Sufficiency or No Sufficiency?
During my years of teaching at Pillsbury Baptist Bible College (1978-1985), I was asked to teach several courses in the area of counseling. I had never had a counseling course in college or seminary. Where would I begin? What resources were available to help construct meaningful courses in various aspects of counseling?
I had come out of seminary convinced of the doctrine of the sole authority of Scripture. I knew that without such an authority, nothing was worth preaching. I spent the first ten years of my ministry anchored to this important truth. There was no doubt in my mind but that the Bible had all the answers for life and living.
Nevertheless, as I planned my courses I began to question the degree to which the Bible actually spoke to this issue. Distracted by the cacophony of voices coming from the psychological world, I found myself being drawn toward some of the more popular psychological systems—especially that of Maslow. It seemed to me that there was at least some validity to what he and other secular psychologists were saying.
Given my earlier commitments, why was I so easily convinced that another resource would give better answers than the Bible? Why have so many other pastors and theologians been so easily persuaded that the perspectives of psychology actually give true answers to the difficult questions of the soul of man?
Part of what motivated me was a striving to become knowledgeable in my field of study and experience. The academic world pushes intellectual mastery, and to stay “alive,” one has to excel. I saw what happened to those who did not excel intellectually, and I was not interested in that!
Also, my personal experience seemed to confirm Maslow’s observations. His perspective seemed valid. It was not difficult to find examples in the Bible that seemed to fit his system. That was the beginning of my journey into the combination of biblical teaching with psychology. This combination is known as “integrationism.”
I will forever be grateful for Dr. Bill Goode, the pastor of Faith Baptist Church in Lafayette, Indiana, who visited our campus and stopped in one of my classes. That day in class, I lectured about how the Bible supported Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Following that class, Dr. Goode commended me for the counseling emphasis that Pillsbury had developed. Then he asked why I was using Maslow. He suggested that if the Bible did actually support some of what Maslow was saying, then I could teach it as well from the Bible as from Maslow. That was the beginning of my journey into actually using the Bible as the sole authority for faith and practice.
A second experience at Pillsbury College was also pivotal. I was the dean of students, a job which brought me into contact with troubled lives and wounded spirits. Students came from all over the United States and from all kinds of backgrounds. Some had recently come to Christ and were struggling with the residue of their past sins. Others came from sound Christian homes and churches but struggled with growing and changing inwardly to become more like Christ.
At the completion of a fall semester, students were preparing to leave for Christmas vacation and time with family and friends. One young woman ended up in my office due to some chaotic behaviors that centered on compulsivity. I wanted to help! I wanted to believe that the Bible had answers for her deep and frightening questions. The truth is, however, that I did not know how to help her.
Shortly before this episode, I had become aware of the Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation in Pennsylvania. This girl’s home was in the Philadelphia area, so I connected her with the CCEF. Dr. Wayne Mack was gracious in meeting several times with this girl. She came back changed following the Christmas break.
I was impressed, but I was also convicted. I contacted Dr. Mack and asked if he would share with me how he helped my student, which he was happy to do. What he did made good biblical sense. He helped to reaffirm my conviction that the Bible really is sufficient. This episode also pushed me to seek further training in biblical counseling—and yes, it was at Westminster and CCEF.
Let me go back to my original question. Why was I so easily moved away from a doctrine (i.e., the sufficiency of Scripture) in which I so strongly believed? The answer lies in my own life experiences. The doctrine did not seem to work its way down to the day-by-day issues of life.
In my observation, many fundamental pastors face the same difficulty. Thus, they find some other voice for their people when they are challenged with complicated issues like the one that my student faced. This equivocation is tragic at the least and destructive at the most. If the sufficiency of Scripture is only a lofty doctrine to which we give lip service, but then easily set aside when difficult issues present themselves, then we do not believe in the sufficiency of Scripture at all. The Bible becomes just another book alongside of psychology. We actually have become practicing integrationists.
