Iron Sharp?

God often speaks to me through song. It's not always worship music, per se...you know, God is holy but He speaks to us remembering that we are NOT. So, sometimes lyrics will get stuck in my head; I've long since learned that I might be contemplating them in a myriad of ways for as long as weeks or as few as days. Time becomes irrelevant as I chase after the morsel of His calling, the tidbit He's holding just for me.
Lately, the song "How He Loves Us"written by John Mark McMillan (find it on YouTube) is on repeat play in my brain...in my heart, really. I've considered it already in light of how He saved me, how He created me and the world in which I walk, how He exists despite our faithlessness, how He exists in light of our faithlessness, how He's sinking me in His grace. Today, I'm considering it in light of How he sends me friendship. Of how I'm broken and mending and healed by the Lord. Of how women have taped my Band-Aids, soothed balm over my burns, and sewed perfect, even stitches on a gash broken wide in my flesh. Why do that, God? Why do I get to have these nursemaids of your glory tending to my afflictions, these bearers of nurturing not immune to folly? These friends who laugh through tears, stand in the rain, hold my hand in the sun?
Here are some of the various renderings of Proverbs 27:17:

"As iron sharpens iron, so man sharpens man." NIV

"Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." NASB

"Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance of his friend." King Jimmy

"Iron makes iron sharp; so a man makes sharp his friend." Bible in Basic English

and my FAVORITE....

"As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens the wits of another." NRSV

My most precious women -- Z, B, Amy -- I love them jealously, for they are treasures with whom I never want to part. Your acceptance of me is the strongest wind, the gentlest whisper, the firmest reminder that I shouldn't maintain regrets...for I am loved by God. I am called as chosen. I am loved well, first by God then by these women. Relationship with them is like a passionate kiss, one filled with God's deepest affections, His most vivid promises, and His affirmation that He'll never leave me. Within me abides the Great Comforter; outside of me dwells the nourishment of friendship with these stellar women.

God inspired McMillan to write this song when he feared the world had forgotten a friend whose final heart cry before he died was for God to use him mightily. Would the world's memory begin to fade where Z, B, or Amy were concerned, I believe I'd run steadily, ceaselessly and blatantly to refresh it, sear it anew lest their beauty leave the earth. Like McMillan, I, too, couldn't abide letting my memory of their character, poise, spirit, and life slip away: how captivating, then, that God would speak to McMillan in a language he understands -- song-- to deliver inspiration, yes, but also confidence...confidence that GOD hadn't forgotten McMillan's friend. Indeed, He remembered Him so well He seeded a song in a writer's heart that has impacted a world of the faithful and faithless alike.

I thank God for my gals daily...I truly do. They are my iron. I sharpen them. I am sharpened by them.

And I know He loves us all.