Mentoring Means Loving and Listening

Dannah Gresh: Do you know that verse that says we need to share one another’s burdens? Here’s Nancy Lindgren with a visual.

Nancy Lindgren: I just picture a big ol’ fishing pole. And together we’re hanging onto the fishing pole, and we’re putting all those burdens on the end of that hook, and together we’re casting them out on Jesus. And it makes it so much lighter for both of us.

Dannah: Welcome to the Revive Our Hearts podcast for July 31, 2023. I’m Dannah Gresh, and our host is the author of Adorned, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Have you ever wished that you could get some wise advice from an older woman you trust on some tough questions you’re facing? I think all of us wish we could have that kind of wisdom. But in our day of shallow connections, it can be tough to find those kinds of relationships.

Here at Revive Our Hearts we encourage you to be intentional about your relationships and to look to passages like Titus chapter 2 as a model for older women teaching younger women.

Let me read Titus chapter 2, verses 3–5. The apostle Paul says that,

Older women are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They’re to teach what is good, and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the Word of God may not be reviled.

Betty Huizenga: It’s interesting that the Titus passage says the older women shall teach the younger women. So it’s really not an option for us.

Nancy: That’s Betty Huizenga, founder of a discipleship program you may have heard of called Apples of Gold.

Betty: I think it’s a sad thing when women get to be a certain age and feel like they don’t have a purpose in the church anymore or maybe they think they’ve done it all. God’s saying, “No. Your life experiences are really important and valuable.” Even our mistakes are valuable, aren’t they, as we teach them to others?

Susan Hunt: It's very much like mothering.

Nancy: This is Susan Hunt, author of Spiritual Mothering: The Titus 2 Model for Women Mentoring Women.

Susan: It's the nurturing care of other women. As Paul writes to the Thessalonians, it's sharing the gospel and our lives with others.

The word "train" in Titus 2 is a word that means more than downloading information. It does mean that, but it's also sharing our lives, showing, modeling. It's a show-me kind of ministry.

So it's coming alongside others and living life with them. It's really the kind of discipleship Jesus did because not only did He teach, but He lived life alongside and with His disciples. That's what spiritual mothering is. It's investing in the lives of others in a nurturing way that we share the gospel as well as our lives with them.

Nancy: So how do you know when you’re old enough to be an “older woman” and invest in the next generation? Here’s my friend, author Carolyn McCulley.

Carolyn McCulley: I think maybe we’re a little reluctant to admit we might be the older woman. But let’s just think that’s in terms of maturity, not chronology, right? We’ve received much. And to those who’ve received much, much is required. There are many, many young women who have no knowledge of biblical womanhood because it’s so contrary to what our culture teaches, and they’re hungry, they’re really hungry for this kind of material.

Nancy: Here at Revive Our Hearts, we’ve encouraged you to have spiritual mothers, daughters, and sisters. That means doing life in the context of community with like-minded women. It means finding an older woman you can learn from. And it means becoming that older woman for someone else. 

Dannah: And if you’re thinking, That’s a great idea, but is it really possible? Our guest today is going to show us it’s not only possible, it works! And it’s a joy for both the mentor and the person being mentored!

Nancy Lindgren is the Founder and CEO of MORE Mentoring. She calls herself a “simple, ordinary woman who loves, serves, and believes in an extraordinary God.” She’s passionate about mentoring, something she’s done faithfully for over twenty years. In fact, she wrote a book titled Mentoring Made Real. Nancy and her husband, Mark, live in Fairplay, Colorado. They have four grown children and a well-worn welcome mat at their front door.

She gave this message in a breakout session at our most recent True Woman conference. Let’s listen together.

Nancy Lindgren: I want to shift the mentoring mindset that most of us have in our heads that we can’t do this. Mentoring is too big. It’s too much. We don’t have enough to offer. So many of us feel like we’re not qualified. We’re unworthy. All of those thoughts.

