Who helped you grow into the person you are now?

We’ve all had help getting where we are as people.
Tonight as I watched The Golden Globes I listened to the winners thank their mentors.
When I was a young wife and mother far from my own Mom God brought some special women into my life.  Of course I didn’t know they were mentors.  They probably didn’t think of themselves that way either.  They were friends with more wisdom and life experience which they shared when the occasion arose.

We hung out cooking or refinishing furniture or watching our kids play at the park.  Nothing was formal or felt like a class.  It felt like friendship.  But in a slow and steady way I was growing in understanding and the relationships in my life were, as a result, happier.   I was happier.  Having friends was great, but having friends who were willing to kind of slowly pour themselves out for me was a gift.  Years later I met a young woman who was also a young mother and the shoe was on the other foot.  This time I was the mentor, but she was a kick to be with and her friendship enriched my life.

Isn’t it strange that while stripping furniture or planting a garden you can talk freely about the real stuff of your life.  Like how infuriating a toddler can be, or how you hate it when your husband ignores you when you talk.  Those are the conversations I recall most vividly.  The smell of furniture stripper reminds me of trying to teach my daughter not to ride her tricycle in the street.  And the suggestion from a mother of four that maybe I should take the tricycle away for an afternoon and see if she’d be more agreeable to riding on the sidewalk the next morning.  No lecture or criticism, just a little dispensed wisdom while she used steel wool to get the last of the old finish cleaned away.

God makes sure we get an opportunity to learn and grow and then somewhere along the line He switches things up and it’s our turn to share what we received.  The people in our lives are tools in God’s hand.  Our shape reflects the impression each one has left.   We don’t accidentally move in across the street or get assigned the neighboring desk.  There’s a plan that crosses our paths with others.  A plan for us and a plan for then, and it’s God’s plan.

God made you as you are in order to use you as He planned.
J.C. Macauley