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Biblical Counsel vs. Psychology (Practical Christianity #6) (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

We live in a therapeutic age, and we must acknowledge that humanistic therapies and psychologies have become in large part rival religions to Christianity. While the Dominion Mandate certainly includes studying the

science of the brain, there have been antagonistic philosophies at work in much of the secular therapy world. There are many trials in this life, but God has given us His sure word to comfort our hearts (Rom. 15:4).

The Text: “And he spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: Two men went up into the temple to pray; the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican…” (Lk. 18:9-14).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

This parable is for those who trust in themselves, think they are right, and thereby, whether they know it or not, despise others (Lk. 19:9). Jesus chose for the parable a man from one of the most respected classes (Pharisees) and a man from one of the most despised classes (tax collectors) (Lk. 18:10). The Pharisee prays in the temple with a lot of gratitude, and he is thankful that he hasn’t fallen into many different sins, and for the spiritual disciplines of fasting and tithing (Lk. 18:11-12). The tax collector, on the other hand, stood in the back, and refusing to even look up, simply begged God for mercy (Lk. 18:13). And Jesus says that the beggar went home made right, but the other was not because God exalts the humble and humiliates the proud (Lk. 18:14).

THERAPEUTIC FAILURE 

Much like the Pharisees, the medical profession has been one of the most respected classes in our modern world because of their (often) selfless service in saving and protecting life. But where there is much good, there is also often a temptation to arrogance and pride, and right after that, much evil (think abortion, trans-surgeries, COVID madness). It is often assumed that if someone has good intentions and wants to “help people,” they must be virtuous and doing some good. But we really ought to have a bit more biblical cynicism. Thoreau once said, “If I knew for a certainty that a man was coming to my house with the conscious design of doing me good, I should run for my life.” Good intentions are not enough.

Since the explosion of humanistic therapies over the last century, one wonders what good it has done us. As one commentator put it, “Despite the creation of a virtual army of psychiatrists, psychologists, psychometrists, counselors, and social workers, there has been no letup in the rate of mental illness, suicide, alcoholism, drug addiction, child abuse, divorce, murder, and general mayhem. Contrary to what one might expect in a society so carefully analyzed and attended to by mental health experts, there has been an increase in all these categories.” Like the woman in the gospels, we have suffered many things from many physicians, and we have only gotten worse (Mk. 5:26). It is also striking that while therapies have increased, Biblical preaching and counseling has largely cratered, with a great deal of it simply echoing therapeutic mantras.

SELF-ESTEEM VS. DIGNITY OF GUILT

At the very center of the problem with many therapies is an anti-Christian anthropology (doctrine of man). The assumption of much humanistic psychology is that people are basically good and bad feelings and habits are a result of their environment (e.g. what has been done to them, chemicals in their brain, genes, deprivation, weather, poverty, etc.). But Scripture teaches that despite the real challenges in our fallen environments, every human being is born in sin, inclined to sin, and morally culpable for their actions and reactions to their environments (Rom. 3). This is the dignity of guilt. The humanist wants to absolve humans of guilt and so destroys human agency: “it isn’t your fault, it was your dad, your mom, your brain, the weather, the economy…” But by blaming everything else, the humanist destroys the individual’s meaning and value. Some of God’s kindest words in Genesis 3 are “because you have done this…”

And this brings us back to the parable. Humanistic psychology often preaches a gospel of pride and self-esteem: talk about how good you are, how valuable you are, all your accomplishments, think positive. But Jesus says that is the path to humiliation and shame: everyone that exalts himself will be (the Greek word is literally) “depressed” (Lk. 18:14). People are often depressed because they are constantly trying to lift themselves up, prove themselves, have high self-esteem. But the gospel, the “good news” of Jesus Christ, begins with the dignity of guilt: “All have sinned.” And the first step towards healing is bowing your head in true humility and pleading with God: “Be merciful to me a sinner.” And Jesus says, that is the path to healing. Taking humble responsibility for our own sin is the path to being lifted up (cf. 1 Pet. 5:5-7).

APPLICATIONS

Are we saying that all therapists and psychologists and their treatments are evil and worthless? Not at all. We are saying beware. Be careful. Be on guard. Some Pharisees were good men, but Jesus said, beware of the leaven of the Pharisees. Beware of the leaven of the humanistic therapists.

Many modern “psychological disorders” are simply the result of unconfessed sin, sinful lifestyles, and sinful habits. Even when it comes to true medical matters, the Bible teaches that we ought to consider whether we have any unconfessed sin (Js. 5:14-16). When it comes to our thoughts and feelings, we ought to do so even more since the Bible explicitly teaches that unconfessed sin results in feeling awful and loss of joy (Ps. 32).

Just as some medical conditions having nothing to do with personal sin, so too, some psychological disorders are true medical conditions that are simply the result of the Fall (Jn. 9:2-3). And sometimes there is a challenging mixture of both.

Many humanist therapies arrogantly teach that it is “abusive” to tell people that they have sinned, that they are wrong, or to correct them in any way – especially victims of other sins/crimes or certain classes of people (often women) because correction makes people “feel bad.” But that is like refusing surgery on cancer because it will be painful. But this is the sin of empathy, and in the name of compassion despises people.

This same arrogance often calls biblical spanking of children abusive. But the Bible is extremely clear: “Whoever spares the rod hates his son, but he who loves him is diligent to discipline him” (Prov. 13:24 ESV, cf. 22:15, 23:13-14). And God disciplines us as His children because He loves us and He wants us to become holy like Him (Heb. 12:5-11). Some trials are God’s fatherly discipline that we are called to endure patiently and joyfully. We do not have some “right” to always feel good.

Humility recognizes that we don’t always understand the connections between the mind and the body, but humility trusts God’s Word above all other words. And humility looks to Christ.

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Chestertonian Gospel (Practical Christianity #1) (King’s Cross)

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INTRODUCTION

G.K. Chesterton was a Roman Catholic who famously saw the beauty and extravagance and personalism of God’s world. Life is an epic adventure, an extravagant stage, an outrageously stunning canvas of God’s glory. Unfortunately, Chesterton believed that Calvinism was a plot to bury all that glory in a pile of fatalism (He knows better now). But the Bible teaches that the doctrines of grace (Calvinism) recovered in the Reformation go hand in hand with his exuberance. Sovereign grace brings the glory into sharp relief.

Robert Capon put it this way, “The Reformation was a time when men went blind, staggering drunk because they had discovered, in the dusty basement of late medievalism, a whole cellar full of fifteen-hundred-year-old, two hundred proof grace – bottle after bottle of pure distillate of Scripture, one sip of which would convince anyone that God saves us single-handedly. The word of the Gospel–after all those centuries of trying to lift yourself into heaven by worrying about the perfection of your bootstraps–suddenly turned out to be a flat announcement that the saved were home before they started. Grace has to be drunk straight: no water, no ice, and certainly no ginger ale, neither goodness, nor badness, nor the flowers that bloom in the spring of super spirituality could be allowed to enter into the case.”

The Text: “Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world: But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son…” (Gal. 4:3-7).

SUMMARY OF THE TEXT

Scripture tells the story of our salvation like a grand adventure. We are all like lost orphan children, trapped and imprisoned in the great dungeon of sin and death (Gal. 4:3). And just when all hope seemed lost, God sent His Son, born of Eve just like us yet without sin, made under the law just like us yet no law breaker, to lead the great prison break, and bring us home to His Father – not only to bring us home but to be adopted as sons (Gal. 4:4-5). Not only have we been adopted, but God has given us the very same Spirit that fills His Son, teaching us to call Him “Abba, Father” (Gal. 4:6). This means that we are no mere servants but true and full sons, and royal sons, with a full inheritance at that (Gal. 4:7).

RAGS TO RICHES

Imagine that one of your ancestors was adopted by a Great King, but through pride and greed was tricked by an enemy and betrayed the King and was disinherited, banished from the Kingdom, and all his descendants were sentenced to work as slaves ever since. But one day a letter arrives at your slave hut, and it is an official legal document, a will and testimony with a deed to a castle. But it isn’t just any castle, it’s the castle of the King your ancestor betrayed, and the will restores all that was lost, making you a lord in the kingdom, and it is signed and sealed in the blood of the Great King’s Son with the words “Debt Paid In Full.”

That is what the gospel is. The gospel is the “good news” that what we thought we had lost forever, what we thought was impossible, has been found and completely restored – the gift of living forever as God’s favored nobility.

DOUBLE IMPUTATION

Theologians call this legal transaction “double imputation.” The gospel is that what is rightfully ours (sin, guilt, and judgment) inherited from Adam has been reckoned to Jesus Christ on His cross, and what was rightfully His (righteousness, holiness, and the inheritance of God), since He was completely sinless and obedient – that has been reckoned to us by faith alone. “For He [God] hath made Him [Christ] to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him [Christ]” (2 Cor. 5:21). “For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit” (Rom. 8:3-4). This double imputation is only possible because Christ came as a new Adam, a new covenantal head. So just as by Adam’s sin, we all inherited sin and death, so by Christ’s righteousness, all who trust in Him inherit His righteousness and life (Rom. 5).

BEFORE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD

But there is one more significant piece that really makes a big difference. The Bible teaches that all of this was planned before the foundation of the world: “according as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world… having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ… That in the dispensation of the fulness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ… in Whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will: that we should be to the praise of His glory” (Eph. 1:4-6, 10-12). “Sovereign grace” is God’s eternal plot to save.

CONCLUSIONS

Chesterton thought that this doctrine of predestination (Calvinism) was a terrible thing because he thought it turned God into a monstrous puppeteer and destroyed the beauty and excitement of Christian life. But Scripture says just the opposite. God’s absolute sovereign grace underlines two things about our salvation: It was utterly impossible for us, and it is all His mercy (Eph. 2:5-9). We were dead, and God made us alive. That is the beginning of the most epic adventure.

If God were not absolute goodness and beauty and life, we might grant that His absolute sovereignty could be a downer. But if the most brilliant, creative, and perfectly gracious and personal Author is telling the story, how could the story be anything less than wonderful? We are His characters. This world is His canvas, His symphony. This story is His surprise party.

All our doubts come down to one central fear: but what if God isn’t good? And the answer to that is: He sent forth His Son to make us His sons.

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Forgiven Families (The Well-Pleased Father #4) (King’s Cross)

Lindsey Gardner on

Introduction

The oil of gladness that keeps the engine of fellowship running smoothly is forgiveness. The forgiveness of God in Christ is what motivates the forgiveness we extent to one another, as well as all the kindness and compassion.

Scripture is abundantly clear that those who call themselves Christians who will not forgive those who have wronged them, cannot be forgiven by God (e.g. Mt. 23ff). We pray this regularly: “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” This is not a “works righteousness,” as though we are trying to earn God’s forgiveness. It is rather the natural overflow of receiving God’s complete forgiveness.

The Text: “… Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you” (Eph. 4:29-32).

 

Summary of the Text

Going back to the creation of the world, words (and therefore attitudes) are powerful: God created the universe with His Word, and since people are made in the image of God, our words and thoughts have the power to build up or tear down (Eph. 4:29). The Spirit hovered over creation in the beginning and filled the builders and craftsmen of the tabernacle (e.g. Ex. 31:3ff), and ungracious speech grieves Him (Eph. 4:30). Corrupt and destructive words flow out of bitterness, wrath, and anger (Eph. 4:31). Our ministry of grace and edification is to be full of kindness, compassion, and forgiveness, all because the Father has forgiven us (Eph. 4:32). Just as the Father is building His Church into a temple by His Spirit, the Spirit is working in and through His people to build generational families that reflect His glory.

 

As You Have Been Forgiven

How does the Father forgive His people?

“As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him” (Ps. 103:12-13).

“I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins” (Is. 43:25).

“Who is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? He retaineth not his anger forever, because he delighteth in mercy. He will turn again, He will have compassion upon us; He will subdue our iniquities; and Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” (Mic. 7:18-19).

“In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace” (Eph. 1:7).

“To Him give all the prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believeth in Him shall receive remission of sins” (Acts 10:43).

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 Jn. 1:9).

 

Forgiveness is a Promise

Forgiveness is a promise not a feeling. This is the basis of God’s forgiveness: His covenant promises of forgiveness are sealed in the blood of Jesus. If you wait until you feel like forgiving, you are making your feelings the standard and bitterness can often develop. But all human forgiveness is simply agreeing that the blood of Jesus was shed for that sin and promising to consider it paid for.

This is why it is important to confess your sins to God first and receive His forgiveness before going to your neighbor. Your neighbor is not actually taking away your sin (only God can do that). Sometimes a confession is trying to get out of a mere human what only God can do. This is the difference between “getting something off your chest” and reconciliation.

This is also why it is a high-handed blasphemy to refuse to forgive your neighbor; it is insisting that the blood of Jesus is not good enough.

In a healthy family, the words “please forgive me” should be relatively common to hear, followed quickly by the promise: “I forgive you.” And Jesus insists that we must forgive seventy times seven for the same offense (Mt. 18:21-22). This is part of being compassionate and tender-hearted. If you are honest with your own heart, you know the way sin and evil creeps in. You know how much you have been forgiven. As Jesus says, whoever is forgiven little will love very little, but whoever knows they have been forgiven much, will love much (Lk. 7:47).

And wherever forgiveness has not yet been asked for, you ought to have forgiveness waiting and ready for them. As far as it depends upon you, there should be grace in your hearts.

 

Applications

Generational Grace: “Keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation” (Ex. 34:7).

One of the ways we need to practice generational mercy is upstream as well as downstream. This means parents need to make sure they are not harboring any bitterness or resentment toward their own parents or anyone. As you forgive those who have sinned against you, you are passing down mercy rather than guilt to your own children and grandchildren.

Practice Restoration: Love keeps no record of wrongs (1 Cor. 13:5). This is what we call “keeping short accounts.” As soon as sin happens, we want to be dealing with it as quickly as it happened (just like other spills and messes). Don’t let dark clouds hover over your kids (e.g. time outs, grounding, etc.). When discipline has occurred, make sure sin is confessed, forgiveness is extended, and fellowship is fully restored.

Sometimes you’ve practiced bitterness (or guilt), and those thoughts and feelings keep coming back. So have your gospel tennis racket ready to bat them away: Christ died for that. And in place of those old thoughts and words, put on gratitude, compassion, and kindness. Whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely… meditate on those things, with the smiling pleasure of your Father at the center of all of it.

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Delighting in Your People (The Well-Pleased Father #1) (King’s Cross)

Lindsey Gardner on

Introduction

We are a nation of bastards. A bastard is an illegitimate son, a son born out of wedlock, a son without a covenant father, and thereby at some level, abandoned and rejected by his father. This has been enacted by mass fornication, adultery, divorce, and in its most violent form, abortion. Even in the church where there is often far more cohesion, there is still sometimes great tension and distance in our families, where there ought to be delight.

This fatherlessness and generational static have their root cause in our alienation from our Heavenly Father. You cannot reject God the Father Almighty and end up in any kind of happy place. If there is tension between fathers and children, it is because we are not in full fellowship with the Father. Every good and perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of Lights, in whom there is no variation or shadow of turning (Js. 1:17), including the gift of delighting in your family.

