From Woe to Go!: A Training Text for Christian Counsellors

Barker, Graham

ISBN 10: 145251268X / ISBN 13: 9781452512686

Published by BalboaPressAU, 2014

Seller Inventory # 145251268X-3-31360001

Synopsis:

What does Christian counselling mean? How does it differ from Christian psychology, Christian psychiatry, or even pastoral care? From Woe to Go! focuses on the vocation of counseling conducted within an evangelical Christian worldview, with Christian principles as its driving force. This guide seeks to integrate a comprehensive counselling model for Christian counsellors, a detailed skills-training program, and an extensive incorporation of spiritual resources. An inclusive training tool, it outlines a three-stage model for Christian counsellors and professionals who want to integrate their faith with their professional work. For those who seek to enhance their skills, it also introduces and explains Incarnational Counselling, an approach that emphasizes the priority of exhibiting the presence of Christ in the counselling process. Authors Graham Barker, PsyD, and Clifford Powell, PhD, bring more than fifty years of clinical experience and graduate counsellor training to their groundbreaking guide, incorporating sound theory, practical skills, and unique spiritual resources available to followers of Jesus seeking to minister in the counselling arena.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:

From Woe to Go!

A Training Text for Christian Counsellors

By Graham Barker, Clifford Powell

Balboa Press

Copyright © 2014 Graham Barker and Clifford Powell
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-4525-1268-6

Contents

Foreword John Townsend, Ph.D., xiii, 
Thanks and Acknowledgments, xv, 
Introduction, xvii, 
Part 1—Establishing a Framework, 1, 
Chapter 1—The History of Christian Counselling, 3, 
Chapter 2—Major Counselling Theories, 15, 
Chapter 3—Essential Counsellor Qualities, 41, 
Chapter 4—Effective Listening— NEW GRACE, 53, 
Chapter 5—The Incarnational Counselling Model, 74, 
Part 2—Incarnational Counselling: The Expanded Model, 95, 
Chapter 6—Task 1—Connecting, 97, 
Chapter 7—Correcting, 111, 
Chapter 8—Concluding, 125, 
Part 3—Practical Skills Training, 131, 
Chapter 9—The Skills of Connecting, 133, 
Chapter 10—The Skills of Connecting II, 164, 
Chapter 11—The Skills of Correcting I: Correcting Distorted Thinking, 186, 
Chapter 12—The Skills of Correcting II: Correcting Disruptive Emotions, 205, 
Chapter 13—The Skills of Correcting III: Correcting Destructive Behaviours, 224, 
Chapter 14—The Skills of Concluding, 239, 
Part 4—Integrating Spiritual Resources, 247, 
Chapter 15—Using Prayer in Counselling, 251, 
Chapter 16—Using Scripture in Counselling, 262, 
Chapter 17—Confession and Forgiveness in Counselling, 272, 
Chapter 18—Hearing God, 281, 
Part 5—Leaving the Woe, Embracing the Go!, 295, 
A. Life-History Questionnaire, 299, 
B. Supervision Competency Checklist, 307, 
C. Concluding Therapy—A Sample Counsellor Letter, 317, 
D. Psychopharmacology for Counsellors, 319, 
References, 325, 

CHAPTER 1

The History of Christian Counselling

This chapter briefly surveys the history of Christian counselling using the metaphor provided by the stages of human development. This perspective recognises that Christian counselling underwent a "conception" stage with the ministry of Jesus. Since that time, there have been identifiable developmental advances not unlike the stages of normal human development.

* * *

The Conception Phase

It can be argued that the beginnings of Christian counselling should be grounded in the interactions of Jesus with his disciples and followers. Others might argue that the roots go even further back, in the early patriarchal dealings of ancient Israel and the wisdom literature, such as Psalms and Proverbs with their wealth of psychological insights. While we acknowledge these ancient underpinnings we begin this brief survey with accounts of the ministry of Jesus.

