I have five Christian “heroes” in my life—two who are now with the Lord, and the others who are 95, 82, and 77, respectively. Over the past several years, I’ve asked my three living heroes to speak to one of my graduate-level classes at Southeastern Seminary, where I teach. They join us via Zoom or Teams (sometimes with help from others on their end), but they spend significant time with my students.
I know these men well, and I know how much they mean to me. But I’m always surprised by just how much my young students devour everything they say. I usually give my heroes a general topic (e.g., “Talk to us about finishing well”), but my students often want to know about even more. They ask about, for example:
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- How did you know God’s call on your life?
- How did you balance raising a family with doing ministry?
- How did you know when it was time to make a change in ministry?
- What would you say to your young self if you were beginning ministry again?
- What’s been your “secret” to finishing well?
What’s caught my attention more than anything as my students converse with these godly men is this reality: my young students desperately want to hang out with and learn from older men of God who are willing to give them time.
Here are some general thoughts on my mind today:
1. Most of my young students—all of whom are preparing for some kind of ministry—don’t have many genuine role models. I wish I could say they all find their spiritual heroes in their pastors, but that’s seldom the case. In fact, many of their heroes are Internet heroes rather than life-on-life heroes. They do not have heroes to whom they can direct questions. I suspect that’s the case for many young adult believers.
2. They long for older heroes who are pushing toward the end. I’m convinced that’s because they’ve seen so many others fall that they desperately want to see someone endure to the end. They want granddads in the faith who are filled with humility and wisdom—and who have run the race and fought the good fight. Young leaders need the assurance that somebody will stay faithful.
3. Sometimes our role is simply to introduce younger leaders to others we admire and respect. When God has blessed us with our own heroes older than we are, we have the opportunity to introduce them to younger people in our ministry and our lives. In fact, I would go so far as to say we have some obligation to make this kind of introduction. Our role as liaisons—even if we connect generations only through the Internet—can be transformational in the discipleship of younger believers.
4. It’s amazing what a single conversation, even an Internet-based one, with the right person can mean to a young leader. Some years ago, I had Robert Coleman (author of The Master Plan of Evangelism) join an online class. When we ended the call, the students were almost silent, knowing they had spent time with a man of God. Some remember that call to this day, particularly the way Dr. Coleman finished by singing a hymn he had sung with mentees for many years. The song of his heart simply quieted our own souls.
5. All of us need to ask this question: when we’re long retired, will young leaders then want to hear from us because we’ve walked with God to the end? If that’s our goal, the decisions we make each day between now and then will be important.
Moreover, we’ll reach that goal not because we want to be so famous that others will want to hang around us; rather, it will happen because God so causes us to walk in humility that others want to be like us. My heroes I write about in this post were/are exactly that kind of man.
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