By Tania Harris

Back in the first century it wasn’t normal for men and women to be friends. They didn’t meet for coffee in morning tea breaks or discuss current affairs over the water-cooler. They didn’t sit next to each other in the synagogues and swap ideas about their theology. They certainly didn’t discuss their spiritual lives by the village well.

That’s why the actions and behaviours of Jesus with the Samaritan woman were so radical. Even his disciples couldn’t fathom his socialising with a woman, let alone one with such a scandalous reputation (John 4:27). Somehow Jesus managed to interact with the opposite sex in a healthy way, even being alone with them in a public setting.

Jesus shows us that it is possible to engage meaningfully with our male counterparts. In the radically new equality of the kingdom he inaugurated, it’s not surprising. It’s when men and women relate together that they are seen to fully represent the image of God (Gen. 1:26-28). So the question is how.

Kissing Your Brother

Here, I believe, the writings of Paul are helpful. At one point Paul is advising his young mentoree Timothy how to pastor a mixed congregation; “Treat younger men as brothers,” he writes; “Older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity” (1 Timothy 5:1a,2). Paul of course was writing from a man’s perspective, but we can easily switch it around to apply to us. If Timothy was to treat older women as mothers and younger women as sisters, then we should treat older men as fathers and younger men as brothers. We should ask; how do we act towards our brothers? and then interact with men who are not our husbands or boyfriends in the same way.

I grew up with three brothers; one older, two younger. As children our quibbles were over who got to sit in the front seat of the car and whose turn it was to do the dishes. We did okay given that our birth order rendered all three of them squished to a single bedroom while I got one all to my own.

My brothers are grown up now and are all married to women who love them dearly. They are good men – I would even say attractive men – but it’s difficult for me to think of them that way. Even though my middle brother bears a scary resemblance to Matt Damon, it’s impossible for me to think of them sexually. The thought of kissing them makes me squirm – as it should. This is what it means to treat men as brothers. The same emotional and physical boundaries that apply to male family members should also apply to our male friends.

Presenting as Sisters

There’s another side to Paul’s advice. If we are to treat men as brothers, then we need to present ourselves as sisters. We need to show ourselves capable of healthy, godly friendships and in doing so challenge the stereotypes that are so often propagated by our culture.

The view of women as sex objects is one of the main reasons people warn against cross-gendered friendship. Instead of seeing women as co-image bearers, peers and partners, society often presents us as seductresses, temptations and objects of fantasy. The latest Holden comes with a bikini clad pouting woman draped over the bonnet. Musical talent comes wrapped in a plunging cleavage. Domestic goods are marketed with glossy legs and voluptuous lips. Our intelligence, emotions, gifts, callings, and personalities are all reduced to a body, a mere shell of the image of God women are called to bear.

While we may not have control over some of the stereotypes of our culture and we can’t change the thoughts and intentions of individual men, we can take responsibility for the way we present ourselves. We can present ourselves as sisters, behaving, speaking and interacting as equals in the family. To these men, we’re not looking for the affections of a lover, we’re not presenting ourselves to turn them on and we’re not offering alluring glances to seek sexual affirmation. That’s as irksome as kissing your brother.

Your Friend’s Wife

I have to admit it’s usually easier for women to be friends with single men. Once it’s been established with your man-friend that you’re more sister than lover, you can get on with the business of friendship. Oh, there’s the rumours to deal with when you regularly sit next to each other in church or hang out together on the weekends, but these are merely minor irritations. The complications come when your man-friend gets married. Now – even if your friendship has been the best thing on the planet – it must take second place to a more important one.

One of my good male friends is an ex-work colleague. We started our jobs around the same time and sat side by side at the desks in our office. Every week we chatted over coffees and compared work notes. In Winter we were ski buddies and engaged in philosophical chats on the chairlift. He taught me how to survive black runs and gave me insights on politics and documentaries on SBS. He was there when I was having a bad day and needed a chin up. I was there the day he met his wife and when they took their sacred vows.

Fortunately I didn’t lose my friend after the wedding day. But that’s not always the case. Sometimes when your single man-friend gets married, you have to be ready to surrender the friendship. Now your friend’s priority is his wife – as it should be. And sometimes a wife doesn’t want to compete with a best friend.

The one way I can still be friends with my married male friends is because their wives are happy about it. They are secure in their husband’s affections and feel no sense of competition. And now they are friends with me.

The best way to maintain friendships with your married male friends is to get to know your friend’s wife. Involve them in the friendship and seek to know them as you do their husbands. It’s not only a good way to increase your friendship circle, but it acts a constant reminder of your role.

My life has been blessed by healthy need male friendships. I think we all need them. But being friends with men, especially married men, means that certain boundaries need to be in place. We need to respect our friends’ wives. We need to present ourselves as sisters. It’s only then that we can enjoy healthy male relationships. And it’s then that we can know God more fully by seeing him through eyes of our male friends.

