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"The Great Commission isn't a calling to be discerned. It's a command to be obeyed." This quote was spoken by Hudson Taylor and is the epicenter of this week's episode. Join Stephen and special guest Trog Trogdon in this powerful episode as they discuss the importance and the practicals of making disciples through mentoring.
Show Notes
"The Great Commission isn't a calling to be discerned. It's a command to be obeyed." This quote was spoken by Hudson Taylor and is the epicenter of this week's episode. Join Stephen and special guest Trog Trogdon in this powerful episode as they discuss the importance and the practicals of making disciples through mentoring.
Kingdom Focus Coaching: http://kingdomfocus.life/
Connect with Trog: trog@kingdomfocus.life
Trog's book, A Walk to Wisdom: https://www.awalktowisdom.com/
Purchase the You Can Mentor book:
You Can Mentor: How to Impact Your Community, Fulfill the Great Commission, and Break Generational Curses
youcanmentor.com
Kingdom Focus Coaching: http://kingdomfocus.life/
Connect with Trog: trog@kingdomfocus.life
Trog's book, A Walk to Wisdom: https://www.awalktowisdom.com/
Purchase the You Can Mentor book:
You Can Mentor: How to Impact Your Community, Fulfill the Great Commission, and Break Generational Curses
youcanmentor.com
Creators and Guests
What is You Can Mentor: A Christian Youth Mentoring Podcast?
You Can Mentor is a network that equips and encourages mentors and mentoring leaders through resources and relationships to love God, love others, and make disciples in their own community. We want to see Christian mentors thrive.
We want to hear from you! Send any mentoring questions to hello@youcanmentor.com, and we'll answer them on our podcast. We want to help you become the best possible mentor you can be. Also, if you are a mentoring organization, church, or non-profit, connect with us to join our mentoring network or to be spotlighted on our show.
Please find out more at www.youcanmentor.com or find us on social media. You will find more resources on our website to help equip and encourage mentors. We have downloadable resources, cohort opportunities, and an opportunity to build relationships with other Christian mentoring leaders.
You can mentor is a podcast about the power of building relationships with kids from hard places in the name of Jesus. Every episode will help you overcome common mentoring obstacles and give you the confidence you need to invest in the lives of others. You can mentor.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to the You Can Mentor podcast. My name is Stephen Murray. I am sitting here today with with a legend, a legend of legends. I mean, you know it's true. It's Trogg Troggden with Kingdom Focus Coaching.
Speaker 2:He is a disciple maker. He has launched a ministry out of his personal, I mean, wisdom and things that have poured into him, and he's pouring those things into other organizations. Kingdom Focus Coaching, Trog, thank you for jumping on the podcast today.
Speaker 3:Glad to be here. Excited to be here.
Speaker 2:I I think everyone in your life has mentioned this before, but you have an epic beard, something that I've always looked forward to seeing how long it's getting ever since I met you probably 7 years ago. And, I mean, it's it's a year it's a year long beard. That's that's a good way to put it over the how do you describe a beard over podcast?
Speaker 3:It's hard, you know. I guess, a year long beard, they call a yeard. So, my daughter I shaved my beard for my wife's 40th, and it's been 4 years or so. My daughter asked me the other day. She said, dad, how long have you been growing your beard?
Speaker 3:And there comes a point where you just kinda keep it trimmed at a certain length. So I would say this is probably a 18 months, maybe 2 year beard, but, I don't know. It's hard to describe maybe the picture I'll do it justice when we have the podcast picture of it.
Speaker 2:It's looking solid. It's looking solid.
Speaker 3:Thank you.
Speaker 2:I I I was telling you about the I mean, my friend from the Middle East. I took a trip to Kurdistan, and there is this small sect of, like, a minority Islamic religion that their their one thing that you don't do to your facial hair is shave your mustache. Like, you have to keep your mustache clean. Wow. And it's called a smell fish.
Speaker 2:It's like that that's how you say, like, that's a nice mustache. You have a you have a nice smell fish. And I I went to Kurdistan with a massive mustache because I was like, I wanna fit in.
Speaker 4:Right.
Speaker 2:And nobody had a mustache.
Speaker 4:I was I was so
Speaker 2:mad. So Because you do
Speaker 3:I have seen you with I mean, you have the Tom Selleck epic mustache. So I'm just I've seen that picture. You know? So I appreciate you growing.
Speaker 4:I
Speaker 2:mean, hearing that from you is everything I need to try. So I try.
Speaker 3:I'm an encourager. You know?
Speaker 2:Well, I I'm excited to have you on the podcast to learn from you and our listeners. Have them learn from you, kinda some tools to equip them in discipleship. We are coming right off of a series where we talked about how are we equipping our mentees to be lifelong followers of Jesus. And I can't think of a better person for us to bring on following that series to share your insight of what you found in making disciples, what works, how how to do it effectively, how to increase people's hunger for relationship with God, and just the persistence of of really being in their life and pursuing them. So thank you for jumping on.
Speaker 2:And maybe you could take a second and just describe in your own words your vision for Kingdom Focus coaching and let our listeners in on what you're doing.
Speaker 3:I think it was Francis Chan who said, if you really wanna experience God, go and make disciples. And so what I tell people is that I help people really experience God by first being a disciple and then giving them the tools and the training and the confidence really to go and make disciples. So in short, that phrase I say is I equip disciples to make disciples because I've always heard that our success is in our successors. Right? And so that's what my ministry is.
Speaker 3:That's what I seek to do every day. I love Colossians 128 when Paul talks about how his goal was to present people mature in Christ, and for that, he labored and he toiled with all of Christ's energy within him to do that. And that picture is a wrestle. It's agony in the Greek. It's how the wrestlers would wrestle in the gymnasium back in the Greco Roman times.
Speaker 3:And so that agony, that that toiling, that striving to present people mature in Christ, it just gripped my heart, and that's that's what I wanna see people do is fall in love with Jesus more and more every day and really experience God through being that disciple. But, you know, when you get on the front lines and you start making disciples, you grow even more. Yeah. So that's what that's what I invest my time doing.
Speaker 2:Come on. And when, I mean, when you think of the apostle Paul, you can't help but think about the people around him and mainly the people that he invested in. So, I mean, you could probably think about Galatia or Ephesus or
Speaker 4:Sure.
