Building A Church Counseling Ministry - Without Killing The Pastor

Author: Sue Nicewander
Series: Ministry Mission
Publisher: Day One Publications
The concept of BCM began with a couple of realizations. First, we have observed that pastors of small to average-sized local churches can use more help with the growing demands of counseling. Second, well-trained biblical counselors are coming out of our Bible colleges and seminaries to a silent job market. How might the two groups be brought together? We started BCM with a small group of central Wisconsin Baptist pastors and lay- leaders from ordinary churches ranging in size from roughly 40 to 300 members. The five pastors who started on our advisory board were extremely busy men with multi-faceted ministries that included regular counseling. As a biblical counselor, I brought the idea for BCM to them. They all loved the thought of having such resources available, but they also agreed that they had neither the time nor the energy to take on such a project. But when I offered to do the legwork, their ears perked up and we began to discuss the possibilities. The concept that would have overwhelmed a single pastor actually energized the group. Now, ten years later, together we have built a uniquely effective model that supplies counseling resources through a trained biblical counselor for each of their churches as well as consultations, training, and/or referrals for nearly sixty others.