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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)

And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. (Act 2:38)

Introduction

Letting a person know what the Gospel is, in a way that fits their situation, is one of the goals of Biblical counseling. Let’s suppose your presentation has as its fruit the person’s cautious or even enthusiastic acceptance. Now what? What do you do with the counselee next? There is a sense in which you may have a new Christian on your hands, but you may also simply have a Christian who has learned new things about himself. What do you do now?

Confession of Sin & Repentance

We’ve already said something about these two terms and will again in the coming talks, but it needs to be mentioned again here that the first change that needs to occur in the life of the counselee is to confess their sin to God and anyone else sinned against, and to commit herself, before God, to change

Change

Some say that change takes a long time. But this is mostly false. To go from being a rank unbeliever to becoming like Christ in every way, does take a long time. But each step of the way is instantaneous. Repentance does not take a long time; it only takes a change in mind and action. Making permanent change in a life filled with habits and even addictions, may take a long time. But making a single choice, right now and behaving, thinking, and feeling differently takes only a change of mind and action. It can and should happen as soon as the spirit of God convicts you and you realize it is sinful.

It is also tempting to think that new thoughts or ways of thinking constitute change. But this is an error as well. Change is only change if something different happens. Thinking new thoughts, or even being excited about new thoughts are not change unless something different actually happens as a result of the new thoughts.

So there is a sense in which change happens slowly, but also in which it happens quickly. But change isn’t change unless something changes.

Develop a Plan of Attack

We’ve chatted with the counselee, determined why they think they are there (presenting problems), sought and found the deeper underlying issues (heart desires), have confessed the sin, and are ready to proceed. This is the ‘turning to’ part of repentance. There is a sense in which confession might be considered the beginning of the turning away process and the turning to part is what counseling is really about. Everything up to this point might better be classified as evangelism. It is important, at this point, to have in mind where you want to take the counselee. What is your end game? What do you want the counselee to be doing or be when everything is finished? This will be done in the context of what God wants for the person and you need to keep that consciously in mind, or the problems of the day will most certainly distract you and sidetrack the process. At the same time, you do not want to abandon the counselee’s presenting problem. You don’t want her to think you did the old “bait and switch” on her. She needs to constantly see the connection between God’s answer and her problem(s).

Responsibility

Who is responsible for what? Is God responsible, or is the counselee responsible? This question is one of the first ones that should come up in counseling. If you are going to help the counselee live with God, she needs to know what God expects of her and let everything else go. Generally, people are either overly responsible, irresponsible, or simply confused about the whole process.

Who or Where Is Jesus in All this?

Because the changes in counseling come from God as the counselee spends time with God throughout the week, homework should be extremely heavy on Bible work. But it is not simply bible reading, it includes assignments that include prayer, ministry, reading in specific areas of Scripture, and involvement with others in the faith.

Personal Identity

One of the goals in counseling is to help the person being counseled remember who they are. If left to themselves, they begin to identify with what they have been doing, who they know, who or what they trust, and even who they have convinced themselves they are (divorced, addicted, depressed, ADD, Co-Dependent, etc). What we need to do is to help them receive their self-understanding from Scripture and through the lens of God. These other sources have eliminated God from the picture and the counselee believes her sources before she believes God’s word about who she is. What does the Bible say about who we are? (2 Pet. 1:3-9). You belong to Christ (Rom. 6:1; 7:4; 8:9; 1 Cor. 15:23; Gal. 5:24). We are not sinners—in whatever way it manifests itself, we are Christians.

Involve Others

It is important that you understand that you are not the savior. Jesus is the only savior. He has provided you as a means to point others to him, but he has also provided others to help in the process as well. You are not the one producing change in the counselee, but you do provide a kind of accountability for her that helps her on her way. You direct her path to Christ and your presence helps her along the path, but so does the presence of others. With this in mind you should think about how you might organize those around the counselee to help in the process. Accountability, according to Paul Tripp (Instruments, p. 270, 271), provides: structure, guidance, assistance, encouragement, warning, and ongoing help.

It is Finished

Knowing when the counseling process is over is a very important question. I’ve found that most often the counseling process is over when the person stops coming to meet with me. It might also end in church discipline in a negative direction or when the person is doing well with the Lord and doesn’t need to come any more. Doing well means…

Overall, they are able to consistently glorify God. This shows itself when:

1. The reason they came to me in the first place has been alleviated and they are set free to worship God without bondage.
2. They are studying the Bible on their own, with a joy and a zeal to know God and to serve him more consistently and effectively.
3. They read other, non-biblical books, with the goal to know God and to serve him more consistently and effectively.
4. They talk with others about God: what they are learning, who God is.
5. They are thrilled to be involved in worshipping God with the people of God, both in corporate Sunday worship and in small group worship.
6. They are actively involved in ministering to others.

This paper on Homework came from Bob Somerville

WHAT MAKES A GOOD HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT?

