Loving Your NeighborSample

Friendship can be need-based. It can cause us to cross ethnic lines and class lines, as it did for Tommy and me. But it can also be seen as mentoring. When I think about mentoring, I reflect on how the apostle Paul wrote to his sons in the ministry, Timothy and Titus. He gave them guidelines for what it means to be a leader. He told them not to be afraid to be bold for the Lord and not be discouraged because they were young. There was a lot that they needed to know, and he was equipped to teach them.

Mordecai was an Old Testament figure who mentored his young cousin Esther as if she were his daughter. His counsel positioned her to become queen of Persia. And when their people, the Jews, were threatened with being wiped out, he reminded her that God had placed her in the palace so she could help them. When it seemed like she wasn’t hearing him, he gave her some profound words that said, “If you don’t come through for your people, God will provide salvation through someone else.” His words of wisdom helped her see the situation differently, and she determined to appeal to the king for her people, even in light of personal risk. She said, “If I perish, I perish.” (Est. 4:16). She could utter those words because of the counsel of a strong mentor and friend.   Friendship can be mentoring.

I am blessed to have had some wonderful mentors who spoke into my life early on and kept me moving in the right direction. One of those special friends and mentors was Mr. R. A. Buckley. He was the most intelligent human being I ever met. He had a modest background, but he was brilliant. He joined the church in Mendenhall when I came back, and he became the father I never had. He would tell me, “Be a good father.” But I didn’t know what that meant. He said, “You got to be a better father.”

I went to pick him up one day and give him a ride into town. I had a young woman in my car I needed to talk with about the civil rights movement. I had this young woman in the car with me for the ten minutes it took to drive out to the country to pick up Mr. Buckley. He said I should not have been alone in a car with a woman. He insisted, “Never do that again. Never do that again!” I never did that again.

Right after my conversion, Momma Wilson in California became the mother I never had. She had one son, and she was discipling me. Momma Wilson told me that I was discipling her. She said I taught the Bible as she had never heard it taught before. I tried not to let that go to my head because you don’t ever get more knowledgeable than your momma. She will slap you down—in love. She taught me how to live. I had left California for a time, and while I was away, her only son was killed in a car accident. When I came back to California, she took all the love she had for her one son and poured that love out on me. Her love was healing for me. Her mentoring kind of friendship helped me in my preaching and my living.

Today, too many people don’t have those kinds of mentors in their lives. We’ve got to nurture people. We’ve got to go deeper in friendship. We’ve got to be willing to risk speaking up when we see folks moving in the wrong direction.