Earlier this year I wrote a post urging “older” ladies to consider proactively building relationships with younger women and helping us navigate marriage and work and parenthood. I received several good comments and then forgot about it until a few weeks ago, when a reader emailed me this message:

I was reading your blog, my mind going in all sorts of directions from N.T. Wright’s books to finding a young woman to mentor. And it HIT me–I AM mentoring a young woman, just not the way I thought it would be.

Once a week, I stay with a young woman, 29 years old, who was diagnosed in January with ALS, Lou Gehrig’s disease. She had just completed her doctorate in physical therapy, her husband was in Afghanistan, they were planning their next chapter of having children. The military brought her husband home and has allowed him to remain in the active military in the States. Since she has already progressed to the point of being on a walker/wheelchair, she needs people to stay with her while her husband works.

I signed up for one day and she talked the whole time—very softly, but talked. At the end of the day I said to her, “You know that I’m 70, have arthritis, and can’t do a lot of your heavy work. I can do light chores, but if you fall, we’ll just have to keep each other company on the floor because I won’t be able to get you up. I need your honesty. What can I do to help? Run errands? Write letters? What?”


She gave me a life-changing response. She said, “I have lots of people to do my work. I have no one to just sit calmly and talk with me.”

So I go once a week and sit calmly and talk with her. She’s telling me about her whole life. So far we are up to age 19. She tells me about her struggles with accepting this disease. She talks about her disappointment at not being able to raise children.

Even at my age and condition, God is using me at what I do best—talking and listening. I know some might dispute my ability to sit quietly and listen, but I can when God calls me to it!

I’m writing to tell you I’m mentoring. And I’m writing to ask for prayer. My daughter said, “Mom, I know this is a God-thing, because otherwise you wouldn’t be doing it.” What she means is, I usually run from anything dealing with sick people. I didn’t even like going with my husband to do home communion! I’m determined to stay with this young woman till…..

Please pray for me.

This friend is choosing to do what she can with where she is. What a great example of obedience as well as a reminder that “mentoring” does not need to be complex or programmed, just an intentional connection between two people. It can also work both ways—I told my friend I suspect she will receive even more from this friendship than she gives.

I’m so proud of her and honored to pray for this adventure. I’d love to do the same for you this summer—leave a comment about your own recent steps of faith and how we can support you in prayer.

Filed under: giving & giving back, people, the church Tagged: ALS Lou Gehrig, mentoring

OOOOOOH the irony.

My friend Jeff recently invited me to contribute to a synchroblog (a bunch of people blogging on the same topic) about how to break through creative blocks. And I couldn’t think of a thing to write.

Experiencing writer’s block while working on a post about writer’s block is thirteen kinds of ridiculous, but I know why it’s happening; when I scrolled through the list of Christian “names” who had already written, I was intimidated to submit my little post into the fray. Suddenly it seemed necessary to not only contribute something to the discussion, but to do so with wit AND originality AND humor AND insight AND spiritual depth.

A tall order. Before working on this I’d been sitting in my hotel room in Mobile, Alabama eating peanut butter cookies. That seemed much easier than trying to compete with these other voices.


And that, of course, is the reason I’m stuck. When I write to compete instead of contribute, readers never get my best work. When I try to impress people, I miss the chance to impact them.

“If you want to write, you can,” says Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Rhodes. “You’re a human being, with a unique story to tell, and you have every right. If you speak with passion, many of us will listen. We need stories to live, all of us. We live by story. Yours enlarges the circle.”

That circle may be thousands of blog readers or a handful of Twitter followers. Resist the temptation to compare circle sizes; instead, consider what yours needs. What concerns them? Enrages them? Confuses them? What are they talking about, struggling with, laughing at? What stories are they living?

The usual suspects will always collaborate to block our creativity, whether it’s writing a blog post, a church enewsletter, or a book. But I’m learning (thanks, Jeff!) that one of the best ways for me to spark a new thought is to stop managing my “image” and start serving my readers. Considering my community is not only easier than trying to be the next super-blogger, it’s also a lot more fun.


What circles of influence do you have? What do those communities need from you this week?

Filed under: giving & giving back, resources, work Tagged: blogging, creative block, standing on giants, synchroblog, writer's block

I wrote the original post after the earthquake in Haiti, but the same questions apply when it comes to helping Japan. For the record, I am hugely in favor of giving money to these causes. But as one person commented, “People will give to what they perceive as a real need, and it’s possible they do not see supporting ‘church’ as a real need anymore.”

91% of the dollars given to Red Cross provide food and water and medical attention to hurting people. With 75% of a church budget going to staff and facilities and just 10% going to missions, it’s understandable when people direct their charitable dollars to organizations with less overhead and more immediate impact.

But at church, many of us also want concert-level production in the worship center and electronic check-in systems for the kids—all of which cost money. Are we willing to forgo these things to increase our missions giving? What really makes us more “relevant” to the world—and to an emerging generation that values social transformation more than bells and whistles?

For years pastors have told us (usually during stewardship sermons) we need only look at our checkbooks to discover what we value. And it’s true—most of us could definitely spend less on non-essentials and give more to mission. But surely the same is true for churches. What do our budgets say about our true priorities?

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Pastors, a non-PC question: Did it bother you to see so many of your church members give money for Haiti relief when so many aren’t giving to the church?

In January, US nonprofit groups received $528 million in donations for Haiti. Yet recent studies by LifeWay Research indicate that more than 50% of US churches have been negatively affected by the country’s recession and 3% are considering closing their doors. The Barna Group reported similar findings; about 20% of churches have had to cut staff and, ironically, 1 in 25 churches have also cut missions support. (Interestingly, only 3% cut back on building plans and facility improvements. But that’s a subject for another day.)

