Christian Counseling: Techniques or Attitude (Part 3)

Bible

The third attitude or belief is best expressed by the priest, Father Cavanaugh, in the movie Rudy: “Son, in 35 years of religious study, I have only come up with two hard incontrovertible facts: there is a God, and I'm not Him.”  The purpose of Christian counseling is not for the counselor to play God, the Holy Spirit, with the client.  A Christian counselor should speak the truth in love to reveal who God is as we learn from Jesus:  “And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14)  This is not an easy path of canned spiritual answers, but being grounded in God’s written and living Word and dependent upon the Holy Spirit in living out grace and truth with the individual, couple or family in the counseling session.

At the College of Counseling we definitely teach students the skills of counseling and using Christian resources to help others.  However, we are more concerned that each student is shaped and molded by the person of Jesus Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit.  As Paul writes, “And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” (2 Corinthians 3:18) The key to Christian counseling is who the counselor is in Christ.

Written by Harvey I. Payne, Psy.D. Dean of the College of Counseling 



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