I have come to believe that the Bible really is sufficient. It brings us real answers even for the most complicated problems of life. I will always be grateful for key people in my life who challenged me with regard to what I said I believed versus what I actually was willing to teach and practice. They helped to keep me from destroying people’s lives.
Their help was timely. It is not too late for you to practice what you say you believe regarding the Bible as your sole authority for faith and practice. God, in all His wisdom, has given us a phenomenal book—it is the sufficient Word of God.
Penitentiall Hymns. I.
Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667)
Lord, I have sinn’d, & the black number swells
To such a dismal sum,
That should my stony heart and eyes,
And this whole sinful trunk, a flood become,
And run to tears, their drops could not suffice
To count my score,
Much less to pay:
But thou, my God, hast blood in store,
And art the Patron of the poore.
Yet since the Balsam of thy Blood,
Although it can, will do no good,
Unless the wounds be cleans’d with tears before;
Thou in whose sweet but pensive face
Laughter could never steal a place,
Teach but my heart and eyes
To melt away,
And then one drop of Balsam will suffice. Amen.
Dr. Thomas Zempel served as a youth pastor for the first ten years of his full-time ministry before moving to Pillsbury Baptist Bible College to teach in the Bible department and serve as the dean of students. Following his six years at Pillsbury and his resident training at Westminster, he became the senior pastor in Windsor Locks, Connecticut. During his years as senior pastor, he had many opportunities to counsel people with a wide variety of needs. This experience helped to establish practical biblical skills which came out of the theological training he received in the area of counseling. It was this training that has allowed Dr. Zempel to head up the counseling department at Central Baptist Theological Seminary, hold seminars in several states, and teach and counsel in three foreign countries. Dr. Zempel is a member of the National Association of Nouthetic Counselors, and has been a NANC Fellow since January 1, 2008. Dr. Zempel and his wife, Jane, enjoy three children and six grandchildren. Jane joins Dr. Zempel in speaking at family conferences and ministering in the local church. He also enjoys music, travel, sports, gardening, fishing, hunting, and woodworking. Not every professor, student, or alumnus of Central Seminary necessarily agrees with every opinion that this article expresses.
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My struggle lies in the area of determining exactly what it claims to be sufficient for, or, more precisely, where the line is between “all things necessary for life and godliness” and “other things that are still helpful for life and godliness.”
We also know that Scripture does not claim to be sufficient for, say, dentistry or brain surgery… and I keep getting stuck on the fact that we do not really know from Scripture how matters of the inner man interconnect with matters of brain and body biology.
It’s easy to say something along the lines of “Scripture is sufficient to solve all counseling-type issues that are not due to physical disease,” but in practical terms, I don’t know how that works out because we do not know all of what is and is not caused by physical disease.
So, in short, my desire is uphold as strong a position as possible on the sufficiency of Scripture but it seems that those of us who believe in this have work to do to a) develop an internally consistent model for relating Scriptural information to non-Scriptural (as in, “outside of Scripture”) information—a viable alternative to “integrationism,” that goes beyond simply rejecting it; and b) how sufficiency works in practical terms when we are facing problems of attitude and behavior that may have physical (or as Adams likes to say, “organic”) components.
In the mean time, one consolation is that so far, my counseling opportunities as a pastor have just about always been clear cut cases of needing to think and act biblically—and brain issues have not been a factor. So this is mainly a matter of theory for me (but for me, a “matter of theory” is not a matter that is less important).
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
So I—and many others—would assert that the Scriptures are sufficient for the whole salvation phenomenon, including growing in Christlikeness/holiness. So the “sufficiency of Scripture in counseling” perspective is that counseling has to do with leading believers forward in their discipleship and that Scripture must be sufficient for that work.
On the other hand, can a physical condition hinder a person’s progress in discipleship? Seems to me that it can (or can certainly appear to), and that’s where I personally have difficulty w/the sufficiency-for-counseling models I’m aware of (to the degree I understand them).
