Mentoring Seminary Students: 5 Lessons Learned After 2 Decades

Would you ask a newly married couple on their honeymoon for marriage advice? Probably not with a straight face.

But that’s what it felt like when a small group of seminary students asked me to be their internship mentor during my second year of full-time teaching.

With my feet barely past the starting line of my now two-decade run as a seminary professor, I started taking on interns. Though I had personally been on the receiving end of profound and life-changing mentoring from high school through seminary, I found transitioning from mentee to mentor to be more challenging than that of going from doctoral student to professor.

Ill-equipped and unsure, I was hesitant to impart wisdom I didn’t think I had to students who were literally just a few years younger than I. This wasn’t a case of imposter syndrome. No. I was an imposter.

Young fool that I was, I took on that handful of interns anyway. At least I let that first batch of students know I didn’t know what I was doing. We would have to learn together. And we did.

The following are some of the crucial things that the Lord has taught me about mentoring students who are trying to sort out their vocations.

1. Weigh one-on-one vs. small group mentoring

As a newbie at mentoring, the first decision I had to make was whether I should do one-on-one or small group mentorship.

Both have biblical and historical precedence. Moses had his Joshua, Elijah his Elisha, Paul his Timothy. But David also had his mighty men, Jesus had his twelve, and the Apostle John left behind a group of pastors to carry the torch well into the second century. I couldn’t really say one approach was necessarily more historically anchored or in accordance with Scripture than the other.

Each approach has strengths and weaknesses.

• On the positive side, the one-on-one approach can create a long-lasting bond of friendship between mentor and mentee. It makes a safe space for deep, personal, individualized advising. It allows the mentee to experience a genuinely unique relationship with the mentor. And it may be the best option for smaller programs, departments, or institutions.
• On the negative side, one-on-one mentorship limits multiplication in discipleship to one at a time. It reduces the mentee’s exposure to a diversity of perspectives and personalities. And it can reinforce an individualistic approach to character growth.

Though I’ve engaged in limited one-on-one discipleship over the years, I’ve come to prefer small group mentoring of about three to five mentees at a time. There are several reasons for this.

1. A small group of about three to five students can nurture some of the relational skills difficult to address in the classroom—things like conflict resolution, consensus-building, community care, crisis management, and teamwork.
2. Each member comes to the group with unique questions, concerns, problems, and needs. Working through these as a team can be as much a learning experience for the mentor as for the mentees. As a result, members can learn as much from each other as they do from their mentor.
3. Group members can develop lifelong relationships—sometimes even lifelong ministry partnerships—that may outlive the mentor–mentee relationship.

Of course, if any of my mentees need to meet one-on-one, mine is an open door. So, the small group mentoring approach can incorporate, when needed, the strengths of the one-on-one approach.

2. Embody an incarnational approach to mentoring

From a theological perspective, mentoring can—and should—be the most incarnational ministry we do as educators.

Pause here for a moment. Because it’s the twenty-first century, I need to remind everyone what “incarnational ministry” isn’t. Simply put, if you can’t get bruised doing it, it’s not incarnational. By definition, incarnational mentoring means meeting in the flesh.

I want my mentees to lock in, not dial in. Effective mentoring requires life-on-life community. Real, in-the-flesh, personal presence.

In this vein, space matters. The warmer, less formal the environment, the better. An office space is fine if that’s all you have available. But a coffee shop, a cozy lounge, or a home? Way better. Coffee and an occasional meal don’t hurt. For-fun team-building events and ministry activities can also embody the incarnational mentoring experience.

I know the incarnational approach to mentoring has huge implications for the constant push to maximize online and virtual tools for education. For the record, I’m not opposed to these kinds of modalities. Technology has given us the ability to do some amazing things in the realm of theological education we could never have imagined before. But as leaders, we must value transformation as much as information, character development as much as curricular completion, heart knowledge as much as head knowledge. So, we must acknowledge the inherent limitations of non-incarnational means of connection.

This may upset a few, but unless there’s a crisis like a global pandemic, I don’t do mentorships by video.

3. Run meetings with care

So, how do I run mentorship meetings?

Each semester, I schedule weekly one-hour group meetings at a time “mutually inconvenient for everyone.” And everyone is expected to attend. Yes, everyone misses a meeting here or there. Even the mentor. But weekly, on-time attendance is vital.

Also, what’s said in the mentorship meeting stays in the mentorship meeting. This discretion allows members to be honest and vulnerable. It also carves out a safe space for me as the mentor to expose future ministers to the often stressful, sometimes frustrating, and occasionally heartbreaking realities of Christian life and ministry.

