Launching Our Counseling Ministry

I am super excited that we are launching our Counseling Ministry this weekend at New Life Church. For a number of different reasons we are calling it “Care Ministry.”

Our Care Ministry team has gone through about 22 weeks of intense training (addictions, depression, bi-polar, marriage and family, physical and sexual abuse, suicide, self injury, etc…). We partnered with Biblical Counseling Center in Illinois to both train our team and to launch our ministry. We have been very happy with their resources and guidance.

This Sunday we are graduating 14 people during our Sunday morning worship service! How exciting is that?

Let me share with you some of the details about this ministry.

Who is the Care Ministry?

• Devoted Christian volunteers trained through Biblical Counseling Center and commissioned by New Life Evangelical Free Church.
• As lay counselors, these volunteers are not professionals providing guidance as licensed health practitioners. They simply offer Christian counseling based on the Word of God and prayer led by the Holy Spirit.

What does the Care Ministry Do?

• Bring the hope of Christ to hurting people by providing one-to-one, couple, or family counseling, shepherding and discipling.
• Provide occasional group discipling sessions on topics such as marriage, addictions, depression, anxiety, etc.
• Equip other people to become lay counselors by making available the Biblical Counseling Center training courses and walking alongside these trainees.

Why a Biblical Counseling Approach?

• To equip the saints for the work of ministry (Ephesians 4:11-13). We believe that it is critical that the leaders of the church are equipping others to do the work of ministry.
• To fulfill the Great Commission (Matthew 28:16-20). Our mission as a church is to be making disciples of Jesus Christ. Christian counseling is first and foremost helping people to become more like Jesus Christ. Christian counseling is discipleship.
• To help people who are hurting/struggling (Matthew 9:36). We want to be a relational church which means we are going to be getting to know each other really well. When that happens, when we let down our defenses, we will begin to see that there is a lot of hurt and brokenness all around us. We want to follow in Jesus’ steps and reach out to those who are hurting with the hope that only comes from God’s Word.

If you want to talk further about this ministry feel free to contact me at michaelw@newlifeefree.org.