Why Discipleship Is Worth Sweating Over

She was young, she was loud, and she made me sweat. This thirteen-year-old girl could get me more off my game than most. She wasn’t like the other girls in my group. Those girls nodded their heads while I talked and hid their nerves behind polite conversation. Not Britt.

Every Wednesday I fought flutters in my belly as my mind settled on Britt. She had questions about everything and those questions felt like a bright spotlight on all the things I didn’t know. I wondered if she was playing me, junior high style. Maybe I was the victim of a “Get the leader to fall head first down the rabbit hole” scheme. I spent the day worrying about the strange twists our conversations could take.

One night, the flutters double-timed into a pounding in my chest as we walked towards the youth group room. Britt pulled a crumpled sheet of paper with questions she had been collecting all week from her pocket. But my suspicions about her motives evaporated as we sat, shoulder to shoulder, discussing her questions about God and loneliness and family and purpose. In that moment, I decided I was willing to stay sweaty as long as she stayed hungry.

I wasn’t able to answer all her questions. My best response turned out to be, “I don’t know the answer, but here’s what I do know and who I’ve seen God to be.” Those words were enough for her. One conversation at a time, she took what I offered, tied it up with her determination to believe in God, and built her own faith.

Britt’s hunger made me hungry. The idea of having an older woman giving me her own, “I don’t know the answer but here’s what I do know” response captivated me. My friend Joann had the perfect resume for the job. She’s smart, strong, and has brave faith. She’s also a great storyteller. So I made my feet disobey my pounding heart. Like a teenage boy hoping the girl of his dreams would be his prom date, I decided to pop the question to Joann—would she be willing to mentor me.

Our lunch dates go something like this:

Joann: So Lori, how’s life? What things have felt hard lately?

Me: I’m really good, but now that you mention it, I don’t know what to do about…

Or

Me: Sniff, sniff. I’m so overwhelmed, I don’t know what to do.

Joann: Hmm, I don’t have an answer, but let me tell you a story about how God solved something similar for me.

I’ve found it’s pretty simple to be a part of what Paul spoke of in Titus 2:3-5: “Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers or addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good. Then they can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands so that no one will malign the word of God” (NIV).

 Titus 2 isn’t complicated. It’s determining to share your life with another woman. The only answers that are required are the ones God has given you so far. There isn’t a scope, a sequence, or a study guide. The supply list is short: a hungry heart, an open life, ­and maybe sweaty armpits!

It’s been fifteen years since Britt and I began our friendship. She still collects questions for me, but now they come via Facebook messages or phone calls from Thailand, where she is a missionary. I’ll always be the older one in our relationship, but she’s no longer just the younger woman. She’s become a colleague, mentoring teenage girls alongside me. Her lists often include questions from her girls. The help I offer her usually begins with, “Here’s what I would have told thirteen-year-old you…”

Mentoring in the way of Titus 2 seems to have a trickledown effect. [Tweet “The return on an investment in discipleship doesn’t end with the initial relationship.”] One life refines another, which in turn influences more lives. If you’re lucky and God gives you a Britt, the trickledown effect comes full circle.

Before she left for Thailand, I received a phone call that began the same as always: “Lori, I’ve got a question for you.” I’ve come to expect Britt’s questions to be unpredictable, but was totally caught off guard by this one. She asked, “How would you feel about me doing a weekly Bible study with your daughters?”

I could barely respond around the lump in my throat as Britt became the answer to my prayers. I am proud of her, and so grateful God gave me the courage to stick with a relationship that made me sweat.

Lori Florida’s life is all about her people. She’s convinced that being Mrs. to one and Mommy to eight will be her most significant way to serve Jesus. She wants to use her life to cheer on and coach the women coming behind her. Lori blogs at loriflorida.com.