Speaker 2:I don't know. It Corinthians, is is is it Thesalonica? I I don't know what the the technical city
Speaker 3:Yeah. Is it Thessaloniki or Nicaea? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. They're in Antioch. Yeah. Like, all all of these cities where there were churches planted, works established where nobody else had worked. You don't just think of those places.
Speaker 2:You think of the people. You think of Right. Timothy. Probably, mainly people think of Timothy. So
Speaker 3:Timothy, Barnabas, you know, Apollos, these kind of guys that
Speaker 2:Silas.
Speaker 3:Silas. Yes.
Speaker 2:There you go.
Speaker 3:Yeah. They're they're names that can often go under the radar. You know? But if you if you think about Barnabas, for example, Barnabas saw in Paul a minister. He didn't see the murder he once was, and my mentor would talk about that, how we get to see people not as they were or even as they are, but who they can and will become in Christ.
Speaker 3:And so I love, you know, Barnabas and his being an encourager and just seeing that minister in Paul, other than the murderer that, you know, he was holding the coat while Stephen was being stoned. I just think that's a great calling for all of
Speaker 4:us Yeah.
Speaker 3:Is that we need to see what people can be in Christ in the future.
Speaker 2:What and I guess as mentors, there are people who've invested in us. And and just anything that we're giving is usually something we've received. So who who are you in this situation? Like, if you're Timothy, who is the Paul to Trog?
Speaker 3:Yeah. So well, that goes back to a phrase I think we we probably talked about before is that everybody needs a Paul, a Timothy, and a Barnabas. Right? And the point is you need somebody older or or further along in the faith. Right?
Speaker 3:You need a peer and then you need somebody that you're pouring into. And so my Paul was a man named Mike Fechner who was a pastor at Prestonwood Baptist. He started a ministry called HIS, Hope and Salvation Bridge Builders, in South Dallas. He did, you know, not to brag on him, but he did a 40 day fast every year. He was just a man of God that
Speaker 2:Every year?
Speaker 3:Every year. Yes. Yes. I know. I know.
Speaker 2:I thought that was one of those one and done kind of thing.
Speaker 3:I know. I know. It's like a marathon. Right? You do a marathon and you're done.
Speaker 3:No. He did a 40 day fast every year, and he just walked with Jesus in a way that was incredible and that you wanted to walk with Jesus like. And so he had 3 or 4 of my friends that he mentored and poured into and just taught me so much about he would call me and leave messages with just praying for me. You know, he he taught me how to pray in front of others. He taught me how big God is.
Speaker 4:You know,
Speaker 3:I would go in with these problems at 24, 25 and think they were huge problems, and and he would take that and show me how big God was so that those problems became so insignificant at the foot of the cross. And so he invested in my life and changed my life, really. You know, God uses a bunch of different people and a bunch of different things, but that season with Mike Fechner and and even now, the quote I just told you about Barnabas was from Mike. You know, he would say, God can do more at night than you can do it during the day. You know, I mean, he would just teach me these things, you know, loving your neighbor and serving the suffering.
Speaker 3:And my my life verse is Matthew 6:33 where it says, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and he will give you everything else. I didn't realize until later, like, that was Mike's favorite verse. And so those things, sometimes it's not what is taught, it's what's caught. And I think that's what mentors do is you just catch their life. You know?
Speaker 3:And so, yeah, Mike Fechner, a hero of mine in the faith, and just meant the world to me. He's passed now. He went on to be with Jesus about 7 years ago, maybe 8, And I had just gone on staff at Bridge Builders to be an urban missionary, and he passed away 4 months later. But, you know, I I used to think that would wreck me, and God really gave me a peace to understand that he's where we wanna be. Why would I wanna bring him back now just selfishly, you know, to learn from him and spend time with him when he's with Jesus?
Speaker 3:And that's where we're all gonna be, and so just a great man of faith that I admire.
Speaker 2:You saying that just made me think about the disciples being invited into discipleship with Jesus and and then his ministry. I mean, in in large part comes to a close with his death and how gut wrenching that would be, and and yet, obviously, that's not the end of the story. 3 days later, Jesus raises from the dead and calls them into their ministry and, I mean, calls them to make disciples.
Speaker 3:And He tells Peter, feed my sheep. When he restores him, he says, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me? But he says, feed my sheep.
Speaker 3:And, of course, you know, Matthew 28, the great commission, when he says that, that was the last thing that Jesus says before he ascends into heaven. And I tell people this all the time. I'm like, look. What's the last thing you would tell your loved ones before you left Earth? Don't you think it might be the most important?
Speaker 3:And so when Jesus is saying, feed my sheep, and then he tells, you know, the 500, go and make disciples and teach them to obey, it's it's vitally important, and I gotta mention this too. Peter went from a coward, denying Jesus three times, to courageous Yeah. After the Holy Spirit came at Pentecost. And that was the same city, the same people, the same everything, but what was the difference? Jesus has has resurrected, and he said, wait here, and then I will send you the the holy spirit.
Speaker 3:And so in the power of the holy spirit, he went from a coward to courageous in Christ. Love it.
Speaker 2:Wow. That that verse, like, the wait the wait here for me, like, I what I remember from the verse is that the disciples wait. Jesus shows up, and it says some of them doubted. Yes. And then Jesus gives the great commission.
Speaker 2:It's like
Speaker 3:That's right.
Speaker 2:He gives he still gives the great commission. He still calls them into it even though they're like, like, you know, I I don't know. Like, am I really seeing Jesus right now?
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:And Jesus calls them into discipleship and imparts that confidence that you're you're talking about. That the thing that you want to impart through Kingdom Focus Coaching is confidence in making disciples.
Speaker 3:Yes. And I think what you said is important that some doubted. There there's room at the table for doubters. Right? Thomas was known as doubting Thomas,
Speaker 2:and there's That's that's, you know, just the fact that you would get a nickname like that.
Speaker 3:I know.
Speaker 2:That's rough.
Speaker 3:That is rough because he was such a faithful man, you know, and we all doubt. Right? And so but, of course, Jesus says, blessed are those who don't see and believe, you know, and so he uses all that as as lessons, but there's room at the table for doubters. And I think that when you have a mentor, you have somebody to go to and say, hey. I'm struggling.
