I’ve told parts of this story before, but recently, I felt like the Holy Spirit was prompting me to share it again. It’s a story about the impact of mentoring boys and a man who probably had no idea what he was doing for me at the time.
And if you’re a father, a mentor, or one of our KOZ leaders, I hope this story reminds you of the impact of mentoring boys and why the time you spend investing in a boy matters more than you may ever know.
A Family That Took a Chance on Me
When I was a teenager, I spent time living on the streets. I was in survival mode, making bad decisions and heading down a road that wasn’t going anywhere good.
During that time, a family found out about my situation and invited me to live with them. Looking back, I’m not sure it was their greatest parenting decision. I was a terrible influence on their son, and they probably had no idea what they were getting themselves into, but they opened their home to me anyway.
For a kid living on the streets, having a roof over my head, food on the table, clean clothes, and a place to take a shower was a pretty incredible deal. I was grateful, and I wasn’t about to argue when they told me there was only one rule. I had to go to church with them on Sundays.
Now, I had some experience with church growing up. My mother was a faithful Catholic, and I’d attended Catholic school for a while. I’d gone through confirmation and done the things I was supposed to do, but I never really understood what it meant to have a personal relationship with Jesus. So, when this family told me I had to spend an hour at church every Sunday, I figured that was a pretty easy trade for a place to live. Little did I know what God had planned.
The Man Who Introduced Me to Jesus
I still remember walking into that little church for the first time. People were hugging each other, asking how you were doing, and genuinely seemed happy to see one another. The pastor talked about the Bible like Jesus was real and like having a relationship with Him actually meant something. It was different from anything I’d experienced before.
After church, people would gather at the family’s house for Sunday lunch. They talked, laughed, and spent time together. For a kid who’d been living on the streets, there was something special about being surrounded by people who genuinely cared about each other. That’s where I met a man named Mr. Moyer.
Apparently, some of the older men in the church had been encouraging him to reach out to younger guys, share the Gospel, and get involved in mentoring. Well, I guess I was an easy target because I was standing right there.
He started spending time with me and my buddy. We’d sit in a room together, open the Bible, and talk about Jesus. I don’t remember all the details of those conversations, but I remember that he never made it feel threatening or uncomfortable. He simply took the time to share his faith with us. At some point, he gave me a full-size Bible and wrote his name and the date inside the front cover.
Eventually, I accepted Jesus into my heart, and Mr. Moyer baptized me in that little church. You’d think that would be the part of the story where everything turned around, and I immediately started living a wonderful Christian life. Well, that’s not exactly what happened.
Sometimes the Seeds Take Years to Grow
It wasn’t long before I found myself right back on the streets, making the same bad decisions and getting pulled into the same lifestyle I’d been living before, but something was different. I didn’t recognize it at the time, but looking back, I believe the Holy Spirit was already working in my life.
Eventually, I reached a point where I couldn’t keep living the way I was living. One Thursday night, I found my way into a 12-step meeting, and that began the process of getting clean and sober. It wasn’t an overnight transformation. I spent years in those programs, working through the steps and learning how to live differently. I didn’t immediately return to church, either. However, I believe God was working through all of it, slowly bringing me back to the faith that had been introduced to me years earlier.
Eventually, I got married, and my wife and I began thinking about how we wanted to raise our children. We both had experiences with people of faith who had made an impression on us. She remembered a wonderful nun from her childhood, and I remembered that family who had taken me in and the little church where I’d first experienced what it looked like to follow Jesus. We wanted our children to grow up surrounded by that kind of Christian community.
So, we became active in our church, and over time, God began putting something else on my heart: the importance of men investing in the lives of boys who desperately need someone to show up for them. That calling eventually became KOZ, Kids Outdoor Zone, and it all traces back, in part, to a young man who took the time to share the Gospel with a teenage kid who was headed down the wrong road.
A Phone Call 40 Years Later
Last year, my wife and oldest son came to me with a surprise around my birthday. They told me they’d found Mr. Moyer.
Now, I’d thought about this man over the years. I’d even tried to find him, but apparently, I’d been reading his handwriting wrong all this time and had his name misspelled in my head. My wife and son had found him on social media, contacted him, and discovered that he was doing well and still active in his church, and he wanted to talk to me.
I can’t really describe what that felt like. They gave me his phone number, but it took me a couple of days to work up the nerve to call him.
