Reflection Options  

Journal  (Reflect on one or more of these questions)

• Do you expect to keep all of your college friendships after you graduate?  What will determine who you stay in contact with? How will you submit those decisions to Christ?

• Journal about a friendship that you felt the need to submit to the Lord.  What was the situation? Why do or don’t you practice that kind of submission with more of your relationships?

• Make a list of 2-5 friends you will definitely want to continue after college.  Write about what makes each of those friendships worth continuing to pursue.  Find a way to talk to them about keeping in touch and tell them why you want to.

Quote Interaction (Interact by agreeing, disagreeing or otherwise engaging with the quote/quotes)

• Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value; rather is one of those things that give value to survival. (C.S. Lewis)

• Today friendship has fallen on hard times. Few men have good friends, much less deep friendships. Individualism, autonomy, privatization, and isolation are culturally cachet, but deep, devoted, vulnerable friendship is not. This is a great tragedy for self, family, and the Church, because it is in relationships that we develop into what God wants us to be… Friendships…are there to be made if we value them as we ought – and if we practice some simple disciplines of friendship. (Kent Hughes)

• How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard. (Winnie the Pooh)

• You have to let people go.  Everyone who is in your life is meant to be in your journey, but not all of them are meant to stay to the end. (unknown)

Reading and Reflection from the book, Shaping The Journey of Emerging Adults: 

• Read the paragraph on p. 152 that says “Don’t chase the idea of the person you want to marry…” Explain why you agree or disagree with the advice in this section.

• Read “Engaging when it’s difficult” (p. 159). When is it most difficult for you to engage in times of relational transition or tension?  What might it look like to submit the friendship to Christ? How can you practice “openness, creativity and persistence” in those times?

• MENTOR: Read the “pacing questions” (p. 155).  Adjust them to fit the situation of the young adult you are meeting with (are they about to graduate? What difficulties do they have in keeping Christ at the center of their relationships? etc.) and come with 3 or more questions you want to ask in your next meeting.