Blog – Working as a Ministry Coach

  Serving as the pastor of a congregation involves lots of conversations. During any given week a pastor is likely to provide marriage counseling, share wisdom with someone making a big decision, lead a meeting, invite someone to volunteer, teach a Bible study, provide feedback to a staff member, preach a sermon, and follow up

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  Leadership is hard because the world has changed. The world is always changing, but every thousand years or so, the world makes a hard turn that negates everything we thought we knew about how to progress and makes everything feel unexplored. A year ago, we were complaining about how poorly schools were preparing our

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  A few months ago, my mother’s brother died. I told her what we are all taught to say in times of grief: “I’m sorry for your loss.” My mother is one of the kindest and most gracious people I’ve ever known, but her response took me off guard: “I hate when people say that.”

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  James, the brother of Jesus, wrote: Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so God can heal you. – James 5:16 The goal of confession is healing, and the means to healing is confessing. This is an intimate interaction that must be handled delicately. While the coach doesn’t formally hear confessions,

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  Can you take a coach approach to preaching? Preaching seems like the epitome of telling. The preacher is the expert who hopes to influence the listener to take a prescribed action. The preacher is letting the listener in on God’s commands, hopes, thoughts and plans. Is this even the right time to take a

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  Coaching belongs in the church. Why? Because coaching is a way of caring for souls. What does it mean to provide soul care? Rather than give my own definition, let me go back, way back, to 1538 and Martin Bucer’s work Concerning the True Care of Souls. Bucer, who was a mentor to Calvin

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