Mentoring

Bill Webb recently saw his 80 years of life flash before his eyes. It was through his seven grandchildren, who'd found old photos and, heartwarmingly, dressed up as him during different eras of his life—celebrating his birthday, his life, and their love for him.

His 21-year-old granddaughter, Kenzie Greene shared an Instagram post about the event. She said, “He definitely knows how to make all of us feel special and remembers things about each of us.” Kenzie recalls that their grandparents always showed up to their sports and other events to express their love and support.

After retiring, Bill has made the most of his life as a grandfather, spending countless nights playing games, sharing meals, and spending priceless time with them at the family house.

Kenzie and the family wanted to do something special for Pawpaw to show him how much he means to them. They decided to highlight eras from his life. Kenzie noted that “80 years is a long time,” and they had to fit all those years into 7 eras that each grandchild could personify.

For each era of their Pawpaw’s life, each grandchild chose an era that represented a connection they shared with him. For example, Kenzie’s cousin Hutton was really into football in high school, so he represented the “football era” of Bill’s life. Kenzie is currently studying at the University of Tennessee, where Bill also studied, so she naturally chose his “frat boy” era. As each grandchild came out, they announced what part of his life they represented, and then showed him an actual scrapbook picture of what he looked like at that stage of his life.

One commenter on her video wrote, “This speaks volumes about love, legacy, and the strength of family bonds. What a reminder of the beauty in honoring those who paved the road before us. This is the kind of legacy that inspires us all. What a family!”

Yet another study shows what should be obvious: teenagers need to spend time with dad. The study tracked over 200 families and found that time with both parents starts to decrease when kids reach the age of 15. But the University of Pennsylvania study also found that the time teens spend with their dads has critical benefits.

A CNN article stated, "The more time spent alone with their fathers, the higher their self-esteem; the more time with their dads in a group setting, the better their social skills." The article also said that time with mom helps too, but there's just something special about time with dad.

The researchers conjectured that one-on-one time with dad "may develop higher general self-worth [in teenagers] because their fathers go beyond social expectations to devote undivided attention to them."

The message is clear: dads can make a huge difference in their kids' lives.

In an article in The Atlantic, Russel Shaw writes:

When my son was a toddler, I realized how much my emotional reactions influenced his. If I showed worry when he fell, he'd wail; if I remained calm, he'd recover. Learning that I could so powerfully influence his mental state was a revelation. This taught me that parenting is about more than just teaching skills; it's about shaping emotions.

Our instinct is to protect our children, but overprotecting can hinder their development. This urge has led to pop-culture mythology around pushy parenting styles, including the “Helicopter Parent,” who flies in to rescue a child in crisis, and the “Snowplow Parent,” who flattens any obstacle in their child’s way.

Lighthouse parents, on the other hand, provide support while allowing their children to learn from their experiences. Like a lighthouse that helps sailors avoid crashing into rocks, Lighthouse Parents provide firm boundaries and emotional support while allowing their children the freedom to navigate their own challenges. The key is learning when to step back and let them find their own way.

The crucial shift is from fixing problems to listening. Listening teaches resilience and communicates trust in our children's abilities. Parenting can be stressful, but by letting them face challenges, we help them build the skills they need to thrive.

Michael Hoffen is a new author, and like him, the central character of his book is a teenager. But there’s quite an age gap between them—about 4,000 years. That’s because Hoffen translated an ancient papyrus from Egypt’s Middle Kingdom and brought to life the true story of a young Egyptian from ancient times named Pepi. In the papyrus, Pepi’s father, Khety, is intent on getting his son a job in the royal court.

Young Pepi wonders what career path he should choose, an important matter still contemplated today by millions of teenagers forty centuries later. His father Khety takes him on a long journey up the Nile to enroll him in a school far away from home. Along the way, Khety explains 18 other terrible jobs Pepi could end up having to work at if he is not hired as a scribe.

Hoffen, who has been translating ancient texts since middle school, became fascinated by a 4,000-year-old or so piece of literature from ancient Egypt’s Middle Kingdom known as The Instruction of Khety.

