DCBC Coaching Ministry at Work

By Lisa Banks-Williams

In 2018, the DCBC Equipping Leaders workgroup met to explore and develop a program to bring mentoring, counseling and support to new pastors and those with major challenges in ministry. The intention was and remains for retired or retiring pastors to mentor, encourage and support new and upand-coming pastoral leaders.

In 2021, the original group expanded to include additional clergy, and the DCBC Coaching Ministry was established with a two-fold purpose: equip new pastors and create a cadre of trained, certified coaches to support their respective ministries.

After careful consideration, we determined that some additional tools were needed to better equip those we intended to serve. DCBC leadership engaged the services of the Coaching Approach to Ministry (CAM) organization under the direction of Rev. Dr. Ken Kessler. Coaching is not counseling, consultation, psychotherapy or mentoring. According to the International Coaching Federation (ICF), “Coaching honors the client as the expert in his/her life and work; the client is creative resourceful and whole. Standing on this foundation, the coach’s responsibility it to

• Discover, clarify and align with what the client wants to achieve

• Encourage client self-discovery

• Elicit client-generated solutions and strategies

• Hold the client responsible and accountable”

Due to a generous DCBC Foundation grant and other donations to the cause, we have been able to provide, at reduced cost, two introductory courses: CAM 501, Foundations for Christian Coaching and CAM 502, Establishing a Dynamic Coaching Relationship, to be accompanied by followup mentor and peer coaching. To obtain firstlevel ICF certification additional coaching sessions, along with a prescribed number of coaching hours are required.

To date, we’ve trained 17 clergy and lay leaders. Beginning in January 2023, we hope to provide a coaching ministry to any DCBC pastor, clergy or member who would like to have a series of sessions with a trained and certified coach.

For more information about trainings, complete a Coaching Ministry registration. A Coaching Ministry members will contact you directly. On behalf of our Ministry Leader, Rev. Gerald Martin, we wish you well and look forward to hearing from you.

Rev. Dr. Lisa Banks-Williams, Student Care Coordinator Wesley Theological Seminary

Coffee & Chat Invitation: Sophia Theological Seminary

The Faculty of Sophia Theological Seminary and Sophia Farms invite you for a conversation over coffee about our re-imagined community: a seminary supported by a produce farm.

Our name, Sophia, derives from the Greek for “wisdom,” and the seed of Sophia grew from a recognition that, in a changing environment, theological education needs wise and creative reimagining. The dream-turning-into-reality of Sophia is an environmentally and financially sustainable community in which faculty and students’ shared labor on the farm produces the resources for the seminary’s operating costs; thus our students will not incur the usual costs for tuition or housing. The Sophia community has been farming with volunteer support since the summer of 2020, and we are now looking forward to our first group of entering students this summer.

Join us, Tuesday, March 21, at 10 a.m. at the Baptist Building to learn more and consider how we can become partners in this work on and with God’s good creation.

DCBC shares the following notable events in the lives of its members…

We congratulate the following congregations and individuals celebrating anniversaries, installations, ordinations and other accomplishments:

 Ryan Wise (center) is pictured during his December 6, 2022, ordination council meeting with (from left to right) Rev. William Young, Pastor, Covenant Baptist United Church of Christ; Rev. Dr. Thuam Cin Khai, Pastor, Siyin-Chin Baptist Church; Rev. Ryan A. Wise, Metropolitan Baptist Church; Rev. Carmella Jones, International Ministries (which is also known as American Baptist Foreign Missions Society); Rev. Dr. Daryl Roberts, Pastor, 19th Street Baptist Church; second row: Rev. Dr. Trisha Miller Manarin, DCBC Executive Director/Minister; Rev. Emmitt Drumgoole, Pastor, Montgomery Hills Baptist Church.

 Riverside Baptist Church, in Washington, D.C., which welcomed Rev. Mia Michelle McClain (pictured at right with Rev. Dr. Trisha Miller Manarin) as its new pastor on September 1, 2022, and celebrated its 165th church anniversary on September 25.

Leslie Alford Mason (FBC DC)