Thank you, Pastor Kevin. Thank you, worship team. Tremendous songs for our message today. And as you saw from what Pastor Larry read this morning, doing right while mentored isn't the end of the story, is it? We can do right and endure mentoring for a time, But then, when it gets a little too close to home, when it gets a little too close to who we really are, it's easy to drop out, or it's easy to drop mentoring. And we're gonna talk about that today, obeying because we have to, but not because we want to. I wanna read 2 Kings 12, one to three, and I wanna turn over to 2 Chronicles, 24, 1 to 3. And read both of them, they add a little bit to the same story. One is written by Jeremiah, 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles by Ezra. Jehoash or Joash, they're both the same name, interchanged. They just leave the Je off sometimes and just go by Joash. We do that with our own names many, many times. William becomes Will, and Richard becomes Rich, and all those kinds of things. Jehoash was seven years old when he began to reign in the seventh year of Jehu. Jehoash began to reign and he reigned 40 years in Jerusalem. It's a long reign. His mother's name was Zebia of Beersheba and Jehoash did what was right in the eyes of the Lord all his days because Jehoiada the priest instructed him. Nevertheless, the high places were not taken away. The people continued to sacrifice and make offerings on the high places. And then 2 Chronicles 24, 1 to 3. Joash was seven years old when he began to reign, and he reigned 40 years in Jerusalem. His mother's name was Zebia of Beersheba, and Joash did what was right in the eyes of the Lord all the days of Jehoiada the priest. Jehoiada got for him two wives, and he had sons and daughters. And you may say, well, why did he do a thing like that? Well, let me tell you. Jehoiada must have done something in his day that was remarkable to limit him to two wives. Most kings in those days had many wives because the secret was having enough sons that one of them wouldn't be killed and that there would be someone to reign after you. Solomon only had 700 wives and 300 concubines. That was his undoing. He did have sons and daughters. Let's ask the Lord to teach us through this message, both as those that need mentored and as those that need to mentor. Father, please speak to our hearts this morning. Please awaken us to the need for mentoring in our own lives. And then secondly, for the need to mentor. And I pray before the message is done today, we will not be able to avoid your finger pointing to us and saying, either you need to mentor or you need to be mentored or both. Let us listen to your spirit before we have communion this morning. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. A.W. Tozer has a book that recently came out. It's lately published. It wasn't published for a long time. It's called The Dangers of a Shallow Faith. The Dangers of a Shallow Faith. On page 205, these vital words he says, The great deterrent to victorious Christian living is the idea that once we accept Jesus Christ as Savior and believe that John 3.16 is all there is to it, our life now is on automatic pilot and we just sit back and enjoy the ride. This is the source of a great deal of disillusionment that leads to discouragement in the Christian life. There is no such thing as automatic pilot in our Christian experience. Every step is an operation of faith that will be fiercely contested by the enemy of our soul. This kind of automatic pilot thinking leads to spiritual lethargy and laziness. Breaking out from the tyranny of spiritual lethargy and laziness, whatever the cost, should be the number one priority of every Christian. And I agree with A.W. Tozer. I also agree with the Lord Jesus Christ in the last words of his Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 7, 24-27. Powerful words in which he talked about how we build and do we build on a good foundation or not. It's not a good foundation to be mentored and endure it. but be planning your escapade or planning how you're going to act when you're out from under that mentoring. Jesus said, everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell and the floods came and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it didn't fall because it had been founded on the rock. You can kind of picture a house up here on College Hill, right there on that cliff. It's on the rock. Then everyone who hears these words of mine and doesn't do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. You might try the sand dunes up here, right on the edge of the sands. Want to have a beautiful view? That would be a beautiful view. But if you didn't go down far, you'd be in trouble. The Lord says, everyone who hears these words of mine and doesn't do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it. He spoke of two different foundations. The one is solid, built on a rock, able to stand on its own and endure any kind of trial. The other is built