It starts right here in our mindset, and I want to make a shift in that and make it doable, that we can do this. We are equipped. God has given us what we need. I’ve seen that in my own life, and I want to see it in your own life, too.

I just want to hear from you. How many of you have had a mentor in your life that has had a great impact on you? I love it. Many hands going up.

Just shout out a few words that you would use to describe that mentor, and we can just hear. What are some of the character qualities that you’ve seen in her that have made such an impact on you?

Wise, passionate, spiritual leader, mother, spiritual mother, older, grace, unconditional love, challenging, prayer warrior. That’s my passion, too.

I love it. We could list a whole lot of attributes, couldn’t we? I’ve had women in my life that have been the same for me.

How many of you have been that mentor to somebody? Are most of you mentoring right now? Okay, fewer hands, but I see them. I’m so thankful for one each of you that are doing that now.

I want all of us in this room to have a passion to do this. We can do this. It is simple, and yet it is so powerful, and it is so needed in this world today.

Twelve years ago I met a young mom in my neighborhood. We met at a block party, and we just stood there and began to talk, and we connected. There was just something about her I just loved, and somehow she connected to my heart.

Soon after that time together, she sent me a note in the mail, and it said, “Will you be my mentor?”

And I thought, What does that mean? What are your expectations?

I didn’t feel like I had a lot to offer. I was kind of doing some mentoring naturally and organically, but no one had ever said those words to me. I didn’t see them written out, “Will you be my mentor?”

You first kind of go to fear, and then I went to the Lord, and I said, “God, do You want me to do this? Will You show me what it looks like to do it?” I felt like He was saying, “Say yes. Say yes.”

So I did, and I invited her over to my house, and of course I brought my stack of Bible studies and books, and I thought she would just want to go through something like that. Well, Sarah showed up, and she didn’t want all of that.

She had a lot of burdens on her heart. Her oldest daughter was five years old and going off to kindergarten, and she was so nervous and so scared, and she just wanted to hear how I handled it.

We had four kids in six years, and I was a little further down the road than she was, and I just shared my heart with her of how I did it. We talked about God. We prayed together.

I left that time watching her eyes light up so much. That meant so much to her. We didn’t have to do an in-depth book study. I needed to show up real and honest and let her be real and honest, and we had the most amazing time together. That was the beginning of a beautiful relationship with this Sarah.

That really kind of launched me into a ministry that God was calling me to start, a mentoring ministry that happened a few years later as I was sitting on my couch one day on a Saturday morning. I’ll never forget it. It was as if God just showed up, and He was sitting right next to me on that day, and He asked me to start a mentoring ministry.

Specifically He gave me details of the plan, and I’m writing down as fast as I can in my journal. I’m asking Him questions, “What does this look like? How do I do this?” He’s speaking to me very clearly. I don’t hear Him audibly, but within every cell of my body, I know God has met me on my couch, and it was powerful.

I just said, “Lord, if You’re calling me to start this ministry called “More” . . . My Bible was open to Ephesians 3:20, “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” (NIV)

That was His Word going out and speaking to me, and I wanted women to experience more. More of Him, more peace, more fullness of life. I was around a lot of women that really were feeling empty and anxious and fearful and worried. I wanted them to experience that abundant life. That was my heart, and I knew it was God’s heart too.

As God put this on my heart, I just said, “Show me how it’s supposed to look.” One by one, that next year, He put thirteen young moms in my life, and I just began to show up. I would take them out to eat for lunch. I would have them over for coffee. We would go to the park. I hung out with these young moms.

I listened to them a lot, and I let them talk and share. I was a safe place for them to be honest and real. I could see it in their eyes, the impact that this was making, especially as every time we would pray together, we would take all of our concerns to God. That made the greatest impact of all. I began to see God is doing something here. There’s something to this. This doesn’t have to be that hard. We can do this.

I feel like God has put me on this planet to be a voice to say to you, “You can do this too. If I can do it, you can do it.” I’m as ordinary as they come. Even if you feel small and ordinary, God can use you in the life of another woman.