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
Thomas Zempel is head of the Counseling dept. at Central Baptist seminary and a counseling ministry that they have. From my understanding he has an excellent reputation as a person and a counselor. The counseling ministry is based on Biblical counseling. They put Nouthetic in parenthesis behind biblical and apparently equate the two. Also, Central Seminary has used the book “Biblical Counseling,” edited by John Macarthur which equates mental illness as being the class of mythology. It was at one time one of texts to be purchased for a counseling class. However, that may not now be the case.
In 1979 John Carter and Bruce Narramore, wrote the book “The Integration of Psychology and Theology” and introduced what they called “The Integrates Model” for the integration of the two disciplines. They affirmed that the Christian must accept all the clear and basic doctrines set forth in scripture including the doctrine of anthropology. They also affirmed that since God is the creator of all things it affirms that there is a unity of all truth. However, they set forth the thesis that all truth apart from scripture is fallen truth. That is it comes from fallen sources and may have wrong conclusions. We see this in the life sciences. The established facts are true and a basis for medical practice. The fallen conclusions occur when the facts are sought to be used to construct the theory of evolution. In the fields of Psychology and Psychiatry truthful facts amy be gathered and of use in understanding some of behavior. However, such facts should not be used to construct conclusions or theories contrary to the clear doctrines of scripture.
I personally do not agree with all that the book sets forth. but some of there fundamental principles are not contrary to scripture and provide a truly biblical approach to epistemology.
Psychiatry and Psychology have had a foundation that was not biblical and many conclusions and theories that have been contrary to scripture and some blatantly against God and the Bible. However, there has been a great deal of change and increased objective knowledge that the Christian must be aware of. Jay Adams was so against Psychiatry that he recommended a medical examination by a Physician but would defame Psychiatry. Since the 1970s much has changed. There have been the extensive study and gathering of medical facts. Genetic studies, double blind social studies, brain scans, and the accumulation of treatment data has made Psychiatry abandon a great deal of Psychotherapy for medical treatment. The brain is still a mystery. But we know much more than thirty years ago. Schizophrenia and Psychotic Bipolar have been established as genuine Psychiatric disorders which can be called mental illness. This is not “Mind” illness which is the aspect of the soul spoken of in scripture which is immaterial, but mental having to do with the process of the mind working through and with the physical organ of the Brain. Mental illness is organic disease. Childhood Schizophrenia is now fully classified separately and is now Autism. Schizophrenia and Psychotic Bipolar occur in the late teens or early twenties (and as late as the thirties in females) when the last development of the Brain frontal lobe occurs. Some of the literature put out by NANCE and CCEF gives some validity to such but still speak of such Psychiatric disorders in a doubtful way and still do not understand present day Psychiatry. Psychiatry today is far removed from Freud, many old Psychotherapy models, and other conclusions that were contrary to God and scripture. Yes, some privater practice Psychiatrists are kooks and many Psychologists, especially some Christian are also kooks not a technical word. That is where discerning epistemology not dumping all must occur.
We have now founded and started a group called “CHRISTIAN ALLIANCE ON MENTAL ILLNESS.” The purpose is to have a foundation of peer group meetings for the caretakers and family and friends of the Mentally Ill.
Some of us do not equate Nouthetic Counseling with biblical counseling. We do not equate their anecdotal stories or help and cure as any more valid than that kind of evidence from Psychology which they have rejected in the past. Biblical counseling both informal and formal existed in the churches for decades prior to 1970 when Jay Adams invented a Nouthetic Counseling and its foundation principles out of thin air. True Biblical counseling rejects the limitations and foundation assumptions of the Nouthetic model. The word nouthos is never used in scripture with an intent of being part of a principle or foundation for counseling. It is part of the normal informal process of interaction among all Christians. Peer counseling by Christians and Elders is the most effective. Especially when occurring by those of similar problems and experience. This has actually been the finding of Psychology social studies and why we taught a class on counseling from time to time in our church. We covered values, specific common problems, process, and common sense application of scripture. No professionalism.
