BENEFITS OF KNOWING ANOTHER (A FRIEND)

One great benefit of having true friends is that it provides a key to unlock another world of opportunity.

Sometimes it is said that it’s about who you know.

A great lady whose destiny was changed forever by a friend she had is Edith Bolling Galt, a preacher’s daughter from Wytherville, Virginia. USA. She had little formal education but was quoted as savvy business women, who successfully managed her late husband’s business empire in a manner that she could afford early retirement, travel widely and enjoy her leisure.

Edith despite having very little interest in politics was known to have successfully run the affairs of The United States of America between 1919 and 1921. How did this happen? You may ask.
It so happened that Edith was invited to the White House for tea by a friend of hers, Helen Bones. Helen was a cousin to President Woodrow Wilson (The 27^th President of the USA from 1913 till 1921) and at that time she was acting as surrogate White House hostess following the death of the First lady, Ellen Wilson. The account has it that Edith became friends with Helen through another mutual friend, Alice Grayson.  Edith had been a very good friend of Alice, wife to Admiral Cary Grayson, a naval officer assigned to President Woodrow Wilson.
As fate would have it, on the day Edith was invited to tea at the White House, President Wilson had a golf game cancelled by a rain shower. History has it that on this day, as Edith stepped out of the elevator, she found herself face-to-face with the President who was still grieving for his deceased wife. President Wilson was smitten with Edith. Two months later, President Wilson proposed to Edith and they were both married on December 18, 1915. The President began telling Edith all the secrets of his job. Before long she was decoding State Department messages for him from nations embroiled in World War 1. A few years following this, the President suffered a series of debilitating strokes. Edith hid his condition from the nation and even from Congress. She assumed many of his duties and referred others to his Cabinet. Her astounding skills made many refer to her as the “Accidental First Lady” and even the “First Female President of the United States”.
Her rise to power though remarkable, was one that did not come because of her education, career, personality, skill or ambitions. It was simply because she knew a friend who knew a friend who knew a friend. How about that? Our connections can lead us into our destiny!

In our lifetimes many of us may not know a president let alone the President of the United States. Neither will we know someone who knows the President. But we do have a Friend who sticks closer than a brother – Jesus, the King of Kings and the Ancient of days, the eternal King of the Universe. H’s got the key connections that are capable of linking us to our destinies!

At the same time, we need to be able to nuture, value and keep the ‘friends’ that come across our paths in life. Having said this, not all friends are in our lives to connect us to the bigger picture, we need to be discerning to keep those who qualify as ‘true’ and ‘genuine’. It pays to know and keep good and true friends.

It is also worth our while to nurture and invest in our relationships primarily with the God head and secondarily with our fellow men. Your destiny can be altered in the twinkle of an eye by just knowing the God head and somebody somewhere……..

Remember in this very beautiful world we are in, it is all about who YOU KNOW SOMETIMES!