Lighthouses: Christian Coaching in a Post-Christian World

By Dean Alan Eaton and Paul Whetham

A game changer in local mission. There are already a number of useful resources in the Christian marketplace that teach you how to engage with people who are open to Christianity, even if only tentatively. Lighthouses: Christian Coaching in a Post-Christian World offers something fresh and different; it presents a model for eng

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lutheran Church of Australia
• Release date: Feb 23, 2018
• ISBN: 9780987623553

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

Gospel sharing in a post-Christian world

Many people in the western world find themselves materially rich, but increasingly time, relationship, and spiritually poor. Our age of distraction and disconnection has, in part, led to a growing mental and spiritual health crisis. In Australia, for example, approximately half the population will experience a mental illness at some stage in their lives, and a quarter of the population is lonely.

In what might be called a perfect spiritual storm conspiring to add to this crisis is the increasing loss of people who provide the majority of our nation’s volunteer contribution to the welfare and wellbeing sector, namely, churchgoing Christians. While some (classical) atheists may deem the abandonment of God and religion a good thing for society’s wellbeing, the hard data tells us that this is not the case. This is because, on the whole, churchgoing volunteers are part of society’s powerful, invisible safety net. Church attendees are more likely than the general community to be volunteers in community welfare (57% vs 35%)¹. So the more we see this volunteer workforce decline, inevitably so does the wellbeing of our general population.

While the Christian church may have been held in high regard in the past, its integrity and relevance today is seriously being questioned² We are seeing increasing allegations and confirmation of sexual abuse, ageing congregations, an increase of civil marriage celebrants and the rise of alternative religions and atheism. On top on these we can add the top six reasons why Australians say they don’t go to church:

• irrelevant to my life

• don’t accept how it’s taught

• outdated style

• issues with ministers

• don’t believe the Bible

• too busy to attend ³.

In the 1911 census, 96% of Australians identified as Christian. In the 2016 census Christians represented 52% of the population. Across all Christian denominations the number of self-identified Christians had fallen from 13.1 million (61%) in 2011 to 12.2 million (52%) in the past five years.⁴ In 2017 fewer than one in ten people regularly attended a church. These Australian statistics typify the emerging picture right across the western world.

All of this paints a rather grim picture from the viewpoint of Christian churches. Increasing numbers of people in our society are embarking upon a voyage towards a secular utopia, focused on personal wellbeing, by intentionally divorcing themselves from the presumed restraints of religion or any form of God. On the other hand, churchgoing Christians are often feeling tired as they seek to maintain their volunteer efforts in the local community while feeling bewildered by the chatter throughout society that discourages them from sharing about the God who motivates them to serve. In a time like this there is pressure to keep up the good deeds in our communities but to shy away from sharing our faith. Reflecting on the experience of people in the Lutheran churches in the United States, Lutheran pastor and mission consultant Dr David Daubert contends:

We have often tried to lead good lives and tried to care for our neighbours. This has been the core of our witness. Oddly, a community formed on the priority of the Word of God over good deeds has relied on good deeds and neglected the Word. The final piece of discipleship is that as Christ serves as our guide in our journey, so we are to be guides on behalf of Christ to others. This means that with caring deeds that are our gift to the world we must also bring a word that helps people see, not the deed, but the Christ who stands in, with, and under the deed (italics emphasis added).⁵

Perhaps it is time for the church in the west to re-imagine the role of the evangelist or gospel-sharer, to provide the handout (or hand up), as well as the finger pointing people to Jesus, the healer of our souls.

Many resources give you a short course for engaging with people who are at the investigative or converting stages of their journey towards God. This resource is designed to train everyday Christians to work with people who are more resistant to the gospel.

By firstly proposing a fresh approach to gospel-sharing based on a coaching model, Lighthouses: Christian Coaching in a Post-Christian World describes how to engage people in a wellbeing conversation that leads naturally to a conversation about our identity in God.

Dean Eaton (evangelist and church planter) describes how a coaching model of relational evangelism can work with Dr Paul Whetham’s insights from the latest neuroscience, resilience, and wellbeing training called Soul Food Café. It then describes how to set up and engage people in your community in a Soul Food Café.

The basic idea is that by transforming existing community and church cafes into informal sacred spaces where people do life together, you can embark upon the search for meaning and give voice to the deeper things of the soul. This book provides both an explanation of and a sample