Speaker 3:I'm doubting. Can you help me? That's when that faith is forged, and that's why I think we need mentors. I've got friends that are doctor degree seminary guys that I'll text. I'm, I'm producing a talk on the Proverbs, and, you know, I'd written a book on it as well, but I text him and I said, hey, Wisdom, knowledge, and understanding help me understand the difference.
Speaker 3:You know? And so we're all needing more information to be able to share with other people. You know, I've talked about this, but, you know, we're not saved to sit or saved to be sent. Well, that's a key piece when we're trying to continue to grow in wisdom and knowledge and understanding and in the word of God. And so we always need those peers and those Pauls, right, to to help us that have been further along that journey.
Speaker 2:Would you say that that's well, I guess I wanna ask you, like, are there are there primary areas that keep us from being confident in in fulfilling the great commission? One of those is just not feeling equipped, but it's like the the the call is there. Jesus has told us to do it, and he told us that he'd be with us. What what what are the things that hold us back from from making disciples?
Speaker 3:I have so many answers for that. You know, I think it's in Mark.
Speaker 2:Or your language is to sit. Yes. Safe to sit.
Speaker 3:Yeah. We're not saved to sit. We're saved to be sent. Right? There are a lot of answers, I think.
Speaker 3:Of course, in Mark when he talks about the parable of the sower and the path, he says, the things of this world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word. So sometimes it's even good things. You know, as Christians, it's good things. Maybe it's a good Cowboys game. You know, maybe it's a good UFC fight.
Speaker 3:Maybe it can even be good things that distract us from the mission. But I would say, in general, for me, when Mike Fechner poured into me, I left after 6 months or a year, whatever it was, with a great passion and desire to make disciples, but I didn't feel like I could be like him because I wasn't ready to do a 40 day fast every year, obviously.
Speaker 2:Every year.
Speaker 3:Every year. Yeah. I know. And but what happened was, it was years later that I got the tools I needed, the tools I needed to give me confidence. You know, if you wanna go to battle, that's one thing, but when you get a gun and learn how to use a gun and get bullets, now you feel confident to go into the battle.
Speaker 3:And so you may have the passion, but if you don't have the tools and then the training, you have to know how to use the material, the gun. Right? Like, I'm just using that as an analogy, but the Bible is the sword of the spirit. So once you get the tool, you need to know how to use the tools. So there's tools and training, and then availability.
Speaker 3:I think a lot of times, you know, I think it was CT Studd said, this life will soon be passed. Only what we do for Christ will last.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And I think that we get distracted, and so we just don't enter in because we we lose our availability to go and make disciples or the time, I would say. So the tools and the training, and maybe I would call it priorities, so there's kind of alliteration for you. But once you get those, now you're on fire. You know what to do. You know how to use the material, and you and you go, and you have that confidence confidence.
Speaker 3:And so I think it's vitally important that that we invest that time to learn those things. Of course, that's
Speaker 4:why I'm doing what I am so I can resource the body of Christ with what they need to have
Speaker 3:that confidence. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think I think the
Speaker 2:the premise of the podcast, you can mentor, is really we are wanting to impart faith into any man or woman out there who wants to mentor kids from hard places in the name of Jesus Mhmm. And that they have the calling to do it. Mhmm. And in in some way, you you are right. There is a need for tools to grow in competency skills.
Speaker 2:In some situations, that may be here are some questions to ask or consider. Here are some activities to do. Talk to us about training because that that's something that I I don't know if everyone is has experienced in making disciples. We we've all gone to the class Right. That was like, well, here is here is Matthew 28.
Speaker 2:Here is where what it says, and here's what Jesus did with his disciples. Tell us about the training Yeah. The next step.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And I would love to share a quote too because we say calling, and I love that word. At the same time, I heard I think it was Hudson Taylor. So the great commission is not a calling to be discerned, but a command to be obeyed.
Speaker 2:Oh, snap.
Speaker 3:Right? And so that's a that's a famous quote. And so I say that because I think a lot of times, you know, we may wait for a calling. We may wait for a warm, fuzzy feeling. And And Jesus has commanded us to go and make disciples.
Speaker 3:And then he says, and, lo, I will be with you till the end of the age. So I tell people all the time, don't wait for the the calling when there's a command already given to do it. Right? So let me start there.
Speaker 2:That's good.
Speaker 3:That's good. But, yes, in the confidence, I I use a thing called the 5 questions. My friend, Josh Rolf, if he's listening, shared these with me. I've kinda tweaked them and made them my own, which I think you should do with any training that you receive. But Jesus says the greatest commandment is to love God with all your heart, your mind, your soul, and your strength, and then love your neighbor as yourself.
Speaker 3:And so what these five questions are, they're broken down into 2 sections, really, about the the greatest commandment. So the first one is, what verse have you meditated on or memorized? I I explained the difference between meditation on the word of God versus memorization, and how did you apply it this week? Because Jesus cares about obedience.
Speaker 4:Mhmm. You know,
Speaker 3:in John 15, he says, remain in me, and I in you, and you'll bear much fruit. And he says, remain in me in my words in you. He says, remain in me in my words in you and obey. You know? And I think it's first John that says, and this is the love of Christ or the love for Christ if we obey what he commands.
Speaker 3:So there's that knowledge of the scriptures. Again, my mentor, just to quote him again, he said, it's not how many verses that you know, it's how many verses you obey and live. Mhmm. Right? And so that's question 1.
Speaker 3:Question 2 is about your quiet time. It's, you know, are you praying? How's your walk with Christ in your prayer life? Are you journaling? I believe that God is always speaking.
Speaker 3:The question is, are we listening? You know, he says that God thunders with his voice in Job, or he says in Psalms that on all creation declares his glory. So I say, hey. God is always speaking. Are we listening?
Speaker 3:So the question is, what else has God been saying to you in your time with him? And so that's the inward man, what I call it. Loving God with all your heart, your mind, your soul, and your strength. The second part is loving your neighbor. So we say, how or who have you served this week, and how did it impact you?
Speaker 3:You might not know how it impacts them, but you can know how it impacts you. So that's the third question. The 4th question then is, how have you shared your faith? And I spend a lot of time explaining. I'm not necessarily saying that you need to, you know, share the Romans road.
Speaker 3:Maybe you can. That's awesome. Maybe you share the one verse of evangelism. Maybe you use the Evange cube. Maybe you use the 3 circles.
