What is Coaching and
Why Should A Pastor Get A Coach?
There are so many challenges and pressures of pastoral ministry.
- 50% of pastors feel so discouraged they’d leave ministry if they could find another job.
- 80% of pastors will not be in ministry after 10 years.
- 91% of pastors have experienced some form of burn out. 18% say its extreme.
- 70% of pastors fight depression.
- 70% do not have someone they consider a close friend.
- 77% feel they do not have a good marriage.[1]
These statistics pre-date the COVID pandemic. A recent Barna report (April, 2022) says that 42% of pastors have seriously considered quitting full-time ministry within the past year. The three main drivers are stress, loneliness, and political division. [2]
Pastors need support, and one powerful resource is coaching. Coaches help pastors identify and discover their needs, priorities, and strategies. They’re not consultants who give answers. Coaches help pastors expand their own thinking to gain clarity, insight, and direction. Coaching helps people achieve their goals and accomplish their mission.
Against pastoral loneliness and isolation, coaches provide a confidential and safe place for the pastor to feel seen, heard, and understood. Coaches are an outside 3rd party who can help the pastors process their thoughts, feelings, and hearts. Coaches look for what God is doing, not just through a pastor, but in a pastor. As an experienced outside 3rd party, coaches can also offer a fresh perspective on ministry issues.
Pastors feel the constant pressure to perform, to gain approval, to prove their worth, even to compete. Pastors need the gospel for their own hearts! Unfortunately, there are very few places where pastors are invited and challenged to personally consider how Jesus confronts their idols and brings deeper freedom, joy, and worship. Coaching can be one of those places.
Pastors often have a budget for professional development, which usually gets spent on books and conferences. Despite good content and good intentions, lessons often don’t get implemented or only make minimal impact. Old habits are hard to break, systems are hard to change, and there is always the tyranny of the urgent. What is lacking is not content but intentional reflection, processing, planning and accountability, which is what coaching facilitates.
Church Smart Resources says, “Every study we have done shows that church leaders will do a better job leading their church to health if they have a coach who comes alongside to encourage them, ask questions, offer resources and hold them accountable.” Ed Stetzer says coaching increases a church’s survival by 135%. One study of executive coaching showed a 400% increase in the effectiveness of training when paired with coaching.[3]
You can multiply a pastor's effectiveness and support personal health. Consider making an investment in yourself or your pastor with coaching!
[1] https://www.soulshepherding.org/pastors-under-stress
[2] https://www.barna.com/research/pastors-well-being
[3] Gerald Olivero, K. Denise Bane, and Richard E. Kopelman, “Executive Coaching as a Transfer Training Tool: Effects on Productivity in a Public Agency,” Public Personnel Management 26, no. 4 (Winter 1997): 461–469.
