Iron

Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another. (Proverbs 27:17) 

I’ve come to a point in my life where many of—if not most of—my friends have tried to legally murder me.  My friends have punched me in the face, choked me into unconsciousness, and double-legged me through walls.  My friends have hurt me, injured me, consoled me, corrected me, and shared with me through both success and failure.

It’s impossible to do the things I love by myself.  I love fighting—I love combat sports.  I can’t train and I can’t compete if I don’t have someone else to do it with.  I used to do a lot of kata when I was younger—those series of movements where a single person simulates what their side of a fight looks like.  I’ve also punched and kicked heavy bags and watched videos about fighting technique.  I’ve done a lot of the fighting things without the benefit of a training partner.  I’ve don’t a lot of them, and none of them have ever made me better as a fighter.

Oil and incense bring joy to the heart, and the sweetness of a friend is better than self-counsel. (Proverbs 27:9) 

I’ve recently become more aware of the value of the friendships that I have in my life, both on and off the mats.  In a moment of pure honesty, I can fully admit that I struggle with a certain perception of self-worth.  I frequently question if people actually want to be around me—if they enjoy my company, value me as a person, or consider my presence to be anything more than an inconvenience.  But God has a tendency to confront my self-perceptions in ways that only God knows how to do.  Of late, He has been reminding me of the depth and richness of the friendships I enjoy and the fact that I need to remember to enjoy them.

He is one of my best friends, I think.  He told me so recently in a time when he must have perceived that I was struggling.  He made it a point to make me know—whether I was ready to receive it or not—that he is not just a sparring partner.  He is my friend.

He is also a friend who is 100% better at Jiu-jitsu than me.

When I told him that I was going to compete again after a 12-year hiatus, he made it a personal mission to help make sure I was ready.  He could crush me pretty much any time he wanted to.  He really is that good.  He’s world-class, but he knows that I’m preparing to test myself, so he doesn’t feel it’s necessary to prove he’s world-class.  Instead, he’s working on helping me to believe that I’m world-class, at least world-class enough to make a good fight of this competition.

But it’s not just about our time on the mats.  Many times it’s about our time before or after we step on the mats.  Those times when he just lets me unload everything that life is throwing at me.  He’s always checking in to make sure I’m doing all right.  And, when I’m not, he works to help me believe that I’m world-class, even off of the mats.

Better an open reprimand than concealed love.  The wounds of a friend are trustworthy, but the kisses of an enemy are excessive. (Proverbs 27:5-6) 

I think I’ve taken a lot of my friendships for granted.  That’s not on those friends; it’s on me.  I’ve got some damage to me that makes me devalue my value as a friend, so I fail to perceive how blessed I am with the friendships I have in my life.  It’s complicated (maybe a little Eric Berne in its thinking), but it’s entirely wrong.  My brain is stupid sometimes.  It minimizes the beauty of the things God has made it a point to place in my life.

He’s been training with me since he was 7-years old (or a little bit younger, possibly).  But now he’s a young adult and a quality young man.  He’s also an absolute killer on the mats.  He’s wearing a brown belt now, but he’s been wrecking black belt divisions for the last couple years.

Now he’s become one of my primary training partners.  I’ll admit that it’s a little bit weird.  I still remember him as a 100-pound kid who loved Jiu-jitsu.  Now he’s not a kid and he’s not 100 pounds.  He’s not 100 pounds, but he definitely is 100% of a threat to me at every moment.

We’ve been training a lot together lately—and by “together” I mean “against each other”.  We’ve been sparring hard, getting ready to compete together.  It’s been rough.  He’s good.  He’s flexible.  He’s dangerous.  He’s clever.

He’s had the benefit of training with me for years.  He’s got my entire game scouted.  He’s become a sniper of sorts.  He knows what my tendencies and proclivities are, and he’s setting traps.  He’s making me second-guess my every move.  He’s making me work.  He’s exhausting me.

Now he’s giving me advice and helping to coach me—the old man—through the newer aspects of the modern game.  He’s become a sounding board and a testing ground.  He’s not a kid anymore.  He’s my peer.

It’s an unorthodox friendship, but I love every minute of it.  I love it more than I can say.