He Barely Remembered Me
How do you call somebody after all those years and explain what one simple act of faithfulness did in your life? How do you tell him that the teenage boy he once sat down with grew up to start a ministry that’s now reaching boys through churches and godly men? Eventually, I made the call and here’s the part of this story that I really want you to understand. Mr. Moyer barely remembered any of it.
In fact, when my family first contacted him, he wasn’t even sure he was the right person. They had to send him a picture of his signature inside that old Bible before he realized that, yes, he really was the guy who had given it to me all those years ago. Something that had meant so much to me was something he hardly remembered doing.
Think about that for a minute. He had no idea that the time he spent with me would become part of a much bigger story. He was simply being obedient to what God had placed in front of him, and that’s exactly what I want our KOZ men to understand.
The Impact of Mentoring Boys Goes Beyond a Saturday
Every month, men across the country give up half a Saturday to spend time with boys through Kids Outdoor Zone. You teach them how to fish, shoot a bow, use tools, build things, and enjoy God’s creation.
Those are all great things, and I believe boys need those experiences, but the most important thing you’re giving those boys isn’t a new skill or another outdoor adventure. It’s the opportunity to experience what it looks like to have a godly man in their lives.
You’re showing them that a man can love Jesus and still love hunting, fishing, and working with his hands. You’re demonstrating what faith looks like in everyday life, not just by what you say but by how you treat people, how you handle difficult situations, and how you show up for others.
For some of these boys, you may be the first man they’ve ever known who consistently demonstrates those things, and here’s something we have to remember: You may never see the results of the seeds you’re planting.
A boy might attend KOZ for a couple of months and then disappear. His family might move, his circumstances might change, or he might simply stop coming. You may never hear from him again, and you may wonder whether those few Saturdays made any difference at all.
I’ve experienced that myself through KOZ, but think about Mr. Moyer. He spent a relatively short period of time investing in me, and then I went right back to the streets. From his perspective, he probably had no idea whether anything he’d shared with me had made a difference. Yet more than four decades later, I was calling him to tell him how God had used those conversations to help change my life.
Mentoring Boys Means Planting Seeds of Faith
Sometimes, I think we get so focused on wanting to see immediate results that we forget how God works. Of course, we want to see boys accept Jesus, get baptized, and grow in their faith. There’s nothing greater than watching a young man begin a relationship with Christ, but that doesn’t mean every boy who comes through KOZ is going to make that decision while he’s with us.
Some boys may need years before they fully understand what you’ve been sharing with them. Others may go through some difficult seasons before they remember the conversations you had around a campfire or the example you set while working alongside them. Our responsibility is to plant those seeds, love those boys, and give them a point of reference they may never have had before.
Think about the boy who comes to KOZ because he wants to shoot a bow or learn how to fish. Maybe he’s growing up without a father at home. Maybe the men in his life have let him down, ignored him, or simply never shown up. Then he meets you.
You’re a man who listens when he talks, remembers his name, encourages him when he’s struggling, and genuinely cares about what’s happening in his life. He sees that your faith isn’t something you just talk about on Sunday. It’s part of who you are.
He may not fully understand it right now, but he’s seeing something different. And years down the road, when life gets difficult, he may remember the man who took the time to show him what following Jesus looks like. That’s the opportunity God has given us through Kids Outdoor Zone.
Keep Showing Up. God Is Working.
I don’t know why the Holy Spirit put this story on my heart to share again, but I have a feeling somebody needs to hear it.
Maybe you’re a KOZ leader who’s wondering whether you’re making a difference. Maybe you’ve been investing in a boy for months and haven’t seen much change. Or perhaps you’ve had a boy leave your group, and you’ve wondered whether anything you taught him stuck. I want to encourage you to keep going.
You don’t have to have all the answers, be the greatest outdoorsman, the best Bible teacher, or the most experienced mentor. You simply have to be willing to show up, love those boys, and let God use you.
Mr. Moyer probably thought he was just doing what the older men in his church had encouraged him to do. He saw a young guy who needed Jesus, took the time to talk with him, and gave him a Bible. He couldn’t have known where that boy’s life would eventually lead, and you have no idea what God might be doing through the four hours you spend with a boy on a Saturday.
So, keep planting those seeds, guys. Keep sharing your faith, keep building relationships, and keep showing those boys what it looks like to be a man who loves Jesus. You may never know the full impact of what you’re doing, but that doesn’t mean God isn’t working.
Regulators, mount up!
TJ Greaney Founder, Kids Outdoor Zone
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