on sand. And yet the one built on sand could be a million-dollar home or more. just built on a bad foundation. Picture a house like that that you would have built. Very attractive. Plenty of bedrooms. Oh, my. So many bedrooms. All kinds of walk-in closets. You've got a modern kitchen. You've got a screened-in porch. You've got a huge family room with a huge television screen. Everything is great. People like to come over. You have folk over. It's a marvelous home until there's a storm. And the storm comes, and the rain comes, and the floods come, and all of a sudden, the foundation is not there. It's exposed, and it just sweeps under the sand and lifts the house up and sends it crashing below. The weak foundation is immediately exposed, and the house was swept away. What happened to Joe Ash? Good mentoring. He endured it. But he didn't put his own roots firmly down deep. And when Jehoiada died, the princes came, the floods came, and he was swept away. How strong is your faith today? Are you being propped up right now by your parents? I hope so. That's what parents are for. Are you being propped up by your spouse? I hope so. That's what we're supposed to be. We're supposed to be a leader or a helpmate. Are you being propped up by your pastors or godly mentors? I hope so. That's God's will. But when you are completely on your own and tough times come, how do you react? How do you react when you get off to yourself and there's no large crowd of Christians around? Your ministry group is not there to talk to you. You're off in college by yourself, wherever it may be today. I'm asking you the question before we share the Lord's Supper. Look at the life of King Joash. The king came to the throne at the young age of seven. He ruled for 40 years over Judah. His life was sadly broken into two halves. One was under Jehoiada. The other is out from under Jehoiada. After his death, King Joash showed his true colors. He turned away from the Lord big time. Now theologically, you can look at it and put your theology over top of his life and tell me what happened. I don't want you to. I want you to read the story and painfully, if you're Jehoiada or Jehoshaba, did they know there was a weakness there? Did they know there was a character flaw there? Did he lose his faith? Or did he have true faith at all? Many people are quick to say, I'm not going to tell you. I'm not going to tell you. Because I don't know. God knows. God knows. I leave that question to God and for you to think about. God knew whether Jehoiada was fooling Jehoshabat and Jehoiada or whether he was sincerely trusting God as a young man. and he could not withstand the storm because the roots hadn't been put down deep. I don't know what happened, but he was unable to strongly form any of his own godly convictions and live them when Jehoiada was out of the picture. When faced with princes in Judah who longed to go back to worshiping idols, Joash caved in immediately. I want to tell you sometimes, theologically, when I'm asked questions, my theology fails me because I have to look right in the face of people and say, I don't know what's going on. Have you seen that? I don't know what's going on. I wish I knew more, but I'll tell you what I do know. I can tell you when the roots aren't deep enough. I can tell you that they may be down a ways, but they're not deep enough. Only God knows completely what's going on. And whatever's going on, 2 Chronicles 24, 17 says, Now after the death of Jehoiada, the princess of Judah came and paid homage to the king. That means they came and flattered him. They bowed down to him. Their peers, they're the same age, young princes. They showed obeisance to him, and the king listened to them. They abandoned together the house of the Lord, the God of their fathers. They served the Asherim. That's the Baals and the Asherim. They go together. They were all brought down by Jezebel from Tyre and Sidon. Before we take the sacred elements today, representing the broken body and the shed blood of Christ, we need to examine God's truths that revolve around the whole subject of shepherding, mentoring, teaching, training, parenting, fostering, adopting, discipling, disciplining. All of these things, they're all mixed up. They're all part of the same bag. They're all part of the same thing. I have four I want to share with you. And I want them each to be something you know that it's for you, whether you are being mentored at the time or need to be mentored at the time, or whether you are mentoring at the time. And I want you to know that you can be mentored and mentor at the same time. In fact, I would encourage you to prayerfully consider being mentored and mentoring at the same time. We're to be those who are learning teachers. If you're not learning and you're just using the old yellow notes, you probably won't be much of a teacher. You need to be learning as well as teaching. Number one, when we're being mentored or when we are mentoring, first of all, we all