In 1996, Brad Hoffmann (a Southern Baptist minister) began working in cooperation with Antioch Affection, a ministry founded by Bob Anderson with a 25-year history of helping restore force-terminated Southern Baptist pastors. Under the Antioch program, force-terminated pastors relocate their families to Brad’s “Refuge Church” in the Orlando area to undergo a formal six-month restoration program.

In the spring of 2000, Brad recruited Michael Todd (MT) Wilson (a Christian Counselor at the time in the Orlando area) to provide counseling to the pastors and families of the Antioch Affection program. The ministry at this time functioned under the umbrella of Brad’s church and as an arm of Antioch Affection.

In 2002, Brad and MT brainstorm ways of taking the lessons learned from force-terminated pastors to develop a model for helping ministers still in the field to not only function at optimal performance but also to avoid the costly consequences of forced termination. This led to the discovery of the seven “Foundation Stones”, with plans to develop materials that could be used for encouraging ministers to develop healthy self-care strategies for long-term success in ministry.

In 2003, ShepherdCare is officially founded as a nonprofit ministry and our first pilot conference for ministers, Practicing ShepherdCare, is held in south Florida. By late-2003, Brad is called to minister as the senior pastor of Memorial Baptist Church in Baytown, Texas. In 2004, MT relocated his private Christian counseling practice and ShepherdCare to the Atlanta metropolitan area.

From 2005-2007, ShepherdCare develops a three-day conference format for ministers and begins to offer them in various parts of the country. This material is eventually published in 2007 through InterVarsity Press, titled Preventing Ministry Failure.

Today, ShepherdCare continues its vision as a resource for helping those in ministry pursue healthy self-care. While many in ministry think that it will never happen to them, we know from experience that preventative care is the key difference between long-term success in ministry and early burnout and/or termination.

At present, ShepherdCare is a small ministry by design. Both Brad (full-time senior pastor) and MT (full-time Christian counselor) give to this ministry out of their abundance. Neither are compensated salaries from this ministry. Yet each is fully committed to their calling to impact those in ministry with the message of healthy self-care. Until God directs otherwise, this will be the ministry model under which we operate. However, we are open to His leading should He call us to this work in a more dedicated way and should He provide the funding needed to sustain such a bold crossing. We simply desire to follow his leading in the way of His choosing. Regardless, we are excited to see what the Lord will do as we continue to respond to requests for help in this much needed area of care for those in ministry.