Be careful who your friends are.

I love all the activities, friends, groups, and what not that you have in high school. The fellowship of great friends that make you laugh, support you when your down, and of course give you a hard time when you have your "blonde moment". The sports where you can easily connect with people from a common interest, such as running for myself. Also the extra curricular where you are working together with people to achieve a common goal or just to have fun. In high school, you're always working or doing something with fellow students, and many of them become your friends.

 Friends are really valuable, definitely in high school, but it goes beyond that, friends are valuable for your entire life. However, you gotta be careful who your friends are. Your friends influence you in your decisions of what is right and wrong, they are the ones that you will most often go to for advice, and the people that you are around the most, minus your family. You become in a lot of ways, like your friends.
With that in mind, hanging out in the wrong crowd can become harmful to your relationship with God. They can influence you to do drugs, which is illegal and harmful to your body. We always wanna be accepted by our friends, so it can lead us to do stuff we wouldn't normally do, like go to that party, drink and go to school the next day with a hangover. Having those types of friends influence us to do things that God doesn't want of us, and it also damages our ability to witness. If you are trying to talk to people about God, and you're the one that hangs out with the wrong crowd, doesn't do the right things, it's hard for them to understand why they need Jesus to "save them from their sins". Also, this doesn't only apply to people that drink and have sex and all that bad stuff. Even friends that just don't honor God, but aren't doing all the things the world views as "bad". Anything really.
Now hear me out, I'm not saying to isolate yourself from these people. Matter of fact, it's ok to still be friends with them. However, don't let them be your best friends, or the ones you hang out with a lot. You know how we have those people we call friends, and they are, but not super close. Yeah, let those people be in that group, cause you still want to be able to reach out to them, without them pulling you down.

So, let's take a look at the other side of things. As I was saying, friends influence who you are, so be wise in your decisions of who you make your close friends. Let them be the ones that are gonna build you up, encourage you to seek God more, and are fun to hang around, without having to do all the other stuff. The ones that will walk along side you in your relationship with God, the ones that will encourage you when you are going through a trial and pray for you. Having that sort of close circle of friends is the one that the bible encourages you to have, and when you look at the whole picture, you definitely understand why.
This is the group of friends where your best friend comes from. The one that you can go to about anything, no matter how embarrassing,  the one person that you share all the stuff with and whom encourages you daily in your walk with Christ. That type of friendship is extremely helpful in high school, not only in making it through, but in your walk with Christ and trials/temptations you face. As Galatians and Ecclesiastics puts it
"Therefore, bear one another's burdens, thus fulfilling the law of Christ."-Galatians 6:2

"Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil.  For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!  Again, if two lie together, they keep warm, but how can one keep warm alone?  And though a man might prevail against one who is alone, two will withstand him—a threefold cord is not quickly broken."- Ecclesiastics 4:9-12.


That threefold cord it talks about at the end of Ecclesiastics, is you, a friend, and God. That circle right there, is the one that will never be broken and can help you with any trial you go through.

All in all, I just want to encourage you to be careful who your friends are. The ones that you hang out with all the time and go to about stuff, be sure they are the ones that will be beneficial to your relationship with God. It's ok to be friends with people who aren't seeking God, matter of fact, I encourage it because it helps in witnessing to them, but don't let those be the super close ones. Pray to God about what He wants you to do with the friends you have now, and never forget the value of a true friend