need instruction in different areas of our lives. We all need instruction in different areas of our lives. Notice verse 2. And Jehoash, or Joash, did what was right in the eyes of the Lord all his days, because, or in which, Jehoiada the priest instructed him. Don't let whatever your translation is, wherein, in which, because, don't let it fool you. All of those are right translations of the word asher. It has about a hundred different meanings. whatever it is, because, in which, wherein, as long as, all of those are correct meanings, and they all have a nuance of meaning, but you can't put them all in the same sentence, but they all are there. Yet, when we compare this text with 2 Chronicles, we realize that when Jehoiada died, Joash went in a different direction. As a little nursing boy, A one-year-old boy, he had no clue. He had no clue how much mentoring he needed, how much he needed parented, disciplined, trained, discipled. He didn't know that. Now, the word for instructed here is an interesting word, and if you'd all just try to do something with me, would you take out your index finger and just point it at somebody? Just find somebody to point it at. Okay? Think about this, the word Yara means to aim an arrow or to point the finger in teaching. How many of you have taught others with a pointed finger? We all have. That's the way we teach many times. Yara means to point out the facts, to point out the truth, to point out the way someone should go. And the scripture says in Proverbs 22.6, train up a child, point the finger. In the way he should go, even when he's old, he'll not depart from it. Now, I wanna be exceedingly specific and practical in this message. As a little boy growing up in the home of Jehoiada and Jehoshabat, doubtless, Joash's aunt and uncle mentored and parented and discipled and disciplined and trained Joash as godly parents should, even though Joash at the time knew nothing of his need. I want to tell you as adults there are times we all need mentored and we have no clue we have a need. We have no clue. God has to tip us off. God has to show us as an adult our need. But like Joash, when he was a little boy, he took it because that's what you do. You're a little child. But when he became king and he ruled 40 years, many of those years were still under the tutelage and the mentoring of Jehoiada the high priest. And Joash knew as a young king, not just at seven, but at 17 and at 27, he knew in many ways he was clueless. He didn't grow up watching his daddy as king. He didn't get to see kingship going on. All he saw was an evil queen mother, a grandma. He didn't know how to do it. He needed school. He needed mentored. He needed pointed out the facts. And Pastor Larry read that they buried Jehoiada with the kings. And then they use a nice Wyoming expression. They didn't say because he had done well. They said because he had done good. Remember hearing that? He had done good. See? A little bit from Wyoming. And I want you to know he had done good. He had done good. He schooled this adult. He mentored him. He pointed out the facts and the truth of what was needed from the king by the people. And as we read between the lines, the implication is clear. Joash as a king slowly began to have an inner turmoil. There's something in the mind and heart of us as adults especially. Once we get to be of a certain age, I don't need anybody telling me anything. And if you haven't gone through that, you're not at least 18 or 16. That's something that individually goes through our mind. You can be 85 or 90 and still say, I don't want anybody telling me anything. It's just part of who we are. But if you're willing to be mentored, you've got to learn what Joash didn't learn, this inner turmoil. Apparently, Jehoiada must have seen some of those weak character traits in Joash, and as he saw those weak character flaws, he must have tried to correct the flaws. Those must have not been pretty moments if you could have heard Jehoiada, this old, old man, over 100, trying to teach this younger king and tell him, you can't do this, you've got to do this. Not that, this. Joash proved after Jehoiada died that he wanted his own way. He didn't want to follow the earnest parenting of Jehoiada, who had been his parent. Now, I want you to know, many times as adults, we need mentoring. But, you know, once you become an adult, you don't have to receive anything. You don't have to put up with anything. So you get a broken leg. Nobody plans for a broken leg, but they happen, right? Anybody here ever had a broken leg? No broken legs? Good. I'm so glad. I hope none of you have a broken leg or hip or anything like that. Anyway, maybe you just didn't raise your hand, but let me tell you this. You go to the therapist, starts out really well, and you say, the therapist really is gentle. This therapist knows exactly what they're doing. The first couple times, they just move that leg a little bit, a little bit, a little bit, and you say, is this