I’m not saying we shouldn’t give to Haiti relief efforts. But it must be hard to support the Haiti push with an undivided heart when the offering comes in below budget every week and you’re deciding which staff person to lay off next.

People love to give to big causes, but they don’t want to pay the light bills. They’ll give $100 one time but not 10% every week. It’s understandable (as noted earlier, I hate tithing) but our churches are suffering.

Does it bother you? Be honest. It would bother me.

Filed under: giving & giving back, opinions, the church Tagged: charity, church budget, donor, giving, haiti, Japan, offering, Red Cross, tithe

I started the week asking if there was some way to model masculinity for a new generation. So I’ll end it with a nod to the many ways women can also be mentors. It’s a responsibility for all of us—a comment on the original post asked if there might be a twenty-year-old girl who could benefit from a relationship with someone my age. Absolutely. And that girl could be a great role model to a preteen. We’re all “older” to someone.

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Dear older ladies,

First off, do not be offended—by “older” I mean older than me and my friends—not old. Trust me, I’ve been well-trained by my mother that old is at least 10 years older than your current age.

“I just want to age gracefully,” mom says. I’m so lucky to have her as my primary example of godly femininity and she definitely continues to model this as she gets older. Not old. OLDER.


But many women my age and younger don’t have such a great role model, and even those of us who do could benefit from relationships with more than one. I’m writing to ask you to consider committing a few hours each week or even each month for this important job.

As women’s mentoring ministries have hammered into our brains for years, The book of Titus teaches this. And if you want to join or launch a “Titus 2″ group to match older and younger women, that would be a great start. But you don’t have to create anything formal or enlist other volunteers to begin making a difference for the women in my demographic—just choose one or two of us and initiate a relationship.

I know, that’s scary, but if you wait for us to approach you it will never happen. Although I’ve asked a few women to serve as mentors in my life, most of us don’t know we need help—or, if we know, we don’t realize we can ask.


And do we ever need it.

We’re raising kids, raising step kids, trying to get pregnant, trying not to get pregnant. We’re reading “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” because we have no mother, big sister or aunt to clue us in. We’re choosing between homemaking and working outside the home and most of us are trying to do both, in houses with more convenience features than ever before that somehow we still can’t manage to keep clean. No one ever taught us to mend a hem or sew on a button. We can create websites from scratch but not a loaf of bread. We’re working in offices filled with men and holding our own (although still receiving less pay, but whatever). We’re looking at our marriages and wondering if we made the right choice and if we can make this last another forty years and if we want to and if we’re bad people when we don’t.


We need you—your wisdom, your sense of humor, your perspective, your practical help. We don’t expect the answer to every life question; we know we’re facing more choices than any previous generation of women. But we also know the important principles behind making those decisions haven’t changed. Some long-term coaching would be so helpful as we try to figure it all out.

Besides, there are still young women walking around in tube tops. Until every last one of us dresses attractively but modestly, consider yourselves on retainer. Because living gracefully applies to every age, young and old. I mean, older.

Jen

Filed under: giving & giving back, life, men and women, the church Tagged: generations, mentoring, role models, titus, women

I’m tired of the “Don’t blame me, I voted for…..” bumper stickers. Here are some I’d like to see instead:

“No griping about the welfare state until you’ve mentored a teen mom.”

“Yes, abortion is wrong. How many of those unwanted kids would you like to adopt?”

“I got a good education so I’m tutoring someone who didn’t.”




Last week I had the opportunity to participate in a branding strategy meeting with Matthew Barnett and other leaders of the Dream Center in Los Angeles. In a city where 11,000 people sleep on the streets and 17% of all families live below the poverty line, the Dream Center is making a real difference. Food trucks feed 22,000 people each month. Dorm-style housing provides a place for the addicted to begin again. A mobile medical clinic offers treatment, lab work and pharmacy services to the destitute on Skid Row. (In true California style, the Dream Center even provides free chiropractic services at its headquarters.)

It’s trendy for churches to be involved with “social justice” initiatives, and many of them do a lot of good. But Barnett and his team are more interested in sharing the Gospel (thousands worship at Angelus Temple each week) and social transformation (in the Dream Center’s first four years, local prostitution and gang violence dropped 73%, the homicide rate dropped 28% and rape dropped 53%).


The Dream Center operates under the assumption that the Church—not politics, policy or government programs—is the answer to society’s spiritual and tangible needs. Instead of pointing fingers at dishonest politicians, they focus on restoring wholeness to a city ravaged by the father of lies. Instead of waiting for political hope and change, they’re offering real Hope (and a hot meal) to anyone in need.


I was inspired by my day with them, but also frustrated when I opened Facebook that night to see the usual status updates of context-less Bible verses interspersed with opinions about Obama, Glenn Beck, the Tea Party, Fox News and Sarah Palin. I wondered how many of these friends, across the political spectrum, not only trumpeted their views online but quietly volunteered to improve a specific problem in a specific city.

As Christians, we don’t get to complain because we voted for the other guy. We don’t get to blame everything on the red states or the blue states or sit at home wringing our hands over the state of society. We don’t get to say “the local church is the hope of the world” but be content with community outreach consisting of Upward basketball and scrapbooking.

Instead, we get to partner with God in the restoration of all things. The church can do what politicians cannot, and now I’m dreaming about how to be part of it.

Filed under: giving & giving back, opinions, people, the church Tagged: abortion, addict, community service, Dream Center, homeless, inner city, LA, Los Angeles, Matthew Barnett, politics, pro-life, social justice, welfare