A Brief History of the Launch of the Biblical Counseling Coalition

A Word from Bob 

I had the humbling honor of being the founding Executive Director of the Biblical Counseling Coalition (BCC). Planning for the BCC began in 2009. I served as the BCC Executive Director from 2010-2017. Here’s a very brief history of those early days when biblical counseling leaders like David Powlison, Randy Patten, Deepak Reju, Garrett Higbee, and I launched the BCC…

The Birth of the Biblical Counseling Coalition

Let’s time travel back to the early 2000s. In 2009, as in the 1970s, as in 2026, a great deal of tension existed between the various groups, organizations, churches, and individuals in the nouthetic biblical counseling movement. At a dinner with half-a-dozen biblical counseling leaders, an influential pastor looked at all of us and said, plaintively,

“Why do I have to choose between NANC, CCEF, ABC, and the alphabet soup of biblical counseling groups? Why can’t you all get along with each other? You have to do something about all of this divisiveness, all of this, ‘I am of Adams, I am of NANC, I am of CCEF.’” 

His voice trailed off…

His pointed statement birthed the conception of the Biblical Counseling Coalition.

Why the Biblical Counseling Coalition?

We launched the BCC with twin goals, organized around Ephesians 4:15 and “speaking the truth in love”:

1. Create and Collate Robust Biblical Counseling Resources: Sharing the truth of God’s Word related to the personal ministry of the Word.

2. Nurture Collaborative Christlike Relationships: Ministering together as biblical counseling leaders in humble, loving, iron-sharpening, mutually-respectful, collegial relationships.

As the BCC’s founding Executive Director, my job description was to:

Unite dozens of individual biblical counseling leaders, 100s of biblical counseling churches, all existing biblical counseling educational institutions, and all existing biblical counseling organizations around these twin themes.

Not. An. Easy. Task.

But a wonderful privilege and a very fun and exciting opportunity!

United in Truth and Love 

We united around truth and love by creating the Biblical Counseling Coalition Confessional Statement. I had the honor of facilitating the creation of this document, as I oversaw the nearly year-long process of three dozen biblical counseling leaders crafting ten editions of what became the BCC Confessional Statement.

For an historical account of the development of the BCC Confessional Statement, see:

A First-Hand, Documented History of the Collegial Development of the Biblical Counseling Coalition’s Confessional Statement.

The Biblical Counseling Coalition Executive Director Profile 

In 2010, half-a-dozen biblical counseling leaders gathered together in the CCEF Conference Room at their headquarters in Glenside, PA. David Powlison and the rest of the leaders made it clear what they were and were not looking for in an Executive Director. They were looking for:

1. A bridge-builder, not a wall builder, not a bridge-burner.
2. A relational and organizational connector, not a silo-builder.
3. Someone who could work respectfully with the wide spectrum of the biblical counseling world, not just with one biblical counseling group.
4. Someone committed to biblical counseling, not just committed to one biblical counseling organization, group, tribe, or wing.
5. Someone experienced in conflict management and relational reconciliation.
6. Someone experienced in building and shepherding collaborative, collegial relationships.
7. Someone with successful pastoral experience, academic-educational experience, para-church leadership experience, biblical counseling ministry experience, and writing/editing/publishing experience.

The BCC BOD thought it best if the founding ED was not solely or primarily aligned with any one biblical counseling organization like NANC, or CCEF, or ABC. The final “C” in the BCC is “Coalition”—a gathering with unity in diversity, with the unity represented by our mutual commitment to the BCC Confessional Statement.

The BCC Executive Director was not to “represent” or “promote” any one group. He was to represent and promote a positive presentation of the beauty of biblical counseling, and of the beauty of the unity of biblical counselors. 

What About Bob?  

So why me? That’s exactly what I asked those half-dozen biblical counseling leaders when they suggested that I accept the role as the BCC’s founding Executive Director.

I clearly told them that I was not the right person. I thought that in order to gain “buy-in,” especially by the most conservative NANC leaders, that someone else should assume the Executive Director position.

However, in David Powlison’s mind, I was right at the center of the movement. As he said to me in that meeting at CCEF,

“Bob, you’re exactly the right fit. If people can’t read your materials, hear you speak, talk to you one-to-one, and see that you are at the center of the biblical counseling movement, then they won’t fit in the BCC.”

So, historically, in 2009-2017, where was I in terms of affiliation with the modern biblical counseling movement when David Powlison, Randy Patten, and other NANC Fellows/NANC Board Members asked me to be the founding Executive Director of the BCC?