gonna be okay? Then, at about the third or fourth time, or the tenth or eleventh time you go, you realize, this is really painful, and I'm paying for it. I don't have to do this. I'm an adult, I can do whatever I want to. And so why do you limp for the rest of your life? Because you never finished the therapy. You never went through it. You never got done with it. It's easy to throw out the exercises and leave the therapist behind. One of the biggest reasons we walk away from needed mentoring in all of our lives is it takes true humility to be restored. It takes true humility to be mentored or to mentor. to full restoration. Galatians 6.1 declares, the reason that you mentor is because you know you may need some soon yourself. That's what Galatians 6.1 says. Brothers, sisters, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual or mature should restore him or her in the spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you also be tempted. You're never above the one you're mentoring. You're just one moment away from the same issue they're facing. There are many believers like Joash who endure mentoring while all the while waiting to break loose and sin again. Many people are sentenced by a judge. To attend classes, programs are designed to help them overcome addiction. Enduring those sentences helps none at all. I have talked to people that say, I've been through anger management five times. Well, that's a shame. Once should have done it, but you endured it. you didn't profit from it. Endurance, enduring a sentence helps none at all. If during the classes you're planning your next escapade when the mentoring classes are over, receiving mentoring humbly as earnest leaders is what makes mentoring work. Now I have a word to you as mentors. Know many people wish to be mentors because they have their own ideas I want to try out my own thing as a mentor, and I want to tell you something. You're dangerous. You're dangerous if you want to try out your own thing. To be a godly mentor, you must agree with God's will, and what he points out is the need in that person's life. Had Jehoiada and Jehoshaphat tried to improve on God's plan, Joash wouldn't have made it out alive. What if they decided, well let's not only, let's not only get Joash, but let's kill Athaliah, or let's try to grab two. Whatever they did, They didn't change what God wanted. They did what God wanted. So often mentors refuse to agree with God about the need in a person's life. Or if they do agree with God, they simply say, I'm not going to be a part of that need. I'm not going to meet it. Now I want to tell you something. If you're like that, you're like the Apostle Paul. The Apostle Paul missed a great opportunity at mentoring. A great opportunity. It came time for the second missionary journey, and on that trip, the first missionary journey, John Mark had departed, and when he had departed, Paul had it in his craw. He did not want him with him anymore. And it came time for them to go, and he said, Barnabas, let's go. And Barnabas said, I want to take John Mark. And he says, I'm not taking him. And Barnabas agreed with the assessment of Paul, but not with what to do with John Mark. Yes, he did depart. But yes, I will mentor him. Let's go together. Paul says, not doing it. And so for months, even years, Barnabas became the mentor of John Mark. Only when Paul was older did he look back and say, oh my, I missed something there. But I want John Mark here before I die. Please send John Mark. He's useful to me now for ministry. Why? Because Barnabas was willing to step up to the plate. If you see God has revealed someone that you love that needs mentoring in some area and you agree with God's assessment, then accept God's full authority as yours to mentor. Because if you see the need and God has pointed out the need to you and to them, and that's all agreed, you don't have to worry if it's your place or not. God gives you the authority. because he says in his word the last words before he went up and ascended. He said, All authority has been given to me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to do all things, whatever I've commanded you. That's the whole book. And lo, I'm with you always, even unto the end of the world. Do not withdraw or be afraid to mentor. If you're being mentored and you're planning your next escapade, have the grace to confess your sin or quit enduring mentoring. Don't waste the person's time who's pouring out their heart to you. That's the first lesson on mentoring. When we're being mentored or when we're mentoring, we all need instruction in different areas of our life. When we're being mentored or when we're mentoring, stopping short of fully following God is tragic. Stopping short fully of following God is tragic. 