When we read the accounts of Jesus's interactions with people, it does not take long before we realise that his interactions included times of comforting, confronting, affirming, celebrating, and instructing. Some were with a single enquirer, such as Nicodemus or the woman charged with adultery. Other encounters involved small groups, such as Jesus's instruction times with Peter, James, and John. Still others involved even larger audiences, such as the crowds who heard him speak on the mountain, in the temple grounds, or on the Galilean shore.

It is interesting to note that Jesus used a variety of communication styles and techniques yet always matched the need with his approach. It is hard to place Jesus into one counselling orientation or another. He was truly flexible, able to be situation-specific yet was not locked into any one fixed style or methodology.

The conception stage can be expanded to include the era of the New Testament writings when the apostles and others dispensed pastoral counsel to the new Christians and their leaders. They used no single, prescribed model, and it can be seen that the approach was adjusted to meet the particular need. But it also demonstrated the personality of the author. We can observe that James, the half-brother of Jesus and early leader of the church in Jerusalem, was very pastoral, while Peter, the dynamic and impulsive apostle, was usually quite directive and forthright.

The Embryonic Phase

As the church expanded, so did its commitment to meeting the pastoral and physical needs of its adherents and their communities. In the early centuries of the first millennium, when Greek and Roman thought still dominated, it was the common belief among clergy, philosophers, and laypeople that psychological problems were actually "spiritual problems." Emotional problems were considered the results of spells and magic cast by witches and warlocks, or they constituted a punishment for performing acts displeasing to the gods.

Many of the early church apologists were among the most vocal in resisting the intrusion of natural philosophies and "scientific pursuits" into the realm of Christian belief. Possibly the most influential voice came from Tertullian (150–225), who railed against such influences. Bettenson records Tertullian's stance:

"What is there in common between Athens and Jerusalem? What between the academy and the Church? What between heretics and Christians? Away with all projects for a Stoic, a platonic, or a dialectic Christianity!" (1963, p.6).

In the centuries that followed, the Church's condemnation of the application of human sciences to life's problems moderated. Augustine (AD 400) and Jerome (AD 420) tended to view science with a cautionary eye while freely quoting from such works. However, their cautionary eyes did not prevail, and by the end of the first millennium, a more pronounced hostility was once again evident. The influential cardinal and bishop of Ostia, Peter Damien (1007–72), denounced any elevation of human reason or scientific investigation as un-Christian. A recent writer, Inglis (1979), noted that, two centuries later, Pope Alexander pronounced that clergy involvement in "non-spiritual" enterprises, such as healing and "medicines," were the Devil's deception.

This conflicted relationship dominated the church until the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century. The Protestant reformers vehemently defended the principle of Sola Scriptura, claiming the Holy Scriptures, rather than tradition or other sources of validation, were the highest authority for Christian faith and practice. At no stage, however, did they endorse Nuda Scriptura, the claim that the Scriptures alone held authority in every sphere.

In his Institutes of the Christian Religion (2.2.15–16), John Calvin (1509–64) proposed a position not unlike that of contemporary integrationists.

Therefore in reading profane authors, the admirable light of truth displayed in them should remind us that the human mind, however much fallen and perverted from its original integrity, is still adorned and invested with admirable gifts from its Creator. If we reflect that the Spirit of God is the only fountain of truth, we will be careful, as we would avoid offering insult to him, not to reject or condemn truth wherever it appears ... If the Lord has been pleased to assist us by the work and ministry of the ungodly in physics, dialects, mathematics and other similar sciences, let us avail ourselves of it.

This embryonic stage proved to be an extraordinary gestation period of twenty centuries. The works of Johann Christian August Heinroth, the inaugural chair of psychiatry at Leipzig University, are a notable milestone where science and theology met in an academic setting. Heinroth suggested a theory of personality based on Romans 7 in the Bible. He believed that the personality was comprised of the basic drives, the ego, and the conscience. He held that these three areas were in conflict, producing a tension that could only be relieved by yielding to the Holy Spirit. It can be argued that Sigmund Freud, the "father of psychoanalysis," adapted Heinroth's theory and developed his notions of id, ego, and superego.