Speaker 3:I put a video out on the 3 circles that are just a rendition. But whatever it is that you like to use, make sure that you're sharing it. You know? Sometimes, it's just saying I'm a Christian. Sometimes, it's just saying or or wearing a cross necklace.
Speaker 3:Right? And so how have you shared your faith this week? That's the 4th one. The 5th one really is just, hey. You have any questions about what you're reading in the Bible?
Speaker 3:You know, you read the book of John with somebody, and they're gonna have a lot of questions. And so that 5th question is like, hey. Let's open it up. There's no bad question. There's room for doubters as we talked about.
Speaker 3:So what are your doubts? What are your struggles? What are your questions? And I may not know the answer, but I can find some resources for it. Got questions or calm dot org.
Speaker 3:You know, we can get those answers, and so those are the 5 questions that I use. And can I tell you my summary if I were to even sum it down? Okay. So if I were to summarize discipleship into one question, I would say, what has the Lord been teaching you this past week? And the reason I say that is because my buddy, JT Patton, and I, we were in business together, and, actually, he was in Missouri.
Speaker 3:I was in Texas, but we would talk every day, and we would ask each other that one question.
Speaker 2:Every day.
Speaker 3:Every day, we would say, what did the Lord teach you today? And people think, well, how can you have something to talk about? But when you're listening And I'm not saying I'm important or JT's important or we're better. We're just saying, when you're looking for God to show up, David said, in the morning, he would pray and wait expectantly. He would lay his request before the Lord and wait expectantly.
Speaker 3:And when we're looking for God to show up, he will always teach us something. Right? In Proverbs, the man was walking by the field and saw an empty field, and he was taught by an empty field wisdom. And so God's always speaking. Are we listening?
Speaker 3:And so if I were to sum up discipleship, I would say, sit down with a a youth, another man. If you're a woman, another woman, sit down with them and just say, hey, what has God been teaching you today and or this past week? And if you can ask one question, you can make a disciple, And that's how simple it is. And so, again, you'll feel like, well, do I have all the answers? Do I you have all the knowledge?
Speaker 3:No. But I promise you, you can find it. And that's what 4 running mentor is about. Right? You you help people in those questions.
Speaker 3:It's what kingdom focused coaching is about. It's what churches are for. Churches are there to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. Yeah. So, anyway, sorry.
Speaker 3:That was a little, soapbox, but I'm excited about that.
Speaker 2:Those are great questions to to try and form form healthy habits for discipleship. I mean, asking about what are you learning from God in a in a relationship with a child, which I I understand there may be some people who, when they think about discipleship, they think of high level theological I don't know. Whatever the tulip thing is and Arminianism and Calvinism and all this stuff.
Speaker 3:Expiation, propitiation, you know, transubstantiation. We can go to all of it.
Speaker 2:And all of those things, but hey. What? How are how are you experiencing God? What is he showing you? And asking that question consistently will start turning some knobs in a child's soul
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:To really consider their their relationship with with God, especially if they're receiving if they're reading the scripture with you or they're being challenged to walk walk through a a curriculum in your program or at your church or where wherever this discipleship is happening. Right. I I I don't usually see mentor relationships outside of a program. They do happen, and they do occur. And but I I just think that for for us, these questions can kind of be sparks Yes.
Speaker 2:To really help kids pursue God, and kids can pursue God more than we think they
Speaker 4:they can.
Speaker 2:They're actually
Speaker 3:I I can't remember I can't remember the king, but he was 8 years old in the Old Testament, and he turned the country back to Christ. And he he he It
Speaker 2:was like all these kings that are like, and they went their own way, and they went their own way.
Speaker 4:And Bad
Speaker 3:king, bad king, bad king, bad king. Good king. 8 years old. You know, we underestimate. Of course, the scripture talks about Timothy.
Speaker 3:He says, don't let anybody look down upon you because of your youth. Right? That's a that's a paraphrase, of course, but and I would say this too. When you ask good questions, the best discipleship happens when your mentee can't answer the question. Not that you're trying to trick them.
Speaker 3:That's not the point, but the point is if I ask somebody, hey, what's God saying to you in your quiet time? And say, well, I didn't have a quiet time this week. Well, there's the teaching. Well, maybe we need to work on priorities. Maybe we need to talk about, do they understand the Bible?
Speaker 3:Are they reading a translation that they can understand? Do they know how to read the scriptures? Do they know how to pray? Do they know how to journal? All of a sudden, you're asking one question, but their answer will reveal where their maturity is or isn't, which is great because now you get to enter in and teach.
Speaker 3:And so that's why the power of questions is so important. Jesus would even say, do you wanna be healed? Jesus asked questions all the time. They would read a or or say something or read a passage, and he would say, how do you understand it? How do you read it?
Speaker 4:Mhmm. So a
Speaker 3:lot of times, it's just reading a passage in the Bible and saying, Steven, how do you under how do you read it? How do you understand it? And then you get to teach. Right? So and then modeling, I would say this too, it's important.
Speaker 3:There's a difference between teaching and training. I use a skydiving analogy. Teaching would be us sitting down for an hour and watching a video on what it's like to skydive. Right? And no Very helpful.
Speaker 3:Very helpful. Right? And know how to pull the rip cord and, you know, know your whatever pedometers to whatever that thing is on your wrist that goes up. It's not a pedometer. Whatever that goes up in the in the sky, and it it tells you how high you get.
Speaker 3:All those things, but but the difference in training is that we're gonna jump out of a plane together.
Speaker 2:Yes. Strapped strapped on.
Speaker 3:Tandem, and I'm going to do this with you. Yeah. That's training. And so teaching is important, but training is important to walk with people through the struggles of life.
Speaker 2:Yes. So so how was your quiet time? Oh, I didn't do it. Okay. Let's do it together.
Speaker 3:Let's do it together. Let's let's well, I don't feel comfortable in praying. Let's pray together.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Let me teach you, you know, the PRAY acronym. Praise, Repent, Ask, Yield. Maybe you don't know how to read the Bible. Let's talk about the process. Let's look for the promises of God.
Speaker 3:Again, what can you repent of? What do you need to obey? What commands can you see? The all these simple tricks and tools
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Forgetting the word, but then the word of God illuminates. Right? God wants to be known. He wants to be sought after. Psalm 11918, I teach people this all the time.
