Awaking Wonder: Becoming the Mentor Your Child NeedsSample

Mentoring: It’s All about Relationships

He who walks with wise men will be wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm.

Proverbs 13:20

Squished as close to me as possible in my overstuffed recliner, my young son, Joel, was giving me a childish philosophical discourse about what he had been thinking about when he was creating a little figurine of a child outside a cabin with his play dough. 

“You know, Mama, when I grow up, I think I will have a home just like this. And I’ll build you and Daddy a house next door so you can be with me and my kids. We will live in the mountains. We will read great stories, play music all the time, eat great meals, and talk about everything, and build a swing set outside, and be great friends. Mama, when I grow up, I want to be just like you and Daddy. And I want us all to be best friends forever.” 

Children come into the world with wide-eyed innocence accompanied by their uncomplicated willingness to trust and believe us and to be vulnerable without the thought of distrust or being hurt by us, their parents. They are open to a world of wonder and learn from every moment of their saturation in the world around them. Joel’s little-boy affection and sincerity touched a deep place inside. I knew he was trying to articulate something in words that he felt deeply. But it reminded me again that I—his role model and a steward of his well-being—wanted to be worthy of his love, admiration, and affection and needed to respond gently and be worthy of his trust. 

Joel reminded me that education is about relationship, about being worthy of the hope of our children. Taking seriously the stewardship of their trust as we guide them should be an underlying motivation of our hearts as we commit to influencing them. We are passing on a life, not just information. 

This passing on of an inspired life begins with a mentoring mentality, the idea that inspiration and understanding develop best from a thriving relationship with the one who guides the wonder and learning. 

Many times, when thinking about what we need in order to educate our children, we focus on specific curriculums or programs. What does this verse from Proverbs indicate about where wisdom comes from?