I will not go into the limitations of Nouthetic Counseling. That requires an extensive discussion. However, there are many who do give testimony of the lack of sympathy, mis placement of responsibility, and harm that has occurred from the counsel of a formally trained Nouthetic counselor. Also, the establishing of a certification by NANCE, and degree programs majoring in Nouthetic counseling has established a new professionalism based upon an incomplete and sometimes contrived curriculum. It has produced prejudices that have prevented the proper second premise application of scripture.
The sufficiency of scripture is not violated by the discerning use and acceptance of that truth which may come from Psychiatry and Psychology. All mental illness must be treated as a Psychiatric disorder which requires Psychiatric care. There should be no hesitance in acknowledging this and declaring the wonderful advancements of medicine and Psychological social studies that has produced much helpful objective truth which has advanced treatment. Such does not violate the sufficiency of scripture.
In the last three weeks I have had conversation with the Pastors and the assistant Pastors of two churches. One of 900 and the other of 1700 in attendance. One Pastor is a graduate of Masters College and one assistant Pastor is a graduate of Masters Seminary. All brought up the subject of Nouthetic Counseling. All now have problems with Nouthetic counseling because of their members being counseled wrongly and/ or seminars in their church taking an approach they viewed as wrong and potentially harmful. I was engaging them regarding seeking to establish a peer group as part of “Christian Alliance on Mental Illness.”
We need to hold to a proper application of the doctrine of the sufficiency of scripture.
Certainly there are wise, sensitive, godly “Nouthetic” counselors out there (I know a few personally) and certainly there are those who are handling Scripture poorly and/or handling people poorly. The same can be said for all of the alternatives. But it’s pretty much impossible for people who believe the Bible and are even half trying to use it to help people to not “out score” those who are not attempting to do either one!
Among “Christian” approaches that pursue integration with psychology in one way or another, the lack of a thought-through relationship between Scripture and “other” that I’ve alluded to also exists—often to a far greater degree and with far more damaging results.
But yes, I’ve met some whom others would class as “integrationist” who, as far as I can tell, are doing a fine job.
I don’t want my criticisms of the “sufficiency of Scripture for counseling” models I’m aware of to be taken as an expression of preference for some alternative, because I have not yet found anything I believe is better. Rather, I hope to see biblical counseling become stronger by working out something better than “integrationism.” (I put this term in quotes because many I’ve read seem to mean something by it that I would never use the term for myself… and that I’m not sure many who are labeled that way would own either).
“Nouthetic” is a term that counselors use with different intents as well. Jay Adams, for example, means something very specific and detailed by it and doesn’t appreciate how many others use it. But the term derives from NT Greek word for warn/admonish/instruct, so people with differing ideas on the details can’t be prevented from legitimately claiming the term according to their own understanding of it. (But I also think Jay’s well within his rights to be annoyed by some of the way off stuff out there that is claiming the term!)
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
Senior Pastor, Harvest Bible Chapel, Fort Wayne, IN
How much biblical counseling training have you had?
Where did you receive it?
How often have you / do you counsel?
How often have “organic” issues impacted the way you’ve counseled?
Senior Pastor, Harvest Bible Chapel, Fort Wayne, IN
My point is these “organic” issues don’t change the sufficiency of Scripture, IMO. God’s word still teaches us how to live for His desires above our own even if we are “sick.” Most of the secular models deny a spiritual element to man…and therefore they fall far short. If I’m bi-polar, my heart is still wicked and I need to learn to guard it. If I’m diagnosed with seasonal depression, then I need to learn to love and honor God through that difficulty.