Speaker 3:It says, open my eyes that I can see the wonderful things in your law. If anybody's listening and they pray that prayer before they get in the scripture, I promise God will answer it. Yeah. Ask God to open your eyes so you can see it. It's just it's awesome when God does those things.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Well, and I I wonder how many mentors have not had that experience of it being modeled to them. Yeah. And when when you put forward that you are now the one tasked with training, not not feeling equipped, not not not feeling like someone's shown you the way, shown you how to do it, strapped themselves onto you. And, I mean, so many guys who apply to become mentors with us I mean, we we mentor kids who don't have a father in their life.
Speaker 2:A lot of the guys that apply to work with us did not have a father when they were growing up, and their passion is connected to wanting to influence and invest in this kid's life. And in a way, they're being the one that goes first, the one that, you know, makes a way for others that didn't have that same experience. And be because of that and and it's not it's not a shot, but I think there are challenges that you face as a mentor if you didn't have a mentor growing up, some older man to follow after. If, I mean, if you didn't have the the Fechners of the world showing you the way, how are you gonna show someone else where to go?
Speaker 3:That's right. I I spent time in the inner city in Bon Ton Farms, as you know. And as farmers, if if I were to tell people, hey. Go and plant these seeds, but I don't give them seeds, you know, you you you can't sow and Or land. Or land.
Speaker 3:You you can't give what you don't have. Yeah. Right? And so, of course, that's what I think about how good God is is he's a father to the fatherless, and and a lot of times, he brings in people, right, to to meet those needs. Yeah.
Speaker 3:But, yes, it's it's so important that that we have something to give. Right? And and we can find it. I I think it was John Maxwell might have said. He said that books became his mentors.
Speaker 3:Right? And so he started reading to learn, you know, leadership, I think it was, and and he might have had a father. I think he was a pastor and all that, but at the end of the day, he said books became mentors for him.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And so I wouldn't suggest that is your entirety, obviously, because there's an intentional and relational piece to men mentorship that you have to have. But for a season Yeah. If if you don't have a mentor, if you don't have somebody that you look up to, grab a good book by a good pastor. You know, I think I mentioned you and I have talked about this before, but George Mueller. Outside of Mike Fechner, George Mueller was a pastor in the 1800.
Speaker 3:Reading his autobiography over and over has mentored me substantially, and a lot of my raising support, my confidence in raising support came from reading his autobiography.
Speaker 2:It would probably inspire you. I mean, that guy that's the guy who ran an orphanage and was like, Lord, would you bring us bread and milk today? And, like, somebody shows up with bread and milk.
Speaker 3:Yes. For
Speaker 2:It's insane.
Speaker 3:It's it's otherworldly. It's it's naturally supernatural. Right? It's here's a short story. At 24 years old, he was reading the scriptures, and he became convicted that he didn't wanna ask man for money.
Speaker 3:He only wanted to ask God. So for the I think he died when he was 91. So if you do the math, call it 65, 70 years. So for 65, 70 years, he never asked man for money. He would only ask God.
Speaker 3:Mhmm. And what happened was he ended up planting multiple churches, he had a scriptural and knowledge institute, and I think it was around 3,000 orphans at the time of his death that he had at one time. So if you think about his lifetime, I mean, so he had facilities for 3,000 orphans, and it was all done on prayer. And so there's a small book called Answers to Prayer, and it's about George Mueller's autobiography, or you could get a bigger one that is called The Autobiography of George Mueller. But at the end of the day, even reading other people's stories of when God shows up creates a confidence Yeah.
Speaker 3:In your own heart and in your own soul. You say, he did it for Moses. He did it for David. He did it for Paul. He did it for George Mueller.
Speaker 3:He did it for Mike Fechner. And then what happens is, once he does it in your own life, for you, you now can't turn around. Right? I've been raised in support for 8 years and and God's been so faithful. Well, I can't now when I lose a donor, because sometimes you do.
Speaker 3:Life happens. You know, I can't go, what am I gonna do? Well, because he's had 8 years of a track record in my own life. I know. I'm driving a car that I didn't purchase because it was donated so that I could serve the Lord.
Speaker 3:Anyway, so it's that track record with Jesus that creates more confidence.
Speaker 2:Come on. That you you mentioned this earlier. You said that your mentor helped you realize not just the big how big your problems were, but how big God was.
Speaker 4:Yes.
Speaker 2:I think that that is I mean, a very compelling vision for mentorship is how how can I display the, I mean, the glory of God and how big he is in respect to our problems? And and I know for for kids being mentored in our program and the kids who who need mentors, who don't have fathers in their life, or or girls who don't, like, the the impact of a positive caring adult significantly changes
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 2:Outcomes. But to to give mentors vision for, hey. I when you're coming into this, our our hope is that you don't just acknowledge the issues that these kids are facing, but actually acknowledge the God of the universe and how much he cares for, loves, and wants what's best for these child for his glory. And I don't know if there were specific practices that he did to help make God bigger than your problems, but I I think mentors would benefit from from hearing about that.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I I will never forget. This is a visual image he gave me, but he pulled a penny out of his pocket one time, and I know we don't use change anymore. Right? But he pulled a penny out, and there was a Coke can on the table.
Speaker 3:And he said the penny is like my problems. It it's big to me, but he didn't leave it on the table. He had me pick it up, and the closer I brought the penny to my eye, the more it obstructed my vision. So if you put a small penny up to your eyeball very close, you can't see anything else.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 4:And
Speaker 3:so even though our problems may seem big, right, to God, they're a penny. They're less than a penny. And so he set the penny back on the table, and then he took the Coke can, and he set it on top of the penny where I couldn't even see the penny anymore. And he said, that's God. God is so big that our problems, we can't even see.
Speaker 3:You know the famous quote about don't look at the mountains, look at the mountain mover.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Look at God. And then I would also say so that was just a visual he gave me that I've never forgotten, but what he also did was he lived it out.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:He he was loving and serving others. He was seeing people come to Christ every day. When he got cancer and died, he had what he called chemo church. I went to MD Anderson with him in Houston. We prayed for the waitress, the server, the receptionist, the hotel worker, the nurse, the doctors, everybody he ran into, even through chemo.
Speaker 3:And and even when he was strong enough, he would grab his you know, the little thing that would hold the IV? He would grab the IV and he would walk down the hall in the hospital, and he would pray for and with other people who were dying of cancer. And it was so powerful to see him live his life out, even in death. And, you know, go back to Peter when he says, feed my sheep. He says, well, what about John?
