Biblical Counseling (part 1)

What is BIBLICAL COUNSELING?

Network Institute of Christian Counseling9 September 2013

Sponsored by

Introducing Harry Morgan

M.A., M.Div., Th.M., Ph.D., L.H.M.C.

• To review the philosophical basis for a biblical & holistic approach to psychotherapy

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

• To identify requirements for a biblical counselor

• To provide a number of examples of biblically-based interventions in counseling based on today’s presentation

What is Counseling?• σύμβουλος (sumboulos) = (σύμ) with +

(βουλή) advice, direction

What is Counseling?(kho-bal) derived from the nouns חבל a rope or חבל a rope puller, a sailor, a pilot (plur. fem. rule, government)

�חבלה ת

What is Counseling?

Proverbs 1:5 A wise man will hear and increase

learning, anda man of understanding will attain

wise counsel

What is Counseling?

“Counseling Psychology is a specialty within professional psychology that maintains a focus on facilitating personal and interpersonal functioning across the life span. The specialty pays particular attention to emotional, social, vocational, educational, health-related, developmental, and organizational concerns.”

What is Counseling?

“Counseling is a collaborative effort between the counselor and client. Professional counselors help clients identify goals and potential solutions to problems which cause emotional turmoil; seek to improve communication and coping skills; strengthen self-esteem; and promote behavior change and optimal mental health.”

What is Counseling?“. . .the provision of assistance and guidance in resolving personal, social, or psychological problems and difficulties, especially by a professional.”

What is Counseling?Not all Counseling is the same!

Proverbs 14:12 There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way of death. (cf. also 16:25)

What is Counseling?• Proverbs 11:14 Where there is no counsel, the

people fall; but in the multitude of counselors there is safety.

• Proverbs 12:5 The thoughts of the righteous are right, but the counsels of the wicked are deceitful.

• Proverbs 15:22 Without counsel, plans go awry, but in the multitude of counselors they are established.

What is Counseling?• Psalm 33:11 The counsel of the LORD stands

forever, the plans of His heart to all generations.

• Proverbs 8:14 Counsel is mine, and sound wisdom; I am understanding, I have strength.

What is Counseling?• Isaiah 9:6 For unto us a Child is born, unto us

a Son is given; and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

• I Corinthians 1:30 But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God—and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.

What is Counseling?Psalm 1:1–2 Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful; 2 but his delight is in the law of the LORD, and in His law he meditates day and night.

What is Psychology?

“Psychology can be defined as the scientific study of the behavior and thinking of organisms. Psychology might be thought of as the study of how living creatures interact with their environment and each other, and how they cope (successfully or unsuccessfully) with that environment.”

Meier, P. D., M. D., Minirth, F. B., M. D., Wichern, F. B., Ph. D., & Ratcliff, D. E., Ph. D. (1991). Introduction to psychology and counseling: Christian perspectives and applications (Second Edition., p. 17). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books.

What is Psychology?

(psyche) = soul (logos) = word, dissertation, science of

“psychologia” coined in 1524 (Vande Kemp, 1996)

WHAT IS THE SOUL?

נפש(nephish)

WHAT IS THE SOUL?

Mind (cognition)Emotions (affection)Conscience (violation)Will (volition)

What is Psychotherapy?

(psyche) = soul + (theron) = healing

What is Psychopathy?

(ψυχή - psūkhē) = soul (πάθος - pathos) = experience or suffering

What is Empathy?

(em) = toward + (pathos) = suffering (sym) = with + (pathos) = suffering

History ofCounseling Psychology & Spirituality

Charles Ryrie: “Christian spirituality always involves regeneration, the work of the Holy Spirit, and time to learn this way of living. Spiritually is a mature and maturing relation to the Holy Spirit.”

• In secular literature, spirituality is a rather generic term.

• Christian spirituality is part of religious life, or the expression of it; seeking to live life in imitation of Christ.


• Earliest forms of psychotherapy likely came from philosophy rather than medicine (Kurtz, 1999)

• Ancient Greeks (Zeno, Epictetus, etc.)

• Spiritual systems often contain psychological components (e.g. The Dhammapada)

• Religion/spirituality and psychology had much overlap until the end of the 19th century

T


Wilhelm Wundt (1832-1920)

William James (1842-1910)

John B. Watson (1878-1958)


Sigmund Freud (1856-1939)

Carl G. Jung (1875-1961)

(Richards & Bergin, 1999)

William James • Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)• Emphasis on personal psychology of religionGordon Allport• The Individual and His Religion (1950)• Offers a developmental perspective of religion• 6 characteristics of religious maturityPaul Pruyser• Extends on work of James and Allport• Describes forms of neurotic religion


(Richards & Bergin, 1999)

Erich Fromm• Religious need for a frame of orientationAbraham Maslow• Self actualizationViktor Frankl• Man’s Search for Meaning• Transpersonal Psychology• Application of scientific methods to spiritual

experience


Hobart Mowrer(1907-1982)

“For several decades we psychologists looked upon the whole matter of sin and moral accountability as a great incubus and acclaimed our liberation from it as epoch making. But at length we have discovered that to be free in this sense, that is, to have the excuse of being sick rather than sinful, is to court the danger of also becoming lost… In becoming amoral, ethically neutral and free, we have cut the very roots of our being, lost our deepest sense of selfhood and identity, and with neurotics, themselves, we find ourselves asking: Who am I, what is my deepest destiny, what does living mean?”

“Sin, the Lesser of Two Evils,” American Psychologist, 15 (1960): 301-30

Modern HistoryPublications since 1900



How is Biblical Counseling different from other Philosophies of

Counseling?

• A Different Plan• A Different Purpose• A Different Power

Secular Psychotherapeutic ModalitiesPlan

for ChangePurpose of Change

Powerto Change

Psychoanalytic

Jungian

Rational-emotive

Behavioral

Adlerian

Rogerian

Existential

Gestalt

How is Biblical Counseling different from other Philosophies of

Counseling?

• Plan for Change – The Word of God

• Purpose of Change – The Son of God

• Power to Change – The Spirit of God

It is not the experience of life, but the experi-ence of the cross that makes one a worthy hearer of confessions. The most experienced psychologist or observer of human nature knows infinitely less of the human heart the simplest Christian who lives beneath the cross of Jesus. The greatest psychological insight,

Bonhoeffer

ability, and experience cannot grasp this one thing: what sin is. Worldly wisdom knows what distress and weakness and failure are, but it does not know the godlessness of men. And so it also does not know that man is destroyed only by his sin and can be healed only by forgiveness. Only the Christian knows this. In the presence of a psychiatrist, I can only be a sick man; in the presence of the Christian brother, I can dare to be a sinner.

• 92% of the US population is affiliated with religion

• 96% profess a belief in God or a universal spirit

Psychotherapy (Shafranske, 1996)

WHY DO PEOPLE SEEKFAITH-BASED COUNSELORS?

Christian Counseling

Seward HiltnerClyde Narramore

James Dobson

Biblical Counseling

Jay Adams

Larry Crabb

Gary Collins

Is Biblical Counseling the same as “Pastoral Counseling”?

History of Pastoral Care in America (1983), E. Brooks Holifield dates its development to the first decade of the twentieth century when a group of New England pastors first began to consider how the newly developed procedures of counseling and psychotherapy could be put into spiritual use by the church.

Is Biblical Counseling the same as “Pastoral Counseling”?

“care of souls” (Latin cura animarum) = care and cure.

“The Christian church has historically embraced both meanings of cura and has understood soul care to involve nurture and support as well as healing and restoration.”

Benner, D. G. (2003). Strategic pastoral counseling : a short-term structured model (2nd ed., p. 14). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic.

Is Biblical Counseling the same as “Life Coaching”?

