What God Writes on Our Hearts

     Occasionally, I greet my mentee, Jeroy, with a very solemn question: “What is the chief end of man?”  He responds with varying degrees of correctness, but usually recalls most of it: “To glorify God and enjoy him.” I always press Jeroy at this point. “For how long,” I ask. “A couple of hours? A day?” He looks askance, culling his memory. “Forever,” he says with satisfaction.

     That might sound like a brag, that I can casually elicit pithy theological statements from my mentee. The truth is Jeroy knows that answer because it is the first question of the Westminster Catechism and not the second or third or any question after that. I had planned to teach him more, as a way to bond and a good reason to meet regularly. But I was never consistent about it, so Jeroy retained only this one answer. I have mentored Jeroy for nearly three years now and am still trying to find that consistency. And Jeroy, now in seventh grade, is still showing me that he is a patient, forgiving young man in spite of my inconsistency.

     Jeroy is oldest of five. He has a passion for basketball and thinks my hook shot is one of the funniest things he has ever seen. Jeroy’s vocational aims shift a little every year, but they always target something artistic, whether shoe design or illustration. Today he wants to get into car customization, but only after attending college at A&M, UT or Tech. He currently attends middle school at Thomas A. Edison.

     Like a lot of kids in West Dallas, Jeroy is smarter than even he realizes. The problems of West Dallas do not escape his attention. The apartments, he says, need fixing and the poor need help. He is bothered by the amount of litter and thinks the banks of the Old Trinity River that snake through his neighborhood are a safety hazard. He sees the gangs too and, no doubt, the violence.  In short, he sees what the Apostle Paul says creation sees: the Fall. And Jeroy groans with all of creation.

     Mercy Street’s main charge is to raise up future leaders in West Dallas as an act of obedience to God. I ask Jeroy for his definition of that kind of leader. “Someone who helps the community,” he says. “And encourages other kids to complete their goals.” Jeroy mentions the litter again too. I think it is so apt that he does this. If a kid not completing his or her goals is a principled effect of the Fall, then litter is a tangible one. Litter is ugly. It gets blown everywhere. It invades. It speaks to a world in disorder. By his logic, a future leader is someone who sets everything in order, which includes the discarded plastic bottles and greasy fast food bags shoved into the curb.

If I wrote my own definition of a future West Dallas leader, I would say he or she is someone who works actively to combat the effects of the Fall in the community of West Dallas. Really, Jeroy’s and my definition are different parts of the same job description. Mine is the objective; his is the list of responsibilities.

     I am Jeroy’s mentor and so I have signed on to help Mercy Street realize their mandate of restoring West Dallas through godly West Dallas leaders. But I am also a contract-breaker. In November of 2011, I agreed to contact Jeroy weekly and spend time with him biweekly.

     I have not done that. And

Jeroy knows this, but he has not called in a lawyer to justifiably terminate our association. Rather, through patience and forgiveness, he greets me every time with warmth, a reminder that he’s not about to wield some Sword of Damocles in judgment. When I point out that he does this, Jeroy just shrugs, a lot like the baffled, righteous sheep of Matthew 25.

     I often fall back into the mistaken belief that I and mentors like me are here to mold the future leaders of West Dallas. But my relationship with Jeroy is a consoling reminder that God is the one accomplishing this, even through chronic transgressors like me. And Jeroy, by practicing virtues like patience and forgiveness, is already engaging in combat with the disorder that plagues West Dallas, as well as ministering to me. It would be a lie to say he always chooses the righteous kind of fight, just as it would be a lie for any one of us. But he is letting me see what quiet combat looks like often enough.
    

     We may never get around to covering the other 106 Westminster questions. Even if we did, I know that it is not what I impress on Jeroy’s brain, but what God writes on his heart, that will lead him in the paths of righteousness. The same is true of any mentee. The same is true for me.