What is biblical counseling? How is it distinguished from other forms of counseling? Is Scripture sufficient for the work of counseling? Pastors Derek Brown and Cliff McManis answer these questions and more in this two-part podcast.
Transcript
Derek: Welcome to With All Wisdom, where we are applying biblical truth to your everyday life. My name is Derek Brown, and I’m here today with Cliff McManis, and we are both pastors and elders at Creekside Bible Church in Cupertino, California, and professors at the Cornerstone Bible College and Seminary in Vallejo, California, and today we want to talk about biblical Counseling. But before we get to our topic, I want to point your attention to WithAllWisdom.org, where you will find a large and growing collection of written and audio resources across a variety of theological, practical, and social topics that are each aimed at helping you grow in spiritual maturity, as Paul says in Colossians 1.28, the verse where we get our name for this ministry. And this is what Paul says. He says, Him (that’s Jesus) we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom that we may present everyone mature in Christ. So the aim of this ministry and the aim of all the resources that we provide on WithAllWisdom.org is your maturity in Christ, and our name reflects the methodology that we use, you might say. We want all that we say and teach to be characterized by a reliance on divine wisdom. And this last point, as we will see in this podcast today, relates specifically to our topic. So Cliff, I want to turn it over to you right away and start with the question, what is biblical counseling?
Cliff: Biblical counseling. Thanks, Derek. Oh, I love this topic, and I am thankful for the opportunity to talk about this with you. But before I give a basic definition of biblical counseling, Derek, I was just going to ask you, because you’re a pastor, you’re an elder in the local church, do you do biblical counseling?
Derek: All the time.
Cliff: All the time.
Derek: All the time.
Cliff: That was my next question. How often do you do it?
Derek: Right. All the time.
Cliff: Every day. For me and you, that’s second nature. It’s a part of our job. It’s what we do, and this comes from how we understand the term or the phrase biblical counseling. But there’s a lot of pastors out there, even evangelical ones or people who say they believe in the Bible, that they would say they don’t do biblical counseling or their church doesn’t. How do I know that? Because we have a steady stream of other churches in Northern California that refer some of their people to our church to get counseling from our elders and pastors, because they say their elders and pastors don’t do counseling. I find that odd. As a matter of fact, I don’t understand that, because if you’re a pastor, you should be doing counseling or biblical counseling. So anyway, that’s just one practical example of why we need to discuss this issue. Starting out with definitions, because that’s where every issue that we talk about that needs to be understood and that is debated in the Christian world, you’ve got to establish your definitions so that we have a common ground by which to have a conversation, even with people that don’t agree with us. So we’ll lay it out with biblical counseling. Here’s my definition of biblical counseling. It’s very specific. Every single word matters, and I would argue that every word and phrase in this simple definition comes right out of Scripture. So biblical counseling is speaking biblical truth to the mind to encourage change or to encourage obedience. By change, I mean obedience, and it’s obedience to Scripture. So it’s speaking biblical truth to the mind to encourage change or obedience to God’s Word is always a good custom when defining terms, especially when they get kind of technical. It’s always good to define your term by what it is, but also by contrast to say what it isn’t. So maybe to clear the air a little bit, I’ll say what biblical counseling is not, so that people aren’t confused. When we’re talking about biblical counseling today, we are not talking about secular psychology. Biblical counseling is not psychiatry or any form of that. Psychiatry is about giving out medicine, basically, by medical doctors. Biblical counseling is not therapy. So you and I as biblical counselors, we’re not therapists. But there are Christians who say they go to their therapist, their marriage therapist, their relationship therapist, their whatever therapist. We don’t do that. Therapy, actually, that’s a New Testament word. Therapeut, and it means to heal. We aren’t in the business of healing, but God is in the business of healing. So we leave ultimate healing to Jesus, to the gospel, to the Holy Spirit, to God’s sovereign care. So he’s the healer. Biblical counseling is not therapy. Biblical counseling, now this one might confuse a lot of people, the biblical counseling we’re talking about, is not Christian counseling. Again, these are like technical terms out in the Christian world and in the counseling world.
There is a whole school of thought that says they advocate for Christian counseling. And usually they don’t mean biblical counseling. So there is going to be a distinction there, which I know can confuse people because are we saying, Pastor Cliff, that biblical counseling isn’t Christian? No, absolutely it is. And then finally, biblical counseling that we’re talking about is not Christian psychology. There is a distinction there, again, a whole school of thought out here. I guess the most popular figure for decades in the Christian psychology world was James Dobson. And we’re not saying he wasn’t a Christian, but what we’re saying is the kind of counseling we’re talking about is very specific and can be distinguished from Christian psychology. So that’s what it is and what it isn’t. Biblical counseling is speaking biblical truth to the mind to encourage change. And I just want to share two Bible verses. I could use literally dozens of Bible verses to establish a definition of biblical counseling, but I think these two will suffice. I must admit I am indebted to Jay Adams, among many others, regarding my understanding of biblical counseling.