Heinroth's publications Disorders of the Soul (1818) and A System of Physical-Forensic Medicine (1825) are considered his most important works. In them, he proposes that "sin," in its broader sense of a lifetime of indulgence in unhealthy and immoral behaviours, is the cause of mental illness. He believed the healing of these involved addressing these "spiritual" issues as genuine realities in the person's life. Heinroth, however, was a singular voice.

The advent of experimental psychology in the nineteenth century and the rise of Freudian thought in the early twentieth century prompted the development of two streams of thought regarding spirituality and scientific enquiry. One stream heaped derision upon spirituality as an anti-intellectual and emotionally unhealthy pursuit. Any public acknowledgement of a distinctive, spiritually based understanding of human behaviour was generally scorned by scholars. The other stream was supported by the notable William James and his pupil, E. D. Starbuck. Each attempted to study the phenomenon of religious experience from a scientific perspective.

The 1901–02 Gifford Lectures by William James were published under the title The Varieties of Religious Experience. In these lectures, he presented his beliefs regarding the interaction of the spirit and the mind. James acknowledged that the pursuit of the spiritual in life was most natural and not to be ignored in clinical investigation. His work led to a significant re-legitimising of the integration of scientific and "Christian-based" study.

Anton Boisen (1876–1965), whose own mental crisis led to a crusade to educate theological students in psychological intervention, warrants acknowledgement. His efforts eventually morphed into the Clinical Pastoral Education Movement in the 1930s. The CPE movement gained significant support from more liberal traditions within Christianity but was viewed with scepticism, and even some alarm, by the more conservative branches of the church.

The Infancy Phase

The Christian counselling movement gained impetus among the evangelical branches of Christendom in the aftermath of World War II in the United States. It was there that Christian psychologists, including Clyde Narramore, advocated the integration of Christian and psychological truths. Narramore's radio program Psychology for Living was influential in raising the profile of the integration movement among the broad Christian public. A major step in the movement's growth occurred in 1952, when the Christian Association for Psychological Studies (CAPS) was formed so that, finally, Christian counselling had both a voice and a home.

During this period, there were also stirrings on the European continent led by the writings of Swiss physician Paul Tournier. In 1940, his first book, Medecine de la Personne (translated in 1957 as The Healing of Persons), advocated that man is more than just body and mind. Man is also a spiritual being and, thus, needed to be addressed and treated as an integrated whole. This theme was further developed in all of Tournier's subsequent popular publications.

Concurrently in the United Kingdom, G. J. McKenzie's book Psychology, Psychotherapy, and Evangelicalism (1940) addressed the interface of the evangelical church of the day and the increasing influence of psychology. McKenzie called for adequate interdisciplinary training for both religious workers and psychologists to avoid the unnecessary trauma created when either was omitted.

This infancy phase was considerably shorter than its predecessor. The dynamics had changed. The majority of the church had accepted the validity and benefits of genuine scientific research and embraced the application of this research to human need.

Childhood Phase

During the ensuing decades, there was considerable growth as a new generation of Christian psychologists and counsellors began to develop and structure the integrative process. As with a young child learning to walk, the initial steps in the integration of Christian faith and psychological understandings were tentative. The United States was again the major venue for these developments as practitioners and scholars sought to define what Christian counselling looked like. Some key events transpired at this time.

* Fuller Seminary began its graduate school of psychology in 1965. This heralded the formal marriage of evangelical theology with psychology.

* Christian psychologists and counsellors began to publish their thoughts and challenge the church about its negative response to the efficacy of psychological research and its guilt-by-association-to-Freud attitude to the practice of modern psychiatry and psychotherapy.