• I was beginning to speak at NANC (now ACBC) conferences every year.
• I was speaking at the Faith Biblical Counseling Training conference every year.
• My books had been, were being, and would continue to be endorsed by multiple NANC/ACBC Fellows and Board Members.
• At that point, I had also worked in an official role with the Association of Biblical Counselors (ABC).
• I also was doing consulting with CCEF and would begin speaking at CCEF conferences.
• I also had launched the Biblical Counseling Forum for the AACC.
• During those years, I would be the keynote speaker at an IBCD annual conference, at a Reigning Grace Biblical Counseling Ministry annual conference, and at many other leading biblical counseling conferences throughout the United States and the world.

If you put all of those roles together, then in 2009-2017 (and still today), I wasn’t “the far-left” of the movement. I wasn’t “the far-right” of the movement. I guess one could say that I was in the “Goldilocks Zone” of the movement. For more about this “Bob guy and the biblical counseling movement,” see this link.

Putting Feet to the Vision 

To fulfill the twin goals mentioned above (robust resources and collaborative relationships), here are just a few of the areas I focused on during those early years:

1. BCC Council Board: The original BCC Council Board (CB) consisted of approximately three dozen members from every major nouthetic biblical counseling organization. As the BCC Executive Director, I was responsible to recommend CB members to the BCC BOD, interview and vet every CB member, recruit every CB member, maintain healthy relationships with every CB member, and assure annually that every CB member continued to affirm the BCC Confessional Statement.
2. BCC Confessional Statement: I oversaw the aforementioned BCC Confessional Statement by shepherding over three dozen diverse biblical counseling leaders in the process of crafting a comprehensive but concise statement of what makes biblical counseling truly biblical.
3. BCC “Trilogy”: In order to unite the twin goals of collaborative relationships and robust resources, as the BCC Executive Director I oversaw the process of dozens of diverse biblical counseling leaders uniting to write three comprehensive and foundational biblical counseling books: Christ-Centered Biblical Counseling, Scripture and Counseling, and Biblical Counseling and the Church. It was my responsibility to craft the book proposal for each book, including book title, book focus, book chapters, and book authors. Combined, I recruited, shepherded, and edited over 100 authors.
4. Annual BCC Leadership Retreat/Summit: Every year over three dozen (eventually nearly six dozen) diverse biblical counseling leaders from every leading biblical counseling organization and academic institution gathered together to build face-to-face, iron-sharpening-iron relationships. Leaders met together in small groups for prayer, accountability, and reconciliation—when needed. Each year, I facilitated a discussion of a “controversial topic” in the biblical counseling world. In civil, cordial, respectful ways we talked face-to-face, rather than talking behind each other’s backs.
5. BCC Blog Posts and Resources: From 2011-2017, the BCC produced six blogs every week, produced numerous book reviews, and collated hundreds of free resources. All of these were garnered cooperatively from 100s of diverse biblical counseling leaders associated with 100s of biblical counseling churches, para-church groups, organizations, and academic institutions around the world.
6. BCC Facilitation of Organizational Unity: As noted above, the biblical counseling world was experiencing disunity in 2009. Many have noted that from 2010-2017, the biblical counseling world experienced greater unity because organizational leaders from NANC/ACBC, CCEF, ABC, IBCD, and others, were talking candidly and respectfully to each other, rather than talking about each other. As the BCC Executive Director, I was responsible to facilitate these organizational relationships. Several times the BCC BOD tasked me with leading conflict resolution and interpersonal reconciliation among biblical counseling leaders—both individually and organizational.

Launching and Leading: Humbled and Honored 

It is one thing to start your own organization. I did that with RPM Ministries. It is one thing to oversee a united organization, such as CCEF.

It is quite another matter to launch and lead an organization tasked with unifying a group of leaders who have had a fifty-year history of disunity.

It is quite another task to facilitate the Christlike collaborative relationships and the production of robust biblical counseling resources among scores of diverse leaders with a history of silo-building and mischaracterizations.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time as the BCC Executive Director. I enjoyed passing on the ministry leadership to Garrett Higbee, who passed it on to Curtis Solomon, who passed it on to Kevin Carson.

I’m humbled to have been asked by David Powlison and other biblical counseling leaders to be the founding Executive Director of the Biblical Counseling Coalition. I’m honored to have served in that role and to have built lifelong collegial relationships with 100s of biblical counseling leaders from around the world.

Thank You, Lord.