Giving and Receiving as a Mentor

Tom digs for extra pens and makes sure the snacks are ready for the teen boys who are about to invade his living room. As he and his buddy Jack prepare for their High School Ministry (HSM) Life Group, they know that these seemingly ordinary actions are setting the stage for a couple hours of community and mentoring that could dramatically change the trajectory of these high school guys’ lives.

Tom has been with this group of young men since they were in Grade 7, helping guide them through all the questions and challenges that come with adolescence. So, the two men prepare and pray. With his Life Group, Tom’s goal is to give these high schoolers something he didn’t have growing up.

When Tom was five years old, his parents divorced. His mom struggled with mental illness and life at home for Tom felt unstable. Tom and his mom moved 19 times before he graduated high school. He lacked the presence of wise, godly adults who could give him the love and validation he needed to grow as a young man. Tom was also wrestling with the effects of his own undiagnosed mental illness. He often felt unloved and unnoticed.

When he was 15, he discovered basketball and quickly rose to varsity level on a nationally ranked high school team. The success he had during his basketball years gave Tom some of the acceptance he needed, but it also cemented his drive for success as a way to guard himself from the chaos at home. When he graduated high school, he thought that life would just keep getting better and that everything would fall into place. He joined the Air Force and even accepted Jesus into his life during a chapel service there, but there was still no outward change in his life. He tried to fill the void he experienced with relationships and eventually ended up in a marriage that only lasted six months.

After the Air Force, Tom went to San Diego State University to continue his education and find meaning for his life. It was the mid ’80s, and the university had the accurate reputation of being a party school. His time was spent competing on the volleyball team and partying with his fraternity.

He says that between the Air Force and college, he spent eight years doing anything he wanted in an attempt to fill the daily emptiness he experienced. He admits it was fun for a time, but eventually the pattern of having fun, then feeling empty, began to wear on him.

Tom had a friend in a Christian college group — an on-campus ministry with the goal of sharing the love of Jesus with college students. He began attending their weekly gatherings, and Tom recommitted his life to Jesus. Again, his life change felt slow due to his ingrained habits and his struggle with mental illness. It took another two years of party life before he’d had enough.

“I came came to a point where I was tired of living the way I was living. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired,” Tom said.

He describes his life as a painful road but one that gave him a new way of seeing the world.

“God put me on a track, and until I could run the track the way he wanted me to, I had to keep running that track over and over,” he said. “Nothing else worked. All the stuff the world says will give you peace doesn’t. Jesus is the only way you’re going to find true peace.”

Through a balance of God’s leading, counseling, and medication, his addictions began to abate and his mental health improved. Tom was on a track toward recovery and full life in Christ.

Life took another turn five years ago when Tom lost his job. He moved to Lake Forest to live with and care for his mom and stepdad, and soon found Saddleback Church. Tom immediately loved Saddleback. He saw the way the church served its members and the community, and knew he wanted to be a part of that. So he began serving.

Tom has been leading a Life Group for five years now, and says he’s had the most growth in his life from serving these boys. His rough upbringing has given him a validity in the guys’ lives — they know that when he gives advice about issues like parents, girls, and drugs, he’s faced everything they’ve faced.

Also, Tom has authored two books based on his life and experience, giving him even more credibility with the young men. He is open and authentic, always willing to share his own issues so that he can steer the boys in a positive direction. He unabashedly admits that sin can be fun — for a little while. But can a long-term sinner be happy? “No. You’re going to feel like crud afterwards,” he said with a chuckle.

Tom knows what’s at stake for these boys if they make the wrong choices, so he fights to send them on a path much different than his own. “In a way, it’s me talking to my younger self,” he said. He wants to be the man he wishes he had growing up and an ally to parents in the battle for their kids’ future.

Eventually, Tom’s group of guys will move on to college, but he will stay right where he is, ready to take on a new group and see them all the way through junior high and high school. Tom knows that all the pain he faced in life will not be wasted. Instead, it can be used to help other young men. “It doesn’t matter what I’ve been through. It matters that God is using it to further his kingdom,” Tom said. “No matter what you’ve been through, God can use you.”

Learn more about Saddleback Student Ministry at saddleback.com/students

To read more stories, click HERE.