Will You Still Open the Door?

“Not to us, Lord, not to us but to your name be the glory.” - Psalm 115:1

I used to work in college ministry where most of my days were spent hanging out with a bunch of kids who just needed a place to go, a person to call, a friend to get tacos with. That’s a job? For real? What a dream.

My first week on the job I was sitting on the couch in my mentor’s office when he had these ominous words for me. He said, “A tsunami of need is going to come through that door every single day. You’ll pour everything you have into loving people who will have no idea how much you’ve cared about them and in a few years they will have forgotten your name. Will you still open the door?” In my pride I thought, “Hey - they might not remember you, but they’ll definitely remember me. Open the door!”

Well, that’s just one of many examples of why I needed a mentor. It took me longer than I would like to admit for me to understand that ministry wasn’t supposed to be about me. It wasn’t my name that they needed to know.

I worked at that ministry (shout out to The Wesley Foundation at Texas Tech!) for four years and in my last few weeks there, I found myself sitting on that same couch in that same office. But this time I was holding a trash can with one hand and with the other hand I was pushing back the hair of a girl I’d just met who was sobbing so hard she started puking. She had been in the worship service when something in the sermon triggered the memory of her abuse and when she knocked on my mentor’s office door to get help, he sent for me.

When she stopped puking she laid her head in my lap and focused on slowing down her breaths. I held her tight while I told her what Jesus sees when He looks at her; things that were very different than the lies she’d been believing. It was a long night. By the time I left the office it was almost midnight. My hair smelled like vomit. My clothes were streaked with snot and tears. I hadn’t eaten dinner yet. And this girl didn’t even know my name.

My mentor said “A tsunami of need....” and we both went home for the night.

———

What I learned then I have to remind myself of even now; there’s only one name that can save, and it’s not mine.

In mentoring you might be able to positively impact someone’s life by making disciples of yourself, but truly life-changing love for others will always be about making disciples of Jesus. There’s a lot of reasons behind why I say that, but to put it simply - Jesus loves the people I love more than I do and isn’t limited in what He can do for them like I am. He’s the greater mentor in every single way.

Side-note: But that doesn’t mean that anytime someone encourages you for doing a great job in serving others you should say “It’s all Jesus!” My friend, God may have sent His son to die for our sins but he didn’t’ send Him back down here to get that soccer ball off of the roof for the 5th time because your mentee keeps going “beast mode” on the field. That was all you.

The heart of the issue I’m trying to get at is that if the kid you’re mentoring right now doesn’t remember your name in 2 years, but he knows Jesus’ - will it be worth it?

If you said yes - let’s kick it up a notch. Let’s say you mentor a kid for 5 years and then suddenly, he moves. After all the seeds you’ve planted…after all the prayer and the pizza…another mentor comes into the picture and just a couple months later something clicks; the kid gives his life to Jesus. When he talks about who had the greatest impact in his coming to know Jesus, this other mentor gets all the credit. None of the seeds you planted even get honorable mention. Will it still be worth it?

How much are you really willing to erase yourself from being the point?

———

Today I work in this ministry where most of my days are spent hanging out with a bunch of kids who just need a place to go, a person to talk to, a friend to share skittles with. That’s a job. For real. It’s a dream.

But the reality is also that the needs are constant and they’re heavy, and just when you feel like you’re making progress…a kid moves, a pandemic happens. It’s not long before you start to wonder if anything you’ve done has been worthwhile at all.

So whether you’re a mentor, a volunteer, or a staff member - we have to ask ourselves this question honestly and frequently: who am I doing this for?

If it’s for the kids - you’ll burn out.

Tsunami of need.

If it’s for yourself - you’ll be disappointed.

They’ll have forgotten your name.

But it’s for Jesus - his plan, his name, his glory - you might still experience the first two on occasion, but it will be worth it. It will be worth it for them to know His name.