If you’re not familiar with Jay Adams, you should be. Went to be with the Lord not too long ago in his 90s, a faithful man of God, prolific writer, wrote, he had a tremendous ministry in this area of counseling, biblical counseling. He didn’t invent biblical counseling, but he definitely in the 70s delineated or articulated it in a way and systematized it as a system consistent with the Bible in a way that hadn’t been done in quite some time, and that was very helpful for people. So he’s kind of the grandfather of the biblical counseling movement since the 70s, and that’s a good thing. So Jay Adams, and he came up with some excellent definitions of biblical counseling based on the Word of God. Eventually his system of biblical counseling, he ended up calling it nouthetic counseling using the New Testament word that he preferred that comes right out of Romans 15:14. So there’s my first Bible verse. I’ll use two verses out of Romans to help us understand the nature of biblical counseling, and the first one is in Romans 15:14. And I’ll be using the New American Standard. And here’s the Apostle Paul at the end of this letter. He’s writing to Christians in Rome in the 50s, probably. As far as we know, Paul hadn’t been to Rome yet, but there were believers there. There was a church there. The gospel had been sent there, and that church was growing. Paul heard about it, and he wanted to go visit Rome, so he sends this letter ahead of him, and he knew some people in that church. And at the end of the letter, he’s encouraging the believers in Rome. So in chapter 15 verse 14, he’s actually talking to all Christians. And he says in chapter 15 verse 14, Now, and concerning you, my brethren, or concerning you, fellow believers, you Christians in Rome. So he’s talking to all believers, not just the elite, not just the leadership. So we could say he’s talking to us in this verse as well because of the Spirit of God. So concerning you, believers there in Rome, I, the Apostle Paul, I myself also am convinced that you yourselves as Christians are full of goodness and filled with all knowledge. How can a sinner, because we’re all sinners, be full of goodness and full of all knowledge? Well, it’s because if you’re a Christian, you’ve been saved, forgiven of your sin, and you have been given the Spirit of God. The Spirit of God lives in you, and the Spirit of God is the one who produces in us the fruits of the Spirit, and goodness is one of those fruits that comes from the Spirit. So that is true of every Christian, that the Spirit of God lives in you and he produces the fruits of the Spirit, and one of those is goodness. And also, you are filled with all knowledge. The Spirit of God gives us wisdom. He gives us insight into God’s revelation in Scripture. So this is true of every Christian. We’ve been equipped by God with the indwelling Spirit, having the fruits of the Spirit, including goodness and also access to God’s wisdom in a way that we didn’t have before we got saved. And as a result, Paul says to these Christians in Rome, you’re full of goodness, you have access to God’s wisdom, and as a result, you are able.
And this word in the Greek, dunamis, kind of sounds like dynamite, it just refers to power. You have supernatural power, basically, is what Paul’s saying. This is true of every Christian. God has given you supernatural power by being born again, having the Spirit of God living in you, and God has equipped you. You have what it takes, the prerequisites. To do what, Paul? Well, here it is. To admonish one another. You as a Christian are able, capable, equipped to admonish one another. And here’s where our definition of biblical counseling comes from, right here, this word admonish in the New American Standard. The King James Bible, I think, uses the word warn. All Christians, you are able, equipped by God, to warn one another. I think the translation in the New American Standard is an excellent one, to admonish one another. And so I just want to explain, flesh that out a little bit, what is this Greek word that is translated as admonish in Romans 15:14 that Paul used, that really is the basis and foundation of the definition of biblical counseling? The word admonish here, that Paul, actually it’s used eight times in the New Testament, this Greek word, and I think all of them by the Apostle Paul. It’s a compound word, so it’s made up of two words, a verb and a noun, and the Greek word is noutheteō (νουθετέω), noutheteō. The first part of it is the noun part, it’s nous, and that just means mind. And then he adds a verb to that, theteō, which comes from títhēmi (τῐ́θημῐ), and all that means is to place or to put. So you put it all together, it’s to put into the mind, to place into the mind. So going back to Paul, basically telling them they are competent to do biblical counseling with one another, and how do they do that? By putting something in each other’s mind. In other words, they’re telling each other how to think, and that’s what noutheteō means, to place into the mind. So the question is, what are we placing into someone’s mind? Because that’s what I do as a biblical counselor when somebody sits down and, Pastor Cliff, can you help me with my problem? Well, let’s go to the Lord and find out, but then I start asking them questions to see what their problem is, and then I want to put something in their mind, which means I am concerned first and foremost about how they think. And what Paul’s saying here with noutheteō, to place into the mind, we want to put God’s truth into their mind. We want to replace their wrong thinking with God’s biblical thinking. That’s all it is. That’s all that means. That’s biblical counseling. It’s replacing our wrong or messed-up thinking with God’s thoughts, and it’s amazing that we can do that. It really is a gracious gift from God. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 16, he’s talking about himself as a Christian and as an apostle, and really for all Christians, he says, because we’ve been saved, we have the mind of Christ. We have the mind of Christ. I think every Christian could say that, which is actually astounding. What that means is I can think like Jesus thinks. I can know God’s thoughts. I can think God’s thoughts. Where are God’s thoughts? They are in Scripture. God had his thoughts, his very infinite eternal mind written down in Scripture for us, and it has been preserved in the pages of the Bible. That’s where God’s thoughts are. And so when Paul says, you know what, Christian? Each of you, you are all competent and able to counsel one another by replacing wrong thoughts with God’s thoughts. So that’s what we do when we give biblical counsel to someone. We listen to them. We find out their problem. We compare it to Scripture. We find the biblical solution, and then we point out where they’re thinking wrong, or maybe they have a deficiency in their thinking, and we replace those wrong thoughts with biblical truth. That is biblical counseling. And the verb there, theteō or títhēmi, it’s kind of a proactive placing or putting. So in counseling, we are proactive, we’re assertive. We are deliberate. We are not passive. We purpose to deliberately expose the wrong and deficient thinking in the fellow Christian and say, hey, you need to consider what Scripture says about that, and now you need to replace your wrong thoughts with God’s truth in the Word. So it’s putting God’s thoughts in your mind to replace wrong thinking. That is a great definition of biblical counseling.
Derek: And something you already mentioned that this passage is addressed to Christians, at large Christians in the church, not specifically pastors, and elsewhere where it’s used in the New Testament also affirms this idea that all Christians should be doing this. So Colossians 3:16, let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing. There’s that word again, one another, in all wisdom. And then he says again in 1 Thessalonians 5:14, we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the faint-hearted, help the weak, be patient with them all. That’s addressed to all the Christians in Thessalonica. And then finally, 2 Thessalonians 3:15, do not regard him as an enemy, referring to the one who refuses to work, but warn him or admonish him as a brother. So this is assumed that Christians, not just pastors trained in theology and biblical counseling, but Christians are expected to be able to do this kind of instruction and admonishing and counseling.
Cliff: Yeah, absolutely. Actually, you raised two very important distinctives of biblical counseling there, Derek. We have micro-counseling and macro-counseling, macro meaning everybody. So this is an expectation of every Christian, like you said, that every Christian to some degree has the ability and expectation to counsel everybody else in the body of Christ because we’ve been equipped. On the other hand, there is specialized counseling where some Christians are just more gifted and capable and insightful and experienced and trained to counsel at a higher level. So we’ll talk about that as well. You also mentioned something really important that I think is a distinctive of biblical counseling is when we do biblical counseling, who do we give biblical counseling to? And it’s interesting that in the eight New Testament passages where Paul uses this word noutheteō to place into the mind, it’s a command to believers. So he’s talking to believers. So just to summarize somewhat simplistically, we don’t give biblical counsel to unbelievers. Do we want to help them? Absolutely. What do we do for unbelievers? We evangelize them. So if I’m sitting down with a married couple and they’re not believers and they’re asking me, Pastor Cliff, can you help us? Our marriage is terrible. We’ve been married 12 years. It’s actually happened to me several times. And I found out that this couple, they weren’t Christians, they didn’t believe in the Bible, but they wanted me to fix their marriage, to break the news to them. I can’t really fix your marriage. Putting a bandaid on a major problem that you have that is a greater problem than your marriage problem, that’s you have a broken relationship not just with your spouse, you have a broken relationship with your creator and your judge, and he can be your savior. But until you get that right, you’re not going to fix your marriage. And so it wasn’t biblical counseling as much as it was evangelism. So that’s a distinctive of biblical counseling. You’ve got to find out where they are first with Jesus.
Derek: And I think that’s a really important point to make because I’ll get the question sometimes, well, can Christians go into the area of psychology and do therapy and so on in a kind of secular setting because they want to help people and help a variety of people? And that’s actually a different conversation because that’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about Christians counseling, Christians, what’s the methodology? What are the resources? How do you define that? That’s what we’re talking about right here. What I just mentioned in terms of a Christian’s question about the help that they might offer in these other areas, well, that’s a totally different question and something we would want to address. But that’s not what we’re talking about when we talk about biblical counseling. We’re talking about Christian to Christian, using the Word of God to effectively instruct and counsel and encourage one another.
