Friendship: Drew Hunter

Episode Transcript

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Friendship

Guest:Drew Hunter

From the series:Made for Friendship (Day 1 of 2)

Air date:April 20, 2026

Drew (00:04):

We are, in some ways, the most connected generation ever—social media and the internet, and ways of connecting over text messages and phone calls—never have people been able to connect this quickly with this many people. And yet, we are the most disconnected generation as well.

Ann (00:28):

Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Ann Wilson.

Dave (00:34):

And I’m Dave Wilson, and you can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is FamilyLife Today.

Ann (00:47):

Did you have a best friend, growing up?

Dave (00:51):

I knew you were going to ask me that. I literally thought—the first name came to my mind—Marty Jordan.

Ann (00:57):

You’ve had so many friends; you always have a friend. You didn’t have a best friend?

Dave (01:01):

I was in New Jersey; and then, Mom and Dad divorced. I ended up in Ohio, and Marty Jordan was one of my best friends all the way through college. And then, he passed. You don’t even know Marty.

Ann (01:14):

I met him.

Dave (01:15):

I know that his mom listens. I’ve gotten direct messages, every once in a while, from his mom.

Ann (01:21):

I feel like you’re unusual in that you’ve always had really good friends. My dad and my brothers—I have two brothers and my dad—they were really good friends with one another, but they really didn’t have many friends. I thought you were really unique, because you had so many male friends.

Dave (01:39):

I do remember when Jim, your brother’s son, came up for a while—like a week—and stayed with us in Michigan. Remember what he said?

Ann (01:46):

Yeah.

Dave (01:46):

He goes, “You have guys coming over like every other day. I’ve never seen anything quite like that.”

Ann (01:49):

Yeah; “People are walking in the door all the time. What’s going on?”

Dave (01:53):

I love that!

Today, we’re talking about friendship, obviously. We’ve got Drew Hunter in the studio. I guess you’re the expert on friendship?

Drew (02:00):

I don’t know if I’d call myself an expert; but I’ve thought about it a lot, and care about it a lot, and want to help other people think and care about it.

Dave (02:07):

You’ve done a lot of thinking on a topic a lot of people don’t do a lot of thinking on. Your book is called Made for Friendship: The Relationship that Halves Our Sorrows and Doubles Our Joys.

I’ll ask you what Ann just asked me: “Did you have a best friend, growing up?”

Drew (02:22):

I did. Although, I think, as you were talking, I was thinking about two who were probably both my best friends: Derek and Brett. I grew up in Northern Illinois when I was younger. They were in my neighborhood, and we had a lot of woods around us. We just spent a lot of time growing up, as friends. There’s some goofy pictures of us.

Dave (02:44):

How about today?

Drew (02:47):

I think, if I was to say one person was my best friend, it’d be my brother, Trent, who’s become my closest friend. But I kind of intentionally don’t think about someone as a best friend; because I have several who are close. At least, for me, I don’t want to pick one over others. I have several I’m really close to and have unique relationships with.

Ann (03:05):

And when you say that, as a woman, you’re afraid that it’s going to hurt your other friends’ feelings.

Dave: Really?

Ann: Yeah.

Well, Drew, you’re married; and you have four sons.

Drew: Yep.

Ann: Do you want your sons to have friends?

Drew (03:16):

Yes. We talk about that a lot, about choosing friends wisely. We talk about kids at school. We want them to have a mindset that they’re friendly with everyone; so there’s not going to be a sense of: “Well, you’re not my friend; therefore, I shouldn’t care about you.”

It takes a lot of wisdom to pick your friends well, because you become like your friends. We see that happening in their life already. So we want them to have good friends; to be good friends; and to think about that, growing up.

Ann (03:40):

Why’d you write about this?

Drew (03:42):

A few reasons. When I first started thinking about the topic, it was about probably 12 or 13 years ago now. I was teaching through Proverbs. I sat down, with the book of Proverbs, and just would read through it and collect themes. I wanted to say: “What are the most prominent themes in Proverbs?” and “I’ll collect what Proverbs says about it and teach on those themes.”

I was not expecting friendship to be part of the list. I was expecting money, words—from reading through Proverbs over the years—I had just not seen just how significant friendship was in particular. Even relationships—I was thinking about loving people, loving your neighbor, marriage relationships, those kinds of things—but I was struck by how many very specific and striking things Proverbs said about friendship.

I started to study it. And then, as I was studying that week, it drew me to John 15, where Jesus calls His disciples friends. I just realized, “My goodness, I’ve read this, who knows how many times. I have a category for it, at some level; but I have not really taken this as seriously and internalized this as I should.”

