Living in Increase (Part 4) - Increase in CommunityIhe Atụ

Elijah and Elisha

The next mentor-mentee relationship we will examine together is Elijah and Elisha. I encourage you to read all of 1 Kings 19 to understand the context of the verses we’re studying today better.

After going into hiding, Elijah converses with God, and God gives him specific instructions on where to go and who to anoint to see change. Elisha, who would eventually replace Elijah as God’s prophet, is included on the list of those to anoint. While there’s more to Elijah and Elisha’s story than these few verses in 1 Kings 19, a fundamental idea of mentorship is introduced in this story: replacement.

God told Elijah that Elisha would eventually be his replacement (1 Kings 19:16). Therefore, Elijah had to invest in Elisha and teach him his ways. While we may not consider the people we mentor to be our “replacements” in our jobs, families, or friend groups, it is an excellent thought to think that as we mentor others, we are replicating ourselves. This begs the question: Is my lifestyle worth replicating?

While mentoring others is a great joy, it is also a great responsibility. If you’re looking to become a mentor to someone else, you have to ensure that what you’re passing on is good. How’s your character? How’s your lifestyle? How’s your soul? When we mentor others and do life with them, we pour ourselves into them, which means we reap what we sow.

Mentorship is, in one way or another, training up a replacement, a replica of who we are. Therefore, we should strive our best to live a life worthy of the calling we have received (Ephesians 4:1) and then replicate that life by mentoring others!

Danielle Babcock-Sapienza and Emily N. Green

Action Step: Write a list of qualities in yourself that you’d like to pass on to those you mentor.