I became a Radical Mentoring Guide in March of 2017. Prior to my arrival and certainly since then, we have been passionate about fire-starting—helping churches launch mentoring, which ignites a mentee to follow Jesus. There is something powerful about casting the vision, striking the match, and watching something new catch flame.

But if I am honest, there has always been a tension beneath the surface.

Years ago, we wrestled with a question we never fully answered. “Are we called to simply start fires, or to tend them as well?” We never asked it out loud, but when you don’t make a clear decision, you eventually default to what comes most naturally. And when stress hits, you always drift toward your wiring.

For us—and for me—that default was fire-starting.

Our processes over the past couple of years have revealed that tendency. I am good, and Radical Mentoring has been good at contacting, serving, and equipping. I am good at charging the hill and moving on to the next opportunity. I don’t keep a long to-do list; I just get things done. I take the hill and move forward. I start fires well.

But if I slow down long enough to listen, my soul has always longed for more. I want to linger. I want to go deeper. I want to tend the fire. That simply isn’t my normal operating procedure.

When fire-tending became real to me as a Radical Mentoring Guide

About two years ago, as we began to sense that a shift was needed organizationally, something personal happened. I was invited to join a mentoring group—not to lead one, but to participate in one. If I had paused to overthink it, I probably would have found a reason not to commit. Instead, I simply said yes, and jumped in.

It changed me.

Seeing Radical Mentoring through the eyes of a mentee for the first time exposed blind spots I didn’t know were there. I was known in ways that I hadn’t allowed myself to be known previously. I connected deeply with two mentors I thought I already knew—but didn’t really know. I gained a prayer partner who now carries burdens with me. It gave me eyes to see the host church differently than I had in all of the years I had otherwise known about it.

That experience clarified something powerful: fire-starting without fire-tending leaves something incomplete.

When you tend the fire, you hold people close enough to know their struggles. You learn what a pastor is actually carrying in a difficult season. You discover three months in that a mentor feels disconnected from his mentees. You uncover the challenges, doubts, and quiet victories you can’t see from a distance.

Getting my hands dirty with seven other men showed me what I had known deep down all along—this way of life is what completes us. Launching matters. Vision matters. But staying close, listening well, and walking with people over time is what sustains and even grows the flame.

Walking beside, not just launching ahead

This is why I love the shift happening at Radical Mentoring. We are still committed to starting fires. But now, we are equally committed to tending them—to knowing our mentors and churches at a deeper level. Not just celebrating their launches, but walking with them and guiding them through their years of mentoring.

The lesson for me, as a Radical Mentoring Guide—and maybe for you—is simple: pay attention to your defaults. Under pressure, you will drift toward what feels natural. But growth often lives in what feels slower, deeper, and less instinctive.  As you lead your groups, don’t just charge the next hill.  Go slow enough to tend the fire burning inside of them.

Sometimes the greatest impact isn’t in lighting the fire. It’s staying beside it to help it burn well.