Personal Ministry

Erasmus had great influence upon the religious world of his time and after, especially through his classic writing, In Praise of Folly.  Why did Erasmus take his direction, and Luther take another to achieve similar purpose?  Erasmus was cultivated through the ideas and mentoring of John Colet so decided to take the route of the intellectual rather than the activist.  Luther chose activism.  Luther was inspired by the Apostle Paul, as the Apostle was perceived through Augustine.  Erasmus was inspired by the Apostle Paul and Jerome – through Colet.  The prism of a mentor can mean a wide difference in results, even in relating to the Apostle Paul and his ideas.  (A modern illustration is found in the liberal viewpoint related to life and ministry of Jesus and the Apostle Paul, and the conservative view.)  Other historical biographies tell the same stories through the influences of teachers, expositors, leaders, parents, friends to the life purpose, thought and action of future generations.  Every serious person, in Christian context, and believing from scriptural counsel that he or she is thinking and acting in the direction of God should take on, to the degree possible, something of a mentor figure to others, especially for family generations.  Jesus had his disciples; the Apostle Paul had Timothy, Titus and a number of others; Daniel had his three friends; Moses concentrated on his family, in brother, Aaron, and sister, Miriam.  The principles of mentoring were partly the motivation of God in the biblical accents on the family, making parents mentors of their children.  Some people miss the idea as seen in the experiences of the patriarchs, and the kings and queens of Israel – often with mixed effectiveness as illustrated in David, successful in Solomon, unsuccessful in Absalom. 

For me, a major project as this is being written is to mentor a great-grandson who invites me to mutual involvement in his life development.  I hope in his future, beyond my mortality, that he can use the similar experience in ministry to advance the concept of close mentoring that causes leaps of maturity and perception for the good of life and faithfulness to a heavenly vision related to persons seeking God and life. Literature and history compete with stories of mentors and mentored.  In Kipling’s Captains Courageous, the spoiled Harvey Cheyne, Jr. is mentored by the skipper, Disko Troop, a stern man of high moral character.  Harvey is put to work on shipboard until he becomes a young fellow worthy of the expense of preparing him for influential life.  Harvey is ultimately united with his father, who rewards Disko by mentoring Disko’s son.  Such stories seem endless in the context of sharing self to others.  I have recently received three statements, pages long, from former students expressing appreciation for life mentoring.

In real life Tycho Brahe (1546-1601) was encouraged by his family to develop his mind – and he did.  His passion was for astronomy which he had to pursue secretly because his father wanted a more practical direction than studying the skies.  Brahe ultimately succeeded in his own choices, and reached out to others so they would not have to go through the kind of personal resistance he encountered.  A protégé of his was named Johannes Kepler, a man who changed the World.  Kepler was a devout Christian who wanted to be a theologian, but Brahe, who mentored him, was an astronomer.  Kepler would have preferred to have followed in the long steps of Luther.  What might the church have gained if a Christian theological scholar had mentored Kepler?  This tells us something about what we might do in our churches to cultivate lives of ministry.  (I quickly admit that God likely meant for Kepler to become what he did become.)  Such an exception doesn’t change the point, that we mentor persons to follow a successful direction we followed in godly pursuit.  As noted above, I am mentoring a great-grandson so to choose, from the evidence of him, how to pick up and excel beyond my own achievements in the context I followed.  As Timothy advanced his life from the writings and ministry of the Apostle Paul, so may I have from a great-grandson, a son in faith to take my legacy even to the same college I attended, gain whatever benefit that offers, introduce his own creativity and launch a mature life and career that will have legacy tools in it.  The meaning of family, in the best sense of meaning, has legacy mentoring in it.  God is eager to mentor us from Scripture.