How Should Pastors Be Equipped for Pastoral Counseling?
This November 14 in Milwaukee at the 64th annual meeting of the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS), at a session on pastoral counseling, I will be addressing the question:
How Should Pastors Be Equipped for Pastoral Counseling?
The formal name of the paper is:
Pastoral Counselor Preparation in Evangelical Seminary M.Div. Programs: Toward a Best Practice Statement of Purpose, Philosophy, Pedagogy, Priority, and Person
The abstract, or summary overview, reads as follows:
Survey research over the past three decades indicates that pastors trained in M.Div. programs believe that:
a.) Seminaries are responsible for training them in pastoral counseling—the personal ministry of the Word.
b.) Their seminary insufficiently trained them as pastoral counselors in the local church.
c.) They are unprepared to function in the role of a pastoral counseling “generalist” in a local church setting.
To address these issues, this paper will examine:
a.) The purpose of seminary pastoral counselor preparation in M.Div. programs: how does the seminary training setting and the local church ministry setting impact and impart a distinctive pastoral counseling identity?
b.) The philosophy of seminary pastoral counselor preparation in M.Div. programs: what view of the Bible shapes the way pastoral counselors form their theology and methodology of pastoral counseling?
c.) The pedagogy of seminary pastoral counselor preparation in M.Div. programs: How should Evangelical seminaries in M.Div. programs equip students for pastoral counseling formation so that they think Christianly (content) and counsel effectively (competence) out of growing personal maturity (character) in the context of local church ministry (community)?
d.) The process of seminary pastoral counselor preparation in M.Div. programs: given that the average seminary M.Div. curriculum allows for one course in pastoral counseling, and at most two in some select cases, what should be taught, why, and how?
e.) The person/professor of seminary pastoral counselor preparation in M.Div. programs: given the purpose, philosophy, pedagogy, and proces of pastoral counselor preparation, what “credentials” best qualify the professor to equip pastoral counseling students for the personal ministry of the Word?
Based upon insights raised from engagement with the preceding five question-sets, this paper proposes a way forward toward seminary M.Div. pedagogical best practice principles that could most effectively serve to equip the pastoral counseling generalist to mature in the “4Cs” of counseling-related biblical content, Christ-like character, and counseling/equipping competence in the context of pastoral counseling ministry in the local church community.
Join the Conversation
If you’re a pastor with seminary M.Div. training, how helpful or unhelpful was the equipping you received in pastoral counseling?
If you’re a seminary professor equipping pastors for pastoral counseling in an M.Div. program, what are your thoughts on how pastors should be equipped for pastoral counseling?
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