February 19, 2009 · 5:49 pm

What discourages you?


Spoke today to a group of pastors about encouragement and discouragement in their ministries and lives. Generally speaking, our levels of either fluctuate with our expectations crashing into reality. When things go as we hoped, we feel encouraged. When they don’t for periods of time, we get discouraged.

What discourages pastors? Many struggle with knowing just how to evaluate their work. Since the work is never done and there is always more to do (another complaining friend, another couple to counsel, another program to oversee, another small group to visit), the temptation is to fall back on some unhelpful measuring sticks and either try to do more than one should or give up and withdraw.

My view is that while our circumstances give ample opportunity to deflate us, discouragement is much less the result of our circumstances and much more the result of unmet desires and expectations. Haven’t you have had the experience where something went badly but since you had no significant expectations for anything better, you weren’t all that discouraged by it? Our problem is that we look to the wrong things to encourage us. We look to successes in ministry, in work, in marriage, in parenting, in whatever we do. And the absence deflates us and tempts us to either get angry or quit.

Among the passages we looked at were:

1. Phil. 2: “If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, then…” Many are familiar with this passage because of Paul’s exhortation to set aside our own agenda and to follow the example of Christ–sacrificially serving others. And many admonish us to take to heart what it is this passage calls us to do. But, what is the engine that drives us? Encouragement. Where does that come from? See v. 21 of the previous passage: “It has been granted you to believe….” Encouragement comes from remembering the work of Christ NOT from our success in ministry.

2. Heb. 12:5. This passage starts out with a “therefore” as well. Remembering all the saints before us and their faithfulness, we are called to “run the race” and “throw off everything that hinders us.” We are to leave sinfulness behind. But such a task wearies us. Verse 3 tells us that spiritual weariness is not fixed by numbing ourselves with food, sex, TV, etc, but by “considering Christ” and his endurance. The the author knows that to kill the flesh we have to fight to the point of what feels like bloodletting. But in verse 5 he tells us to take courage because God is disciplining us. Huh? Did you ever take courage when your father or mother disciplined you? I didn’t. But Hebrews is telling us that one of our sources of encouragement is that God is treating us as family and so he lovingly disciplines and refines us. 

Bottom line, our encouragement comes from remembering that God is at work in our lives even if we cannot see it. Now, encouragement may come in the form of being able to quote Ps 88 which communicates much faithful despair. 

One more point. We ought to differentiate between discouragement and grief or sadness, or frustration, or confusion. These are not the same. It is possible to be dismal about the outcome but having courage to keep going. Courage and action are more likely signs of encouragement than anything else.

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February 18, 2009 · 1:57 pm

Access to short christian counseling articles


I’ve noticed that the American Association of Christian Counselors has made many of their magazine (Christian Counseling Today) articles available for free on their www.ecounseling.com website. You can search by author or keyword to find what you might be looking for.  

My 800 word essay on repentance after abuse can be found here. A longer and very helpful article by another psychologist on the 12 features of spiritual abuse can be found here.

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February 17, 2009 · 2:50 pm

Racial put downs compared to others


Two times in the last monthone of my children has been racialized. During an exchange amongst a group of friends where they were trading (not so) humerous barbs, the other child made a racial comment about my son’s skin color or hair. These comments were made by children having received from another some comment designed to make fun of their glasses, weight, height, and/or athletic ability.

What I find interesting is how unreactive my kids have been and how extremely reactive their friends were. None had any problems calling someone fat or stupid or short or slow or blind or whatever. But as soon as the race card was played, that changed everything. Alarms sounded, parents notified, etc. But my kids probably wouldn’t have told me that these events happened (even though they have no problems tattling on each other).

I know that racializations (generalizations, stereotypes, etc.) are extremely painful to the receiver. And whenever we hear them, we ought to confront them without delay. But lest our righteous indignation overwhelm us, let us not forget that other forms of objectification are equally painful. This is the message I am delivering to my kids: We do not tolerate making fun of other people, period. I think my kids get it but I’m not sure their larger community gets it. And the biggest problem we have is from other white kids looking to get others in trouble.

But here’s my dilemma. I notice that in much of the literature written by transracial adoptees concludes that their parents never talked about race, never understood the deep pain they felt from racializations and racism, and have no interest in living in their old neighborhoods. Now, I could conclude that those writers, now in their late 20s and 30s, grew up in an era where parents tried to be “color-blind.” But I do wonder if the message my kids hear from me as I confront them on their own use of put-downs is that I don’t really think racializations are that serious a problem.

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February 16, 2009 · 2:23 pm

Wanna see a MA Counseling program in action?


For those of you in the Philadelphia region and considering an Masters degree in Counseling you are hereby invited to our March 9th “taste of Biblical Seminary.” This open house is just for those interested in a counseling degree and will expose attendees to what we do at Biblical. You’ll come hear from profs and students, have a meal with us, have time to ask current students anything you want, and then sit in on our classes. You’ll leave with a very clear sense of what we are about.