Speaker 3:You remember you remember that part? He says, well, what about John? How's, you know, how's this gonna play out for him? And and Jesus says, don't worry about him. What is it to you?
Speaker 3:He said, this is the kind of death that you will glorify God with. And so even in death, we can glorify God, but I've watched Mike Fechner live out and seeing him and God in fact, mentors are so important that I would tell his stories before I had my own. Right? Because I would say, hey. I'm new in this walk with Christ, but I know a man that does a 40 day fast.
Speaker 3:I know a man that sees people in the inner city come out of poverty. I know a man that's leading other people to Christ through chemo. And so that's where mentors are so important because just them modeling out. You know, we say, follow me as I follow Christ. We have two goals as Christians.
Speaker 3:Follow Jesus and fish for men. That's it. And when we do that and God has stories, the mentees get to say, hey, I'm growing in my walk, but you should talk to my mentor. Right? And so that's what
Speaker 2:I've said. Love God and love your neighbor as yourself.
Speaker 3:That's it.
Speaker 2:And I don't I don't know if we usually attach love your neighbor as yourself as discipleship and mentorship. It's usually like, oh, you know, feed that guy that is on the side of the road. It's not, hey. Invest. Make sacrifices.
Speaker 2:Impart impart the things that God's taught you into into those that he he places around you.
Speaker 3:Can I share another verse? You you know I love pulling verses now.
Speaker 2:You are full of it. Full of the scripture, not full of No.
Speaker 3:I understand what you mean. Full of the scripture. That's I I get it. It's the best compliment to be full of the scripture, that I could have, but Paul says this in Thessalonians. He says, what is my joy, and what is my crown, and what is my hope of boasting on that day?
Speaker 3:And what he's talking about is judgment day, and he says, is it not you?
Speaker 4:Mhmm. The
Speaker 3:people that we disciple, the people that we love, the people we serve, the people that we mentor, they are our joy and crown of boasting on judgment day. And so I ask people, who's your crown or joy of boasting on that day? Do you have any crowns? Do you have anything to boast in the Lord on on judgment day? And that that's a beautiful piece of the pie because of the picture here, because Paul would talk about, as a parent, he said, not many of you had fathers, but I became your father in the faith.
Speaker 3:Paul cared deeply as as a parent cares for his children, about the maturity of those in Christ. You know, I say, let's not leave any spiritual orphans at the altar. A lot of times people will come to Christ, and they'll pray a prayer, and they have entered from death to life. And we give them a Bible, and we say, come back to church. And I'd ask people, I say, would you give a steak to a newborn baby?
Speaker 4:Mhmm. Of
Speaker 3:course, you would not. You would give them milk in a bottle and all that stuff, and we can't expect a new believer to just pick up the Bible, 66 books. It looks huge, and they're probably intimidated by it. I think it was the Ethiopian, right, that was reading the Isaiah. And was it Philip that came to him and he said, do you understand what you're reading?
Speaker 3:And he said, how can I? Unless if somebody explains it to me. And And that's mentorship. That's discipleship. Is it opening the word
Speaker 2:of God and explaining it to people? That's the most beautiful response.
Speaker 3:Isn't it? How can I understand it unless somebody shows me? And then he shows them. So that's mentorship.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That that image in my head of a kid saying that question, how could you not sit and just pour your life into him?
Speaker 3:Right. Until Christ is formed in you. Mhmm. Right? That's the scripture.
Speaker 3:Until Christ is formed in them. That's what we're doing. And and here's the awesome part. The reason I like to use questions is because the Holy Spirit guides in all truth. When we submit ourselves to the authority of God under the word of God, we can trust that the Holy Spirit will guide us into all truth.
Speaker 3:And I'll tell you another story. Sorry. I have so many stories, but leave him nameless because he's a good friend of mine, but I was determined to ask good questions. I was in sales, and when I was in sales, we would say something like this. If you say it, they'll doubt it, but if they say it, it's always true.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 4:Now it
Speaker 3:doesn't mean it's objective truth, but it's true to their experience in life. So I started asking questions, especially in discipleship. And so I asked my buddy one time, and I could tell he was really struggling with money and and maybe even an idol of money, a lot of us do in the in America. Right? We struggle with with money or worshiping it.
Speaker 3:Although we would never
Speaker 4:say that, because we give our 10%. Right? Of course.
Speaker 3:I'm being sarcastic. Right? But but, anyway, I could see that he was struggling with finances, and and, you know, maybe worshiping or idolizing them, and I asked him. I said, brother, what's the Lord trying to tell you right now? What's he trying to show you?
Speaker 3:And he paused, and he said, the Lord wants me to stop chewing tobacco. Now, in a 1000000 years, I didn't even know he chewed tobacco. Okay? I would not have, as the mentor Called
Speaker 2:him out on that.
Speaker 3:I wouldn't have called him out on that. Not not at that moment in our relationship and discipleship, but it taught me the Holy Spirit is working in everybody's life. And instead of me trying to dictate what I think they should learn at a certain time, I just wanna be available to ask the right questions and let the Holy Spirit guide them into truth, And then I teach, and I train, and I do all that. But if that's what the Lord was working with him on, guess what we're gonna talk about? That.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And let him grow maturity where he is.
Speaker 2:I I mean, it it's perfect. Like, there's there's something about it it not just being the Holy Spirit's job to ask questions because, clearly, God, if he's speaking to us, he's also asking questions and trying to get Yes. Into us like that that verse. It's like, the spirit searches all things, even the depths of God. Like Yes.
Speaker 3:He convinces and right? Yes.
Speaker 2:He knows everything. He doesn't have to ask questions. He still does, but there's something about you being asked by another
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 2:And having having, I guess, the opportunity to confess or to share. And that is a very formative way that I mean, as humans, we we grow because of that prodding and those Right. Those opportunities for us to bring what's inside to The surface. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And and allow people in. Yes. That's I mean
Speaker 3:Sorry. There's a proverb about this. It says, a man's heart is like a deep well, but a man of understanding will draw it out. And that's the principle I use in discipleship is I wanna be the man of understanding that draws out what God is already doing in their heart and through their life and through the circumstances. Know, people ask me, well, how does the Lord speak to you?