A good homework assignment should assure that the counselee is working in all of the following areas:

• Regular Bible Reading with applicational journaling or at least application.
• Reading in Proverbs
• Read one chapter per day in Proverbs.
• Record one verse that stands out to you.
• Record a sentence on why it is important to you.
• Write out a prayer asking God to accomplish that verse in your life.
• Bring in your journal so that I can be encouraged by what God is teaching you.
• Reading in the Gospels
• Read one chapter per day in the Gospel of Mark this week.
• Keep a journal answering the following questions related to your daily reading:
  • What chapter or verses you read.
  • What did you learn about Jesus from your reading?
  • How should what you learned help you in your walk with Jesus?
  • Write a one sentence prayer thanking God for some aspect of what you learned or asking Him to help you grow in your walk with Him as a result of what you learned.
• Discovering Wonderful Things (DWT – Ps. 119:18) type of memorization with application and praying back to God.
• The counselee is exhibiting a heart issue of self-centeredness therefore I will plan to assign.
• Read one chapter per day in the book of Philippians.
  • Record what portion you read for the day. Keep a journal answering ONE of the following questions related to your daily reading:
    • What did this passage say about God?
    • What does it say about the message of the Gospel?
    • What is one thing from this passage for which I can thank God?
    • Is there a sin to avoid? Is there a command to obey?
    • What is a specific teaching that can be understood from this passage?
    • What did this passage say about putting off sin or putting on righteousness?
    • How will you apply what you have learned from this passage in your life today?
    • From this passage what is one thing I should ask God to Help me with?
    • Write down a specific application you will make in your life today as a result of your reading.
  • Read Phil 2:3-11 every day.
  • Meditate on and do a DWT on Phil 2:3-5.
  • Each day as you read your chapter in Philippians look for what that chapter teaches about Paul’s view of self and serving Christ and others.
• Church Attendance and application of the message.
• Attendance At Church
• Attend church this Sunday. Hebrews 10:23-25
• Take notes on the message.
• Record one application you can make from the message on a 3×5 card. State the application in one sentence. On the back of the card write out the application as a prayer asking God to accomplish this application in your life this week. Carry the card with you and pray it back to God at least once a day. Use it as a book marker in your Bible and pray it to God each time you read the word.
• Look for one person you can greet and show kindness to before or after the service.
• Small group accountability.
• Usually some collateral reading that supports the issue being addressed by the counselee.
• It is good to give a reading assignment but you need to give the counselee more specific responsibility with regards to the reading. Not just to read the book but how can he be a doer of the Word. Example – Read Chapter 1 in The Book Assigned
• Highlight the 10 most important statements from the chapter.
• Come prepared to discuss why each of the statements you highlighted were important to you.
• Choose the most important statement for you to apply in your life right now.
• List three specific steps you can take to start practicing that truth this week.
  • Practice those steps daily.
  • Record the results in your journal and bring them in.

This makes the assignment really practical and measurable.

• Read through Love Life for Every Married Couple by Ed Wheat with your wife.
  • Spend 10 minutes per day 5 days per week reading together.
  • Take turns reading or allow the one who likes to read the best to read.
  • Continually discuss what you read by stating: “I like that, what do you think? or “I’m not sure I agree with that, What do you think?” Do not argue just listen to each other.
  • Highlight the items on which you agree and put a ? mark by items over which you disagree.
  • Write one statement you both agree on from each chapter on a 3×5 card for each of you and review it every day. Put a prayer on the back of the card asking God to accomplish in your life what the statement declares.
• Ongoing emphasis on hope.
  1. Give me a verse for ongoing hope!
  2. Consider this idea for instilling hope:
• Have 3×5 cards with you in the counseling session.
• Write out a specific verse on Hope that you give to the counselee during the session. I.e. 1 Cor 10:13, Heb 13:5.
• Write out 1 Cor 10:13 on a 3×5 card during the session and on the back write out a prayer like this, ‘Father I thank you that you are faithful and that all our problems are common to man. I thank you that you never give us a temptation, test or trail that is greater than we can handle. I thank you that you always provide a way through the problem so that we can handle it. Lord help me to pray in the midst of each trail for the way out.’
• Then give them the card and ask them to review the verse 3 times per day and each time they review the verse pray it back to God.
• This keeps hope before them in a practical way every day throughout the day.
• This idea can be repeated with a new verse each week that they are building in to an arsenal of verses on hope. They can review 15-20 verses on cards a day in just a few minutes and yet it will keep their minds set on the hope we have in Christ.
  1. HOPE AND ROMANS 8:28
• Memorize & do a DWT on Rom 8:28-29.
  • Pray these verses back to God every day asking Him to give you hope in that God is at work for good both temporally and eternally in your life right now. Ask Him to enable you to genuinely believe that He is working all things together for good.
• Read Romans 8 (the whole chapter) every day this week.
  • Journal 1thing each day in the chapter that gives you hope.
    • Write this as a prayer of thanksgiving to God and pray it back to God.
  • Journal 1 thing each day that He could be teaching you through your trial to make you more like Jesus.
    • Write out and pray a one sentence prayer asking God to grow you in that area.

