Why Mentoring Matters: A Start to a New Series

I believe in mentoring. In fact, around my office at Southeastern Seminary are numerous pictures of students I’ve mentored through the years. I’m grateful for each one of them. For the next several weeks, in fact, I’ll be posting about this vital approach to disciplemaking.  

I wish I could say that someone mentored me when I first became a Christ-follower, but that didn’t happen in my life. Instead, I had to figure out on my own how to walk with Christ when I was a young teen believer in a non-Christian home. I’m sure I would have lived more in victory had someone been walking alongside me with intentionality.

My exposure to mentoring actually began when I had dinner with Robert Coleman, author of the classic work, The Master Plan of Evangelism. I was a young professor at Southern Seminary in Kentucky, and Dr. Coleman was a guest speaker in a doctoral class I was leading. Over dinner one evening, Dr. Coleman—who himself had mentored others for decades at the time, and who had a mentee with him that night—challenged me, “Chuck, if you want to make a difference in your ministry, invest in young students the rest of your life.”  

That dinner took place almost thirty years ago, and I’ve been following Dr. Coleman’s advice since then. Based on my experiences and my studies, here’s why mentoring matters: 

1. The approach is biblical.  If Jesus and Paul made disciples through this means, how can we not follow that pattern?  Older men and women teaching the younger generation is not optional for the church (Titus 2:1-8). God teaches us so that we might teach others who then teach others, and the process continues.  

   
   

2. Christian teaching lived out reinforces the truth of the Word.  The mentee who watches his mentor do personal evangelism is more likely to catch that fire.  Faith exhibited during times of crisis becomes a challenging example for the disciple to emulate.  Simply stated, it is in the classroom of life that we best see the Word in action. 

   
   

3. Mentoring discipleship requires the mentor to guard his life against the Enemy’s attacks.  Committed disciplemakers wear a bullseye on their back for Satan. Knowing that their actions affect a second generation of believers, however, good disciplemaking mentors stand strong against the Enemy. They put on the full armor of God and live it out. 

   
   

4. A strong disciplemaking relationship provides a safe place to deal with failure.  Confession is good, for it brings our sin out of the Enemy’s darkness into the light—where we can deal with the wrong through repentance and forgiveness.  A disciplemaking mentor models holiness, calls his disciples to the same, holds them accountable to that standard, and offers forgiveness when they fail. A good mentor picks up his mentee when he falls.  

   
   

5. Mentoring helps raise up the next generation of leaders. My experience is that young people are looking for mentors—and they will gravitate toward them. They long for older adults to show them how to walk with Christ, raise their families, and influence culture. At the same time, having a mentor gives young people courage to spread their wings, test their skills, and prepare for leadership. 

   
   

6. Mentoring allows both the mentor and the mentee to grow during the mentoring relationship. It would be hard for me to describe fully all that I’ve learned by hanging out with young people. Not only have they helped me understand their generation, but they’ve also equipped me to evangelize in a culture I often don’t understand. I’ve even learned the language of a generation that speaks English, but who define words differently than my generation did! 

   
   

7. Mentoring often forces us to lean on God. As a mentor, I’ve spent hours praying for mentees who are seeking God’s answer to a question. I’ve also wept many tears over mentees who’ve made foolish choices that cost them much in the long run. Investing in others has taught me that I cannot change lives; God does that—and my responsibility is to equip others even as I trust Him with the results.  

   
   

8. Mentoring pushes us to think about what really matters. I have two graduate degrees. My wife and I own a house and two cars. I serve as a seminary dean and a global educator. We have a few dollars in the bank. What I realize at this stage of my life, though, is that all this “stuff” doesn’t matter much. What matters are the people in those pictures in my office I mentioned earlier – former students who are now the pastor, the dean, the lay college minister, the missionary, the church planter. People matter—and they’re the product of mentoring.  

   
   

9. Investing in others and releasing them has a way of keeping us humble. The goal of mentoring is unique: pouring your life into someone else so that he moves on to invest in others. The relationship still exists, but it changes over time as the “released one” serves God in mighty ways (and, ideally, in more powerful ways than you and I have). Knowing we’re raising up others to send them out keeps us from seeking to build our own kingdom. It keeps us humble.  

   
   

10. Mentoring promotes intergenerational relationships—and that’s good for the local church. In my church upbringing, most of the ministries were age-graded. Seldom did we as children or teens spend much time with older adults. I didn’t realize it then, but that reality weakened our church. We needed all generations to interact so we could learn from each other.  

    
    

Over the next several weeks, we be discussing processes, goals, and struggles of mentoring.

I suspect you’ll find that this kind of disciplemaking can be costly—and often risky. It takes time. It makes you processes.  

I pray you’ll also find it’s worth the effort, however.