Barnabas File

In a recent Christian Coaches Cafe LIVE Call, coach Chris McCluskey talked about the challenge of making meaningful, sustainable change and suggested two approaches that we often use in addressing needed change.   On the one hand, those initiating change may attempt to use these three strategies or arguments: Fear--“If you don’t do this, you are going to die.” Facts--“Here are the rational reasons to do this.” Force--“You’ll do this or else.” As I thought about the best way to encourage change in a congregation, I quickly realized that all of these fail as adequate motivators.  Fear tends to elicit denial and an “I’ll show you” attitude.  Facts may help to develop strategy after a decision is made, but people make choices more often with their heads than their hearts.  I think it goes without saying that force does not work in most churches, especially the Baptist churches where I have spent most of my life! The alternativ...

When I teach coaching classes for Central Baptist Theological Seminary, I use texts that come at coaching from different perspectives. Some are by strictly secular writers, while others are oriented toward churches or the business community.   Usually, the author or a text will have a particular model (often shown as a schematic) that depicts his or her approach to coaching. In evaluating the books we used this semester, one student pointed out that a couple of the models seemed to focus on coaching as a process while another looked at coaching as a relationship.   This raises an interesting question:   “Is coaching a process or a relationship?” From one perspective, there is a clearly delineated process in any coaching model.   Although I often say that every coaching conversation has three parts—a beginning, a middle and end—most models propose a way forward for the coaching conversation with several parts or steps to be accomplished.   Sometime...