Need a mentor?

Me too.

That's something that I've been thinking about a lot lately. For the last three years, a friend of mine named Mike in California has helped play that role. I actively seek out breakfast and lunch meetings with leaders I admire in Nashville. I try to learn as much as I teach when I get to speak at conferences. But thus far, I haven't had a tremendous amount of luck working with a local mentor.

I had two mentor situations in Atlanta that didn't work out, but even then could see the potential need for that in my life. A friend of mine is in the mentor group that Michael Hyatt runs and he's loved it! I've thought and prayed a lot about this particular subject, especially in the last 6 months.

But for me, finding a mentor has been a little bit awkward.

How do you possibly find a good mentor? How do you ask someone to be your mentor? Do you grab breakfast and then kind of casually say, "Hey, would you please pass the coffee, and speak into the five quadrants of my life-spiritual, emotional, physical, intellectually and financial?" Would that work? Of course not.

And I honestly believe in the importance of mentorships and how you can see them modeled in the Bible, but how do you structure one?

What do you talk about? What do you work on? How do you know it's working? Is it like Paul and Timothy and I need to find someone who will walk insanely long distances with me and actually write me letters? So many questions.

Finding myself in that exact spot was a big part of the reason I was excited to partner with LifeWay on their new book, Mentor: How Along-the-Way Discipleship Will Change Your Life.

It's a book by Chuck Lawless that offers a six week study exploring mentoring as a God given relationship where one growing believer encourages and equips another to reach his or her potential as a disciple of Christ. That last sentence is exactly what I was trying to say in the first six paragraphs of this post. And it's not just a book. There's a leader's kit you can get with seven video segments,
a playlist, a downloadable leader guide, and more. (Click here to learn more about what's available!)

From figuring out first century mentors to strategies for structuring a mentor relationship, there is a ton of great content from Chuck Lawless on the topic of mentoring.

And I even have 5 FREE copies to give away.

Want to win one? Here's how!

1. Leave a comment on this post with an answer to the question, "Have you ever had a mentor or mentored someone?"

2. Twitter a link to this post with this link: http://bit.ly/oIe32T . If you don't have a Twitter account, you can use Facebook. You can write your own or use this example. "Win a free copy of Chuck Lawless' new book "Mentor" on @jonacuff's blog http://bit.ly/oIe32T"

3. On Saturday August, 20 we will pick 5 winners. We'll announce them the following week and you can email your address if you're one of the winners.

That's it.

So, have you ever had a mentor or mentored someone?