It’s just so encouraging to see what God does when we’re available and we show up and we say yes to Him.

Three steps. If we’re going to shift our mentoring mindset, I want to talk about three things we can do. The very first thing we have to do is talk about dispelling our fears, because we all have them right? We have those fears that rise up.

Dispel the fears. We need to get rid of them. We need to notice and acknowledge that they’re there, but then also just say, “No more. I’m not going to fear.”

There’s so many fears that can say, “I’m not enough. I don’t know what to say. What if we don’t connect?” It’s all the “what ifs” and the red flags, and the “What if this doesn’t go well?” But I want to say, “What if it does go well? What if it really makes an impact on another person’s life?” I want to be a part of that.

We need to dispel those fears and get rid of them, and really just say, “No more.” No more to those fears. They’re not going to control us. They’re not going to rule us.

We also want to look at what the Bible has to say about mentoring. I think it’s so important. Jesus had a lot to say, and He modeled what it looked like to live a life of mentoring. I think the very first passage I think of is Matthew 28:18–20. If you have your Bibles, open up with me, or find it on your phone. These are the key verses, I feel, Jesus was saying before He left this earth. It was His last words to His disciples.

I think we need to pay attention to those last words. What are they? Jesus said this, Matthew 28:18–20.

Jesus came and told his disciples, "I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

Right there we see that we are to go and make disciples. I love that Jesus didn’t say, “It can only be done this way. You have to be on a stage, speaking to at least 10,000 people, or you have to have social media followers of 20,000 or more.”

No, you can disciple people God has put right into your life, just as simply as walking alongside them, loving them right where they’re at, being Jesus to them, living out what it looks like to be a lover of Jesus.

To go and make disciples. I believe mentorship is a form of discipleship. It may not use those words in the Bible. Mentor is kind of a modern-day term, but mentorship is a form of discipleship.

I see mentorship as being more relational, side by side. You’re coming alongside another person; where discipleship, sometimes you think of that teacher and student. You’re teaching them doctrine; you’re teaching them the things of God’s Word. Maybe you’re doing a Bible study together. Maybe there’s deeper discipleship.

I love the relational discipleship, the one-on-one, the prayer-focused mentoring. That’s what God put on my heart as He asked me to start this ministry. I believe that’s a key part of it.

He ends these verses with, “I will be with you always.” I love that. We do not have to mentor by ourselves. We have the Holy Spirit in us, giving us power, giving us the words to say, and we are not alone in it. That gives us confidence right there. God is with us.

That word teach makes me think of the Titus 2 passage which many of us are familiar with, the older women are to teach the younger women and train. It uses that word in there as well. I don’t know about you, but does that intimidate you, those words teach and train?

Those are kind of heavy words. What does that look like? Do I have to have a white board and tell them the one, two, threes of how to do this? Teach and train just always made me feel kind of nervous. I’m not good at that. That’s not me.

I think of teaching and training as more about modeling and living out in front of another person, just sharing with them the greatness of God and who He is in your life. It’s truly just the overflow. You spend time with Jesus. You get to know Him, and you overflow with Him. You let that come out. They’re listening to you share. They’re hearing you talk about how much you love Jesus, and in a way, they’re being taught.

I’ve had women say, “Thank you for teaching me.” It’s so fun to me to see how God can take that teaching and training and really turn it into modeling and just living out a lifestyle of prayer and a lifestyle of mentoring.

Another verse that I really love is Galatians 6:2. This is just another example of what it can look like to mentor. Let’s just turn to that, if you can find Galatians 6:2. I love how it’s worded in the NLT. It says this:

Share each other’s burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ. If you think you are too important to help someone, you are only fooling yourself. You are not that important.

Don’t you love that? It kind of makes me laugh. That is for all of us as mentors. We’re really not that important when it comes right down to it. God is the important one, but if we can share each other’s burdens and come alongside another person, they can feel safe enough to share the hard things and the things that worry them and keep them up at night. I think it’s a beautiful picture of what mentoring can look like.

