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After laying the groundwork for ministry to youth by understanding that God calls people of all ages, we looked last month about what it means to step into what often feels like a completely foreign culture: the world our teenagers inhabit. And so building on the concept that for youth ministry to be effective it has to be incarnational (we inhabit their world as Jesus came and inhabited ours), then the third piece is that ministry has to be relational in ordering for mentoring to occur. And it is in mentoring that the real stuff of making disciples happens.

In the gospel of Mark, we find Jesus and many followers up on a mountainside. “Jesus… called to him those he wanted, and they came to him” (Mark 3:13). There are several points that we can draw from this passage.

First, relational ministry is not to the crowds. In verse seven of this same passage, we see crowds of people following Jesus. He went apart, and “called to him those he wanted.” He limited the group of people that he would spend most of His time with. Second, He called them to Him. This shows deliberate intention on the part of Jesus, and thus, we must also be intentional about how we go about our relational ministry. Third, they came to Him. This may seem obvious, but it is important that we are clear enough in our intentions toward people that we are investing in so that they want us to be in their lives in that capacity. It’s a waste of time to try to mentor someone if they don’t want to be mentored. However, this needs to be done in a subtle way, because the concept of mentoring is often completely foreign to folks. Think of it as coming alongside someone and journeying with them as you both grow in your lives with Jesus. You’ve been further down the path then they have and can help them out as they learn some of the things you’ve already learned. But you can also learn from them, and so while you may be that person’s mentor, don’t forget to be a student yourself! And find a mentor for yourself as well… none of us were meant to accomplish life all on our own.

In Acts, Paul is depicted as always traveling with someone: first Barnabas, then Silas, then Timothy joins with him and Silas (Acts 13:1-3; 15:40, 16:1-3). As Paul went through his ministry, he brought people with him. Despite the fact that it was a disagreement that separated him and Barnabas, Barnabas also followed this model in taking John Mark with him, (Acts 15:39) which increased the number of two-man teams that were modeling this type of ministry in that day. The discipling relationship came before the sending out.

We see this also in Matthew when Jesus sends out the twelve (Matt 10). They had been with him, learning of Him, and then He sent them out. At some point, which is unclear in Matthew, the disciples come back to learn more. In Luke, the evangelist has them coming back to report to Jesus what they had done (Luke 9:10). When they did this, Jesus took them and they went away by themselves, or tried to, but the point is that they withdrew for more time with Jesus.

Again in Luke, when Jesus sends out the seventy-two, He sends them out two by two, they return and tell Him what happened, Jesus responds with more teaching (Luke 10). All of these examples point to a pattern in the Scripture of what relational ministry looks like. In the New Testament, we don’t find examples of people in ministry by themselves per se; they seem to at least be in groups of two. Also, as a pattern for discipleship, the disciples are taught, and then sent out. They return and give a report; they receive more teaching. They are not left cut off from relationships, and they are not left without feedback or teaching. This is key for our ministries today.

We’re not just mentoring young people in a vacuum: we’re teaching them how to do the work of the ministry so that they will be disciples who make disciples. We’re helping mobilize the next generation of workers in God’s harvest, and we’re doing the work of the ministry ourselves while we are accomplishing this.

The Great Commission tells us to go and make disciples of all nations. This is how disciples are made: as we who have gone further in the faith look behind us and pull someone up alongside us and teach them from what we’ve learned. Then as they do that, and the person they pull up beside them does that, we very soon have a whole network of relationships where the people of God are learning from one another and growing together to spread the good news of the kingdom of God to world in turmoil that desperately needs to hear it.