Stories of love and friendship in the Scriptures

Love. Friendship. Connection. Belonging. As beings created by God in his image, these are among the core characteristics that make us human. Even more than food and shelter, they are integral to our thriving, to our existence. Throughout our history, we’ve celebrated them in art, story and song.

We’ve not celebrated them equally, however. Romantic love tends to take centre stage, which isn’t surprising, given that God designed the union between a man and a woman to be the most intimate expression of love. When we think of love, our default leans toward romance or sexual intimacy.

The Scriptures, by contrast, offer a fuller and richer portrait of love. Romance and sexual intimacy are a part of the picture, but they’re not centre stage. They’re just one of the diverse facets of love, all of them beautiful gifts from God, reflections of his image in us and expressed, as we might expect, through story and song.

Ruth and Naomi

But Ruth replied: Don’t plead with me to abandon you or to return and not follow you. For wherever you go, I will go, and wherever you live, I will live; your people will be my people, and your God will be my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me, and do so severely, if anything but death separates you and me. (Ruth 1:16-17)

The overarching theme of the story of Ruth is expressed by the Hebrew word, hesed, which means kindness, compassion, and faithful love. On one level, it’s a beautiful, romantic account of Ruth meeting and marrying Boaz, the two thus becoming ancestors of David, and of Jesus. The heart of the narrative, however, is about Ruth’s hesed – her loyal love and care for her mother-in-law Naomi.

Despite being a stranger in a strange land, with practically no resources or prospects, Ruth remained faithful to her promise. As a young woman in her prime, she worked with tireless energy to provide for the physical and emotional needs of her aging mother-in-law. In the end, the local women described Ruth to Naomi as “your daughter-in-law, who loves you and is better to you than seven sons” (Ruth 4:15).

Hannah and Samuel

The next morning Elkanah and Hannah got up early to worship before the Lord. Afterward, they returned home to Ramah. Then Elkanah was intimate with his wife Hannah, and the Lord remembered her. After some time, Hannah conceived and gave birth to a son. She named him Samuel, because she said, “I requested him from the Lord.” (1 Samuel 1:19-20)

Although Hannah lived over 3,000 years ago, her experience resonates with many women (and men) throughout the ages – the heartbreak of not being able to have children. She poured out her tears and prayers to God for a son, whom she promised to dedicate to the Lord’s service. God heard her prayer, and she named her baby boy Samuel in thanks and remembrance.

True to her word, Hannah brought her son to stay with Eli the priest at Shiloh, to serve in the Lord’s sanctuary there. Each year, she would make Samuel a little robe and bring it to him when she and her husband came for the annual sacrifice. At the birth of her son, Hannah had sung a prayer of joy and praise, a song that would be echoed a thousand years later by Mary as she awaited the birth of her son, Jesus (1 Samuel 2:1-10; Luke 1:46-55).

David and Jonathan

When David had finished speaking with Saul, Jonathan was bound to David in close friendship, and loved him as much as he loved himself. . . . Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as much as himself. Then Jonathan removed the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his military tunic, his sword, his bow, and his belt. (1 Samuel 18:1,3-4)

Kindred spirits. Friends for life. These are the modern expressions we might use to describe the relationship between David and Jonathan. In the language of the Bible, their souls were knit together, and each loved the other more than himself. Being the son of Saul, David’s inveterate enemy, put Jonathan in a risky position. Nevertheless, he supported and shielded David from his father’s wrath and strengthened David’s faith in the Lord.

Elsewhere, the Bible speaks of “a friend who sticks closer than a brother” (Proverbs 18:24). This kind of loyal, intimate friendship was valued more highly than romance in the Ancient World, and even into the Early Modern era. Given the entire scope of God’s grand narrative of redemption, it can be argued that the same emphasis is true in the Scriptures.