Under the guidance and collaboration of his two co-authors, Egyptologists Christian Casey and Jen Thum, Hoffen spent three-and-a-half years translating hieroglyphics into modern-day prose and gathering images to tell the story of Kheti and Pepi.

He then published a book called “Be A Scribe! Working for a Better Life in Ancient Egypt.” In the book he describes just how little the human condition has changed in thousands of years and shows readers that working for a living has never been easy!

Possible Preaching Angle:

Parents still want the best for their children, and teenagers face important decisions as they set out on their career paths. This story shows how little parenting has changed across thousands of years. The record of an Egyptian father giving life advice to his son mirrors the same instructions that Solomon gave to his sons in Proverbs, “Listen, my sons, to a father’s instruction; pay attention and gain understanding. For I give you sound teaching…” (Prov. 4:1)

Former Oregon Ducks star Greg Bell remembers a pivotal moment that changed his relationship with his daughter Sofia.

Greg had just finished watching Sofia, then eleven, cross the finish line at a track meet. When he went over to congratulate her on her finish, she had a question for him. She asked, “Dad, why are you and everyone yelling at me while I’m running?” Greg laughed. “Sweetie, we’re just trying to help you run faster.” Sofia looked around and tersely replied: “What do you think I’m trying to do?”

Sofia is now a sophomore at the University of Oregon, and a star ball player in her own right. She won a national championship in a Nike invitational tournament with her AAU team, and was named a McDonalds All-American in 2023. And she credits both of her parents for their encouragement, especially her dad.

Sofia said of her dad, “He definitely gave me a lot of guidance and still does. He is pretty consistent with his texts and his little stuff.”

Reflecting on how he changed his own parenting style, Greg said, “(For) most kids, I think, the worst part of sports is the ride home. We didn’t want sports to be a negative for her. She’s already going to be self-critical.”

Greg is convinced that Sofia chose the same path he did, playing the same sport at the same school, because he gave her the space to express her own personality. By allowing her this freedom, he believes she was able to find her own way and make her own decisions. He says parents can help their kids the best when they’re not lurking or overbearing with parental interference. Greg told a reporter:

So much of it is just having a strong relationship with her. What’s the relationship going to look like when the ball stops bouncing? If I’m a jerk to her while we’re in the gym, what’s that going to look like in five years?... I shot all the baskets I’m going to shoot… It’s her legacy. Not mine.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Like a loving parent guiding a teen into adulthood or a coach guiding a star player into a successful athletic campaign, God walks with us every day and gives us what we need to become the people we were created to be.

When the No. 1 seed Alabama men’s basketball team suffered an upset loss in the Sweet 16 in 2023, coach Nate Oats sought out advice from one of the greatest coaches of all time—Alabama’s football coach, Nick Saban.

It will come as no surprise to learn that Nick Saban, the seven-time title-winning football coach, had some wisdom to offer his colleague. Saban emphasized the importance of not dwelling on the opportunity the team had just lost, but focusing on the next opportunity to come.

Saban’s approach paid off. Despite losing more games and earning a lower March Madness seed than it did the year before, the 2024 Alabama basketball team reached the first Final Four in the program’s 111-year history.

“It’s a great philosophy in life,” Oats said this week. “There’s a lot of adversity you hit … You live in the past; you’re not going to be very good in the present.”

That’s where Saban came in. One of the greatest winners in the history of college sports, Saban also happens to know plenty about losing. As Oats pointed out, most of Saban’s championships came during seasons marred by at least one crushing regular-season defeat.

It may be surprising that Saban was so willing to let Oats pick his brain. But as it turns out, it’s something the pair have been doing for years. After he was hired from Buffalo, Oats asked Saban if he could embed himself into Bama’s practice facilities to see how the best college football coach of all-time ran his program.

Oats said, “I went and watched practices. I sat in on staff meetings. I shadowed him for a day. I went on road trips with him to see how they operated. I tried to learn as much as I could.”