2 Kings 12.3 says, nevertheless, see the qualification? You did good, nevertheless. The high places were not taken away. The people continued to sacrifice and make offerings in the high places. Now I don't know all the reasons this happened, but don't lay the problem at the door of Jehoiada. Why? Because Joash is a king for 40 years. Many of those years he was a full-blown adult. He's responsible for his own choices. And 2 Chronicles 24, 15 to 19 that Pastor Larry read says, and I'll read it to you again. But Jehoiada grew old and full of days, and he died. He was 130 years old at his death, and they buried him in the city of David among the kings because he had done good. I just love that Wyoming speech. He had done good. in Israel, and toward God and His house. Now after the death of Jehoiada, the princes of Judah came and paid homage to the king. They flattered him. Then the king listened to them, and they abandoned the house of the Lord, the God of their fathers, and served the Asherim with the idols. And wrath came upon Judah and Jerusalem. That's the wrath of God for his guilt, this guilt of theirs. And God sent prophets among them to bring them back to the Lord. These testified against them, but they would not pay attention. Joash agreed as a seven-year-old boy to get rid of all the bales along with Jehoiada. Pretty easy to agree when you're seven years old, and Jehoiada's present. But now, when you're a grown man, you're in your 40s or 30s, and Jehoiada is dead, what's a little bit of idolatry? It's not that big a thing. It's not that big a deal. You know, let's cover all our bases. Let's give everybody a little bit of our time. To have God's qualified blessing, you've done well while being mentored. Nevertheless, you haven't been right in forsaking known sins in your life. That is an awful place to be. It will ruin your life. Now I want to talk to you. What small sins are you countenancing in your life? Are they outbursts of anger? Is it bitterness? Is it little sins, refusal to respect and obey authority? Is it watching movies alone in your home that are pornographic? Is it lying, just little tiny lies to control good outcomes? Is it drinking enough even at home, just when you're home with other couples there, but you become a little tipsy and you aren't quite as moral as you were before you drank? How are you going over the line? Where are you playing fast and loose with God? Where are you pushing the envelope? Why are you playing the dangerous game of how close can I get to the line without falling? God saw the real Joash after Jehoiada died. He began to pour out his wrath upon Judah and Jerusalem for this guilt of theirs, allowing idolatry to go on in all the high places. We cannot consort with spiritual idolatry and still claim to worship God in spirit and in truth. Refusing to deal with known sin in our lives while we are mentoring or being mentored is as deadly in our lives as taking a rotten peach and putting it in a bushel of peaches right in the middle and giving it three days. You can give up freezing or canning peaches. A fuzzy rotten peach will spread through every peach. These days, you've got to get out that fuzzy peach out of your life. It's going to spread. I want to think about the common problems in mentoring. I'm going to speak to one specific one that even relates to parenting, so listen up if you're a parent, especially if you're a parent of an older teenager or early 20s, teenager in college. Joe Ash appeared to have it. The problem However, it's always been wanting out. Wanting out, break out of mentoring early. Or as a mentor, say, well, I've done what I can. It's getting difficult. When it gets difficult, I'm done. To be satisfied with compromise and sin, receiving God's partial or qualified commendation is not enough. Many parents seek to shepherd their sons or daughters, virtually giving up correcting or disciplining them based on their culture, based on America, and what is the thing today? Some will tell you you can discipline your kids up to age eight. Some say up to age 12. Some may say even up to age 16. Some say right until you Release them. Hebrews 12, 7 and 8 says, that's the word of God, it's for discipline that you have to endure. There's never supposed to be a time in your life when you're not under discipline. And if you're in the home, you should be under discipline. When you're out of the home, you're still under God's discipline. It's for discipline that you endure. That's why I'm alive, beloved. I'm alive today because I still need more discipline. I'm not upset about that. I'm one of the sons because if you're not disciplined, you're not one of the sons or daughters. Listen, it's for discipline that you have to endure. God's treating you as sons. For what son is there whom his father doesn't discipline? If you are left without discipline, left, in which all have participated, then you're illegitimate children and not sons. Then in Hebrews 12.10, speaking of parents, it says, for they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but God disciplines us for our good that we may share his holiness. Do you have children in your home that are gone to college and then home for a