The International Coach Federation (ICF) defines coaching as “partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. Professional coaches provide an ongoing partnership designed to help clients produce fulfilling results in their personal and professional lives. Coaches help people improve their perform-ances and enhance the quality of their lives.


“Coaches are trained to listen, to observe and to customize their approach to individual client needs. They seek to elicit solutions and strategies from the client; they believe the client is naturally creative and resourceful. The coach’s job is to provide support to enhance the skills, resources and creativity that the client already has.”


EncourageModel

Identifies: Etiology

Faulty ThinkingFalse Beliefs

Coach

Counsel

Exhort

How does Theology & Anthropology relate to Counseling?

Theology

Anthropology

= (theos + logos) the study of God

= (anthropos + logos) the study of man

Anselm: “faith seeking understanding.”

“The deeper one’s thought penetrate in the field of psychotherapy, the closer one comes to the realm of theology… The fundamental questions with which psychotherapy ends can only be answered with theology.”

(Rollo May, Love and Will, 1967, page 218)

Imago DeiGenesis 1:27 So God created man in His own image; in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.

אלהים צלם(selem) = “image” or representation,” and (demut) = implies comparison. The essence of human nature can only be understood by comparison with God Himself.

The Tricotomous Nature of God

a body a soul

a spirit

The Tricotomous Nature of Man

Cp.God the Son,

Jesus

Cp.God the Father

Cp.God the Holy Spirit

Holistic Counseling

• Interprets physical, psychological and spiritual symptoms in a proper diagnosis of pathologies

• Integrates the body, soul and spirit in the healing process in any one or all of the parts

“The cure of a part should not be attempted without the treatment of the whole, and no attempt should be made to cure the body without a soul.”

Socrates, 400 B.C.E.

Socratic Concept of Healing

“Men ought to know that from nothing else but the brain come joys, delights, laughter and sports, and sorrows, griefs, despondency, and lamentations. And by this, in an especial manner, we acquire wisdom and knowledge, and see and hear and know what are foul and what are fair, what are bad and what are good, what are sweet and what are unsavory . . . And by the same organ we become mad and delirious, and fears and terrors assail us . . . All these things we endure from the brain when it is not healthy . . . In these way I am of

of the opinion that the brain exercises the greatest power in the man.” - Hippocrates, On the Sacred Disease (4th Century, B.C.)

How is Biblical CounselingNaturally Holistic?

• Body

Salvation = wholeness

• Soul

• Spirit

Present

Past

Future

Justification

Sanctification

Glorification

Integrating Secular Psychological Insights & Instruments

• Augustine described the process of appropriating gold and silver from the Egyptians as the Israelites left the country. In the same way, he compared taking knowledge from “heathen” institutions and applying them properly to Christian purposes.

• How can we understand and apply knowledge from secular psychology, psychiatry and neurology in Christian counseling?

Integrating Secular Psychological Insights & Instruments

• Body

• Spirit

neurology psychiatry

• Soulobservations, testing & assessments

biochemistry brain surgery

therapy

insightdiagnosis

intervention

Partial Integration

No Integration

Integration

Integrating Neurology & Psychiatry

Embryonic Brain Development

Personality Integration & Disintegration

Isaiah 6 Seraphim’ declare “Holy, Holy, Holy”

ἅγιος [hagios] = separated

קדש [ko·desh] = separated, holy, sacred, complete


Isaiah 6 Seraphim’ declare “Holy, Holy, Holy”

“wholeness” – integration, integrity

קדש


Isaiah 6 Isaiah’s confession “Woe is me, I am undone”

[’owy /o·ee] = “woe is me!”אוי ,become unclean = [/taw·may] טמא

defiled, undone, fragmented

I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. 2And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.

Romans 12:1-2A Biblical Philosophy of Change

Is Holistic

BeliefsBehavior

A Biblical Philosophy of Change

EmotionsDesires

Thoughts

You can contact Harry at:

Biblical Counseling Center825 4th Street WestPalmetto, FL 34221941-729-6600

[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.truthtransforms.com/

Biblical Counseling (part 1)

Healthcare