Speaker 3:Well, sometimes it's through a song, and sometimes it's through a sermon, and sometimes it's through circumstances, and all of these things. Now it will always line up with the word of God. Right? But just learning how to hear the voice of God and capture those thoughts, I teach people how to journal. Maybe they use a pen and paper, or maybe they use their iPad, or maybe they use their phone.
Speaker 3:Whatever it is, are they capturing those thoughts and those insights as the Holy Spirit is convincing and convicting them? You know, I think it was Albert Einstein that said, the dullest pencil is sharper than the brightest mind. And so capturing that information on paper, on your phone, or wherever to to remember it and to reflect is huge.
Speaker 4:Wow. You you had you had
Speaker 2:glazed over this. You know so much of the Bible. We've talked about practically half of it so far. I think I I honestly don't know where it is, but Paul talks about you have many teachers, few fathers, something along those lines. And I'm I'm making a connection.
Speaker 2:I wanna see what you think. Teachers maybe are more designed to put something in you. Fathers are more of what you just said from from Proverbs of understanding that god is doing something inside of you, and I'm gonna bring it to the forefront. I'm going to help you understand how to live from within and and live in the light. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And, I I mean, I think that that's a powerful way to look at it. And most mentors would probably think of themselves as I'm supposed to teach you, put things in you, not necessarily pull things out of you Yes. And help you process. And, is is that fair?
Speaker 3:I think that's fair. You know, teaching is vitally important. My wife's a teacher, and so my dad was a teacher. My brother's a teacher. I've I've got a family of teachers.
Speaker 3:Teaching is important. I call teaching head knowledge. It's it's great. It's needed. It's the beginning of wisdom, but that training is heart knowledge.
Speaker 3:That's where the formation happens. Right? It takes it, as the old saying, from your head to your heart. When you look at wisdom in the scriptures, it's applied knowledge. It's not just knowing what to do, but it's knowing when to do it.
Speaker 3:It's it's having a gun and knowing how to hunt, but it's also knowing when to shoot so that you can put meat on the table. Right? It's that is wisdom, and so I think that's what you're saying. Right? Is that there's there's this head knowledge, but there's this heart knowledge, and there's this formation.
Speaker 3:Because once you experience the text of scripture that is living and active, it becomes 3 d. It becomes 4 d. You know, it it it jumps off the page. I gotta tell a funny story about Phil Robertson.
Speaker 2:That's the guy with the beard like you. Right?
Speaker 3:Yes. And for those wondering, he has a longer beard than I do. I got to spend a few minutes with him, and I got a picture and
Speaker 2:That's hilarious.
Speaker 3:I was bummed that he had a little bit longer beard, but that's okay. But I was talking to him and I told
Speaker 2:There's gotta be conferences for for that, like a beard conference or something.
Speaker 3:Yeah. To be fair, my beard is a little curlier and his straighter, so I don't know, you know, if I straightened mine, what would happen. But I got to spend some time with Phil, and I had read his book. And I told him that I share the story all the time, and and I just texted his I think it's his nephew, Ben, the other day, and I told him as well. But he has a story.
Speaker 3:He came to Christ, and people were stealing his fish on the Ouachita River, and that was how he was surviving and providing for his family. This was before the duck calling and all that stuff. And he would before he knew Christ, he was, you know, in the in the world and drank a lot and used his guns and, you know, tried to scare people away from shooting shotguns in the air and and trying to protect his land. Well, he came to Christ and he's reading love your enemies, and he's like, lord, what what do you mean love my enemies? I have people stealing my fish.
Speaker 3:Anyway, so he takes God up at the Lord's word. He takes God's word at it, and what he ends up doing is he goes down to the river. He sees men stealing his fish, and he takes his boat, puts his gun in fact, I don't know if he took his gun or not, but put it away either way. And he drove up or drove up. What do you do?
Speaker 3:You boat up
Speaker 4:to a boat. Is that what you do? Drive up on
Speaker 3:the boat, and the men obviously were frantic. And he said, hey, guys. What are you doing there? And they started lying to him, and they said, well, I don't know. This net was caught and, you know, trying to untangle it, and he said, well, hey, let's pull the net up because they didn't know it was his.
Speaker 3:He said, let's pull the net up, and they pulled the net up, and there was a bunch of fish. Okay? And every time they would pull a big fish in, he would give it to the men that were stealing his fish, and, of course, they were feeling bad, and they were like, no. I don't need this. I don't need this.
Speaker 3:He was like, I insist. They pulled in the whole net. He gave them all the fish, and then he looked at them and he said, listen, guys. He said, I know you're the one stealing my fish. He said, you can have all of it.
Speaker 3:He said, I know we all get hungry. We're human. He said, if you're ever hungry again, come up to my house. It's a mile and a half on the corner, and we'll have a fish fry, and I'll feed you and your whole family, but you don't ever have to steal my fish again. And from then on, he never had a problem with somebody stealing his fish.
Speaker 3:And so the reason I tell you that story is because when we take the word of God and we apply it and we experience God through his word and obeying it, that's the heart knowledge. That's the, training that we're talking about and that goes beyond the teaching. Right? So, anyway, I love telling that story.
Speaker 4:Man, come on. And,
Speaker 2:I mean, a part of probably many mentor relationships is that dynamic of actually a fence with the people that you're investing your life in of wanting something for them that they don't want for themselves. I don't know if you've experienced that. I I think that that's probably a universal experience
Speaker 3:for Yes, sir.
Speaker 2:Can
Speaker 3:can I tell you my phrase about that? You know, I have a phrase. I'm sure. It says, you can't want it more than they want it for themselves. Right?
Speaker 2:That's the
Speaker 3:we all have experienced that. Now my mentor would say, look. I'll walk with you as far as you wanna go, but if you stop, I'm gonna keep going.
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Right? And so that piece of I'm I'm going to continue. I'm not gonna quit gives, again, confidence, but there's there's a old phrase in the country. I'm from the country. It says you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.
Speaker 3:Right? And we kinda stop there, and I say, yes, but you can salt the oats and run them on a hot day. And what I'm saying is we can do our best to make them hungry and thirsty for the things of God, and that's where I don't I don't stop with just, yeah, you can leave them to water, but you can't make them drink. I say, man, how are you salting the oats? How are you walking them on a hot day?
Speaker 3:Are you running them on a hot day?
Speaker 2:And giving up too early.