(04:47) That week was really pivotal for me. And then, after that, I just kept thinking about friendship. I had friends, growing up. Through my life, I valued friendships; but I realized: “I’ve not really thought about it, or thought about it deeply, or much at all.” I think that week I realized: “I’ve never spent five straight minutes thinking, intentionally, about this. I’ve read books about marriage, and parenting now; but never read anything on friendship, never had conversations or heard lectures or sermons directly on friendship.”

I started talking to people about this and realized their experience was the same. We all really value friendship; but we realized, after thinking about it—I had one friend, who said to me, [as]I was talking to him about this—after we started talking for a few minutes, said, “I’m a really lousy friend.” That’s common. I disagreed with him, because he’s one of my friends; he’s a great friend. But we do realize that, without intentionality, there are gaps in our lives here.

(05:31) Those are a few things. And then, over time, why it ended up being a book is because just noticing that there really weren’t, at the time, many resources at all, from a biblical Christian perspective on friendship. It seemed to be lacking—and then, we continue to be in a steep decline in just experiencing friendship—plenty of studies show that. All those things came together to create the need for this book a few years ago.

Ann (06:02):

I’ve talked to so many wives. We’ll talk about our friendship, and we’ll talk about our husband’s friendship. I can’t tell you how many wives say: “My husband says he doesn’t need any friends,” and “I’m his only friend,” and “I’m the only friend that he needs.” Have you heard that before, Dave?

Dave (06:18):

Yeah; we were talking earlier that: 30 years of preaching, I bet I did a message or two a year on friendship or community; [we’re] made for friendship, made for community. I remember a stat—I tried to find it—years ago, that there was a study done of American men. If I’m remembering it right, it said nine out of ten American men say they do not have one true friend.

Drew (06:43):

Wow.

Dave (06:44):

They have a lot of acquaintances, work buddies. It was interesting: the study went on to say, when they were boys, they had friends; but as they grew into men, and got involved in their lives, and marriages, and things, it’s not something the average American guy—I don’t know how it compares to other men around the world—but in America, we, often, don’t have a real, what we call a real friendship. Did you find that as well?

Drew (07:10):

Yeah; in fact, I remember someone making a joke, at one point, when I was talking about friendship. He said, “Yeah, we have this newly-found miracle of Jesus: He had

12 close friends in His 30s.”

Ann: Wow!

Drew: Because it’s just so rare. We have it early in life. If you go to college, college can often be a pressure cooker for friendship; because you have so many overlapping spheres of life—where the people you go to church with, or in ministry with, or have class with, or where you live—overlap. And then, we get out of college; and then, we move around. There’s so many factors that lead to it, but we end up friendless.

A lot of studies are showing those kinds of statistics, where they’ll just interview a lot of people. Cigna Health Insurance did a study, a number of years ago; and they found that half of the people would say that their relationships aren’t really meaningful to them. Something like 40 percent said that no one really knows them at all, which is another way of saying they don’t actually have a friend—or even a family member—they consider that close. So 40 percent are saying, candidly: “No one really knows me.”

Dave (08:10):

You tell me, because you just wrote about this: “Are we living in one of the loneliest times in history?”

Drew (08:18):

I think so. I think others can point to that; I think studies would show that. What’s really unique about this though is that we are, in some ways, the most connected generation ever—

Dave (08:28):

Yeah, with our devices.

Drew (08:29):

Absolutely—social media and the internet, and ways of connecting over text messages and phone calls—never have people been able to connect this quickly with this many people. And yet, we are the most disconnected generation as well. We’re the most connected, disconnected generation because studies are showing we don’t actually have real life-on-life, face-to-face, heart-on-heart, soul-on-soul friendships. We’re in a really unique position right now.

Ann (08:57):

So why is it important? Teach us; you’ve done all this study. I think wives are like, “This is important, and I want my husband to hear it. ”

Dave (09:05):

Wait, wait. Why are we talking just about “…my husband to hear it”? You don’t think women need to hear it as well?

Ann (09:11):

Yeah, I think we do, too. I think women are lonelier than they have been in the past, too. We all get so busy—we’re taking care—you guys know: we’re taking care of our kids; we’re going to church; we’re in our jobs; and we think, “Do [I] have enough time for friends?”

I’m just talking about the women that I know and talk to: they feel bad for their husbands, so I’m going to hit the husbands a little bit.

Dave (09:36):

Okay; hit the husbands.