In the same way, encourage the young men to be self-controlled in everything. Make yourself an example of good works with integrity and dignity in your teaching. (Titus 2:6-7)

It’s hard for me to be vulnerable.  To open myself up authentically to another person—to trust them enough to give them ammunition that could potentially destroy me—that’s unnerving.  But it’s not just about trust.  It’s about my persona.  I don’t like admitting that I’m weak, and I definitely hate admitting it to other people.

There’s this group of men that I spend time with.  I think they think more of me than I deserve to be thought of, if that makes any sense.  None of them fight—like, on the mats or in the ring—but every one of them fights for me in the place where it matters most, in the heavenly realms.  I’ve been sharing some heavy stuff with them of late, and I have to admit that it is a strangely uncomfortable but overwhelmingly glorious thing to have men shed tears when you share your heart.  Those are true friends, and the kind of friends who aren’t asking me to give anything in return but myself.

And let us be concerned about one another in order to promote love and good works, not staying away from our worship meetings, as some habitually do, but encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. (Hebrews 10:24-25) 

I’ve made something of a new friend lately, and he’s been truly inspirational to me.  He’s one of my pastors and he’s a pastor who loves Jiu-jitsu.  He came out and started training with my team.  Then, after a couple conversations he had the brilliant idea that we should grab a beer together.

I found myself pouring out my heart—it’s easy to do with him.  But the interesting thing was when he began to share his own life with me.  It wasn’t a one-sided conversation.  I realized that I wasn’t the only one who struggles.  He’s a pastor and I’m a black belt.  We’re at the top of our respective food chains.  It seems like we’re not supposed to struggle with life challenges.  But he’s really helping me to understand that I’m not alone in my struggle.  I have people who can struggle alongside me and I can struggle alongside them.  That’s the joy of true friendship.

Two are better than one because they have a good reward for their efforts.  For if either falls, his companion can lift him up; but pity the one who falls without another to lift him up. (Ecclesiastes 4:9-10) 

I’m pretty focused on Jiu-jitsu right now.  I’ve been putting in some serious time. My body is wrecked and I wake up every morning with a veritable assortment of aches and pains.  I’m a beautiful wreck and I love being back in competition mode.  There’s something indescribably satisfying about the journey.

But then I receive a text, a text from our kickboxing coach. “Hey, can you come in for some rounds with the team tomorrow night?  We have some guys getting ready for fights and they need to get some work.”

Tomorrow is my rest day.  Also, I haven’t been training my kickboxing game for a while.  I’m rusty and I’m slow.  But I’ve done this stuff for a lot of years. I guess you could call me experienced, or seasoned, or just old.  But I’ve still got tricks and I’ve still something to offer to my team.  I need a rest night less than my team needs my effort.  It’s a good time to be the kind of friend that I want to have.  It’s time for me to show up for someone else.

A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a difficult time. (Proverbs 17:17) 

Not all of my friendships are fighting friendships, but many of them are.  There’s something astoundingly unique to the friendships I’ve developed on my martial arts journey.  I’ve been training with one of my best friends in the world for about 25 years now.  We know each other inside and out, both on and off the mats.

When he saw that life was getting…complicated…for me, he immediately insisted that I compete again.  He’s known me long enough to know that it’s what’s good for me, that I need something to focus on outside of all the other stuff.  He knows that it’s not about the actual day of competition, but that it’s about the work I’m doing to get there.  It’s about the journey of being part of the team.  He’s already looking to set me up to compete after that—I’m not sure that I’m ready for that, but I’m not sure that I’m not.  He’s the kind of friend that might not take no for an answer, so I might not have a choice.

I think God has really been waking my stupid brain up of late.  When things are difficult,

I have a tendency to isolate and hide.  I don’t want people to see me in my weakness.  But it is in my weakness that I most need to be seen.  Vulnerability is hard, especially for a guy like me who perceives himself to be some kind of apex predator and doesn’t want anyone to know I have difficulties that I haven’t figured out.

That’s not realistic.  I can’t be a better fighter if I train by myself.  I can’t be a better person if I life by myself.  I need these folks in my world—these people I call friends.  And I need to be a friend to them, too, the kind of friend I would want to have.