A mentor is a lifelong blessing

I can't take credit for the origination of these thoughts. They are merely an extension of the sermon I heard this morning. Our minister is doing a series on friendship and today's topic was mentoring friendships, with Elijah and Elisha as examples. He starts with the question that many of us ask at some point in our lives--Have I made a difference at all in anyone's life? "One way to make a positive impact in this life is through mentoring, a relationship where one person shares his/her wisdom, knowledge, and life experience with another. The goal is to help the other person reach more of his/her potential." Rick (our minister) used the relationship of Elijah and Elisha to make his point (1 Kings 19:1-21; 2 Kings 2:1-10)

It was a really good sermon and got me to thinking about the people who have been mentors in my life. There are more than I can count, including my parents, of course, and many Sunday school teachers over the years. However, the person who is foremost in my mind is my friend Bettye Jo, who passed away just a year ago. I met Bettye Jo years ago when I was just a kid at the church camp that she and her husband directed. She was about 15 years older than me, with small children of her own--just the right age for me to look up to and admire. She was a great model of a Christian wife and mother. But besides that, she befriended a pre-teen girl in a remarkable way. Each summer, during the week that I spent at camp, our relationship grew as she counseled me about my disagreements with my best friend, as we visited over a cold Pepsi, and as I observed her deep faith in God. We wrote letters back and forth during the year and I visited her home a number of times. The more time I spent with her, the more I grew to respect her.

Our friendship continued as I became a young adult. I graduated from a camper to a counselor at the camp. Bettye Jo continued to mentor me, even though I was now an adult. I married a few years after I completed college, and then I had children of my own. Her children were grown by that time. At some point during those years, Bettye Jo received a cancer diagnosis. I don't remember what kind, but I do remember how brave she was and how much she trusted God during that time. She successfully beat the cancer and continued much as she had before.

However, a few years ago, Bettye Jo began having some odd symptoms. After consulting numerous doctors, she was diagnosed with ALS-Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis--also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. What a devastating blow! Here is this wonderful woman, still in the prime of her life, with tiny grandchildren, and she is struck with this horrible disease. But, true to her character, she never complained, never questioned God or His love for her. She stayed strong and faithful to the end, even while her body failed her bit by bit. This was her biggest challenge yet, and she taught me, and many others, what it means to trust in God.

I don't know if I ever expressed to Bettye Jo how much she meant to me or how much she influenced my life. That is one of my biggest regrets of our friendship. But, I hope and pray that she saw how I lived my life and somehow knew that she had a tremendous effect on me and decisions that I made.

That is a long story to explain how someone mentored me. I have other mentors in my life now--especially other women in my church. But I often forget that I have a responsibility to mentor others, as well. I doubt that I will ever have the impact on others that Bettye Jo did--in her own quiet way she affected hundreds of people, as evidenced by the over 700 people at her funeral. The quantity, though, is not important. If I can impact one or two or five people in a positive way, then I have accomplished what God has set out for me to do. I need to be an Elijah to someone else's Elisha. I'm sure it won't be hard to find someone to mentor. The hard part will be making sure that I am setting the Christian example that I should be. But, if I pray and remember the lessons I learned from my mentors, and look to the greatest Mentor of all, Jesus, I just might be able to be a positive influence on someone.

How about you? Are you making a difference in someone's life?