Six-time Super Bowl winner Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots parted ways in January 2024. This sparked a lot of commentary on the coach’s legacy. Offensive lineman Damien Woody played for the Patriots from 1999 to 2003 and was integral in helping the team win two Super Bowls. Speaking on ESPN's morning talk show First Take, Woody explains how Belichick went the extra mile to help him reach his full potential, on the field and in life:

I tell people this all the time. Every moment I stepped in that building in New England it was like game day every day. You had to be mentally and physically prepared to be in a grinder. That's the type of environment that Bill had in New England. He always made sure that everyone was uncomfortable. Because we know that when you're uncomfortable that's when the greatest growth comes about within you as a person. So, it should surprise no one the level of success that Bill and the New England Patriots had because of the environment that was there.

But I remember Bill back in my early days. "I think it was like 2001, Bill Belichick put an anchor in our locker room. That anchor signified how much overweight we were as a football team and how much dead weight we were carrying around that was keeping us as a team from getting to where we want to go. During my playing career I always had problems with my weight. So instead of reaming me, Bill went out of his way to set me up at a program at Duke University. Paid for it himself. I was down there for two months. This man came down to North Carolina multiple times to check on me to see how I was doing.

That to me speaks volumes about the man. And so, like I sit here today just processing and I'm thankful for every lesson that I learned there because I've been able to carry that not only through my playing career but just through my life in general.

A father’s influence on their sons is profound. As young men, we look first to our fathers to help lay the foundation for our own future growth. They help us distinguish between right and wrong. They encourage our strengths and nurture our struggles to prepare us for the future.

But fathers aren’t perfect. Sometimes opportunities to teach life lessons or impart simple skills get lost in the chaos of life. And it’s easy to look back with longing and regret at those moments.

The point is to not dwell on mistakes. Rather, it is to learn about what you might want to prioritize as a father. So, what do their kids wish their dads taught them when they were still young. Here are five things they said:

1. How To Be Present

“I wish I had learned from my father the importance of experiencing life, moments, and relationships over working for the dollar. Make your living but be present. Cherish family because time is the one thing you can't get back.”

2. How To Know My Worth

“My father never taught me to be confident in myself. He was abusive and manipulative and I would doubt whether any actions or decisions were the right ones. One thing stands out in my mind is that I must cherish my own children and never make them feel inferior.”

3. How To Fix Things

“My dad was one of those guys who was very mechanically inclined. If I could go back in time to being a kid again, I would have asked my dad to take time to bring me in on some of his repair jobs. It would have given me much needed confidence when working with my hands, which happens a lot as a dad.”

4. How To Care

“My dad wasn't very present during my childhood. He was a traveling businessman and was gone 2-3 weeks of every month. The biggest thing he never showed me was how to care for the people I love.”

5. How To Problem Solve

“My dad was very much a ‘Let me do it’ kind of guy. He wanted to fix the problem rather than help us learn about it. I appreciate what he was trying to do, but I think it hindered my ability to think for myself while I was growing up.”

How often do we as parents imagine our children playing a professional sport? Whether it is swimming, gymnastics, college football, or basketball, there is often the hope that our child will make the cut.

‌Youth sports is a big industry in the United States. The Aspen Institute says it is a “30-40 billion dollar,” industry. The average family spends around $883 a year to cover the costs of just one primary sport. We might ask "Is the cost worth the investment?"

‌The reality is that only 3% of High School basketball players will play at college level. And this number drops significantly further along the professional level.

‌According to the NCAA, “Only 0.02 to 0.03 percent of high school players end up playing in the NBA or WNBA.” Think about that number! That means out of 10,000 high school players only 1 or 2 will ever get the chance to play a professional sport.

‌Possible Preaching Angle:

It is so easy to get focused on the wrong goals. Matthew 25:14-30 makes clear that it is not the amount of the talent, but our attitude towards our gifts that is crucial. We each have been given at least one gift and different abilities. Jesus says do not look at what others do, instead make a difference with the talent you have been given.

Dr. Joe Carella, Sport Psychology Consultant with the NBA’s Orlando Magic addresses what to do "When you see yourself differently than your boss does."

Anyone who gets drafted in the NBA feels like they're going to be an all-star with a long career ahead of them. Perhaps you think of yourself as a primary scorer, the guy you give the ball to at the end of the game to make the bucket to win. The coach, however, sees you primarily as a defensive player. You can either fight or accept that.