little while? You say certainly. You don't think that you should ever discipline your son or daughter. That's the way at college and back home for the summer. I want to tell you something important. It's just a matter of whether you love them or not. It's just a matter of whether you love them. Should we ignore high school and college sins when We step outside the boundaries as Joe Ash, whether it's love, respect, honesty, or obedience. Do we give our qualified commendation and ignore the rest and say, that's good enough and let disobedience go? Because somebody told us, you can't do it after such and such an age. God doesn't change for America. God doesn't change for our culture. Proverbs 19, 15 says, discipline your son or daughter while there is hope, and do not desire their death. If there's no hope for your son or daughter, don't discipline them. If there's hope, then when they're out of bounds, thank God. Thank God for those times of discipline in your life. Thank God. Thank God. All seven of our sons and daughters, if you'd catch them alone in private, you could ask them, did you ever receive discipline when you were in college? They would say, yes. Don't stop short in mentoring. Thirdly, I've told you we all need instruction in different areas of our lives. I've told you don't stop short of fully following God. It's tragic. Number three, when we are being mentored and when we are mentoring, replacing godly counsel with man's counsel ruins us. It ruins us. Notice 2 Chronicles 24 17. Now after the death of Jehoiada, the princes of Judah came and paid homage to the king, and then the king listened to them, looking for guidance in all the wrong places, for all the wrong reasons, from all the wrong people will bring our undoing. How many of you have ever watched a relay race? When you're on the back side of, whether you're the first one, second one, or third one, you're thinking every step. You're thinking, where is this foot going to land, and where is this arm going to be? When you come back for the other, you can't let it go until they grab it. If you let go, it'll drop. How many batons have dropped? Jehoiada died. held this back and apparently there was no one to grab it. And the princes of Judah grabbed it. They grabbed it. The passing of the baton in our lives from faith and obedience, that should be the apex of our legacy prayers. The apex is who's going to pick up the baton when I'm gone, when I'm out of the picture. Someone that believes in the Word of God and obedience to God's revealed revelation, the enemy of our souls knows every time someone steps down from a position. Right here in our church, what's most important when someone steps down from a position is not who takes their place. It's what happens in the transition. How is that baton passed? If you step down, find a way to get with whoever and pass that baton, pass that baton, pass the legacy of what you've come to believe, what you see. Somehow, what's most important is not that we find a new leader, but what do we do in the passing of the baton? These princes, they grabbed the baton. They just took it. They easily challenged the shallow heart of Joash. One of the sins many Christian people use for advantage is flattery. Christian people in Christian churches like ours and all over use flattery. You know what flattery is? Flattery comes up to your preacher or it comes up to your friend. And I can do it, and you can do it. You say the most flattering things to me, or I say the most flattering things to you, and behind your back, around the dinner table, it's a whole different line. If you're one of those people and you're in the mentoring business, get out of the mentoring business until you get right with God. God is not mocked. You cannot godly mentor and double speak. If you're in double speak, one thing here and one thing there, get out of mentoring. Galatians 6, 7 and 8 says, Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. Whatever one sows, that he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, and the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. These officials of Judah sensed this was their moment to grab the baton without Jehoiada there. Joash didn't have this inner value system. His roots weren't deep. He didn't have the same discernment antenna. Joash allowed flattering princes to become his replace mentors and counselors. They took Jehoiada's place and it was to his own ruin. You're gonna find that out in the next message, it's so sad. No matter how much godly influence is around us, it finally comes down to our own personal choices. And there comes a time when there's no Jehoiada around, there's no parent around, there's no godly mentor around. And when you try to argue with God someday, you may say, well, I didn't have the right mentoring. And God will look at you and say, I gave you godly mentors. I gave you Barnabases. I gave you Jehoadas. I gave you Jehoshabas. I gave you a royal nurse. I gave you the best. And