For more information and an opportunity to have a meal with me, check out this pdf on our website: http://www.biblical.edu/images/embark/PDFs/infoeventmar09.pdf

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February 12, 2009 · 9:44 am

Persisting Conflict: Breaking the cycle


As you can imagine, most people I see in counseling settings have a conflict with someone in their life that doesn’t seem to resolve. The problem comes up again and again. Change the scenario, but the dialogue remains the same. Someone shuts down, someone presses hard, someone brings up the past, someone changes the subject, someone seems to agree at first but then later reverses their position. You get the picture.

There are many reasons why we fall into this kind of pattern. But, one comes to mind as a common reason: We want to be heard and we don’t feel like we are being heard so we keep doing things in order to be heard (silence, many words, loud words, etc.). The end result is both parties feel unheard and generally unwilling to really “hear” the other for fear their concerns will be ignored.

One way I try to break the cycle is to draw 2 intersecting roads. In most conflict, we are going different directions and we want the other to come with us. And when we consider going with the other down their road, it feels as if our road (concerns, desires) will be left far behind.

In order to break the cycle we have to stay in the intersection, without demanding that we go down either road. The intersection means that both of our concerns and interests are being considered. We stay there to hear without leaving. We fight the anxiety that staying there means giving up. It doesn’t. The intersection is to be a safe place (okay, in real life hanging out in an intersection probably isn’t the smartest thing).

When conflicting parties agree to hang out in the intersection, I find that most of the anxiety and fears of rejection or neglect subside. And frequently, parties agree that the concerns of both are legitimate. And just maybe they can find another road that they both can travel in safety.

What word pictures do you find helpful when confronting persisting conflict?

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February 11, 2009 · 12:39 pm

Scandals and privacy: Why we want both


I was listening to a news story about the Alex Rodriguez steroid scandal yesterday and reading the third chapter in Lauren Winner’s “Real Sex” book and I  got to thinking about the confusion in our culture: We demand privacy AND we love the scandal. Follow me for a minute:

1. A reporter asked the “man on the street” whether he thought Alex was no longer a role model for his sons. The man replied something to this effect, “What Alex puts in his body is his own business. Stop reading his mail. He has to make his own decisions and so do my sons. It’s a matter of privacy.” So, this man argued that what Alex does with his own body should be his own business since at the time of his taking the steroids it wasn’t illegal.

2. This thinking is commonly found in conversations about sex as well. Winner, in chapter 3, discusses our culture’s acceptance of the mantra, “what two consenting adults do is none of anyone’s business.” In fact, it shouldn’t even be the topic of conversation. FYI, Winner is arguing the opposite–that what you do in the bedroom is a matter of concern for the Christian community. So, Christians should care about their neighbor’s sexual ethic as it impacts the whole community. 

3. Yet, we love the scandal. As a culture, we are more prone now than ever to air someone’s dirty laundry. Haven’t we just been bombarded with some actor’s profanity filled rants? Obama appointees Some actress’ sex tape is “leaked”? Now, Alex Rodriguez is a juicer. I’m sure Joe Torre’s book about his Yankee years will sell big. Why? It’s going to have juicy, PRIVATE, details. We love the scandal. Just not our own.

By the way, the church really isn’t any better. We’ve all heard and repeated things like: “Did you hear about ____ son and what he did?” “Did you hear about ___ down the street and that their pastor was caught doing ____?”

Point: We want the freedom to do what we want in private without others finding out. We don’t want friends and family prying and asking those direct questions about our sex lives or other potentially embarrassing activities. Yes, I know, many of us are in accountability groups because we know we need people prying. But, really, does any human since our fig-leaved first parents really want accountability? No, even though we know that when we have folks asking us the tough questions, we’re less likely to be outed in a scandal.

2nd point: Oh, and we love the scandal for personal reasons. It makes us feel better. I, for one, would NEVER take steroids. That makes me feel better, even though I might have my own private struggles with being honest about taxes, time sheets, how I parent when no one is watching, etc.

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February 9, 2009 · 11:06 am

Do you see your body as good?


At church on Sunday I attended a class discussing Lauren Winner’s “Real Sex: The Naked Truth About Chastity” (Brazos, 2005). Her thesis (in the second chapter anyway) is that the church tends to have one of two responses to singles about sex: either be honest and loving (e.g., go ahead) or just don’t do it. She suggests that we look at the larger context of the “say no” passages in order to see God’s larger view of sex as good in the right settings. I won’t go any further here with that thesis but all that to say:

Winner wants us to think about the body as being good. And since the body is a sexual entity, that sex is also good. Got me thinking that most of us don’t see our bodies as something that is good. We focus on the fall and the brokenness we see. We see our lack of health. We see insatiable desire. We see danger. We see something that doesn’t measure up to the image we most want to see.

But here is the challenge. Did God make your body? Is it good? If you only focus on what is not good about your body, what are you missing? How are you marring the true story about your body?

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February 6, 2009 · 12:02 pm

Do you need an expert counselor?


Have you ever had someone approach you as an expert in something? Feels good, even if you demur the attribution. Occasionally someone makes such a comment to us counselors, “I heard you were the best counselor to deal with ____ and so that is why I am here.”

