Recently at a YOU Lead women’s leadership training, we had a panel answering questions submitted by attendees. Several past and upcoming posts address those and try to help answer them. Click here to read other posts answering these questions.
Today’s question is: Is it possible to have an effective mentoring ministry without a formal program?
Certainly the early church didn’t have a formal mentoring program but in Titus 2:3-5 we are given instructions as women that we are to mentor other women. A formal mentoring ministry is a great catalyst to connect women and Woman to Woman Mentoring helps you do that. You can check out Janet Thompson’s blog for more information.
But, shouldn’t mentoring be spontaneous as well? Many women fear mentoring just because they view it as another 2-3 hour commitment a week. What if we can just encourage older women to look around in their normal daily routine and see where the young women show up. Are they in the workplace? The neighborhood when you walk the dog? Your small group at church? Your school or you child’s ball field? Surely we can all find younger women around us if we look.
Get to know them: find out about their family, their work, their church involvement (or not!), their interests. Show them you care and that you will pray for them as they have needs. The most important thing is to be available. Young women are desperate for the ears, words and hearts of older women who have journeyed in life longer than they have. Invite her to coffee or dessert, or even for a meal in your home.
If you will pray and ask God to show you how, you can mentor other women “along the way” and as a leader you can help your older women understand the mandate from scripture, the needs of young women and the legacy of investing in eternal work.
Several Psalms talk about this very thing. Take a look at a few: Psalm 78:1-7, Psalm 102:18, Psalm 145:4-7, Psalm 22:30-31, Psalm 71:18
Pray and ask God to show you the best way to help your women understand the natural and easy way to share life with younger women. Ask Him to show you who needs to be mentored and who needs to be mentoring…actually that’s ALL women! Teach the lifestyle of mentoring as you lead women in all aspects of women’s ministry.
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Woman to Woman Mentoring