Rev Bill

A few weeks ago I began posting my thoughts as I read the book Pursuing The Full Kingdom Potential Of Your Congregation by George Bullard.

I noted that Bullard prefers to use the term “coach” instead of “consultant” or “mentor” to refer to a person who may help a congregation through the spiritual strategic journey process of discerning the best way for the congregation to reach their potential for God. You might wonder why the term “coach” is important. Bullard believes it’s important to differentiate between a consultant, who might come in and give the congregation some options for programs they might be interested in, a mentor, who might share with the congregation programs they have done and suggest the congregation try them, and a coach, who can help the congregation through a process where they decide where God might be leading them. A coach focuses on helping the congregation learn a process of discernment so they discover God’s answer to their particular situation instead of continuing to have to go to a consultant or mentor for more anwsers.

Imagine that you are a parent of a 7th grader. One night your 7th grader comes to you for help with their math homework. You have several options for helping them. You can work the problems for them (if you know how), you can give them the answers to each step (if you know the answers), or you can help them discover how to go through each step and come up with the answer. Helping them discover how to go through each step may not be the fastest way to solve the problem, but they will learn more in the long run.

That’s something like the role of a congregational coach. They help the congregation discover a process for determining what they feel God is calling them to be doing in their specific community.

For more about congregational and individual Christian coaching you can go to Bill Howard’s web site — Be Coached.org — or to the web site for The Journal of Christian Coaching.

You can purchase Bullard’s book here — and read Bullard’s blog here.

Let me know what you think about the idea of Christian coaching!

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