Solomon and his bride

How beautiful you are, my darling. How very beautiful! Your eyes are doves.
How handsome you are, my love. How delightful! Our bed is verdant; the beams of our house are cedars, and our rafters are cypresses. (Song of Songs 1:15-17)

Naturally, romantic love also has its place of honour in God’s good design for humanity. Nowhere in Scripture is this more evident than in the Song of Songs, extolling the physical and emotional attraction between the youthful King Solomon and his anonymous bride. The poetry drips with imagery of gardens and fruits and spices, evoking the young couple’s mutual desire and longing to consummate their marriage.

While the Song can be read as a metaphor of God’s love for his people, it is also an ode to physical love – but not without boundaries. This good gift of God is reserved for the marriage bed, to be enjoyed by husband and wife. As the bride warns her friends, “Young women of Jerusalem, I charge you, do not stir up or awaken love until the appropriate time” (Song of Songs 8:4).

Jesus, Martha, Mary and Lazarus

While they were traveling, he entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who also sat at the Lord’s feet and was listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks, and she came up and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to serve alone? So tell her to give me a hand.” The Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has made the right choice, and it will not be taken away from her.”
(Luke 10:38-42)

Along with the Twelve Apostles, Martha, Mary, and Lazarus were among Jesus’ closest and most intimate friends. The three of them were unmarried siblings who lived together in the village of Bethany outside Jerusalem. Martha was the eldest and head of the household, assisted by her sister Mary, who studied at the Lord’s feet, an honour most rabbis reserved for men. Their younger brother, Lazarus, whom Jesus raised from the dead, is silent in the accounts, suggesting he was either a minor or perhaps a young man with special needs (John 12:1-7).

When Lazarus was ill, the sisters sent for Jesus, and when their brother died, they brought their grief to the Lord, each in her own way. Before raising Lazarus, Jesus comforted each sister in the way she needed. He assured Martha that he was the resurrection and the life. With Mary, he simply wept (John 11:1-44).

There is an undeniable warmth and familiarity between Jesus and these three siblings. Their relationship is one of the most beautiful and heartwarming portraits of friendship in the Scriptures. It’s a demonstration of the high value Jesus places on friendship as an expression of love.

God and his people

“No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. I do not call you servants anymore, because a servant doesn’t know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything I have heard from my Father. You did not choose me, but I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce fruit and that your fruit should remain, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he will give you.” (John 15:13-16)

John begins his account of Jesus’ final hours before his arrest by stating that Jesus loved his own to the end (John 13:1). He then spends five chapters unpacking Jesus’ lengthy discourse on love to his disciples. At the heart of this address, Jesus defines the greatest love as laying down one’s life for one’s friends – which he was about to do. He assures his disciples that they are his friends, whom he has chosen and to whom he has confided the Father’s will. The Lord also stresses that if they truly love him, they will keep his commands.

This definition of love is one of the main threads running through the length of Scripture. From beginning to end, God shows his gracious, faithful love (hesed) to ungrateful, unfaithful sinners – like each of us (Exodus 34:6-7; Psalm 136; Lamentations 3:22-24). Because of his infinite, eternal love, he sent his Son to give his life so that we might live as his daughters and sons – as his friends – forever (John 3:14-17; Romans 5:1-11; Romans 8:12-17; 1 Corinthians 15:1-8; Galatians 4:1-7; Ephesians 1:3-14; 1 John 3:1-3; Revelation 21:1-4).

Every genuine form of love, appropriately expressed, is a gift from God to us, intended to point us to him as its source. As his image bearers, we’re designed to give, receive, and appreciate love in all its facets. Each facet – intimacy between a husband and a wife; love of a mother for her child; care for an aging parent; affection between close friends – reflects some aspect of God’s love. In a culture obsessed with sexuality as an identity marker, we can know our identity is in Christ’s love for us and display that love in all our relationships.

Sources and further reading

Timothy Keller, The Prodigal God: Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith, Penguin Books, 2008.

Timothy Keller, Go Forward in Love: A Year of Daily Readings, Zondervan, 2024.

C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves, HarperOne, 2017.

Rebecca McLaughlin, No Greater Love: A Biblical Vision for Friendship, Moody Publishers, 2023.

Subby Szterszky is the managing editor of Focus on Faith and Culture, an e-newsletter produced by Focus on the Family Canada.