you chose to go astray. Fourthly and lastly, when we are mentored, when we're being mentored or when we're mentoring, and this point is the most important. The main issue is surrender. It's surrendering to God's plan for us. Joash obviously didn't surrender. Verse 2 and 3, he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord all his days, 2 Kings 12, all the days in which Jehoiada the priest instructed him, nevertheless the high places weren't taken down, the people continued to sacrifice and make offerings on the high places. If you are called to shepherd, to mentor, to foster, to adopt, to parent, to disciple, to discipline, to teach, to train, any of those words, consider one matter carefully. Has God placed you in a person's life knowing you're the only possible mentor he can use at this time to meet this need? Not every need means if you know about it, that's your call. Not every need is a call. But if you know, I want you to know that just yesterday I was involved in mentoring in a situation where I knew I was the man that had to do it. I knew I was the man. What if God shows you like he showed Mordecai? Adopt this niece of yours as your own daughter. And so he adopted Esther. And therefore, he could speak into her life when she, without the king knowing it, became the queen, and her being a Jew. And the moment came when wicked Haman had the plan, and she thought she could escape. And Mordecai sent a message to her, because now he could speak into her grown life. And he said to her, in Esther 4.14, Who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this. Stepping up to the plate when God calls you can mean rewriting history. You can rewrite what history might be by being a mentor. Now as I come towards the end of this message, and we're getting close, I want to tell you Mentors and those needing mentoring, and that's all of us, I have some painful, final, thoughtful questions. I have five questions and then a challenge. That's it. If you're going to be mentored or if you're going to mentor. Number one, who would have mentored John Mark if Barnabas had ignored or denied the call of God, Acts 16.37? Who would have come to help Paul out before he died if Barnabas had ignored or denied the call of God? Mentoring is filling a void sometimes that no one else could fill legitimately. Number two, what if Mary, the mother of Jesus, had ignored Jesus' call to her from the cross, behold your son, speaking of his disciple John, and what if John would have ignored or minimize Jesus' call to behold his mother, speaking of Mary? No, from that hour John took Mary as his mother into his own household. He took her from the cross to his house. He mentored immediately, John 19, 25 to 27. Number three, what if Paul, seeing the void in the life of the young son of Eunice, the grandson of Lois, had ignored the role God said, I want you to be Timothy's daddy? It wasn't an official adoption, but it was an adoption. Because he wrote in 2 Timothy 1-2, I write to my beloved son. My beloved son, Timothy. Wow. Wow. No daddy to mentor him. And Paul stepped up to the plate. He was his beloved son. Number four, what if the mother of Alexander and Rufus, the wife of Simon, the Cyrene, what if she would have been intimidated by the Apostle Paul? And when God said, I want you to do some mothering in his life, she said, who me? That's not my place. Then we would have no Romans 16, 13 in the Bible saying, greet Rufus, Paul says, chosen in the Lord, also his mother, who has been a mother to me as well. Can you imagine the mother of Rufus mothering the Apostle Paul? What did that look like? God helped her do it and him to receive it. Number five, what if Jehoshaphat had ignored or denied God's call for her to steal that little baby boy, Joash, from the royal nursery, from his planned destruction by Queen Mother Athaliah? And what if the high priest Jehoiada had ignored the call to Mender, this grown-up king, as long as he was alive, and he would have said to God, God, I'm over 100 years old. Do I ever get a break? As long as he was alive, Joash went straight. What if he had told the Lord, I'm too old to mentor? Those are the five questions. Now I have the challenge. What if you pass over, ignore, minimize, or deny God's call for you to be mentored or to become a mentor? Today, if you hear God's mentoring call, harden not your heart. Receive mentoring or be God's hope and mentor if he calls you. Now I close with these words and this is it. While there is hope to shepherd a heart, while there is hope will you depart? While there is hope discipline, will you step up and be God's hand? While there is hope to teach and train, while there is hope will you refrain? While there is hope to mentor now, while there is hope will you bow out? While God is knocking at your door, will you obey? Will you restore? If you agree training's a must, will you fight God or will you trust? Will you repent? Will you confess? Will you surrender? Help me. Will you say yes?