Authors such as Gary Collins, Larry Crabb, Everett Worthington, and the Minirth-Meier team began to publish for an expanding US evangelical market. At the same time in the United Kingdom there were significant publications proposing the same integrative process; Frank Lake, a psychiatrist with a background as a missionary, published Clinical Theology (1966), and Roger Hurding, a physician, followed with his book Roots and Shoots (1986). Both publications acted as polemics to the sceptical evangelical populous.

The childhood phase proved difficult to negotiate. There were a number of antagonists who resisted any attempt to integrate Christian belief with psychological theory and practice. The most notable was Jay Adams, a professor at Westminster Seminary in the United States. In his book Competent to Counsel (1970), he claimed that any attempt to integrate Christianity and psychology would undermine the authority of the Christian Scriptures. Adams believed the Bible contained all the truth necessary to bring healing to a sinful world. Adams gained a large following and in turn published multiple volumes in support of his position.

Author Tim Stafford, in the May 11, 1993, edition of Christianity Today, stated that Adams's critique seems to have ironically spurred on the growth of Christian psychotherapy, making it more self-consciously evangelical. This was partially the result of Arthur F. Holmes and Gary Collins entering the debate with their watershed publications. Holmes's All Truth Is God's Truth (1977), and Collins's The Rebuilding of Psychology (1977), successfully challenged the Church and the psychological fraternity to consider the legitimate foundations of the integrative movement.

The childhood stage of Christian counselling was frequently characterised by a struggle for legitimacy and acceptance within the evangelical Christian community and the Western public in general. This struggle continues in some areas, and at the time of this publication, there still exists some divide between those who advocate integration and those who oppose the notion.

The Adolescent Phase

As in human adolescence, the Christian-counselling movement began asking itself, "Who am I? What should I look like? How do I make sense of the large number of fixed and variable factors in my makeup?" As these questions were addressed, there emerged several differing models as to the identity of this integration movement.

One of the earliest models, described as "Biblical Counselling," but distinct from the movement that followed Jay Adams' writings, was proposed by Larry Crabb. He re-shaped Albert Ellis' Rational Emotive Therapy (RET) into a cognitive therapy acceptable to the Evangelical Church. Crabb acknowledged that the psychological community had made many significant discoveries that warranted "plundering" in the cause of Kingdom ministry.

Perhaps the greatest influence came with the 1979 publication of The Integration of Psychology and Theology. In this book, Rosemead professors, Carter and Narramore posited four possible integration models based on Richard Niebuhr's 1951 classic Christ and Culture. Carter and Narramore use the four models, "Against," "Of," "Parallels" and "Integrates," to describe the more common approaches to integration. This publication was the forerunner of many publications by other authors, such as William Kirwan and Siang-Yang Tan, proposing their understanding of the Scriptural model of counselling and psychotherapy.

We have found that the various models reflected three philosophical positions that better describe their intentions:

* Those opposed to integration reflect a Reductionist position that rejects the possibility that truth can be accessed from outside the chosen discipline.

* Those who embrace complementary approaches take a Revisionist position, in which supportive "truths" from alternate disciplines are accommodated upon revision.

* Those supporting an integrative approach appear to hold a Restorationist position that believes all truth is God's truth and seeks to restore that unity.

The struggle for identity continued as differing schools of thought duelled over territorial rights. Colleges and associations were formed to promote the various "faces" of Christian counselling, and denominational conflicts emerged over which position was the more "Biblical" or "scriptural."

Bufford (1997) noted: "By 1992 there were ten distinctive themes that could be identified in the Christian counselling movement." To name a few, the list of themes included: Christian anti-psychology; Biblical counselling; Christian lay-counselling; pastoral counselling, and the Christian Recovery Movement. These themes represented the competing "identities" of the adolescent phase of the Christian counselling movement at the end of the twentieth century.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from From Woe to Go! by Graham Barker, Clifford Powell. Copyright © 2014 Graham Barker and Clifford Powell. Excerpted by permission of Balboa Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

Bibliographic Details

Title: From Woe to Go!: A Training Text for ...
Publisher: BalboaPressAU
Publication Date: 2014
Binding: paperback
Condition: Good