A man began buttering his wife with romantic talk. "My dear, let me feast my eyes upon your lovely face, and I'll buy you a sable muff. Let me hold your hand, and I'll buy you a silverfox scarf. Let me kiss you, and I'll give you a mink cape. Let me ..." "Stop!" she pleaded. "that's fur enough!"

Like two porcupines, some people will never get too close for comfort. The poets and theologians have reminded us, perhaps too often, that the real problem of our generation is loneliness. Is our current craze for VCR's and cable TV indicative of our deep rooted aloneness? Genuine friendships are difficult to come by. Put on your thinking cap for a moment. How many real friends have you had since high school graduation? Out of my senior class of two hundred, I manage to reach out and touch only three. Or how many friends do you write or call regularly - other than at Christmas?

Have we thrown the baby out with the bath water? Have we given up on lasting friendships in our society? Knowing that our acquaintances will be shortlived, we approach one another at arms' length. On our street, five families have moved in and out this year alone. Perhaps the old Chinese proverb is correct about the king who looked into a mirror. One day he replaced the mirror with a window. He saw children eating out of garbage cans. He saw other forms of human misery he never knew existed. By reflecting less upon ourselves and more upon the aloneness of others, the possibilities for more intimate friendships are enhanced. True friendships blow no fuses.

Jesus lived in a world where human exploitation and regional hatreds were common fixtures. It's easy to see why there wasn't a high trust factor among people. There was no love lost between Herod and the Jewish populace. So you can see why that eastern Mediterranean society wasn't ready for an honest and open human being. They were totally disarmed when Jesus came across as genuine.

Recall the time he returned to Nazareth, his hometown. Things were buzzing. People were talking. "What's all this new stuff Jesus is teaching? Isn't he the miracle man? Isn't he Mary and Joseph's son?" The verdict: He wasn't a favorite son. They turned him off and turned him out. He was not accepted. Could this be attributed to their failure to accept themselves? When he taught "Love your neighbor as yourself," wasn't that going a bit overboard? Did Jesus know them too well, speak too plainly for their own good? Were not his expectations of the Joneses and Smiths too high? In the end Jesus was hurt.

He gave the arm of friendship. They gave him the cold shoulder. He had just run through an exhausting schedule. He had been in great demand as a mender of broken dreams and a recycler of human bodies. He was tired. He needed a break. Going home again, he thought, would be the perfect tonic. Just to see Nazareth. How he would recall his boyhood days and delight in that kaleidoscope of sweet memories. His brothers and sisters would be there to share old stories and update the Nazareth News Chronicle.

It was not to be. His winning streak of prolific miracles came to a temporary standstill. Faith was scarce. No faith, no miracles. Sure, a few miracles did come off and all miracles, as few as they may be, have to be considered class A. But still, Jesus was disappointed in unrealized potential. More than anything else, he was disappointed that the miracle of friendship did not materialize. Jesus himself needed friendships to sustain him during his long, tiring hours. When the home door was slammed in his face, well, it got to him.

It is a natural human assumption that people are distrustful of others until proven otherwise. Today's custom of handshaking originated, not with brotherly (and sisterly) camaraderie, but from a suspicious all hands-on-the-table policy. When a transaction was made between two persons, each wanted to be dead certain the other didn't have any tricks up their sleeves. Are we a different breed today? Before the Vietnam War peace negotiations in Paris, it took several months to decide the size and the shape of the table itself.

The citizenry of Nazareth couldn't see that Jesus' logistical approach to his ministry flowed from the friendship factor ... "God in Christ reconciling the world unto himself." The home folks remembered Jesus as Joseph's apprentice who repaired their furniture and erected their outhouses. They remembered his boyhood pranks. Perhaps they didn't want to forget. Then he comes on with this open arms I'm-here-to-be-your-friend policy. "Life's just not that way," they were thinking. "The Romans and the Pharisees have seen to that." Still Jesus, in his warm and personable style, would not let up. Time was always too short. Jesus would continue to come across as a caring human being in spite of sister sour and brother gloom's I-told-you-it-won't-work mentality.

For most of us it comes across a shade presumptuous for Jesus to say, "Let me be your friend." Like the citizenry of Nazareth, do we also question Jesus' intentions? "Can we really trust him? What ulterior motives does he bargain with?" The answer for us today is that Jesus has to be correct. Without his friendship, our paranoia of mistrust will continue. The grand gospel reminds us again and again that intimate friendships are salvageable. They are possible if we want them to be possible. There are flickers of hope. I recall the telephone commercial which hums, "Reach out and touch someone."

Are not the majority of us out of touch? Americans are out of touch with the Soviets. Blacks are out of touch with whites. Welfare recipients are out of touch with bank trustees. Shall we go on? With the transitional nature of our times, it is so easy to lose contact. But when you lose contact, you lose control. That's the point. You lose control of your children. You lose control of your marital relationship. You even lose control of your future.

"Reach out and touch someone." That's a good beginning. Jesus at least made an effort to reach out and touch the needs of old friends and relatives back home. The dateline message of Jesus through the centuries has always resounded with a call to friendship. In his story, "Where Love Is, There God Is Also," Leo Tolstoy tells about a shoemaker whose life has been transformed by the Scriptures. One evening God calls to him. "Martin! Ah Martin! Look tomorrow on the street. I am coming." In the morning he awaits with anticipation. His concentration is interrupted by a friend who drops by after shoveling snow. He gives him a cup of tea. Later he gives a street lady some soup, a coat, and money. He still waits. Later he intercedes to settle a problem over an apple a boy stole from a proprietor. Evening comes. God still has not come. He leaves his cobbler shop and settles down to read the Scriptures. "Why has God not come?" he thought. He opens the Bible to Matthew 25 which reads, "I was hungry and you gave me food." Now he understands. His dream did not deceive him ... the Savior really called upon him that day, and he really received him.

Will we give that Friend an even chance to enter our lives today?