I think of the verse how we’re supposed to cast our cares upon the Lord because He cares for us. I just picture a big old fishing pole. It’s not like that mentee is casting her cares on us and all of a sudden we have all the burdens on us. It’s like together we’re hanging onto the fishing pole, and we’re putting all those burdens on the end of that hook, and together we’re casting them out on Jesus. And it makes it so much lighter for both of us. It’s not like we’re taking each other’s burdens on, but we’re sharing, because we’re hanging onto the fishing pole together.

That’s that visual that God’s given me. It’s a beautiful picture of walking alongside another woman and sharing a burden of hers together. It’s a beautiful example of mentoring.

One final chapter I want to look at is Psalm 145. There’s many verses we could look at. This is my most favorite chapter in the whole Bible. I think it’s an example, a great example of what it means and what it looks like to be a mentor, and what it sounds like.

Psalm 145. I love it so much because it talks about the greatness of God and who He is. That’s really what we’re doing as mentors. We’re pointing people to God, telling them, this is who He is.

It says this:

I will exalt you, my God and King,
   and praise your name forever and ever.
I will praise you every day;
   yes, I will praise you forever.
Great is the Lord! He is most worthy of praise!
   No one can measure his greatness.
Let each generation tell its children (and I say, “Let each mentor tell their mentees”) of your mighty acts;
   let them proclaim your power.
I will meditate on your majestic, glorious splendor
   and your wonderful miracles.

And it just goes on to say, speak that out. Declare it. Proclaim it to the next generation. They have to hear about the greatness of God. That’s what a really good mentor does. It’s not about us coming with all the great advice and all the answers. It’s pointing to our great God and saying, “This is who I’ve come to know. I know this is His character, and we can rely on His character. He’s true, He’s faithful, He’s good, and we’re pointing to Him. They fall in love with Jesus, and that’s the goal in mentoring, right there.

We’ve talked first about we’re going to dispel our fears, and secondly, we’re going to display the four pillars of mentoring.

Those are kind of my own words that I use, but I love them, because in all these years that I’ve been mentoring, I feel like these four words have come to the surface of what is mentoring all about. What do I need to do? 

I just say there’s four words: love, listen, encourage, and pray.

I just want to start with that word love. I think if a woman steps into your life and she knows that you really care about her, and it’s not about you. You just care, and you show up, and you look in her eyes, and you let her talk. You see her. You let her talk, so you hear her. You get to know her. She is going to feel so loved.

That makes a big difference. It’s huge. If she feels loved, she will feel like, “I can tell you anything. We can go to God about anything.” You’re going to connect in an authentic way in that loving relationship. So it starts with love and really seeing that person where they’re at.

Then listen. I say over fifty percent of mentoring should be listening. That’s probably not what the world would say. The world would say you need to be talking. You need to be passing down all your wisdom and insight and advice.

I feel over all these years as I have stepped into these kind of relationships, the more I listen and let a woman talk, she just feels loved and feels like she’s heard. She can process it and share it and get it off her chest, and her load is lighter because of that, as well.

I think of one story. One of these mentees I had, I was meeting with her. I showed up, and I just asked her one question, and she talked for one whole hour. I don’t think I said one more word. It was kind of funny, I just sat there listening.

At the end, she said, “Okay, I have to go now, but thank you for all the advice you gave me.”

I said, “You are so welcome!”

I didn’t say a thing, but that gave me a picture of this is what it looks like. You listen well, and they feel like they’ve been heard, and you don’t even have to give them advice, but they feel like you’ve given them advice

God can do that, even as we listen. He can be stepping in and sharing things with them that we don’t even have to say. What freedom is that, right? It’s not on our shoulders. It’s not on our shoulders to have all those answers. Do more listening than talking.

The Bible talks about that. It’s scriptural. “Be quick to listen and slow to speak.” I want to be like that as a mentor. I want people to feel like they can tell me anything, and I’m really going to listen.