I work with the players to accept their coach's vision and to develop the skills to excel in that role. If you don't take advantage of the opportunity you're given, you may regret it for a long time. Interestingly, this is much less of a problem with veteran players. When you're a rookie who might not want to recognize or accept your limitations, it's hard. Unfortunately, the guys who don't develop greater self-awareness are more likely to resist change, and their NBA careers are shorter and don't match their potential. But the players who find a way to be dependable while embracing the challenge of changing perceptions are the ones with long, fulfilling careers.

Possible Preaching Angle:

In the Christian walk, our "Coach" ultimately decides what position we will play and our role on his team. His vision for our life is always the right one. Leaning into it, and not wasting our time trying to be someone else, is the best was to find true success.

In his newsletter, blogger Aaron Renn reflects on the crucial role of mentors:

One of the core functions of mentors is to [tell you the things] people are already thinking and saying about you behind your back - and helping you overcome them. A Financial Times profile of American Express CEO Steve Squeri shows how a mentor did this for him.

Squeri is the grandson of Italian and Irish immigrants and the son of an accountant who worked nights and weekends at Bloomingdale’s department store to make ends meet. During his studies at Manhattan College, Squeri lived at home. He had never been on an aircraft until he joined a training program at what is now the consulting group Accenture.

Four years later he moved to Amex. There, his Queens accent and cheap suits stuck out so badly that an executive took him aside. He said, “You have a really sharp mind, but the rest of you needs a lot of work. [Senior managers] tend to use all the letters of the alphabet when they talk.”

The mentor took Squeri shopping, arranged for [speaking] lessons and even organized sessions with a cultural anthropologist so the younger manager would feel comfortable when he was sent to the group’s overseas offices. Squeri says, “I’m an example of how anybody can get to the top with a lot of hard work and having people that run the company that … are looking at individuals broadly and not judging books by their cover.”

Renn comments: “This mentor saw a diamond in the rough guy and made it his business to polish him up. This sort of thing is worth its weight in gold. [But notice how] good mentorship gets uncomfortable.”

By the year 2000, Judge John Phillips had long since lost count of the number of minors he had sent through the California penitentiary system for crimes committed during a violent and hopeless adolescence. He said on one occasion, “You send these young people to prison, and they learn to become harder criminals.”

In 2003, he set out to find a better way—to get kids in an environment of support where they could pass through these difficult years with a hand on their shoulder. Phillips started Rancho Cielo in the town of Salinas, ironically using an old juvenile detention center.

Rancho Cielo has a wide variety of programs, much of which is hands-on and kinetic, from the carpentry and construction program and vintage car repair, to beekeeping and equestrian care. Experts and industry professionals frequent Rancho Cielo to share their knowledge; like Tom Forgette who teaches the auto and diesel repair shop, and Laura Nicola, co-manager of the ranch restaurant, whose other job is at the James Beard Award-winning La Bicyclette.

“Upstairs,” traditional high school level classes are held for academic topics like writing and mathematics, usually to prepare students for a GED or community college admission. This is paired with additional preparatory courses like resume and cover letter writing and interview skills.

17-year-old Omar Amezola said, “In my other school, it was all reading and writing. Here the teachers are more chill, you don’t have to stay in your seat all day, you can do things that are hands-on—it’s cool.”

Each year, 220 students attend Rancho Cielo. While some don’t make it, 84.8% of first-time offenders who enroll at Rancho Cielo never re-offend, compared to the 40% recidivism rate in the county. Even with all the tutoring, diversity, and infrastructure, it costs just $25,000 to put a kid through Rancho Cielo, compared to the $110,000 it costs to house them in prison.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Grace; Judgement; Justice; Mercy – There is only endless punishment when God judges the guilty for their sins. But through his redemptive grace, he offers hope, a new life, and a new beginning to those who come to him in faith in Christ.

Author Nijay Gupta recounts the 1965-1966 story of a group of six boys who ran away from their homeland of Tonga.

The young boys stole a boat and headed out hastily in search of Fiji (some five hundred miles away). They took a sack of food and a small gas burner stove, but no map or compass. Due to their amateur sailing skills and the unfriendly seas, they were lost, adrift for eight days, until they finally spotted land. They ended up on the deserted island of Ata. These Tongan boys were stranded there for fifteen months.

