We face a generation in search of Obi-Wan: the wise mentor who can pass on how to live. Mentors used to be found in schools, churches, social organizations, and families, but all of those sources are drying up.
Teachers are being asked to do more, test more, and assess more. The factory model of schooling that is often imposed on them, the massive paperwork, all make it hard to have the time to mentor. Nobody ever got tenure for being a great mentor and burned out teachers make bad mentors anyway.
Pastors of small churches face demands to compete with big churches that can lead to less pastoring. Pastors of big churches may adopt a “celebrity mentality” that keeps them distant from folks. Too often those who wish to mentor don’t have the time given other demands put on them and those who have the time do not use it to mentor.
Fewer kids are joining scouting or other clubs. Those clubs, youth groups, and social organizations have become more frantically energetic in order to keep the kids coming. It is hard to mentor during a paint ball war, following the fence painting project, just before the movie marathon.
Good teachers, pastors, and leaders keep finding a way to spend good time listening, helping, and building into the lives of younger people. These are my heroes. We need so many more of them.
This weekend I sat with a group of former students, now teachers, and their students under the leadership of one of the greatest teachers I have ever known: Professor Al Geier of the University of Rochester. He was able to lead a slow, careful, thoughtful, humorous, joyful, difficult, painful discussion with three generations of students.
We found our Obi-Wan and if you cannot have Al for class, at least let me point you to three characteristics of a mentor that he has shown me. Find such people. Sit with them, under them, and beside them.
A mentor listens. Geier knows much, but he listens more. He will give his thought, but only after he has heard what we actually think. No mentor is a narcissist because he is too intent to get to his answers and cannot take the slights that naturally come during mentoring.
A mentor is in the struggle with us. A mentor does not dash in on his jet, shoot some footage with the poor folks and head for home. A mentor takes years with the same group of people and is willing to learn with them.
A mentor has something insightful to say for us and not just for everyone. I cannot tell you why the class this weekend worked so well. You had to be there and be part of the long relationship formed by the community. Al wasn’t giving us his stump speech, he was giving us wisdom we need to hear just now.
You could not have broadcast it because it wasn’t for anyone else.
We need to honor the Obi-Wans, the mentors, and give them the time and resources to help pass on wisdom to the next generation. Of course, the rest of us must value being mentored enough to take time to learn. I have been blessed in my mentors: parent, teachers, friends, but I have also been blessed to have the time to listen and learn.
Maybe one thing churches, schools, and organizations can do is create the quiet space where mentoring is possible. Christians had better care because our older men and women are called to teach the young men and women. The best model is as always: Jesus. He heard our cries. He came and dwelt among us. He had Words of Life. He is the model for every fictional mentor, every Obi-Wan, and is better because He is real.
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