Mentoring- To Own a Dragon Post One

I’m told that there’s an old Charles Heston sci-fi movie that involves a plot to convert human beings into fuel. Heston’s character uses this stuff until the last few frames of the movie. He tosses his head back and screams “Soilent Green is People.”

That’s kind of how I feel trying to distill a memoir into teachable points. It feels like husking corn and then tossing the cob and dining on the shell. I highly recommend that you go read To Own a Dragon: Reflections on Growing Up Fatherless. Once you experience the power of the book I hope you’ll forgive this exercise.

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Writing the study guide for the first three chapters might end of being the most difficult part of the process. The guide will be used by the Belmont Foundation to train men how to mentors to the boys of single moms. Don uses the first three chapters set up his own story of growing up without a dad. He describes the impact that it had on his life. Then he describes how the MacMurray’s took him into their home as a young adult. The introduction of a mentor at the time of life when many individuals are launching away from a family created a “crisis” in Don’s thinking. What follows is this powerful memoir.

Here are some passages that I focused on as I developed the study guide. I think they are not only pertinent to mentors but to children’s ministry and family ministry practitioners as well:

Chapter One: The Replacements:

Don humorously recounts the variety of would-be mentors in his life. He focuses on the impact of David Gentiles, a youth pastor who invested one-on-one time in him. I used this chapter to write questions and experiences to get participants to explore the impact of mentors in their lives. I think this is an important exercise for we practitioners who get so program-driven. God seemed to design mentoring (ie. family (Deuteronomy 6) and discipleship) as the means that a God-shaped life is formed. We’d be wise to make sure that our programs serve as vehicles to deliver these relationships.

Chapter Two: Our Problem: To Own a Dragon

Don views a documentary on elephants and discovers that male elephants without a father end up being more aggressive and move violent– “the elephant equivalent of sexual frustration.” Don releases that this is his experience. Part of the role of a dad is to help is the son navigate through the tempest of adolescence. Without a father, urges aren’t tempered by logic and casual relationships. In the study guide I tossed in some of the stats that the Belmont Foundation collected about what they call the crisis of American fatherlessness. I also tried to create a hopeful tone. God is gracious. And he’s also clear in scripture that he is for the disadvantaged. God looks out for the single mom and the fatherless child. So I wanted men to explore the impact of having or not haven’t a dad had on their adolescence. But I also want men to see that they can embody this sense of hope as they become a mentor.

Chapter Three: The Mentor: Terri Said I Could Make a Sandwich

This chapter, I think, is transitional. In Chapter Four on, Don takes a topic by topic aspect of adulthood that became challenges as a result of not having a present dad (finances, sexuality, work ethic, authority, decision making, etc.). In this chapter, Don moves the conversation from his childhood to encountering the McMurray’s– a couple who let Don move in with them for four years. Don wrote that for the first time in his life he had a male authority figure.

In the study guide I leaned into that one paragraph about male authority. I created experiences to get men to explore their history with male authority and the impact that it has on them today.

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I’m realizing that part of my being “Orange” (so it’s a verb now?) is not only partnering with the youth ministry, but with the men’s ministry as well.

(BTW: This is an unofficial, unsanctioned guide. No endorsements/permissions from Miller. It’s something agreed upon between myself and the Belmont Foundation.)