Drew (09:37):

It certainly is an issue for both genders, and in different ages and spheres of life. There’s a lot of angles that you can look at friendship to see our need for it. If you just start at Page 1 of the Bible, you see our need for it. God creates this wonder world. He creates these different realms of sky, land, sea—fills it with communal life—gets to the sixth day and creates humanity. He makes humanity in His image; and then, they’re called to go fill the world with communal fruitful life and joy. That’s the commission for Adam and Eve to do: to fill the world with human society and friendship.

(10:22) But what’s interesting—in those first pages of the Bible—God says He makes humanity in His own image; and He speaks of Himself in the plural: “Let Us make man in Our image.” Now, we don’t explicitly see the trinity there; but we see that God is a plurality. It doesn’t take long, reading the Bible, we find out Father, Son, and Spirit have made humanity in the image, then, of a triune God.

(10:35) Before there was creation, or any men or women, there was God: Father, Son, and Spirit as an eternal fellowship of love. God—Richard Sibbes, a Puritan, put it this way—he said that God has a spreading goodness. He spreads His goodness, which means He didn’t create anything because He had a lack or a need; but because He wanted to share the fullness of His life and blessing. He creates humanity in His image—the image of a communal God—not because He needed us, but because He wanted to bless us. One of the blessings is to be made in the image of a God Who loves fellowship and community, this triune God of love. Humanity is made with this need to experience the fullness of joy in community with God and with one another. So we see that just on Page 1.

(11:23) And then, Chapter 2 rewinds into the sixth day of creation to talk about how that actually happened. When you read the first story of creation in Genesis 1, you see that God made humanity, Adam and Eve; everything’s very good. And then, Genesis 2 rewinds into that day; and then, shows the process. He started with Adam—He started just with one—Eve’s not made yet. He says about Adam: “It is not good that man should be alone.”

(11:51) What’s so striking about that is that, so far, we’ve just heard everything’s “good,” “good,” “good,” “very good.” And then, now, we rewind back into the sixth day and realize that there’s a moment when something was not good; so He makes Eve, not just as a spouse, but as a friend to create a world of friendship.

What’s also interesting here is that Adam hasn’t sinned yet. So the first problem in human history that God solves is that of companionship and friendship before sin’s even here: “It’s not good that man should be alone.” That’s a strong statement for why we need friendship. We’re made in the image of a God of love; we’re made for friendship. God Himself says, “It’s not good to be alone.”

(12:35) And then, you can go from there and see all the problems that happen when we are alone. Proverbs says that the one who isolates himself breaks out against all understanding and reason. We see what happens when people are put in solitary confinement. That’s just a little picture of what we’re all experiencing when we are lonely and isolated in life.

Ann (12:47):

The thing that I was thinking, too, as you were talking, Drew, was Scripture—how God, as He talks about His people, the Israelites—the Sabbath/the Shabbat is always together with people. He has so many celebrations where people are together. Food, when we eat—there’s this beauty of when we come together and we eat—it’s good for our souls. I think that, if that’s demonstrated in the Scriptures.

Drew (13:13):

Right. Yeah, I agree.

Dave (13:15):

One of the things I’ve done every year is fast. I used to do a two-week fast before Easter.

What are you laughing about?

Ann (13:23):

I think I know where you’re going with this.

Dave (13:25):

I don’t know if you know where I’m going.

What made me think of it is when you said eating with people is something you enjoy. One of the hardest things about fasting is that goes away. I can sit at a table with people, who are eating; and I’m really mad at them, because they’re eating and I’m not. But most of the time, you don’t sit down with people during that fast, which is obviously a different—you’re doing a spiritual discipline—but I never thought of that—when I first said, “I’m going to fast”; that I’m going to miss community. God has hardwired every human being to long for and need community.

Ann (14:00):

That’s why I was laughing; I thought, “I love it when you fast, but I also hate it; because, ‘Oh, this is no fun; we can’t eat together!’”

Drew (14:08):

You know what’s interesting about that is, when you fast from food, you end up appreciating food more and appreciating people. I think God has made food partly for the sake of friendship and community; I think you can make a biblical case for that.

What’s interesting, too, is—I was reading a book the past couple weeks—on the way that the digital world has influenced us—technology, and social media, and our addiction to our phones and all these things. I was really surprised about one part of his book, where he talked about solitude being really important; it was actually important for friendship and community. It was surprising because we wouldn’t think that; it’s like, “We’ll be around people.” He said, actually, we need solitude. We don’t have solitude anymore because our minds—and it’s not just being alone—it’s giving space for your minds to not be occupied doing something, even checking your phone, checking your mail, checking the news, checking social media. Our mind no longer has opportunity to relax and do what it does when it doesn’t have things going on, like it has for human history.