Senior Pastor, Harvest Bible Chapel, Fort Wayne, IN
The most experienced psychologist or observer of human nature know infinitely less of the human heart than the simplest Christian who lives beneath the Cross of Jesus. The great psychological insight, 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 man. 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 a Christian brother I can dare to be a sinner. The psychiatrist must first search my heart and yet ne never plumbs its ultimate depth. The Christian brother know when I come to him: here is sinner like myself, a godless man who wants to confess and yearns for God’s forgiveness. The psychiatrist views me as if there were no God. The brother views me as I am before the judging and merciful God in the Cross of Jesus Christ (emphasis mine)How can a methodology of dissecting and correcting human behavior whose foundational principles ignore the basics of Christianity (there is a God, He is holy, and we are sinners) play any part of BIBLICAL life change?
Senior Pastor, Harvest Bible Chapel, Fort Wayne, IN
1. My accuracy on Jay Adams is well documented by the books of Jay Adams such as “The big Umbrella.” The present NANC website posts anti Psychiatric statements. Oh yes, the word choice is definitely highly prejudicial. I am arguing against him and his ideas.
2. There was a recent Sharper Iron thread that involved an interview with Jay Adams done by Aaron. I would suggest one read that thread instead of raising the same defense issues here.
2.The post #13 citing David Powlison of CCEF is a post defaming Psychiatrists. So we do not have to go far to get that type of information from Nouthetic sources do we.
3. If Jay Adams did not originate Nouthetic counseling from thin air perhaps one can direct us to a pre Jay Adams Nouthetic counselor advocate or sources. By his own admission he was seeking to call people back to what he called Biblical counseling. I was trained in Biblical counseling in seminary before Jay Adams was really heard of. The training used the Bible as the text and simply applied it to commonly encountered problems encountered in Pastoral ministry. There were a couple texts used also. One was “Counseling from the Bible. Can’t remember the author and it is no longer in my library.
4. So far as integration of Psychology is concerned, some have set forth three main theories: 1. The against model where all is bad and must be avoided. This is the Fundamentalist model which accepts Nouthetic Counseling because they do not know how to handle second premise truth of Biblical application; 2. The absorption model which accepts all as equal and complimentary to biblical truth. The liberal theology believers practice this; 3. The parallels model which places such truth along side each other and makes little attempt to integrate; 4.The integrates model which places scripture at full inerrancy on all to which it speaks and truth discovered outside scripture as from fallen sources which must be subservient to scripture. However, it recognizes that something really true is always God’s truth as He created all things apart from Himself. As I gave testimony on the prior thread, I was an “against model” and Nouthetic supporter converted when confronted with mental illness involving our son. Since that time I have had constant contact with the mentally ill and all that they go through and what must be done for treatment. Medical diagnosis, treatment with drugs, and constant monitoring is the only successful treatment for Psychotic Brain disease. These are the real people who have real problems. All non Psychotic and non organic are best handled by biblical counseling by people not exposed to Nouthetic counseling theories and approaches. Nouthetic counselors are neither totally biblical and often lack the necessary life experience or Pastoral experience to help significantly.
5. The quote given in a prior post that is by David Powlison illustrates why those involved with the really mentally ill consider Nouthetic counseling dangerous. My son has had four different Psychiatrists from the county mental health who he has seen. Non have been Christians. It makes little difference. They make the diagnosis and have tried different medication and monitored results. He does better on the Rispidal, an older anti Psychotic drug. Some of the newer drugs such as Abilify have worked wonders on some patients but were not suitable to him. When going to a physician, it is always nice to have a Christian. But most want and accept the best at his practice and rarely ask for only a God believer or a Christian. It is so with treatment of Mental illness (Brain Disease). The statement by Powlison about understanding sin and not believing in God is of little value in these cases. Psychiatry, as actually practiced today, is not as presented by Nouthetic writers. The Psychiatrist prescribes not talks. The Psychologist talks (Psychotherapy). The Talking Psychologist can be replaced by a Loving Biblical counselor but preferably not a Nouthy as they have a poor reputation with Psychiatric cooperation. Powlison should give that tirade the Cardiologist, Oncologist, or heart surgeon if he ever needs one and let them read it. But if he is taken into ER he should probably wait until they have treated him.