I’ve been counseling long enough to know that while I do know something about some problems, the person giving me this compliment on the first meeting is also signalling me something about their thinking. Generally, they are signalling that that want me to fix their problem. Not always but often they want my expertise to rub off on them with minimal effort of their own. Although that is a good thing to consider when finding the right surgeon and yes you want to avoid incompetent counselors, good counseling is mostly accomplished by the hard work of the counselee. So when you consider what counselor you might need, consider the following:

1. Is the counselor promoting themselves as expert? Be wary. Experience is good. Identity as expert may not be. Promoting oneself as a “nationally recognized speaker and counselor”? Run!

2. Is the counselor known to be a talker? One who hands out “the 5 secret steps to solve…” Stay away.

3. Is the counselor known for listening skills? Are they willing to learn? This might be your best shot. Well, it would also be good if they have heard of your problem before too…

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February 5, 2009 · 3:46 pm

The God I Don’t Understand 7: How does the Cross work?


My apologies to those waiting for the next chapter in Wright’s book. Some other writing assignments require me to put down my fun books and pick up some work-related reading these days. But enough of my excuses… In chapter 7 Chris Wright admits that one answer to the question, “How did the cross achieve salvation for us?” is simple and from Scripture: “Because it did.” But he like many others would rather not stop there. And he contends the bible doesn’t stop there either.

He reminds the reader that evangelical interpreters of the Bible regard the most helpful metaphor of the cross as judicial–substitutionary atonement. There are other metaphors used in the bible to explain the “how” but 1 Cor 15:3 underlines and emphasizes that Christ’s death on the cross was sacrificial and substitutionary. Here Wright brings up the controversy surrounding “penal substitution” and the grounds by which some reject this forensic focus to substitutionary atonement. Of the 7 reasons he lists, the primary ones (in my eyes) are the sense that penal substitution focuses too much on guilt, portrays God as mechanistic or always angry, and emphasizes the only way to deal with sin is with violence.

Wright believes the arguments for rejecting penal substitution would be good if in fact evangelicals held them. But he fears that the arguments against the penal metaphor are caricatures. From this point he looks at how the bible paints God’s love and anger. His anger and love must be, he contends, taken together as part of a whole, rather than having one negate the other. The two expressions are not contrary to each other any more than we may be angry with a loved one for bad behavior and yet still love them at the same time. He suggests the Cross satisfies both God’s love and anger.

He further rejects the conflict between God the father and Jesus the son. God is not the angry father and Jesus the loving son who steps between us. That viewpoint would destroy God’s essential unity (see John 17 for this). He uses extensive quotes from John Stott here to bolster his argument

Finally, he addresses the concepts of guilt and shame. The argument has arise that penal atonement only makes sense in cultures with a “developed sense of personal and objective guilt.” Shame cultures, it is suggested, would not be able to identify as well. Further, in a postmodern world it appears that shame is the more likely experience (of not being internally consistent with oneself). But Wright says that both shame and guilt are addressed by the cross and both are related. He points to Ezekiel who talks about being shamed and feeling shamed (36:16-32). The cross (and the forgiveness behind it) takes away the shame quality even though they still feel it when they remember what God has done. Wright suggests that ongoing feeling is healthy. He quotes from another of his books

Israel were not to feel ashamed in the presence of other nations (36:15), but they were to feel ashamed in the presence of their own memories before God (36:31-32). Similarly, there is a proper sense in which the believer may rightly hold up her head in company.

He then talks about how God in the OT and Jesus in the NT publicly affirms those who were shamed. God removes their shame, no matter what others think of them. They now hold their head high. And yet, Wright tries to articulate that this person may still feel shame when remembering past sins but he is quick to point out that this feeling does not crush but fuels “genuine repentance and humility and for joy and peace that flow from that source alone.”

While the content of this chapter seems a bit more about confronting a wrong he sees in the penal substitution debate than about answering how the cross works, nonetheless I find his writing about guilt and shame quite helpful here–especially how he distinguishes the kinds and sources of shame. I think it might be helpful for those who trust in Jesus but who struggle with shame to consider for a moment what their shame drives them to do. To hide? To be grateful for God’s restorative work?

Next week, we’ll look at his final chapter on the cross.

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February 4, 2009 · 5:37 am

Try your hand at diagnosing clients…


Ever wondered if your counselor really knows what is in the Diagnostic & Statistical Manual (DSM, ver. 4TR)? Or do they just do the flip and dip method (let the large book open to any page and blindly point to a spot on the page)? Let’s hope not. Well, some professors are trying to increase the accuracy of their students via video vignettes.

One such person, Dr. Aaron Rochlen of U. Texas, has a website with 5 video vignettes available on his website (http://www.edb.utexas.edu/psychopathologypractice/index2.html) for students to watch and then try their hand at giving a DSM diagnosis.

Warning. Site is free. There are no answers given so don’t bother submitting your diagnostic considerations as they won’t go anywhere unless you send them to someone. Second warning: At least one of the “clients” uses some curse words.

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