Pastors know well that no two people under their care are in the same place spiritually. Making and growing disciples involves taking people’s spiritual temperature, helping them confront and address sin, guiding them to develop a love for Scripture, and much more. This Common Challenge covers ways you can introduce, initiate, and instruct the entire congregation into the life of allegiance to Christ.
Sometimes pastors' step in-and later regret it. Despite pure motives and a deep desire to help, their well-intentioned intervention can at times do more harm than good.
The toughest counseling problems are those where the changing needs to be done by someone other than the one I'm counseling. For instance, the wife has come for help, but the husband is the alcoholic. Or the mother-in-law is a hypochondriac, but the daughter-in-law has come to me. How do you help in those situations? Should the problem person be confronted?"
Almost every pastor knows the dilemma. What do you do about the man, for instance, who takes his wife for granted and puts his marriage on autopilot, unaware or unconcerned that his wife is starving emotionally? Or the woman who bounces from one job (or relationship) to the next, never satisfied, always looking for something else? Or the couples in premarital counseling who are blind to serious areas of incompatibility?
This scenario and many more informed the Minsters conference and fellowship in Birmingham recently as organized by Couples Koinonia.
For more on this and many more profound deliberations at the meeting, visit: