A Charge to Keep

Supervision can be a gift of grace. This book explores pastoral supervision in the context of leadership development and equips readers with practical tools with which to create and implement policies that will help ministers become better, more effective grace-filled leaders. The book is informed by qualitative research using the introduction of structured supervision into the life of the Methodist Church in Great Britain as a case study. The author then brings this research into dialogue with her pastoral experience as both a supervisee and supervisor in order to integrate supervision, together with its methods and Wesleyan theology, into the total life of the Church.

This book informs both ministry practitioners and those with responsibility for the formation and professional support of clergy about the nature, benefits, and obstacles of pastoral supervision and the issues that should be considered in introducing supervision into the life of the Church. The author begins by thinking about the reasons for considering supervision as a means of grace and transformation in the service of fruitful ministry and mission. She proceeds to outline what pastoral supervision is and is not. The final section explores some of the practical issues of devising and implementing a supervision policy.