The Text: “And Jesus, when He was baptized, went up straightway out of the water: and lo, the heavens were opened unto Him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon Him: and lo a voice from heaven, saying, this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 3:16-17).

 

Summary of the Text

The Father shows up directly in the gospels just a couple of times, and both times He says almost the same thing. The first is at Christ’s baptism: “this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 3:17, Mk. 1:11, Lk. 3:22). The second is the transfiguration: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Mt. 17:5). What we learn in the gospel directly from God the Father is that He is well pleased with His beloved Son.

 

Restored to the Father

Eph. 3:14-15 says, “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom every family in heaven and earth is named.” This means that families exist because God is Triune: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. All human fatherhood gets its meaning and purpose from God the Father. And when the Father shows up, the central thing He wants the whole world to know is that He is well pleased with His beloved Son.

Many men did not have fathers or else their fathers were absent or harsh, and this is why God sent His only Son into the world: “And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children, and the heart of the children to the fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse” (Mal. 4:6, cf. Lk. 1:17). Generational dysfunction and animosity are burdens, and when sin is not dealt with, it is a great curse. But Christ came to bear the curse of sin and heal the generations. He does this by taking away our guilt and shame, but He restores families fundamentally by restoring us to God the Father. “For He [Christ] is our peace… For through Him [Christ] we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father” (Eph. 2:18). That Spirit is the same Spirit that came upon Jesus in His baptism, the same Spirit that caused the Father to proclaim, “this is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Gal. 4:6).

 

Delighting in Your People

Our delight in our people is grounded in the delight of God in His people in His Son. “The LORD thy God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will rejoice over thee with joy; he will rest in his love, he will joy over thee with singing” (Zeph. 3:17). This is not God rejoicing over a perfect people; this is God rejoicing over a people He is saving. This is not a blind love; it is faithful love. It is a delight in what is and what will be.

This is the bedrock of Christian family life: we are The Delighted-In and so we are Delight-Full. Our Father is well-pleased with us. He rejoices over us with singing. It is His holy, infinite delight in us that is to spill over into our homes. This infinite joy is plenty for every Christian, but he who finds a wife finds a good thing and has obtained favor from the Lord (Prov. 18:22). Children are the inheritance of the Lord; they are His great blessing and reward (Ps. 127:3-5, Ps. 128). Christ is the pool into which the pleasures of God pour infinitely (Ps. 16:11), and if you are in Christ, that pleasure pours out of you.

 

Delighting in Creation

This delight is not only directly in your people. God has also created a universe that expresses His delight, and it was created for the enjoyment of God and His people. Delight is a gift, but shared delight multiplies the gift and binds us together. This was part of God’s point in His reply to Job’s great complaints: God points Job to His favorite parts of the universe and invites Job to join Him in ruling the weather patterns, riding constellations, caring for ravens and goats and unicorns, and playing with dragons (Job 38ff).

Our Father delights in His work and creation, and therefore, this delight in work and creation should mark Christian families: work, hobbies, sports, games, camping, fishing…

 

Applications

The center of this delight is a bloody cross where all our sin was nailed and crushed. This is not a humanistic optimism or a stiff upper lip. This is gospel grace. Sin paid for. Debts forgiven. Adopted by the Father. As you have been forgiven, so forgive. Confess, forgive, walk in the light. No backlogs. No bitterness. No hidden sin.

This is also central to discipline and correction. Christian discipline restores joy, which means it must be your baseline. Is your discipline and correction doing that? Parents, your job is to make sure that it actually yields peace and joy (Heb. 12:11).

A Christian family should be marked by playful delight: joyful work, chores, wrestling, tickling, jokes, laughter, singing, dancing, adventures, and games. And in the midst of it all, many, many words of praise, delight, gratitude, and love. Why? Because this is the way of your Father.

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