The Cost of Conviction
I had a mentor in my early adult years. I had a mentor in a way a lot of people probably aren’t accustomed to anymore. They showed me how hard a person could pursue something they truly believed in.
They were my spiritual mentor, so to speak. Not concerning the things I talk about here, but for my previous, Christian ministry work. It was more than that actually! A lot more…
I was already studying under someone that I had grown up with prior to him. This person was a very dear friend, much closer to my age. He taught me a lot about art; we gamed and worked out together.
After suffering a great deal of depression and a stress induced stroke, he finally came out as gay, no longer willing to ruin his life by shoving it down.
Our religion practiced excommunication. A few days after they announced their ruling, my new mentor, his previous mentor, showed up for Bible study.
I was carrying a huge weight on my chest since my last conversation with my recently ostracized friend, knowing every one of his friends and family would be cutting him off. I told him he was given the greatest burden to bear, but I too had to do what I believed was the will of God. Still, I would miss him horribly.
As my new mentor opened up the study materials, he started asking me where I had left off with my friend (his last student). I started to tell him, but as our eyes locked, the reality of our “brothers” shunning hit us both. Remember, this meant life and death to us, eternal life or punishment.
His cheeks turned colors, his lips started to tremble, and tears began rolling down his face. I don’t think we studied much that night. I don’t really remember much beyond that. But I do remember the next couple of years.
The loss of our friend hit him hard, but I had never seen such a work ethic from anyone. He had such passion and drive to do his very best. This man had a family, built and ran his own HVAC and cleaning businesses working upwards of 60 hours a week, ministered 90 hours a month, and still had me shadowing him.
Gave me a job, in fact! Several, kind of. We studied together, we worked together, we ate together, and soon we began preaching together.
I had a lot of time to get to know this man. He was definitely judgmental of people that were, let’s say, more leisurely spiritually. But he tried SO hard in SO many ways.
He sincerely committed to the grind. He struggled for both God, religion, work, and family, squeezing every last bit of effort from himself. I wager to say, sacrificing something invaluable in the process.
Eventually, I started questioning things; I was never able to get over my guilt for my friends excommunication, and soon I decided I would stop accumulating evidence for my beliefs and start testing against them with as much critical thinking as I could muster.
One 350 page color coded binder later and soon I was on the other side of the “judicial hearing” getting excommunicated myself.
I’ve tried repeatedly to reach out and apologize to my friend who left before me, but he doesn’t want anything to do with me now. I miss him. I deserved this lesson. It changed my life, and now it’s changing the lives of our beautiful readers.
My second mentor's work ethic has motivated me to work relentlessly on behalf of both my mentor’s lessons to me:
The worst actions can have the best intentions and occur at the hands of some of the kindest, most sincere people.
There are lessons in each of our good traits.
There are lessons in each of our bad traits.
Never be certain of anything more than how to love and accept others.