(15:22) He said when—and there’s studies that show this about what’s going on in the brain—when your mind doesn’t have a task to do, it defaults into using a part of your brain that thinks socially. It’s even measured in infants, so this is just hardwired. Our mind defaults to think about our relationships. I thought, “That’s so interesting”; because, recently, I’ll go out on my deck and just sit there by myself on some evenings or make a fire.

Dave (15:33):

Wait, wait. You got four boys and you get to sit on a deck by yourself?

Drew (15:36):

It’s at like 9 at night; it’s already dark, and I’m exhausted. I’ll get it for a little bit, and I’ll make a fire. I start thinking about friendships; and actually, valuing them more. That’s the point in this book, actually, is that our digital addictions are making friendships worse—not just because we’re spending time away from friends, kind of connecting in superficial ways—but because we don’t have time for solitude, where we actually think about our relationships and value them more. I inevitably find myself calling a friend, or just thinking about my friends and valuing them when I am alone.

There is a balance we need. Actually, solitude can help us engage with friends, not just being alone with our phone, but actually reflecting on life. Perhaps one of our lacks of friendship in life is partly because we don’t even have this space anymore in this culture to think about what’s valuable, what’s important in life: “What do I want to spend my time doing?”

Dave (16:30):

You know, before we continue, let me just say this to the listener: at FamilyLife, we really believe strong families can change the world. And when you become a FamilyLife Partner, you help make that happen.

Ann (16:41):

And I don’t know if you realize this: your monthly gift helps us equip marriages and families with biblical tools that they can count on.

Dave (16:49):

Now, that’s a pretty good deal. And we also want to send you exclusive updates, behind-the-scenes access, and an invitation to our Private Partner Community, which is pretty cool. So join us, and let’s reach families and marriages together.

Ann (17:02):

You can go to FamilyLifeToday.com, and click the “Donate” button to join today.

Dave (17:12):

Since I left the pastorate after 30 years—Ann has heard me say this—it’s like, “Wow, I’m lonelier now than I’ve ever been.” It’s a sense that I don’t go to a—we used to go to the office every day—and there’s all these staff and people around. There’s the other side—”I don’t want to be around any of these people. They bug me, and I bug them,” but you’re around people every day.

Now, we’re in a world that’s a little different. A lot of what Ann and I do is alone. We have each other, which is awesome; but I’m not around as many men as I used to be. How do you—a guy like me; or even—you’re in a different stage of life, so you’re probably around people a lot; and you’re sort of like I was like, “I want to get away for the solitude bite.” But if you’re a person, who doesn’t have a lot of friendships—man or woman—how would you encourage them? How do you develop that?

Drew (18:02):

Yeah, there’s a lot of things that you can do. One of the things is just making sure you do value it properly and just recognize this is a non-negotiable in life. Seeing that work is important; family’s important, if you have one; certainly, marriage should be your best friend/best friendship, but not your only friendship. Recognizing that you need to make it a non-negotiable; and then, building in space for it. There’s a lot of things you can do.

I think one of the things you can do is schedule it. Just think about the non-negotiables in life; everyone has them:

Eating.

For some people, exercising.

Reading the Bible and prayer.

Work.

Eating as a family.

If those things are important, you build your life around them. You have predictable rhythms and times that you do them.

Friendship should be just put into our calendars like that, too. There’s a lot of ways you can do it. My wife and I will often have seasons where we just reserve one evening a week, a Wednesday or Thursday, when we put hospitality on our calendar. We’re going to invite people over and spend time. We have that reserved for people to be in our home, either for dinner—although, in our family life, it’s a bit crazier now—so we wait until a little bit later for dessert, or drinks, or something afterward. Or you can say, “Lunch”—during my work week—”I’m going to have lunch with this person every week.”

(19:18) Or you have it open with someone—you just know: “On Mondays, I have lunch with a friend,”—and then, you schedule it that way. I have coffee, every other week, with a friend of mine at about 3:30 on Tuesdays right now. That’s where we spend time getting together throughout the weeks and have a lot of conversations in everyday life, but we’ve just made sure to reserve that time to make sure we’re talking openly and honestly about struggles in life, challenges in life, things we’re encouraged about, confessing sin to one another, all of those things.

Scheduling it is a huge one. There’s a lot of steps, but those would be a couple that would be first ones to take.

Dave (19:53):

One thing, even as you say that, I think, “How often does the typical guy”—and I don’t know if women feel the same way—I’ve said this: “I got to work out. I got to get three workouts/four workouts in a week.” I don’t think I’ve ever said, “I got to meet with a buddy.” Like you said—“We’re made for friendship,”—so it’s that important.

