Circumstantial Relationships

A couple of weeks ago, I asked where people felt most alone in their lives. Was it in their finances? Marriage? Singlehood (or is it singleness?) Church? Work?

One of the recurring themes was this notion of relationships that appear rich for a certain amount of time, but when a given circumstance changes (like somebody moves or changes their place of employment or leaves a church), the people in those once close relationships seem to fall off the face of the earth.

My dad was the pastor of four churches, and I remember him grieving relationships that would disappear. He would try and keep in touch with old friends but because we had moved, the relationships were more difficult to invest in. I’ve also been on staff at a handful of churches – one for several years – and some of the relationships I had that I thought would be lifelong changed the moment my zip code did.

Even now, as we’ve lived in the Nashville area for about a year and a half, we’ve moved from Nashville to Franklin, and I have gone from working full time on a church staff to writing and speaking full time, which has me traveling at least thirty weekends a year so I’m rarely actually attending the church I was on staff at. It’s been interesting to see how some of my relationships have changed when the circumstances changed.

In most cases, it seems like when our relationships are these “circumstantial” relationships, we tend to feel abandoned to some extent when they’re gone. Sometimes we reach out and aren’t met, and sometimes nobody moves and the relationship simply fizzles out.

And maybe those relationships weren’t meant to be a seasoned friendship.

And maybe that’s okay.

All this thinking on circumstantial relationships has me wondering if sometimes, we aren’t intentional enough in keeping up with people with whom we were once close. I know I’ve been guilty of investing in a relationship because I knew it was mutually beneficial to some degree, and when that changed, I pulled away. And I know that I’ve been in relationships with people who have done the same.

I’m just as guilty as using as I am of being used. Perhaps we all are.

What role do circumstantial relationships have in our lives? If most of us seem hurt when these relationships end, maybe they were meant to go deeper than we’ve allowed them to. Are we too busy for nurturing and cultivating relationships outside of our everyday environments?