Their rescue finally came through Australian Captain Peter Warner, who happened upon them as during a return sail from the capital of Tonga. Casually focusing his binoculars at a nearby Ata Island, which was thought to be uninhabited, he noticed a burned patch of ground. He said during a later interview, “I thought, that’s strange that a fire should start in the tropics on an uninhabited island. So, we decided to investigate further.”

As they approached, they saw a teenage boy rushing into the water toward them; five more quickly followed. When the boy reached the boat, he told Mr. Warner that he and his friends had been stranded for more than a year, living off the land and trying to signal for help from passing ships.

Most stories of dramatic rescues tend to stop there, and the reader is left wondering, “What happened to these boys? Were they okay? Did they live happy, and fulfilled lives? Did they stay friends?”

The rest of the story is that immediately after Wallace delivered them back home, they were arrested for stealing the boat they had “borrowed.” Warner took pity on them and paid the boat owner $200 to get the kids off the hook. Furthermore, Warner decided to quit his job in Sydney and stay in Tonga long-term. He started a fishing business there and hired the shipwrecked boys as his crew. Warmer mentored and stayed friends with some of them for the rest of his life. One of the boys said, after several decades of friendship, “He [Warner] was like a father to me.”

Gupta adds, “This captures poignantly the difference between a plastic, ‘get-out-of-hell-free’ type of salvation message of Christianity, and a deeper, more relational, dynamic vision of ‘rescue’ that is characteristic of the New Testament.”

Editor’s Note: Captain Peter Warner passed away in April of 2012 at the age of 90.

Most people have never heard of Coach Miller Bugliari, but the legendary American boys’ high school soccer coach is still at it—coaching his 63rd consecutive season, at age 87. The accumulated numbers are absurd. Bugliari possesses a lifetime coaching record that looks like an international telephone number: 916 wins, 130 losses, 82 ties. The list of titles includes 21 state championships. There is so much hardware and memorabilia piled into Bugliari’s office it can be difficult to locate the Hall of Fame coach behind his desk.

People around him note that humility is one of the keys to his success. In a recent interview he quietly told a reporter, “I take a little pride [in all those victories], but I try to ignore it.” Later in the same interview he said, “I think everyone is blessed with something they like to do. I just enjoy it. I’ve always enjoyed working—and the kids keep you young.” One of this year’s (2022) team captains described Coach Bugliari this way: “I think people would be surprised at how humble he is.”

For Bugliari it isn’t about the championships. Talk to a Pingry graduate about Bugliari, and you’ll get an earful about their former coach’s intellectual curiosity, his patience, the way he shaped young men into parents, leaders, and coaches themselves.

This was one father-daughter activity Dr. Harold Roberts Jr. and Dr. Sophia Roberts will never forget: The day they teamed up to perform heart surgery. Sophia is a general surgery resident physician at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, Missouri. That's also where her dad Harold serves as an associate professor of cardiac surgery.

Sophia Roberts' interest in medicine started at an early age. Harold Roberts said he took her to her first operation when she was around 11-years-old. Harold said, “Instead of reading storybooks to her at times, I was showing her anatomy books and stuff like that. She showed a real interest in (medicine).”

Sophia was recently able to fill in for another physician and assist her dad during an aortic valve replacement surgery. On the day of the operation, Sophia started off by helping open the patient's chest, and the rest of the surgery went very smoothly. Doctor dad said, “I couldn't have done the case any better if I had another heart surgeon assisting me. What can be better? I taught this kid how to ride a bicycle a few decades ago. Now, to get to teach her how to operate on a human heart is pretty mind-blowing.”

A Glamour magazinevideo asked a number of girls and women on advice they would want from an older person in their life. Here are some of the questions these young women asked:

How do you become who you are today?

What should I not stress about at 14-years-old?

What is the best way to make a decision?

Looking back on your life what did you find most valuable?

What do you do when you realize that your dreams are not actually going to happen?

How do you manage having kids, being married, and having a career?

What is the secret to living a happy life?

Is having children really worth it?

(What are the) secrets to a long and happy marriage?

You can watch the entire 2:30 minute video here.