Ann (20:13):

I have; I’ve thought that, Dave, because I know—for my emotional wellbeing and spiritual wellbeing—I need to be with my friends. I have to have somebody, besides you, who knows everything about me, that I can be incredibly vulnerable with. I can tell them secrets; I can tell them things that I’m struggling with. I can tell them how I’m frustrated with Dave, and they’re going to pray.

Dave (20:35):

I even told her one year: I said, “Go ahead, tell them how much of an idiot I am.”

Ann (20:40):

He said that; he’s the pastor!

Dave (20:40):

“You don’t have to cover it up.”

Ann (20:43):

I’m like, “So you’re saying—you’re the pastor of the church—and you’re saying I can tell my friends anything?” You go, “Yep, you can just go ahead and tell them.” I thought that was incredibly humble of you.

Dave (20:52):

What about married couples? Do you think they need other married couples as friends?

Drew (20:57):

Yes, other married couples; yes. And even just the man having other friends, who are men, and the women having other friends, who are women; I think both/and are really important. I know that some people get married; I’ve heard plenty of stories where both people have friends, who then get really hurt; because they’re just cut out of life, because the couple gets married; and then, they put all of their friendship into that marriage. Other people are hurt by that.

(21:21) And then, something happens down the road; and the marriage ends for all sorts of reasons; and eventually, death as long—might be a sobering thought—but unless the Lord takes them at the same time, one of them is going to be unmarried again. That’s devastating if you have no other friends; it’s not the way it was supposed to be. We’re supposed to enjoy rich friendship.

I think even having other friends—both couples and even just men, having other men as friends, and women having other women as friends—strengthens the marriage. Christina and I have a stronger marriage because we also have our friendships, that we even free each other up for; because I’m a better man, and a better husband, and a better father, because I have friends that help me become a better man, and husband, and father. She grows from her friendships, as well. We bring that to our marriage. And then, we, of course, can enjoy other couples together, as well, if it fits.

Dave (22:16):

Hey, Drew, I was thinking to end this conversation this way. There’s a guy listening—husband, dad; and of course, it could be a woman, as well—but I’m thinking of the guy, who’s saying, “I agree. In fact, Drew’s convinced me today the theology of friendship is real; it’s Scriptural. I need to have friends in my life. I really don’t have any. What do I do?” What would you tell him to do?

Drew (22:40):

A couple things. One, ask God for friends.

Ann (22:43):

Pray.

Drew (22:44):

The Lord made you for friends. He orders everyone’s lives; He can bring friends into your life. Pray, and ask the Lord, “Would You bring me a friend? You made me for this. I need this. Please help.”

(23:02) And then, I would say focus, not so much on finding a friend, but on being a good friend. As you’re around people, just open up conversation—focus on them, ask questions, love people well, be interested—be an encourager rather than a critical person, which keeps people from even wanting to be your friend. Don’t be a gossip—all the things of basic—“Follow Jesus; become like Him; be a good friend to people.”

And then, pray that the Lord would use that to bring friends into your life. It’s different than—”I’m going to do this on my own,” and “I’m going to get a good friend. I’m looking for people who are good friends for me,”—that just won’t work.

Ann (23:32):

I like that advice; because especially, with women—I’ve talked to women, saying, “Nobody will be my friend,”—I like what you said. Even when I read that of: “Become a good friend; become someone who’s loving people, praying for them: ‘How can I pray for you?’ Start there, and pray.”

Dave (23:47):

It’s easy to be the victim.

Ann (23:48):

Yeah.

Dave (23:49):

Even when I would preach on this, I would think, “There’s some people, thinking, ‘Well, nobody’s ever reached out to me.’” It’s like, “You know what? You reach out. You initiate, and God will answer that prayer.”

Ann (24:03):

This is FamilyLife Today. What did you think about that with Drew Hunter?

Dave (24:06):

Great stuff. And by the way, you want to get his book; it’s called Made for Friendship: The Relationship That Halves Our Sorrows and Doubles Our Joys. And that is exactly what you experience with real friendship.

Ann (24:19):

Oh, it’s so important.

Dave (24:22):

Go to FamilyLifeToday.com, and click on the link in the show notes to buy that book. We’re going to have Drew back with us tomorrow.

Ann (24:29):

We would love to pray for you—I would, personally, love to pray for you—and we even have a team at FamilyLife who can pray for you. Just go to FamilyLife.com/PrayForMe.

Dave (24:45):

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