Chaplains Receive Specialized Training To Help Others
By John Lucas
July 2010
Chaplains recently received valuable training that will better equip them to minister to a wide variety of people when they are experiencing sudden distress and trauma.
Every year countless numbers of people suddenly find themselves in critical need of stress relief and mental, emotional and spiritual support. People become victims unexpectedly due to natural and manmade disasters and also by experiencing traumatic life emergencies. They need trained individuals to comfort and help them. This specialized training is provided by the Kansas-Nebraska Convention of Southern Baptists to chaplains and other caregivers.
KNCSB held two such specialized classes in May which were attended by 15 chaplains and prospective chaplains. Lenexa Baptist Church, Lenexa, Kan., hosted the events. The classes were the North American Mission Board’s “Disaster Chaplaincy Basic Training” and the International Critical Incident Stress Foundation’s course “Individual Crisis Intervention and Peer Support.”
Both courses equip chaplains and caregivers in a classroom training to minister personally to individuals in crisis. Each course required two days of classroom training and participation in order to receive individual official certification.
Those attending these trainings are people who possess a genuine Christ-like compassion to care for others and meet human needs. These trainings have been described as “mental and emotional first aid” and “emotional and spiritual triage.” Each course complements the other by providing an overall integrated strategy for helping victims.
Those receiving this training can help in a variety of life-challenging experiences through various chaplaincy or care giving ministries such as, law enforcement, emergency services, hospital or hospice settings, and in other caregiver disciplines. These experiences can be such everyday life occurrences as: death and dying; long or tragic illness; and other such life-disrupting happenings.
Natural and manmade disasters are another opportunity to apply such skills. Chaplains on disaster assignments often find numerous opportunities to help traumatized and hurting victims as well as helping disaster relief volunteers and workers.
Those who received the training were eager to seek God’s will in applying their newly acquired skills and knowledge. Some were planning to help in Haiti as disaster relief chaplains and others were ready to help locally in their churches and communities.
Prayer was not only emphasized during the training but those attending got to experience firsthand God’s promise to answer prayer. One of the chaplains arrived to class ill one day and had to leave because of his considerable discomfort and pain. Shortly after his departure the class prayed for him.
A little later that morning he returned to class and shared that his pain had suddenly disappeared. He asked the class if they had prayed for him. Everyone rejoiced in the knowledge that God had kept His promise to answer prayer.
A second chaplain had the opportunity a few days later to minister to a family in which a death had occurred. Clearly God had selected these individuals to receive specialized training in order to share the Gospel through the ministry of caring for and listening to the needs of others.
Anyone who would like to enter chaplaincy ministry or receive additional training in the caregiver area of ministry may contact John Lucas, KNCSB at (800) 984-9092 extension 817 or send e-mail to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
Subscribe to Updates