Possible Preaching Angle:

It is important for mature women to be accessible to answer questions and serve as role models to the young women in our churches. “Older women, likewise, are to be …. teachers of good. In this way they can train the young women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled, pure, managers of their households, kind, and submissive to their own husbands …” (Titus 2:3-5).

The kids at Summit Elementary School in Butler, Pennsylvania, are looking out for their peers five miles away at Broad Street Elementary. Broad Street is in a food desert, where it's difficult to get fresh produce.

Two years ago, Summit Elementary school students, led by teacher Angela Eyth, began growing fruit, vegetables, and herbs on campus, with the bounty going to families at Broad Street Elementary. Angela said, “It's amazing when you start with a small idea and it can grow. No pun intended.”

The Summit Elementary students are not only learning how fruits and vegetables grow, but they are also gaining math skills through measuring and estimating and coming up with solutions to problems. Recently, they figured out a way to keep out bugs that eat kale.

The school received a grant to build a stand at Broad Street Elementary, where they will put out the corn, squash, carrots, beans, and other items they grow. This is just the beginning—future plans include planting sunflowers, Christmas trees, and a pollinator garden. Angela said, "The kids are in charge of everything. They're so proud of what we're doing here."

New York Times columnist Kashana Cauley knows a little something about regrets. She wrote, “My friends and I got tattoos so we could feel dangerous. Not very dangerous, because very dangerous people went to jail, but slightly dangerous, like a thrilling drop of botulism in a jar of jelly.”

She explains in the piece that when it came time to select her first tattoo, she picked a design of Chinese characters that she was told meant “fame and fortune.” But then she had chat with an older Chinese-speaking woman in a university locker room when they were changing clothes.

“She asked me what I thought the Chinese characters on my shoulder meant, and I told her. Then she asked me what I was at school to study, and I said law. She frowned and told me the tattoo was better suited for someone in the arts — that I should hurry up and get into the arts. We both laughed.”

But Cauley thought it would be different when she got a tattoo of her own name. As an African American descended from slavery, her knowledge of family history doesn’t extend very far. But a friend told her once that her name meant something beautiful and significant in Arabic. As a result, she looked up an online Arabic translation of her name, and got that design as another tattoo.

And she was satisfied with her choice … until she wasn’t. “For a few years I walked around confident that I had finally restored some meaning to my name, until an Arabic-speaking friend spotted my tattoo at lunch. ‘What do you think it means?’ she asked.”

Her friend’s response surprised her. “Instead of complimenting me on the beautiful, permanent version of my name needled onto my arm, my Arabic-speaking friend paused. Apparently, tattoo No. 2 was actually one of those 404 error messages, when an online search comes up blank. So my arm said, more or less: ‘Result not found.’”

“As a reluctant pioneer in the field of bad tattooing, I spent years afterward stubbornly telling people it meant ‘the eternal search.’ It sounded more elegant than ‘I didn’t find a correct translation of my name on the internet.’”

Possible Preaching Angle:

We can avoid embarrassing mishaps by asking for the counsel of others to help guide us through the major decisions we make.

When it comes to countering negative messages about women from social media influencers like former kickboxer Andrew Tate, young men are tapping into underutilized resource--each other.

In an interview with CNN, Ted Bunch affirms that relational conversations are key elements that help neutralize harmful messages linking masculinity with violence. Bunch is the founder of the anti-violence organization A Call to Men.

Bunch says, “(Misogyny) teaches men that aggression, violence, and the domination of others is somehow embedded in their DNA. It’s not. ... Part of the problem is, these men don’t listen to or respect the experiences of women. But they listen to each other. If men speak up, other men will respond to that.”

Bunch also acknowledges that positive messages from influential male celebrities also helps make a difference, citing helpful comments and campaigns from actors Benedict Cumberbatch (equal pay for women) and Justin Baldoni (healthy fatherhood).

“There are more and more men doing this, because men are realizing this way of thinking doesn’t work for us,” Bunch says. “It doesn’t feel good.”

Possible Preaching Angle:

As Christians we are called to treat each other with respect and kindness. When men in our community fall short of that standard, we can help call them to a higher standard.