I remember one retreat we were at, and I offered to mentor women, to come downstairs and have one hour with me. There were like eight women there. I said, “I’m just going to be available, if you want to come down and meet with me. I’m here to listen.”

One by one, these women came, and they just began to cry before I even said anything, because they finally had someone who was willing to hear the really hard stuff that they didn’t share around the kitchen table, as we were all meeting together. They came down and sat with me and cried and just shared their burdens.

I prayed over them, and we had the sweetest time, but again, it was another visual of, “Nancy, this isn’t about you. You just be available. You show up. You listen. You let them process, and God will do what only He can do.” It’s a beautiful thing to watch.

Dannah: That’s Nancy Lindgren, with part 1 of a message she gave last fall at our national conference, True Woman '22. We’ll hear part two tomorrow on Revive Our Hearts. You’ll find information about her book, Mentoring Made Real, linked within the transcript of this program at ReviveOurHearts.com.

Nancy—Nancy Wolgemuth—there’s something so right about this concept of women investing in one another’s lives.

Nancy: This is something that has been on my heart for a number of years. There’s a whole generation of baby-boomer women—the largest generation in our country's history—who are retiring or nearing retirement. Many of them are empty nesters. I believe these women can be a huge resource for the Body of Christ if they’ll keep their focus outward on how they can invest in others during this important season of life.

Dannah: Nancy, my mom is one of those women. God really used circumstances to speak to her heart two years ago, inviting her to stay in ministry. As she’s searched Scripture, she believes that while there may be shifts in her energy and career that limit the way she serves the body of Christ, there’s really no retirement from glorifying God with her life!

Nancy: Your mom is a great example of that. I love that you've followed in her example, and I also have an example in my mother. That's the kind of example we want to set for the women coming behind us.

Well, at Revive Our Hearts we spend a lot of time focusing on this whole subject of women discipling and mentoring and investing in the lives of other women. That happens day after day through this program. It also happens through a lot of our resources, including the book Adorned: Living Out the Beauty of the Gospel Together. I'm thankful for the small group kit that goes with it. It gives women a handle on how to do this with a small group from their area.

Over the years, this message of women discipling and mentoring other women has been resonating with women all around the world. Many have said, “I want to do this.” They’re taking the next step, calling up some friends and saying, "Can we get together?" We are talking about life on life. Women together through the joys, the sorrows, the ups and downs. They’re pointing each other to the Word and to Christ. They’re reminding each other, “Heaven rules. Christ is King.”

Whatever your season of life, it really comes down to that message.

Dannah: It sure does. And if you lead the women’s ministry in your church, if you’re a pastor’s wife, or if you’re a woman who’s just plain interested in mentoring others, listen up! Tomorrow evening we have a two-hour online training event called Mentor Me! I’ll be there, our own Leslie Bennett will be there, Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth will issue us a challenge, and also Nancy Lindgren (our guest today) will be co-hosting the whole thing. Here’s what to expect:

• You'll Get Equipped 
  You'll be prepared to mentor and train others to mentor by experienced teachers. 
• You'll Create and Sustain a Mentoring Culture
  We're going to help you learn how to lay the groundwork for a long-term culture of mentoring.
• You'll Develop a Mentoring Lifestyle
  You'll understand what works and what doesn’t for all ages of mentoring— including tweens and teens. 
• You'll Be Commissioned 
  We'll encourage you to move forward with confidence to fulfill your calling to mentor.

It’s tomorrow evening, August 1, from 7 to 9 p.m. (EDT). But even if you can’t make it to the live event, it will be recorded. So you can sign up today, and you’ll have access to the content beyond tomorrow evening on demand. 

There’s more information about registering for the Mentor Me online training event at our website, ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1-800-569-5959.

Tomorrow on Revive Our Hearts, Nancy Lindgren will be back with part two of her message called “Mentoring Made Real.” I hope you’ll tune in. Again, that’s tomorrow on Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth is calling you reach out and share the freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness you have in Christ.

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