Video Transcript: The Cry For Spiritual Fathers and Mothers: Chapter 11 How Does It Really Work?
Nearly 20 years ago, I was in the Nation of New Zealand, and while I was there, I was in a meeting, and someone came up to me, and as I remember, he was a Presbyterian pastor, but he had a real prophetic call in his life, and he said, God give me a prophecy for you. And began to prophesy over me. And he
prophesied that God called me to relate to a younger generation, be involved somehow administering the young generation, young people. And I, I in my heart, my spirit, even I was involved in church leadership for many years, I feel like and I was getting older, I felt like this, probably something to this, something of God to this. This, probably nearly 20 years ago, 18 to 20 years ago. So so about a year later, I was in a conference in Washington, DC, and while at the conference, I received prayer from someone I had known from the West Coast, a very well known pastor and leader. Then he began to speak over me and prophecy over me, almost the same thing that I heard just before in New Zealand. He said, You're called to a younger generation, and God's going to use you with the younger generation. So I made the assumption that meant I should start a youth ministry. So I get a bunch of people together, my house, our house, and that God spoke to me to work with a younger generation. We started a brand new youth ministry. And every I think it was, Monday night, I would meet with a group of young people, and I trained to give teaching. And we thought, they'll bring their friends, and we're start this, this new, new youth ministry. Well, way I enjoyed it. So my friends, we did it together, but really never grew very much, or may have been 20 to 30 people, the most you came in, went down to about 20, maybe 15 is and I thought there's something missing. I wasn't sure what it was. But while this is happening, there's another group in our county who started a Bible study, all led by young people. And this group grew from about 25 to 50 to 100 to 200 to 400 to 500 it was growing and growing and growing. I thought one day, these are the lot of these young people were young people. I knew someone I was pastoring, and we just was passing, just in the process of turning things over to another generation, and and I knew these young people, they're my friends and and I thought, this is interesting. This is growing. And what I'm doing is not yet, I'm trying to obey this prophetic word. And one day I just realized, what am I doing? God never called me to start a youth ministry. God called me to pour my heart into a younger generation. And then these young people came and said, Would I be one of their advisors? They had two or three or four different pastors and leaders who advises to them. And I remember sitting in a restaurant one morning, and they were asked me, How are you filled with the Holy Spirit? And I explained to them from scripture, they said, Could you pray for us here at this restaurant. We went back into another room and prayed, and I just became close friends with these young men, I remember, and this ministry continued to grow. You'll grow to more than 1000 sometimes 1300 people every week, all led by young people. They never pastors, coming in every Tuesday night. And while I had been having this ministry every Monday
night, that was getting smaller and smaller and smaller. Now size isn't the issue, but I realized there was something missing. So I said to this younger generation, those of you who feel called to, let's just go get involved in this other ministry. And I realized the mistake that I had made is what the prophets had said was true. I was called to young generation, but I wasn't called to start a youth ministry. I was called by God to be a spiritual father to this, this youth ministry that has started that God was obviously blessing and lasted six years and changed 1000s of lives. I was called to be a spiritual father to younger generation. Now, practically, I would talk about, what does it look like to be a spiritual father? Now we're talking about some of the different spheres of influence that you will have. And I mentioned before when Jesus had different spheres of influence. You know, it was Jesus, and then John, then the three, Peter, James and John, then the 12, 120 and of course, then he ministered to the multitudes. So again, listen to God do what he calls you to do. And remember, it was probably just for a season that you pour your life into into certain people. I remember I was poor my life in this young generation leaders. I sat at a restaurant one day with one of the leaders, and he said, I think I figured out why God chose Lancaster County, Pennsylvania to see this move of God. I think I figured it out. I said, What do you think it is he says? Because God knew to be fathers here to help us, and there were other fathers, a group of pastors and leaders, we were just there to help them and bless them, not control it, but bless them, and what God was doing through them. So what are some things that I have learned over the years from scripture, from experience, from others, of being a spiritual father and mother? One thing that's really important is be transparent and be vulnerable. Be open about your own life. I used to think I had the answers, and I tell people, if you do this and this and this, they'll work. Now I don't I try not to do that. What I do today say, look, here's what the Bible says. I show them what the scripture says. I tell them my story. This how to apply to my life. Then you go and take this you go and listen to God, and you do what God's called you to do. See transparency leads to intimacy. As are transparent with God, we have into intimacy with God as we share our feelings and things that have gone on our lives with our spiritual sons and spiritual daughters. It builds a relationship of trust as we intimacy together with each other and with God, together, I have found, if we're not open. They will not be open. I have a friend who said to me once, I was leading in leading this house fellowship, and he said, I asked her, House Fellowship, does anybody have any needs, anything we can pray for? And it's, No, we're fine. He says. So I said, Look, I'm going through some stuff that I share with you, and I'm going through he's I share some things in my heart. He was open, vulnerable. He did within five minutes. Everybody had a problem because they were all of them, because he was open. There's a sense of being a spiritual father, spiritual mother, whereby we are vulnerable, we are open. I meet with young couples, you know, my wife and I
