Friends are important. The kinds of friends we have are even more important. Seated in a classroom in Bible college years later, one of my professors spent a few minutes one morning talking about just how important friends are. He remarked how he had heard someone once say that if we obtained five friends, real friends with whom we could trust, in one's lifetime, we indeed would be blessed. He personally limited that to just two, however.
Christians are even guilty of avoiding closeness with others.
Obedience to such a command is impossible without closeness. As soon as those things are cleared up, then I'll bare the burdens of others. I was jolted with the revelation and immediately began thinking of the concerns and desires of other fellow Christians. Such constitutes friendship. For a number of years I have been concerned about the lack of such relationships among fellow Christians.