While I don’t want to turn them into jaded cynics, I also don’t want any of my mentees to launch into ministry with unrealistic expectations. They need to know ministry isn’t always a walk in the park. Sometimes it’s maneuvering through a minefield. The work of ministry is good, yes; but it also has its share of bad and ugly. For this reason, I let them see the joys and the struggles, the victories and the defeats.

4. Give enough quantity time for quality time

When I first started taking on mentees, I had to decide the terms of the mentorship: not only how often and how long to meet, but also how long the mentorship itself would last and what we actually did in those meetings. I experimented with a few different approaches.

Once I did a single-semester internship with a student whose name I have since completely forgotten. I think it was James, but it could have been John. I literally don’t remember. If that sounds horrible and impersonal, that’s my point. For me, one semester was just too short to get to know someone personally and to invest in them meaningfully.

Now brace yourself: I also learned that a whole year wasn’t quite enough. After one year, I’m just getting to know my mentees enough to build meaningful relationships.

I have since settled on a two-year mentorship model, and I’ve never looked back. The first year establishes the foundation of the relationship. The second year often results in great conversations addressing real life questions, issues, and challenges. In that second year, we harvest the fruit of trust planted and nurtured in the first year.

During those two years, my students wrestle with various facets of ministry calling and preparation—not just whether God is calling them into vocational ministry but which vocational ministry God is calling them into. Because of the deeper roots and taller branches grown in the two-year mentorship, our relationships can often continue to grow through changing seasons of ministry.

The two-year mentorship also relieves the pressure of trying to make every single weekly meeting a life-transforming experience. Some weeks we may discuss actual problems they’re facing in pastoral ministry. Other weeks we may debate theological questions that come up in class. Maybe we’ll talk about the prospect of PhD or DMin studies. We could hold a mock ordination interview, discuss a social or political issue, or even argue about the latest Star Wars movie.

All my mentees have been in my home. They have my phone number to text or call any time. Most have kept in touch over the years. They reach out to me for continued shepherding and advice. Some have even become colleagues and partners in ministry.

Bottom line: The two-year mentorship allows enough “quantity time” for “quality time” to occur. But even then, it has its limits.

5. Know your own limits

While I have one foot in church, where I’ve served as a member and leader, I’m primarily an academic serving as a full-time professor. Considering my own experience, I can mostly give my mentees a taste of the academician’s life. I let them in on the behind-the-scenes of institutional politics. They experience the life cycle of research, writing, and publishing projects. And they get to help me work through my own challenges as a professor. These are my strengths.

But I have limits.

I can’t give my mentees pulpit experience. They won’t gain hands-on experiences doing baptisms, communion, weddings, and funerals. And while we can and do talk through issues at their churches, they’ll never be able to sit through elder or deacon meetings with me to see how to work with leadership.

In short, I can’t be all things to all people. But I can be the right thing for specific people. Then, in the context of those relationships, I’m able to draw on my own experiences to help them navigate the obstacles in their journey toward fulfilling their ministry calling.

Paying the price and reaping the rewards

This leads to a surprising aspect of my two-year mentorship: it’s para-curricular. That means it doesn’t appear in the seminary catalog, doesn’t show up on the student’s transcript, and doesn’t get assessed or evaluated by accreditors. It costs the student nothing but time. And it doesn’t factor into my official responsibilities as a professor. (Read: I don’t get paid to do it.)

Why do I do it? I do it because I love my students. I do it because I love the body of Christ in which those students will one day serve. I do it because it reflects the priorities and passions of our Lord, who had his five hundred disciples, yes. But he also had his twelve. And his three.

Having engaged in two-year group mentorship for about two decades, I have the privilege of looking back and seeing the fruit of my labors. Some of my former mentees have gone on to pastoral ministry or missions—what I half-jokingly call “real ministry.” Others are teaching in Christian schools. Many have continued into PhD programs and are now laboring in Christian academia, hopefully discipling their own mentees. Some have transitioned out of ministry but continue to labor for the kingdom as faithful spouses, parents, and church members.

Since those first uncertain and unsteady steps onto the twisted path of mentoring, often through trial and error, I gained several insights along the way. My prayer is that current or future ministry mentors at academic institutions find some of the lessons I learned helpful as you seek to shepherd students discerning their own calls to ministry.

Share your thoughts

What are the best practices for professors to mentor their students for ministry? Join us in the Word by Word group to share your thoughts.

Resources for further reflection

• Svigel, Michael. Let the Wise Hear!: Devotions for Thriving in Theological Studies. Published by the author, 2024.

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