You Need Friends: Reclaim Your God-Given Design for Community and Remedy Your Loneliness for Good

by Jake Thurston

Loneliness isn’t your destiny—God designed you for deep, meaningful friendships that can transform your life.

Discover how to reclaim your God-given design for community and experience the joy of being fully known and loved.

Jake Thurston combines biblical truths and psychological insights to help readers remedy loneliness and build faith-centered, life-changing friendships.

In this book, you will learn

Remedy loneliness through the ancient Christian practice of spiritual friendship.Engage more deeply with your local church and community.Build stronger friendships through the power of vulnerability.Experience the freedom of being fully known and understood.Live a more fulfilling, God-centered life through meaningful connections.You Need Friends provides faith-driven strategies to transform isolation into authentic community. This book equips readers to build deep relationships that empower them to thrive spiritually and emotionally.

It’s time to reclaim your God-given design for community. Start your journey to deeper connection with You Need Friends today!

256 pages, Paperback

Published February 10, 2025

Reviews

[Brennen Schmitt · Rating 5 out of 5]

meaningful friendships can be hard. this book just might make them easier.

my favorite part of this book was all the external sourcing. too often, i’ve found quations can stall the flow of a book while adding little value. YET, this is far from that. the expert opinions made me lean in and actually grapple with the material.

[Ethan Linder · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was impressed by how this book walks through the loneliness our culture is experiencing so pervasively, and offers nimble, flexible, but clear frameworks for cultivating a life and community of friendship. An essential book for those looking for ways to befriend others — or for those congregational leaders looking to deliver on one element of congregational life that’s often over promised but underdelivered: community.

Highly recommend!

[Kirk Weikart · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mother Teresa said that loneliness is the leprosy of the modern world. Much has been written and spoken about how technology has led to a more isolated and individualistic culture in the US.

Thurston establishes all of these issues in well researched fashion. He then goes on to study and offer responses and action steps to resolving the loneliness epidemic. The responses can be either spiritual or secular, but he illustrates how the ancient concept of spiritual friendship is a deep and practical resolution. His Friend Zone Matrix helped me realize different levels and depths of relationships, and how to get more out of them.

The book is designed for individual or group study, but clearly outlines the benefits of community. It is easy to understand and follow, and his conclusions seem inescapable.

[Evan Hoekzema · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved the approach and variety of this book. It’s grounded in both a scriptural and scientific base, and fleshed out with real life application and stories. Its message of community and being known is needed now more than ever, and it was easy to read and understand. Great book!

[Taylor Showley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jake Thurston hits it on the head! Backed by scripture and data, Jake demonstrates something our culture needs now more than ever: FRIENDSHIP. As this was personally a timely read, it's a message every heart needs. The practicalities in this book will be with me for years to come!

[Ali Varghese · Rating 4 out of 5]

⭐️4.5⭐️

Really enjoyed this book! Some new information and some really good reminders I hadn’t read in a while. Friends are so crucial and such a blessing in doing life side by side.
Thanks for writing this book Jake!

[Shara Goswick · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an incredible reminder of how important friendships are in this life. I believe God created us all for connection, in this book is a great tool in learning how and why we should make friends. I loved it!

[Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

I've spent a lot of time reading about friendship lately in preparation for a sermon series I'll be preaching on the topic. This book is hands-down one of the best out there. If you're looking for community, if you're looking to understand the biblical foundation of friendship, or if you're looking for how to grow deeper friendships, this book will be a tremendous help for you.

[Jesse Taggart · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a great book that doesn’t just “talk the talk” about friendship and community, but also “walks the walk,” and really shows you HOW to develop genuine friendship throughout various areas of life. This book handles individualism vs. collectivism really well, too!
I was super impressed by the research and the matter-of-fact nature to each discussion piece given. But more than anything, the heart behind this book is 1000000% needed in today’s day and age.
Read this!!!

[Abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

“It is truly a different caliber of friendship when you can freely share about both the deeply personal matters of your soul and the things of God together, as God originally designed it to be.” (194)

Jake Thurston approaches friendship in ways that I have never intentionally thought of before. You Need Friends starts from an anthropological study of community, morphs into the intentional,creative design of humanity by God, and then culminates into a deeply reflective and personal approach to not only identifying our relationships with all of our communities but also providing a structure for creating appropriate intimacy and vulnerability.

I marveled and told everyone who would listen his commentary on the implications of the disappearance of the front porch (pgs 72-73). I filled with gratitude and awe as we journeyed through the character of God as our friend and the gravity that has on our motivations for obedience and faithfulness (pg 110). I took the time to go through my contacts and plot my relationships on the friendship matrix (153), and I reflected on the ways I invest in arguably my most important community: my church (173-181).

But I am truly most inspired by his template for spiritual direction (204), and I am eager to apply it to my women’s small group. Reaching my thirties means that it’s time for life chapters to slow down a bit. Life isn’t constantly changing, I’m not constantly moving, and my communities are mostly staying consistent (thankfully). This structure means that it’s time to be intentional about the way I cultivate friendships, and You Need Friends provides the framework to do just that.

[ohheybove · Rating 5 out of 5]

Over half of us are lonely…and I’m one of them?

This book really couldn’t have come to me at a better time. While going through my own journey of how to rebuild my community - this book has been instrumental in putting to words what I have been experiencing, prompting me with really insightful questions, and tangible ways to bring about the community I have been praying for and searching for.

If you are someone trying to figure out what is missing in their lives relationally, why it seems so hard to make deep, meaningful friendships (even for us extroverts!), and what to do about it - this book is for you.

Author Dr. Jake Thurston delves into the loneliness epidemic that is prevalent in all age groups of today. From Gen X to the eldest, all have been experiencing extreme cases of loneliness. Dr. Thurston paints a picture of our current landscape but gives us practical tips for how to remedy that loneliness - through claiming our God-given design for community. He introduces the Christian practice of “spiritual friendship” - something I kind of knew about, but couldn’t formulate until reading this book.

I am so grateful for this book, the timeliness of it, and the changes I am seeing in myself because of it. I can’t recommend this book enough!

[Jason · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really 4.5 stars. To be transparent, I would consider Jake a friend from back in college. But this is an amazing book, and so necessary for the church today. In a world clearly experiencing a loneliness epidemic, the Church should have an answer. Sadly, churches have rarely been places of deep connection. Jake helps lay out some of the causes of our loneliness problem, and describes how the church can be a solution. I especially appreciate the way that he very clearly lays out how to create spiritual friendship groups, and includes evidence of a test run to show that they can work in practice. I really think Jake has found something the Church desperately needs today.

[Kim Shafer · Rating 5 out of 5]

You Need Friends is a beautifully written, faith-filled guide that speaks straight to the heart. In a world where loneliness and disconnection often feel overwhelming, this book is a refreshing reminder that friendship—both with others and with God—is not just important, but how God made us to be. If you’re craving deeper relationships and a closer walk with God, You Need Friends is a must-read. It reminds us that we are never alone—God is our greatest friend, and He desires us to experience life-giving friendships with others as well.

[Karen T · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was looking for a book to read on Christian friendship as the Lord had been lately teaching me about friendship. The book does a great job teaching on what Scripture says about spiritual friendship. If you long to have closer and deeper Christian friendships read this book and you will be inspired to be a close friend to others that is centered on Christ.

[Julia Hayes · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so great! I loved the audiobook even more! It is so timely and needed. Warning to introverts: you WILL feel convicted, but conviction is a good thing right? 🙃😂

My favorite part was the discussion on being more intentional about who you spend your time with. I want to be intentional rather than my friendships being about convenience.

10/10 recommend.

[Will Kallhoff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Newsflash: you actually can't do it alone. We were never supposed to. Not only that, but spiritual friendship is a discipline that can pay dividends in multiple life arenas. A great reminder and a callback to a world that existed long before social media and the isolation of this age.

[Christina Embree · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book for anyone looking to build community and help people to find meaningful relationships especially within the church.