Rare Event: 2 in 1

We’re celebrating a rare event in our ministry:  just a few weeks ago we had two mentors start within one week of each other!  You might recognize one of them in the picture below!

It’s been a long time coming.  I was thrilled to become an urban missionary last year since this let me increase my ministry hours and opened up time in my schedule so I could become a life coach, myself.  Now, the demands of support-raising (we've nearly reached our goal!) have slowed down enough to get started.  Praise God!

I’m matched up with a wonderful boy named Andre. He’s a smart and outgoing kindergartner at Hope Academy who loves basketball, sledding, and just spending time together. He’s gotten to know Jeremiah, Levi, and Hannah, and they've hit it off well. When I started mentoring I knew it would be fun, but I'm surprised to find I enjoy it even more than I expected! God is good!

Ben and his wife, Bethany.

Our other new mentor is Ben.  In the end of December, he contacted me to let me know that both he and his own mentor (a pastor at Bethlehem) felt like God wanted him to start working with a young man. He let me know that he was hoping to mentor someone near his home in the West Metro.  We found a 14 year-old youth who lived near Ben and appeared to have a lot in common.  He was part of the national ministry’s waiting list, so I called up his mother to see if I could drop by to get to know them better and get him registered with Bethlehem.  It turned out I called exactly one year from the day she first signed her son Bobby up for a life coach. 

Two weeks later Bobby’s mom told Ben and me through tears how happy she was to have the opportunity for a godly man to get involved in her son’s life.  So far things are off to a good start.  Last week Ben was taking Bobby out to the racquetball court to teach him the game Ben shared with an important mentor from his own college days. 

We’re thrilled to have Ben come on board!  He’s part of the Air Force National Guard, and is set to deploy in late June for five months overseas.  He obviously has a lot of good reasons to wait a year to start mentoring, but it’s impressive that he didn’t want to push it off.  One of those reasons has to do with becoming a father.  He and his wife are expecting their first child to arrive in mid-July after he’s deployed.  Please pray for God to provide a way for him to be there for the birth!