© August 17th 2015, Tania Harris

This article first appeared on God Conversations here.

By Tania Harris

Some of the best friendships of my life have been with men.

I think of Paul who invited me to share his church offices when I first set out to plant my church. We met as students in one of our Masters classes. He was the short geeky one; funny, well-loved and smart. Half a decade older, he was also more skilled in ministry than I, having planted his own church and flexed his pastoral muscles for years. During the week we would discuss theological points in our sermons and on Monday mornings, we would debrief our services over smiley cupcakes from the local bakery. Paul was there to reassure me when the numbers were down and provide advice about the drunk who gate-crashed my service. He was first on my church board and led my commissioning when I left.

I think of Aaron, an ex-navy guy, who when he first entered my church was aghast to see a “chick up the front”, but managed to stay on in spite of it. He was the one of the first to get on board with the vision, to offer his home for fellowship and share the preaching roster on Sundays. At Christmas time, he demonstrated his true loyalty when he rocked a Santa suit at our community outreach just because I asked him.

I think of Pete, an integral part of the God Conversations ministry, who sits in his studio on a regular basis, diligently recording and mixing my podcasts; who patiently listens to my frustrations and cheers at the testimonies and who gets as excited as me watching thrillers on the couch at the end of a long week.

All of them have been close friends who have stood with me through different times of my life. All of them have been God’s provision for me in the season I was in.

All of them have also been married.

Over the years I’ve read books and articles with titles like; “Ten Rules for Working with Women.” They’ve included such instructions as: “Never be in a room alone with a woman; always leave the door open in the presence of a female, and don’t ever maintain eye contact with someone whose not your wife for any length of time.” In other words, don’t be friends with women.

I understand where they’re coming from. The dangers of close male-female friendships are abundantly clear. Marriages, families and entire communities have been devastated because people have done the very things those articles warn against.

But at the same time, friendships with the opposite gender have enormous potential to enrich our lives. They provide us with greater perspective and open us up to seeing the world in a different way. They also enable us to know God at a deeper level through relating to the other part of the image he called us to share (Genesis 1:26-28).

So how does a Christian woman do friendship with men?

The Need for Boundaries

What those articles about cross-gendered friendships were trying to emphasize was our need for boundaries. As Townsend and Cloud in their well-known book on the topic describe them, boundaries define who I am in relation to others. They define the roles I play and the responsibilities I have in each of my relationships. We all need healthy boundaries in our lives. Like a child who flourishes within the safety of well-defined parameters, boundaries give us the freedom to thrive in our relationships.

Where those articles get it wrong I believe, is in the nature of those boundaries. The rules they lay down are primarily external. They are imposed from the ‘outside-in’ and though well-intended, they can be hopelessly ineffective.

Ask anyone whose experienced the effects of sexual chemistry. Where lust and longing are involved, external boundaries are about as powerless as a wire fence against a bulldozer. The door to the office may well be ajar, but the boundaries of the heart can still be crossed. There might be a third person in the room, but thoughts may still be wandering to places they shouldn’t go.

If we are to have healthy friendships with men, our boundaries must be internalised. That means we need to take responsibility to carefully regulate our hearts – even more than our office doors.

Know your Heart

Once when my friend Paul and I were attending a pastors’ retreat, the question came up of whether we should drive there together. The campsite was over two hours away and we lived in adjoining neighbourhoods, so it made sense that we travel in the same car. When I asked my mentor for advice, she told me the last three moral failings in our denomination were male to male. “Just go together,” she said; “You’re fine”. And we were. Paul was a brother to me. He knew it and I knew it. We’d even discussed it at some point. There was no need to enforce external boundaries because the internal ones were already there.

There’ve been other relationships though. Those times when the boundaries weren’t quite so clear; where there was a danger that lines could be crossed either from my side or theirs. These were the men I wouldn’t do coffee with, sit in an office for extended periods of time with or drive alone with in a car.

May I say, it is never difficult to tell the difference? We know it when it happens. Ever since high school, we’ve learned to recognize when someone’s eyes linger too long or when our hearts beat a little faster than they normally would.

The key is to consider every relationship on its own merit. To ask; where is my heart in this relationship? Are the boundary lines where they should be? It’s up to us to take responsibility for the way we respond to our male friends – to consider what’s going on inside and act in a way that protects both ourselves and others.

It’s worth it of course. When we take time to establish our internal boundaries, we can be free to enjoy the blessing of one of the most worthwhile relationships in our lives. Having healthy male friendships is a gift available to us to enjoy. But if we’re not willing to keep our hearts in check, perhaps it would be better not to have any male friends at all.

© August 7th 2015, Tania Harris

This article first appeared at God Conversations here.