Choose Thankfulness
On the last day that I saw my mentor, we were sitting in her living room. I remember the sun was pouring into the room, lighting up the figurines on the bookshelves and there were birds chirping in the backyard. It was picturesque and all wrong for the circumstances.
Both of us had just been given news that would cause immense pain, suffering, and grief in and around our lives for years to come. My mentor found out she had cancer, and I found out my husband was leaving me. It was the beginning of a season of endings for both of us, and we were just sitting together at the start, thankful to not be alone.
When I first met this mentor, years before her diagnosis - she immediately challenged me with her heart of thankfulness. Before then, I would have said I was pretty decent at seeing the good, but after meeting her I understood that she was running marathons while I was jogging around the block. She trained me though - not with a lesson, but with her life.
I saw her choose to be thankful through financial hardship. Through the difficulty of her husband’s health struggles, surgery, and recovery. Through her mother and father’s deaths. I heard it in the way she talked about her appearance, abilities, and experiences. In how she talked about her family and neighbors. In how she talked about cultural divides and personal conflicts. And even in the midst of the excruciating pain endured while fighting the cancer and facing her death - the last message she sent me before she passed started and ended with the words, “I am thankful”.
Walking through life next to her was like a strength and conditioning workout for my heart, and when the day came when choosing thankfulness in all circumstances according to the will of God (1 Thessalonians 5:18) would require some serious internal strength on my part - I was ready for it. My mentor fought the good fight. She finished her race. And she trained me to do the same.
On the day of her funeral, the church was filled to capacity; hundreds of relationships were represented in the room. Hundreds. I don’t think she knew that’s how many people she had pulled into the race with her because her eyes were never fixed on anything but Jesus, but that’s just the impact she had. Everything about the way she lived was an invitation to run with her; eyes forward on the things of heaven. The stories shared in celebration of her life that day testified to the quiet power of this one woman, who endured hard things and still chose to celebrate the good, seek out the beauty, and live in wonder at the glory of God.
As mentors, we cannot prepare our mentees for everything that they will face, but we can invite them to run with us as we strengthen and condition our hearts to be the Men and Women of God we are called to be, regardless of the circumstances. We can train them in the disciplines of celebrating the good, seeking out the beauty, and living in wonder at the glory of God. If we do that, even when our race is complete - more victory will follow. Because we’ll be able to look behind us as we cross that finish line, and see that hundreds more are on the way.
Will you run with me?