The heart God has for us is the same kind of heart we want to have for people we are mentoring.
God’s heart is to desire all of your heart
God’s heart for us starts with his desire for a relationship with us. He wants us to know him and to love him.
Give mentees an example of a close, abiding relationship with God
You can model an appropriate response to God’s heart by showing your mentee what it looks like to develop an intimate relationship with God that responds to his desire for relationship. Spend time with Jesus on your own to draw on his strength and wisdom. Also incorporate this into the mentoring relationship.
What does it mean that we want our mentee’s heart?
God wants our heart. Can that also be said of our relationship with someone we’re mentoring? Yes, insofar as we want them to share their heart with us. We desire relationship with them. We hope they will come to us honestly and openly, with all the real, raw experiences of their lives.
A mentoring relationship expresses sacrifice, like Jesus’ sacrifice for us
Mentoring someone requires sacrifice, of our time and energy. You will give up a piece of your heart as you invest yourself in their life. For example, you may need to pick up the phone late at night when you get a call.
God’s heart is to receive our honor and obedience. Does this translate to a mentoring relationship?
Sometimes a mentor has to say something hard or challenging, not to get anyone to obey us, but to help them align with God’s will. We’re making a disciple, not of ourselves, but of Jesus. As the apostle Paul said, “Follow me as I follow Christ” (2 Cor 11:1). So we have to be prepared to have conversations about obedience and honoring God with people.
The heart of God for us is to bless us with good gifts
As we mentor others, we have to believe this about God. We will potentially have hard conversations about the character of God, such as why God acted in certain ways in the Old Testament. So we want to constantly bear witness that God is love. God is good. To communicate that, we must believe it. As a person transitions out of Mormonism to follow Jesus, it will likely require some real sacrifices on their part. They need to see confidence in us that, in the end, it will all actually be good.
We also want them to experience our generosity toward them. When we act out God’s generosity by blessing them with simple gifts, even a cup of coffee, this has a way of making the generosity of God feel real.
