I believe that anyone who has a responsibility for the spiritual guidance of others should be in a relationship of accountability with another for the sake of the people he or she guides, teaches, or preaches to. Otherwise we are going to grow, if we grow at all, in a deformed shape that will be passed down to others. I see such distortions frequently. It is a biblical concept to be accountable to someone else. Timothy was mentored by Paul, Paul by the disciples in Antioch. Friedrich von Hügel, author and spiritual director, once wrote: “Behind every saint stands another saint. That is the great tradition. I never learnt anything myself by my old nose.”
From John Ackerman’s Listening to God (pg. 67).
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