During their very first hour together, KHUSA mentor, Daryl and his young, mentee, Caleb were filling out a ‘My New Friend’ sheet to get better acquainted. When Daryl came to the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Caleb responded, “A Pirate!”
Daryl smiled and said, “Is this because it was recently Halloween?”
Caleb answered, “No”.
After the hour was over, Daryl called his prayer partner and shared Caleb’s answer about wanting to become a pirate. Instead of digging deeper into the young child’s reasoning as to why he wanted to be a pirate, Daryl’s prayer partner prayed. Over the next few days Daryl and his prayer partner began exchanging dialogue on how to incorporate Caleb’s fascination with pirates to promptly build this new relationship.
Daryl was challenged on how he was going to use Caleb’s fascination of pirates to help engage him during their time spent together. Although, Daryl was confident he would find the answer because he knew his relationship and time spent with Caleb would be surrounded in prayer by his prayer partner. This is why prayer partners are so integral to a KIDS HOPE USA mentor and mentee relationship!
The day came for Daryl to meet with Caleb again. Daryl and Caleb began their hour with questions of what happened since last week. After reconnecting, Daryl told Caleb that he had a surprise for him, but they would need to complete some work the teacher requested first before he would reveal the surprise.
Caleb worked diligently to complete all of his assignments and when he was done, Daryl opened his Kids Hope USA mentoring bag and pulled out a book on pirates. Caleb’s eyes opened wide, “A pirate book, that’s AWESOME!” exclaimed Caleb.
Unfortunately, the library only had pirate books that were slightly beyond Caleb’s reading level, but because Caleb was a strong reader for his age and the book was filled with illustrations, Daryl brought it for part of Caleb’s big surprise anyway. Daryl explained this to Caleb, but Caleb seemed eager to take on the challenge full force. As Caleb began reading, Daryl snuck out a pirate eye patch out of his bag. Holding out the pirate eye patch, Daryl asked Caleb, “Do you think you could read this challenging book better with this on?”
Caleb’s eyes opened wide, “Oh WOW!” he shout. Caleb smiled from ear to ear as he started reading his pirate book with his eye patch on.
Thank you, prayer partners; you play in the effectiveness of a mentoring relationship through prayer!
Thank you to our friends at Meadow Baptist Church in Lawrenceville, GA for submitting this story!