6. Biblical counseling yes. Nouthetic counseling no.
7. Jamie Hart reflects the Nouthetic viewpoint that just never gets it. I have been talking about Mental illness which is organic Brain disease effecting 6% of the general population. He is talking about biblical life change, which by the way falls under the authority of scripture, and is delegated to the church, and then to elders not counselors. According to the Barna group only 5% of the adult population are born again Christians of minimal biblical understanding. Do we have too many Nouthetic counselors and not enough evangelists of the personal evangelism type?
8. One Nouthetic counselor is one too many. Spiritual problems the responsibility of Elders and church members not counselors waving a piece of paper that declares them “certified.” Let us get back to real Biblical counseling and recognize that the Bible gives us authority to allow other truth and treatment to help those with other than just spiritual problems to receive the medical help available by Psychiatry.
Again, every one needs to see the movie “The Soloist.” Now on DVD and a true story that reasonably represents what many Mentally ill and those who care for them go through. Until you have dealt with those who are going through a Psychotic episode and stand looking at you and don’t know you or attack you, you haven’t begun to learn the basics of mental illness.
[Jamie Hart]…By way of example, just a few months back I counseled a gentleman who was diagnosed Bi-polar, and told he an illness called “Selective Sound Sensitivity Syndrome” (he couldn’t stand the sound of people eating, clicking pens, etc). His psychiatrist basically said he could do nothing for him and that needed to seek counseling some place else. I didn’t question whether or not these were simply labels or legitimate illnesses…they were certainly legitimate to him! So really, I didn’t even touch it. I asked him to please let me know if any of the noises I made in the counseling room bothered him, as I wanted to avoid them. Other than that, I simply treated it as I would have a stomach problem, or cancer. Let’s learn how to live in such a way that God is honored through this difficulty. His “illnesses” didn’t abdicate his responsibility to love and obey God and to love others above himself. So we carefully looked at his life, his thoughts and heart motives, and worked at living life in way that God was honored. It went well (not all of cases like this do).This is one area that I think psychopathology has gone insane- pun intended. Not every single issue in a person’s life is a syndrome or a disorder. My husband can hear someone chewing gum and clipping their fingernails three blocks away, but he doesn’t have a Syndrome. He’s just like everyone else who finds certain repetitive noises distracting and annoying. But we are so afraid to say “Get over yourself” (not in those exact words) because we don’t want to appear to be lacking in compassion. We patronize what is sometimes plainly ludicrous until a person really IS disabled by something like clicking pens and rustling clothing. There is now a generation of people [URL=http://www.neuropsychiatryreviews.com/may04/npr_may04_excessiveTV.html raised on television[/URL] that have the attention span of a gnat- they can’t sit still or focus without flashing lights and a commercial break. Should this be treated with drug therapy, or a change in behavior, in their spiritual discernment?
It’s perfectly sensible to direct someone having problems to their physician or psychiatrist to test for any physiological issues- but we also must address those issues that are a sinful obsession with self and a lack of self-control. There IS a healthy balance.
I agree with Bob T. here-
Spiritual problems the responsibility of Elders and church members not counselors waving a piece of paper that declares them “certified.” Let us get back to real Biblical counseling and recognize that the Bible gives us authority to allow other truth and treatment to help those with other than just spiritual problems to receive the medical help available by Psychiatry.We do not have to be afraid of science, but we do have to measure what science claims by the Word of God. A healthy skepticism of the conclusions the world draws from their research and studies is a good thing because we understand that all truth comes from God, and if science denies God, their grasp of truth is going to be limited to a certain degree.
[Jamie Hart] Aaron…just gathering a little data here :-)Training: a few classes, including one as recently as 2008 (I think… maybe 2007)… and reading since early college days.
How much biblical counseling training have you had?
Where did you receive it?
How often have you / do you counsel?
How often have “organic” issues impacted the way you’ve counseled?