are married 45 years, and as I said in a former one of the former Sessions, who I'm so in love with her today, feel very blessed to be married over 45 years. But I tell people we had 44 good years, or one really hard year after five or six years of marriage is very hard. And often tell young couples a story how we thought we could have lost our marriage. We went to marriage counselor, we got help, and God, by His grace, healed our marriage. And I tell this story, but then I find their responses, wow. If God can heal you, he can give us hope and heal us. Because people think we have it all together. We don't have it all together. God has it all together, but we need to be honest and open, and we need to be transparent. And let's point people to Jesus. Let's point people to him. You know, you don't have to feel like you have to fix everybody, because you will not fix everybody, but Jesus is one who fixes us. Galatians 4:2 says that children need guardians and stewards, and you know, until the time appointed by the Father, this applies also to spiritual sons and daughters. They need people to help them as we point them to Jesus and help them build a relationship with Jesus. I'll say it again. No one ever takes the place of the Heavenly Father. We're here to help others be connected to the Heavenly Father and to be all he's called. He's called them to be spiritual fathering is not a way to get people to do what we want them to do. Spiritual fathering is not a way to get people to serve our ambitions and our visions and our dreams. Instead, it's an opportunity to help discern the will of God for their lives as they hear from God, and then hold them accountable to do what God's called them to do. By the way we talk about being accountable, and you know what true accountability is is? Let me tell you what to do. Accountability if you're accountable to me and we have a personal relationship, true accountability is you pray was God called you to do then you asked me to hold you accountable to do that. I remember, I was struggling in my devotional life, my time with God many years ago. So I asked a friend of mine said, hold me accountable. Call me at seven o'clock every morning for a while, make sure I've had time with God, see, but he wasn't saying, You must get time with God every morning, even though is important, but he was simply saying, Yes, I will hold you accountable. Do something God has shown you that is true accountability. Now, obviously the people have sin in their lives, and we're house church leaders, and we have responsibility, help them face that and find freedom. Of course, there's a place for that, but I'm talking about spiritual fathering here and mothering relationships. How often should you meet together? That's between you and them and the Lord? It might be once a month. A new Christian might be once a week. It might be somebody you work with. I remember I was in New Zealand talking about the importance of being a spiritual father, spiritual mother, and talking about being a mentor and a minister, and how are all called to be ministers. I remember there's a man the back of the room raised his hand. He said, Could I please take a minute tell you my story? I said, sure. He said, I grew up in the nation of Scotland. I felt like I was called to
go to seminary. And I said, I tried, but as I flunked out, I moved way down here in New Zealand. I was discouraged. I tried to go to another Bible school, and somehow it didn't work. He said, I got a job recently, and the guy next to me asked me about my faith, and he said he gave his life to Christ, and now he said, every day, he said, Every day we're talking about Jesus. I'm helping him grow in the Lord. He said, You know, I could, I wanted to go to Bible college to be a minister. He that's why I wanted to go to Bible college. But he said, and I just burden. I'm not a minister. I'm not a minister. But today, said I see it. He said, It's like his load is fall off my back. He said I would no longer try to be a minister. I am a minister because he was ministering on the job every day. He's a spiritual father, this person on this assembly line where he was working. So again, how often do you meet together? It is often as kind as the Lord shows you, and whatever that looks like. Some people prefer having breakfast. Some people prefer just praying together. Some people love me. Just ask lots of questions. I mean, it's different for everybody. I have this restaurant right near where I live, and the owner of the restaurant's a friend of mine. I mean, there are a lot when I'm home, because I meet with so many people. There have been many times I've had three breakfasts in the same restaurant in the same morning. That's why I had to go on a weight loss plan, because I have, you know, orange juice and coffee at one, and something small the other, the other, little bit more coffee, whatever. If I do that, because I'm traveling constantly, I need time to spend with people that, God show me I need to pour my life into. Now the owner of the restaurant said I probably should rent a table. I understand why he says that, but the reality is, we're called to whatever takes to spend time with people. We pray for them. We stand with them. I remember mentring a young farmer many years ago. I go out in the field and sit on the tractor with him and pray with him, asking how he's doing his marriage and how he's doing and his own spiritual life on the tractor. So again, as many ways to do the here's a key. Here's a real key to being a spiritual father. Jesus did this all the time. Jesus asked lots of questions. He said, Who do men say that I am? Who do you say that I am? He asked questions. And we need to learn to ask questions. I took some when I got my degree at Southwestern Christian University, when I turned age 60, I got my degree, and I waited a long time for that. And what I did, I took some courses on coaching, life coaching. I realized the power of asking questions, especially powerful questions, questions that don't have a yes or no answer. And here's the kind of questions you can ask. How's your relationship with Jesus? Again, all this is in your text, if you if you have the book The Cry of the spiritual fathers and mothers. How is your relationship with your spouse? If they're married, who are you praying for? Has your thought life been pure? What struggles are you having this week? Have you shared your faith this week? Are you serving other people in love? What was your greatest joy? What's your biggest disappointment? What do you see
