The last few weeks I’ve been writing about how the devil can use discouragement to mess with our heads. Another big way he messes with us is to plant doubt that God doesn’t care or even exist. The most likely time we’ll think this is when we pray for something we really want and may even need, but we don’t receive it. My wife struggled with this growing up with a dad who was very sick with sarcoidosis (it was as unpleasant as it is to spell) for the last 13 years of his life and despite her many prayers (and the church’s), he ended up dying at 54 of a new problem, the flesh eating disease – he had a pretty rough go. My wife never doubted God’s existence, but she struggled with how she saw Him – understandably. I, however, was the opposite. Growing up, I believed God cared… if He existed: How can a loving God allow pain in the world? I struggled with annual periods of doubting God’s existence until I read The Gift of Pain at 23. This is when I realized that pain isn’t a reason to doubt God because it is, in fact, a gift meant to protect us (pain forces us to stop and let our body heal). This lesson led to one of the points I’m now constantly promoting: There is good in all things. This belief is rooted in the importance of being thankful in all circumstances, which is the key to a happy life.
A year after reading this book and having a mindset that no longer doubted God’s existence because of pain, my stance was tested pretty hard when my dad suddenly died of a heart attack. My new understanding was so helpful, however, it prevented me from experiencing my normal doubt. In fact, I was eventually able to see my dad’s passing as the greatest life lesson I’ve ever received – there is good in all things – which added to my healing. The one thing this new mindset couldn’t fix, however, was something that carried on from my late teens to my mid 30s: I desperately wanted a mentor to help guide me on my career path and for being a good man. I prayed about it; I begged God for it; I searched for it, but I never found it… and now I see that was the best thing for me.
In my therapy schooling, I read that young people really benefit from having an older person involved in their life who’s not their parent – I experienced that first hand. When I was in late elementary school my church hired a youth pastor who was a Bible geek… and I thought he was great. Being a Bible geek myself, we connected really well. He ended up being at the church for about six years transitioning from youth pastor to pastor part way through, yet he always made time to meet up with my brother and I for golf (we were equally terrible), a movie (my brother and I got free movies because we both worked at a movie theater), and book studies (I said we were geeks). Besides him getting us reading books like What’s So Amazing About Grace? he was more of an older brother than a mentor, but it was really great… until the church screwed him over hard and he pretty much disappeared. I commend him for not telling anyone about the behind scenes garbage because he was trying to reduce the risk of gossip, but it was really hurtful to my brother and I to not be told anything – weren’t we friends on some level? Didn’t he care? Silence can be very hurtful; it can be worse than fighting because it leaves the other person questioning themselves and the relationship. We tried to connect with him several times including 15 years later when I told him I was engaged, but the reality is he abandoned us in his attempt to heal, and I’m not sure he ever found his healing as much as he ended up pretending that part of his life never happened.
Despite the unfortunate end, I am still very grateful for the time he spent with me. I feel very lucky to have grown up when I did because now it’s incredibly hard to find an adult who will invest in young people not related to them since they’re at a high risk of being considered a predator – our culture sucks. In our over-protection, we’re messing ourselves and our young people over. Having mentor relationships can highly benefit both the mentor and the mentee sense of value and confidence. Even worse, this lack of non-parent, adult involvement has left many young people seeking guidance for how to live through peers and social media – that sounds like a recipe for disaster… because it is.
I’ve always been drawn to hanging out with older people. Even now, my wife and I regularly try to visit two of my parent’s best friends. Maybe I am drawn to older people because I was the youngest in the family and I liked the challenge of trying to keep up with older kids. Maybe it’s my unconscious need to feel my dad’s approval and any older person giving it satisfies that need. Maybe my insecurity found safety when I could rely on older people to be there as backup if something went wrong. Maybe it gave me an easy out for when I wasn’t as good at something as the older person – they’re older so they should be better. Maybe it was because of experiences like with my youth pastor who helped me. Whatever the reason, after I lost connection with my former youth pastor, I wanted someone I could look up to and learn from; someone not my parent to care about me. A couple times I thought I found someone like a youth pastor, a pastor (including the ones I worked for), a teacher I met in my post grad schooling, or an older therapist at the office I worked at, but there was always a reason why it didn’t work. My current conclusion for the main reason why I never found anyone to invest in me is because, ironically, I appeared to be fine on my own – that’s a crazy thought. Regardless of the reason, looking back on most of my options, God protected me from working with them because He wanted me to be different. Plus, almost everyone ended up proving to be very emotionally unhealthy and someone who could have caused more harm than good. Instead, it was like God was saying to me, “You say you want a mentor, but I’m here. I’m guiding you. Do your part, and I’ll do mine.” And here I am now with my own style that I can one day package and sell. It’s a style that started being forged in 2006 when I began as a youth pastor teaching weekly lessons through God’s lead that transitioned to my website beginning in 2012. God didn’t answer my prayer of a mentor because He was/is guiding me, Himself.
What’s really amazing about my journey is one of the people I wanted to be my mentor was a pastor I met in 1999 (the good old days). I ended up writing and performing sketches for a year at his church before I was led elsewhere, but I would visit his church when I could and I was able to take a course he taught during my first Masters. He was someone who mentored a lot of young people. He probably would’ve included me on his roster, but I was too scared to ask. The other fact is part of me hoped he would’ve asked me to be one of his mentees like he saw something special in me – hence my need for a mentor because I was that lame.
My wife and I ended up joining his church this past fall and it has been incredible on many levels. First, the music and sermons are the best of the best. Second, we’ve been making some new friends as my wife and I actively try to connect with people. Third, and most important, when I first met the pastor I was 19, and now I’m 42, ordained as a pastor, and with a solid career I forged through God’s blessings. I’m no longer a student wanting something from him; I am his equal. Upon reflection, that’s really what I wanted with him all along. I wanted to be his friend and since I wasn’t his mentee, I have the opportunity to be just that. God didn’t answer my prayer because He wanted to give me something better. He also wanted to give the pastor something better – an equal, which he’s even affirmed to me. As someone who’s been in church leadership I understand how lonely that role can be, and now I am in a better position to be a blessing to him, which is pretty great.
Sometimes the best thing for us is not to get the thing we want… a statement every parent of small children has seen firsthand: (parent) “You think you want that, but I have something better for you coming; just be patient.”
This week may you consider that better things are in store for you if you have a little faith.
Rev. Chad David, ChadDavid.ca, Learning to love dumb people (like me)