thought, maybe I won't. You know? Maybe I'm not meant to step into what God's got for me right now. Maybe I'm meant to stay hidden and that this is just who I am. That's what isolation does. Isolation makes lies sound like the truth. Eventually I decided to call my parents and they picked up, you know? And I told them what was going on, what I was feeling. And instead of letting me agree with the lies that my mind was telling me, they told me the truth. They reminded me that God's not done with you. God's not done with you yet. They reminded me that what God puts inside of a person matters, and that the world needs the plans and the purposes that He's put on my life. He's not finished with me yet. So I got up and I kept going. Not because I was suddenly strong or anything, or that I beat anxiety. No. It's because I had people close to me. Not close in proximity. They were across the country. Close to my heart. People who knew me and could speak truth into my life when my mind was telling me lies. I'd like to invite the rest of the band to come up. As I was writing this sermon out, I felt a little push from the spirit, I think, to say this to you guys today. So here it is. Some of you are worn out and tired from all that life has thrown at you in your career, in your relationships, your marriage, that family situation, and that habit that you just can't stop doing. And the anxiety or the depression that you think will never go away. Maybe you're on the bathroom floor and you're thinking about giving up. Would you just listen to me for one second? God's not done with you yet. He's not done with you yet. You might feel like you've missed it. That you've been fighting the same battle for years that you're too far behind, you've made too many mistakes, and that there's too much shame. It's not too much for God. And he's not finished with you yet. Before you ever felt shame or anxiety or regret, he saw you. He knew you. He loved you. Before you ever had failure attached to your name, he had a purpose attached to your life. He's got a plan for you. He laid out a purpose in your life before you were even born. You're not some accident trying to find meaning. You're the greatest creation of a God who doesn't make mistakes. The same God who came down to this earth as a man. He didn't wait till we, you know, cleaned ourselves off or fixed ourselves up. No. He came near to this world when this world was still broken. And he walked with us. He broke bread with us. And then he took the brokenness of the world and put it on his back. He took your sins and my sins and he carried it up a hill and he took our place on the cross with nails in his hands and in his feet and a crown of thorns on his head. He breathed his last. And he died. For you, for me. For greater love has no one than this. That someone laid down his life for his friends. He's the perfect friend. He's the perfect friend. And three days later he rose and the tomb was empty and he defeated death. And so, if he can bring dead things back to life, why do you think he can't bring life back out of you? Nothing is too much for God, and nothing can cancel the calling that he's put on your life. The panic attack doesn't cancel the calling of God. The depression you're going through doesn't cancel the calling of God. The divorce that you went through, it doesn't cancel the calling of God. The mistake that you made five, ten, twenty years ago does not cancel the calling he has on your life. The addiction doesn't cancel the calling of God because it doesn't matter how many times you've messed up. All that matters is that you get back up. You come back to him. For though the righteous fall seven times, they rise again. You're gonna fall. We all will. All that matters is that you rise and he'll pull you back to him. By his grace, he will help you. And more often than not, the way that he reaches out and pulls you back to him, it's through his community. Sometimes the way the perfect friend shows up in your life is through imperfect people. And I hate to break it to you. If you want to live out the past and the purposes that he's put on your life, and you're still here thinking, oh, I got this, you don't got this. You don't. Not on your own. And that's not weakness. It's wisdom. Seek out and invest in godly community. Watch it change your life. Because wisdom doesn't walk alone. So why should you? Let me pray. Father, we we believe. We believe in your way. We believe. Would you help our unbelief? We want to do things the right way. We want to do things your way. There are people here that are longing for community. They're sensing a gap in their life that only you can fill, that only you can provide. So would you see them? Would you answer them? Would you show your face? Provide community. Provide people. Provide open doors. And would you give us the courage to walk through them? Would you allow us to walk in your obedience to what you have to say? Because your way is better. Your way is so much better. Would you allow us to do things your way?