While building a comprehensive theory, or a comprehensive approach to counseling, it is important that we answer the question: What is the definition of illness? What are the elements in a comprehensive definition of “cure”? What needs to be cured? What is it that’s going on in illness that needs to be addressed, that needs to be cured? What needs to happen for a sick person to be declared well? We need to talk about the development of the techniques that would govern or guide a therapeutic process that would bring people to a point of healthfulness.
Biblical Counseling
In Effective Biblical Counseling, Larry Crabb shows how church-based and faith-focused counseling provide ideal models for deepening Christian lives and Christian communities. The goal of Christian counseling is not to make people happy, but to spread the word of the gospel by opening minds and hearts to God's word. With serving God as the primary goal of spiritual counseling, Crabb's approach is distinctively Christian and therefore provides a strong foundation for future work.
Reframing the counseling process as being oriented toward God is a radical departure from traditional psychology. Traditional psychology serves the ego and the self, not God. Christian counseling serves God first and foremost. Individuals who come to the Christian counselor do so precisely because they need to know how they can serve God better, even if their problems are articulated in more mundane or selfish ways. The Christian counselor's objective is to liberate the person from mundane and selfish concerns, to allow that person to find God.
Crabb frames human personality pessimistically but within a Biblical context, as the author assumes original sin and acknowledges the inherent sinfulness and selfishness embedded in human nature. The wide variety of problems that clients will present to the Christian counselor includes those that reveal the common ground of sin. Personality structure is important enough to Crabb that the author devotes an entire chapter to the topic. Moreover, Crabb offers a separate chapter devoted to human motivation. Crabb discusses the structure of the human personality in terms of the conscious mind and unconscious mind. In the chapter on human motivation, Crabb describes human beings in scriptural terms. Human beings seek gratification, and that gratification is often rooted in false beliefs. Fulfillment only comes from Christ, and never from the pursuit of shallow goals, whether those goals be related to money, power, or prestige. The Christian counselor recognizes this, and tries to help dispel the myths that lead a person away from God.
People do change, which is why the Christian counselor exists to provide a church-based service. Via prayer, reading scripture, and listening to services at Church, exposure to the gospel motivates the type of positive change that is desirable from the perspective of Christ. Human development is framed in spiritual terms, as an individual will grow in accordance with where that person places his or her energy. Energy devoted to God will be rewarded in spiritual benefits, including closeness to Christ and the ability to spread the gospel affirmatively. Energy devoted toward insecurity, fear, doubt, or anger will result only in divergence from the Holy Spirit, according to Crabb. However, guilt can be a powerful motivator for a person to seek change. The Christian counselor can help the person recognize the power in feelings like guilt, which can motivate change. Change should always be from a self-centered focus to a God focus. Individual differences are explained simply by the fact that some people become open at some point to accepting God's truth and being willing to surrender all that comes in the way of accepting Christ.
Crabb is clear on defining health and wellness in spiritual terms only. Health does not end with the body, as health is dependent on the condition of one's soul. Crabb stresses the importance of obedience to God as a benchmark of health. A person can be physically healthy in all appearances, but be spiritually sick by not obeying God. Health only comes from God, and illness is only related to one's distance from God. Furthermore, a healthy individual finds deep meaning in daily life. A sick person does not, and seeks meaning in mundane things that provide only temporary pleasure ranging from sex and drugs to career and power. Finally, the Christian counselor does not focus on the symptoms of a problem, but on the solutions to the problem that cut to the root cause.
Crabb does a good job of showing the core contributions of Christian counseling, especially as secular counselors do not address the root causes of problems. Instant gratification or self-satisfaction are poor methods of attaining happiness, let alone spiritual salvation. Yet the secular counselor does provide these false hopes to clients. The Christian counselor, according to Crabb, discourages members of the community from seeking the easy way out. Christian counseling is about bringing people closer to God. As Crabb points out, the Christian life is often far more difficult to live than the secular life, because it involves discipline, self-abnegation, and obedience. It is much easier to give a person a bottle of pills and tell them to go home and relax. It is quite another to tell the person that they have a mountain to climb, but that when they reach the top, Christ will welcome them with open arms. Crabb's approach therefore syncs with Hawkins's approach, which addresses the heart of Christ ("Personal Integrated Counseling Theory").
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