yourself doing five to 10 years down the road? How can I help you fulfill what the Lord's called you to do? Don't ask all those same questions the same day. All right, just take one or just take two. There's some examples of things that we can we can do. And again, you don't have to solve every problem only God does. I talked before, but being a Holy Spirit hinge, God might use you to connect them with somebody else, or to a book or to certain kind of ministry. You know, you don't have to have all the answers, but that's why you need to maintain proper boundaries with them. We talked just briefly before about inter about dependent relationships and codependent relationships and emotional dependent relationships, and we do need to be careful that that can't happen. That's why it's important that we're spiritual fathers, spiritual mothers. We're planting churches. There's others we're connecting to who can help us walk through those situations. Proverbs 19:19 says this, If you rescue him, you have to do it again. Some people just want to be rescued, and you have to do it again and again. We're helping people trust Jesus, not helping them. Just trust us or just trust the house church or the church for helping them. Trust Jesus. Now what if we need help? And that's why sometimes we do. That's why there's Christian counselors, that's why there's deliverance ministries, that's why there's healing ministries. That's where we need the rest of the body of Christ. Remember, you are not their source, but God is get some help if you need to. I remember I was mentoring a young man, and one day he was concerned, because he felt like I was taking too much time with others. I was mentoring not enough time with him. And then the relationship became, got weird and got dysfunctional, but I had others that I was connected to in my life who could help me walk through that so that he could, I could help him find someone else who would give him what he needed. You know, it's okay if these relationships are only for six months or a year. Some will be lifetime, some will be short term, so will be long term. But again, if you think it's long term, start short term and evaluate in the process, but make it easy to get out of the relationship, then you know, otherwise, it becomes controlling. If you find there's an issue, a problem, it's not working, address the root of the conflict, try to resolve it, but if you can't have somebody you both trust come in and help you work through that whole situation. And it's great to have multiple spiritual fathers and multiple spiritual mothers at the same time, and that's great. When my father was living, he's now with the Lord. He mentored me in finance. I had others who mentored me in church leadership, and others who mentored me in other areas. If you're again, fathering new believers again. There's lots of ways to do this. Well, we we've done for years, and we've recommended these books, knowing Jesus Christ, the Lord, we call a biblical foundation series, one little book, and takes four weeks, and you go through this with somebody, they go through it and they read the scriptures, they fill in the blanks, and they get the revelation, sit and walk through it together, and do that week after week. And we've been literally seen
hundreds of 1000s of these have been distributed throughout the body of Christ. But there's many ways you can do that, and you can find what really works best for you. There's what we call homogeneous fathering mothering widows. Who've
been widows for a while, can be a spiritual mama to a new widow, business persons, to a younger business persons. I have a friend. He said he finds great joy in mentoring young business persons and many young business person. That some of them have told me, we've been greatly blessed by his ministry into our lives. Men mentor men. Women mentor women. Titus 2 that we had read before, which says women should the older women should mentor the younger women. And of course, Titus was involved in mentoring the men. Now there are times that there's group mentoring Billy Graham and Bill Bright, the founder ofCampus Crusade for Christ, now called crew, were both mentored by woman named Henrietta Mears, been as a group mentoring. And that is a different situation. Obviously, it's just unwise for men to mentor women and women to be mentoring men, and then as soon as you can, you turn it over to turn the ministry over to those you're training and trust as they'll even have a double anointing and do a better job than you you could ever do. And you know there will be changes when children grew up, like many that I mentored for years, in many ways, they're like peers to me today, and it's a whole different relationship. And I still feel honored to be a spiritual father in their lives, but really they've helped me a lot. It helped me see things that I wouldn't have seen. I noticed when my father, when my father, was very, very old, that he began to look to me to help him. It's almost like the relationship began to change. And that can also can change spiritually, where our spiritual children will help us and help us and serve us as we get older and involved in mentoring together. The bottom line is, we want to see the kingdom of God advanced. The kingdom of God has advanced to people, do people who are mentored to become more like Jesus. We're seeing the character of Christ built in their lives. We're praying that Christ is formed in them. And the most important thing that you will do for a spiritual son or daughter is pray for them day after day after day and stand with them in prayer and then ask them questions and be there for them so they can feel secure that there's one person in the world they can go to who is not going to judge them, but it's going to be there for them and help them. Will speak truth to them. Bible says, Speak the truth in love, speak the truth to them, but has their best interest at heart. Couples can mentor couples again. There's so many ways that this can work, but this is part and parcel, part and parcel to the kingdom of God. And in the scriptures, God's returning the hearts of the fathers to the children. He's returning the hearts of the children to the fathers in the day we live in