Where: BJU, Central Seminary, a Biblical counseling organization here in Wisconsin
How often: couldn’t really put a number on it, but it has not been a huge part of what I do
How often organic: I’m not sure it’s ever been an issue, though there have been a couple of times when I wondered
My struggles with it have mainly to do with a larger struggle, which is the relationship between Scripture and science, or to put it another way, the relationship between general revelation and special revelation. During BJU days, the emphasis in all subjects was integration of general and special—that is, Scripture is supreme and all other subjects (I was in the school of education as well as the school of religion) must be brought under its reign. But this involved working out to a fair degree how they actually interconnect. What happened was that what I heard and read encouraged me to believe in the unity of truth and to seek to integrate the study of math, history, biology and—yes—psychology with what Scripture reveals.
But then, toward the end of college days, I began to encounter a different view that rejected integration—in a few classes and in some required reading, including Competent to Counsel. In seminary, that trend continued in a class or two on that subject and reading of one volume in particular from Master’s Seminary neck of the woods. Dogmatically anti integration. What was unanswered then, and remains unanswered now as far as I know, is what do we do with unity of truth if we assert that psychology (the study of human behavior and thought) should not be integrated with Scripture?
I really think that none of the anti-integrationists would deny the unity of truth (all truth that really is truth is God’s truth), so the real problem is probably one of expression. Whatever we say in criticism of science in general or psychology/psychiatry in particular (and there is a whole lot to criticize!), I do not believe we ought to deny the idea of General Revelation and “two books” in the process or say/imply that there is any field of study that cannot or should not be brought under the Lordship of Jesus Christ and conducted in a way that honors the superiority of Scripture while simultaneously granting it’s full value for exploring God’s general revelation.
Another part of the problem is that many of those who have given “integration” a bad name, claimed to be attempting that very thing. But if that’s the case, many critics of integrationism have confused poor implementation with faulty principle. In many cases the principle has been sound, the execution has been botched. So it seems to me. So there are “Christian” psychologies that absorbed enormous amounts of data and dogma from godless studies and then tacked on a few credit hours of Bible and called it integration. I’m not for that. But this is not integration at all. So I believe that we are off track going against “integrationism” as a principle, when we ought to be going after inadequate practice.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
[Bob T.] 7. Jamie Hart reflects the Nouthetic viewpoint that just never gets it. I have been talking about Mental illness which is organic Brain disease effecting 6% of the general population. He is talking about biblical life change, which by the way falls under the authority of scripture, and is delegated to the church, and then to elders not counselors. According to the Barna group only 5% of the adult population are born again Christians of minimal biblical understanding. Do we have too many Nouthetic counselors and not enough evangelists of the personal evangelism type?I want to start out by saying it’s evident that there has been some real hurt in your life from someone who had a Nouthetic approach (probably several someones) and that’s really unfortunate. I am sorry that you and/or your son have been treated in an unloving way. There are many in biblical counseling to who lack love and understanding.
Bob, I am on SI to learn and grow. I believe you have something to teach me. You have been through experiences that I may never go through and you have come to conclusions that you feel strongly about. I want to learn from them…I will freely admit that my position can change if God reveals it needs to.
With that said, accusations naturally bring up defences…and the accusatory tone of the above quote is bringing up my defenses! I’m working through it…but it would help to avoid that in future.
Do you believe you know enough about my ministry to make that accusation? If I could encourage you in any way, it would be to hold accusations in check. Teach me…ask me questions that make me think about my position…discover what I really believe. I’m looking forward to learning and growing with your help.
Senior Pastor, Harvest Bible Chapel, Fort Wayne, IN
I guess I am trying to further understand the Nouthetic approach. with my first two questions.
1. Is it ever allowable that behaviour is caused by a medical condition?
2. Is the brain and brain function considered a biological system similar to the heart, lungs, etc…?
For Both sides:
3. Back to the sufficiency question; What exactly does either side believe the sufficiency of scripture mean? And, what is the logical conclusion of that belief?
Not sure I have time to respond, but interested in hearing what is thought and reading where this thread goes.
Discussion