Mentoring is a Blessing – Just Do It!
Rather than wait for others to come and be your friend, why not you first be a friend to someone who needs a friend? This piece of advice came from my Sunday school teacher back in 1985, when I was only an infant year-old Christian. I was desperately shy and awkward when it came to making friends. To me, a mentor is someone who comes alongside a Christian younger in the faith, in order to initiate and bless the person with love, encouragement, teach spiritual disciplines, and nurture her to love God. I discovered that there are three blessings in mentoring:

1. Mentoring is a blessing to the mentoree.
Through a mentoring relationship, a mentoree is guided in the spiritual disciplines of prayer, God’s Word and evangelism, and is constantly exhorted to love Jesus. In the mentor, the mentoree finds a confidante who makes time to listen. The mentoree also gets prayed for regularly by the committed mentor.

2. Mentoring is a blessing for future generations.
Mentorees who have had a positive mentoring experience are better equipped to move on and be a mentor to others. It is a joy to see my mentorees caring for and helping another believer to grow. I liken it to the “double joy” that grandparents feel when holding the children of their children in their arms.

3. Mentoring is a blessing to the mentor.
As the writer of the Proverbs tells us, “he who refreshes another, will himself be refreshed” (Proverbs 11:25). In the New Testament, Jesus Himself tells us, “it is more blessed to give than to receive” (Acts 20:35). In blessing others, we are blessed in return because we feel fulfilled and
good about ourselves that we can give to others. My husband can testify of how I start out tired out before a meeting, but leave energised after talking with certain individuals or counselling someone.

For me, there are also heartwarming times when a mentoree blesses the mentor with a simple but a very caring gesture, by offering the question, “How can I pray for you?” That is reciprocation of the love, care and time given.

Mentoring has also been instrumental in spurring me to grow in my own pilgrimage because of the constant need to model faith and Lordship in my own life. It is very difficult to exhort someone else to surrender when we, as mentors, do not model these in our own lives. It often challenges me to ask myself, “How should I react to this situation? How best should I react so that I can still keep a clear testimony before my mentorees?”

What motivates me is the belief that we do not live only for ourselves but for posterity. Therefore, I am a model for my mentorees. In observing how I live, they would be exhorted to live likewise. We all need good Christian models. For this same reason, the writer of Hebrews lists for us the heroes of faith in chapter 11 , that in having so great a cloud of witnesses, we will run with endurance the race that is set before us (Hebrews 12:1). Steve Green, in his song, puts it simply, “May those who come behind us find us faithful.”

Mentoring is a Journey
While mentoring has been a blessing to me, it is often not plain-sailing. I have had my fair share of painful experiences too. In that sense, mentoring is a journey.
But through it all, I see the Lord Himself tutoring me, helping me find strength in Him alone. Mentoring others has drawn me so much closer to our Lord Jesus because He too was a mentor, and He too tasted bad times of being misunderstood, hurt, betrayed and deserted. I have not come even close to the point of
shedding blood. Mentoring is a journey for three reasons:

1. Mentoring is a journey because we’re always learning.
Mentoring may involve being misunderstood, saying words that are difficult yet needful and in the process, getting our mentoree upset. It takes a mature mentoree to be able to accept the needed admonishing.

Likewise, the mentor has to be wise in deciding if the mentoree is ready for harsh words. It is by no means an easy task. This process leads us to the foot of the Cross and in mentoring others, we find ourselves in a most vulnerable and dependent role, depending on the Lord Jesus for His grace and resources. We can go to Him for all our concerns and heartaches in mentoring. For He will grant us wisdom and love to teach and guide our mentorees.

In this way, mentoring is a journey of discovery because we learn and grow as mentors even as we mentor others. We basically learn on the job.

2. Mentoring is a journey because we’re not perfect.
A mentor is not a perfect person who has overcome all hurdles in discipleship, but a growing disciple who is surrendered to the Lordship to Jesus Christ. This means the mentor will still struggle with some issues and still make mistakes but continue to draw strength from the Lord and is willing to be transformed. No human except Jesus, when He was on earth, ever arrives as a mentor.

We all learn a little bit more as we go along. When we look at the life of Jesus the Master Shepherd, we see how He was often misunderstood, hurt, and finally betrayed and deserted. Often, many of us fight shy of mentoring another because we fear being hurt and we fear commitment. But this did not stop Jesus from mentoring fallible men. He still chose them and committed Himself to them for three years before He died.

3. Finally, we understand through mentoring the power and sovereignty of an Almighty God, that it is He who gives the growth not us.
As Apostle Paul reminds the Corinthians, it is not he who plants nor he who waters who gives the growth but God (1 Corinthians 3:6). From my personal experience, I used to help a few ladies who continually struggled with spiritual inertia over a few years. Though I cared a lot for them, I felt I had little to offer them so we ended the mentoring relationship. In the years that followed, I prayed for them for change and breakthrough. Today, all glory goes to God because they are now leaders in their own right, faithful and committed to Jesus.

Keep mentoring – it’s a worthwhile journey!

Tina Chua is a former GP (General Paper) teacher at a Singapore junior college. She is presently a homemaker looking after her two boys, John and Joel. She is married to Pastor Dr Chua Chung Kai (see Pg 32 for Dr Chua’s story on “Xeroxing Man”) and enjoys mentoring ladies and her children.