Speaker 3:You're giving up too early. Yeah. Right? And and there becomes a point in the discipleship relationship where, you know, we're looking for coachable people and committed people. And if they're not coachable and they're not committed, at some point, you might stop.
Speaker 3:But I've had 5 years later people come back and say, you know what? I wasn't ready then, but I'm ready now.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:And to that point, God God always remembers prayers. I would say it this way. Our prayers never die. So because God is everlasting and all knowing, the prayers that my mentor prayed for his children 20 years ago, God is still answering even though Mike has passed on. I I literally had breakfast with Jonathan 3 or 4 weeks ago, and he was telling me about prayers that God is still answering from when Mike prayed when he was a child.
Speaker 3:And so prayers never die. And so when we're in that battle and we see somebody that may not be coachable yet or may not be committed yet, we can always pray and ask the Lord to to soften because he's the one who takes the heart of stone and makes it a heart of flesh. Right? And and God is always working, and so we never Luke 18, he tells us the whole story of the persistent widow so that we don't give up in our prayers, so that we'll keep we won't cease in praying. And at the end, he even says, but when I come back, will I find faith like this on earth?
Speaker 3:And so that's our job is to continue to press on even when we feel like, you know, maybe the mentee isn't is kinda stopped. You know?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Man. Well, I I mean, I think that that that pursuit, the persistence, the salting the oats, I don't even know what that means. I guess
Speaker 4:you put salt salt in
Speaker 2:their food and make them thirsty. Yeah. I don't know anything about horses, man. So
Speaker 3:Can I tell you? Have you ever eaten a bunch of pizza that was salty and you just you're full, but you want a gallon of water? Yes. That's it. That's what I'm like.
Speaker 3:There you go.
Speaker 2:I love it. Well, that that puts forward a vision for mentorship Yes. Where if if these kids grow up and they look back on their life and see the men and women in their life that pursued them when they didn't deserve it Yeah. Which I think every every disciple of Jesus felt that Yes. That that's the vision that they have for making disciples as well.
Speaker 2:And Mhmm. And that that's a that's a legacy that's left to them that will that will live on, that that they'll impart in some way. And I know I mean, you wrote a book on Proverbs, with the express purpose of of really asking the question, what am I leaving to those that are following after me? I I mean, you have all these resources, kingdom focused coaching. We're gonna put that in the show notes to make sure our mentors find it.
Speaker 2:But could you just end our time thinking about legacy, thinking about the the legacy of disciple making of of really what what are we trying what are we getting at? Is it just these relationships, or is it really you know what? We're we're leaving something that will change generations.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Well, it is generation changing. It is the method of the gospel being advanced to the ends of the earth. Jesus says 2 things. He says, go and preach the gospel to all of creation.
Speaker 3:I think that's in Mark. And then Matthew 28, go and make disciples. So preaching and making disciples is his method of advancing the kingdom of God across the globe. And so the legacy is this, and and I'll mess up the numbers right now, but it's basically if you preach to a 1000 people every day with 7,000,000,000 people on the planet, it's gonna take you, like, a 1000 years. I forget the math, but a long time to reach 7,000,000,000 people.
Speaker 3:But if you make 3 disciples every year, and those disciples are committed to making 3 disciples every year, in 21 years, you could have 10,000,000,000 followers of Christ, which is over. That's beats the world population. Right? And so it is a legacy. And so because the end goal is people knowing Jesus Christ.
Speaker 3:It's every tribe, tongue, and nation worshiping before the throne of Jesus in Revelation. This is why we do what we do because we want people you know, in John 317 we know John 316, but in John 317, it says, Jesus didn't come to condemn the world because the world is already condemned. The good news of the gospel is good because there's bad news. Apart from Christ, we're sinners and we're going to hell. But because of Christ's perfect life, death, and resurrection, and conquering death, We get our faith in Christ, we get heaven, we get Jesus forever, and that's why he he says go back to what you're saying earlier.
Speaker 3:While we were yet sinners
Speaker 4:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:He died for us. And so while people are yet stubborn, while they're still not ready, Christ died for them. And so that's the legacy. It's the glory of God. It's heaven full of worshipers of Jesus Christ because we were once sinners, but now we're saved by the by Jesus Christ alone.
Speaker 3:And that's the evangelism part of discipleship is that we need to be sharing the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ, because apart from Christ, we are going to hell. And people don't like to talk about that anymore, but it's biblical.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And and the
Speaker 3:the only way out of hell is Jesus Christ, and that is the legacy, is faith in Jesus Christ puts us in heaven, and the world needs to know that.
Speaker 4:It's all good.
Speaker 2:It's rock. I love you, man.
Speaker 3:Let me see. Thank you for having me
Speaker 4:here today.
Speaker 2:I keep I keep thinking about the Ethiopian eunuch for some reason. And I I wonder how many mentors are out there who don't feel like they have the the the tools or the training, and that the the thing that's gonna move the needle is them saying being willing to to say, how will I know unless someone teaches me? How will I know unless someone shows me? And that is humility to be able to ask that question. Yes.
Speaker 2:I know that they can mentor, but it takes humility to be willing to ask. Yes. And and so if you're a mentor who's who's right there, who needs to be asking that question, I I'd encourage you to reach out to us, reach out to Trog, Kingdom Focus Coaching. He has tools. He has training materials available to to show you how to make disciples through your mentor relationship.
Speaker 2:And and know that your mentorship is casting a vision to the person you're mentoring for their mentees later on in life. And so Yes. I hope we we all feel the weight of that. Like, that's a healthy weight to feel that that we are putting forward a vision for mentorship every time we meet with our mentees. I wonder if you could just pray for our mentors, Trav, and we could finish there.
Speaker 3:Yes. Would love to. Lord Jesus, we love you. Lord, we ask you to help us love you even more every day. Be with those who want to mentor, but maybe they haven't stepped up and raised their hand.
Speaker 3:Give them the confidence, give them the courage to obey Your command, to go and make disciples of all nations, teaching others to obey, knowing that you are with us. We are never alone. And we pray for those that are mentoring, that are discipling, that they will pour your love into the hearts of those that are growing in Christ, that there will be many Pauls pouring in to the Timpanzees, that they will train faithful men that will go and train more faithful men, that we will invest our lives in helping others become mature in you so that on judgment day, we will have grounds and joy and boasting before you. We ask this in Jesus' name.
Speaker 2:Amen.