Cliff: Yeah. You mentioned a key word there that I forgot my definition that I want to add is you used the word help, because if you were to ask somebody off the street, what does counsel mean counseling? I think most people would say, well, it’s helping people, helping people by telling them stuff.
Derek: Right.
Cliff: And that’s pretty universal.
Derek: Yeah.
Cliff: Mormons, do they want to counsel and help people? Absolutely. Do Muslims want to help and counsel? Yes, they do. Yeah. But at its core, that’s what counseling is. It’s trying to help people by telling them stuff, giving them advice or whatever. But that’s at the root of the definition of counseling. So we’re talking about a specific kind of counseling. It’s biblical counseling, putting God’s truth in the mind of that person. And also this idea that we’re helping, it implies there’s a problem. So you don’t give counsel to somebody who doesn’t have a problem or they’re not asking for help. You can teach, you can instruct, whatever. But counseling really is, there is a recognized need or a problem. I’ve got a dilemma, I’ve got a struggle, I’ve got a problem, I’ve got a fear, I need help with it, and I need a fellow believer to help me. So just that word biblical counseling implies that we’re trying to help another believer, take God’s thoughts to deal with their problem. And you start with, as a good example, Romans 15:14. To complement the definition there, I want to go to another passage by Paul in Romans. This is a more common word in the New Testament, and it’s in Romans 12, verse 8, where Paul’s listing some spiritual gifts, and he’s talking to believers again. Every Christian has a spiritual gift, a special endowment from the Spirit of God that they are supposed to use to help build the body of Christ and help other Christians grow. And Paul lists some of the spiritual gifts here in 1 Corinthians 12, verse 7, he says, those have been gifted with the gift of service, then you need to be using your gift serving others. Those of you who have been given the gift of teaching, you need to be using your gift of teaching. And then verse 8, he says this, and those of you Christians who have been given the gift of exhortation, that you need to use that gift and exhort others. So the New American Standard uses the translation of exhortation. But the Greek word is literally parakaleo. Again, it’s two words, para, like parallel, where the word comes from, it means alongside of. So it’s para, and then kaleo, which means to call, literally to come alongside, to come near to, to call near. The emphasis there is you’re coming alongside somebody that needs help, you’re putting your arm around them. It’s also a picture, very concretely, of being intimate with someone, almost a one-on-one situation. And that’s the uniqueness of biblical counseling, because we have preaching, which can be to large groups, small groups, usually a one-way kind of communication. This para-kaleo, to come alongside, this is more intimate, it’s more personal. Again, it’s usually addressing the fact that there’s a unique problem that needs help.
Para-kaleo, to come alongside, it’s a verbal verb, meaning this is something we do verbally, we speak when we use this gift. That was also true of noutheteō, that we’re speaking truth. And that’s the same with this word, para-kaleo. We’re speaking truth to other people. But on parakaleo, this verb is used 109 times in the New Testament, and about 30 times the noun is used, and it is translated in almost 10 different ways by your English Bible. Just one Greek word, listen to some of the words of the New Testament that translate just this one Greek word. Appeal, comfort, console, cheer, encourage, beg, implore, exhort, urge. And actually, there’s a couple more that I didn’t list. So that just shows you the variety and the flexibility of this word. And it can be summarized down to three ways or implications of this verb, which actually an excellent translation is counsel. So what Paul is saying is, hey, God has given you the spiritual gift of counselor, and you need to use that gift, and you need to be counseling other believers in the church. And it’s specialized counseling. So as you said earlier, Derek, every Christian is expected to counsel at some level. And at the same time, Paul says, as with all the spiritual gifts, there are also those who are specially divinely equipped to do this. So we have gifted biblical counselors. And that word has three implications or nuances to it. It’s to provide comfort. That’s to maybe somebody who’s hurting. It’s to provide encouragement, maybe to someone who needs motivation or a slap on the back. Go get them. Maybe they’re indecisive. And then finally, that word refers to exhorting someone. And again, that’s the warning part, the rebuking part. So it’s kind of threefold. With this gift, we can give hope. We can also give direction. And at the same time, we can give consequences when we need to. So it’s a beautiful, diverse gift, this gift of counseling.
Derek: Yeah, a very rich word in terms of all that it can mean in various contexts and implications. So that was an excellent introduction. Cliff, thank you for taking us through that introduction to biblical counseling. And guess what? We have more that we would like to say about this topic. We have more that we know Scripture has to say about this topic. So we’re going to come back in part two and talk more about biblical counseling. We want to talk about the sufficiency of Scripture and other important topics. So we’ll do that. Until then, keep seeking the Lord in His Word, and we’ll talk to you soon.