1. Read Christ and Your Problems

• Highlight the 10 most important statements from the booklet.
• Come prepared to discuss why each of the statements you highlighted was important to you.
• Choose the most important statement for you to apply in your life right now.
• List three specific steps you can take to start practicing that truth this week.
• Practice those steps daily.
• Record the results in your journal and bring them in.

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Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. (Gal 6:1)

Introduction

Gathering information about a person is great stuff, but what do we do with it? If we have gone through the first six questions and have used effective events in the person’s life, they should be very ready to hear what God has to say through you and their subsequent homework—which comes in the next lecture.

It is easy when you see a brother or sister in sin to want to “fix” them. And when I was younger, that’s exactly what I sought to do. But it usually backfired because the people I was trying to help often saw me as more full of my own sin than they did theirs. I was unspiritual. I was often trying to play the spiritual one, the one who could fix everyone else’s problems, but I hadn’t taken myself into consideration first. The major difference between someone spiritual trying to help, and someone not spiritual trying to help; is the attitude you bring to the conversation.

You Who Are Spiritual

A spiritual person comes with no dog in the fight. He doesn’t care about himself in the discussion. He is only there because he loves the person and he wants to help that person come to Christ. The counselor is secure in his relationship with God and is only there because he wants the best for the counselee. With this in mind, the counselor will be less inclined to succumb to the various temptations a counselee might present. Sometimes counseling is a lot like trying to touch someone’s eyeball. Because we are dealing with hearts, things can get very personal very quickly. Sometimes, counselees come for one thing and the counselor starts getting close to other things that weren’t on the table to discuss. The counselee can become angry, hurt, frustrated, or impatient. This in turn presents the counselor with the temptation to react in kind. But a spiritual friend will maintain his walk with God and will not fall to that temptation.

Application of the Gospel

It must remembered that the goal of counseling is to bring people to the throne of God in order to help them mature in Christ. Christian maturity causes the counselee to look more and more like Christ. She will begin to talk like Christ, walk like Christ, live like Christ, think like Christ. She will become more and more like Jesus walking around. Sometimes, in the thick of life’s struggles, it is easy to forget this goal and to begin treating symptoms and not causes. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks (Mt. 12:34) and so it is important to always remember that the heart is the goal, not a simple change of mind or external change of behavior.

A major part of this is to remember that all is of Grace. It is all about the Gospel and the provision made by Christ’s death and the power given in his resurrection. We are totally dependent on Christ and the Holy Spirit to give us the new mind, new motivations, new power, new wisdom etc.

The Gospel Itself

It is important at this point to remember what the Gospel is. In a nutshell it is that God created men to make him famous (give glory). We rebelled against our creation purpose, thus earning God’s wrath. God, because he still loved us, sent Jesus to take our punishment, which he did by dying on the cross. And God, also because he loved us, raised Jesus from the dead and seated him at the right hand of the Father where he rules today. This is the Gospel. Nothing more, nothing less. You can go into great detail about what it all means, but at its core, this is the Good News of our salvation. 

Our Message

Love—How much does God love us? There are a couple of ways you can approach the answer to this question. First, God is love (1 Jn 4:16). If God is love, then his thoughts, feelings, actions toward us must be motivated by infinite love. Second, God sent his only son to suffer and die so that we might be saved. Would you send your son or daughter to die for someone who hated you and did everything they could to insult you and denigrate you?

Hate—sometimes it is important to point out that while God loves us, he also hates us. God hates sinners. “The LORD tests the righteous, but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence” (Psa 11:5); “There are six things that the LORD hates, seven that are an abomination to him: haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood, a heart that devises wicked plans, feet that make haste to run to evil, a false witness who breathes out lies, and one who sows discord among brothers” (Pro 6:16-19); “For you are not a God who delights in wickedness; evil may not dwell with you. The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers. You destroy those who speak lies; the LORD abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man” (Psa 5:4-6), are just a few of the passages that explain what God thinks of sinful men and women. This is why God also says the wages of sin is death (Rom. 6:23).

Covenant—Our great salvation came to be because of what the Bible calls covenant. A covenant is a relationship that God establishes with and within different groups of people. He created a covenantal relationship with Adam when he created him and gave him things to do and not do in the garden (Gen. 2). He created a covenantal relationship with Noah after the flood (Gen 9). He established the covenant with the people of Israel in the dessert through Moses (Ex. 14). He did it again with David (Psa 89:3) and finally with Jesus. We call this last one the New Covenant.

There are a few important things to point out for our purposes: First, God has not created several covenants, he has one covenant and has re-established it over and over again throughout history. Second, this is important to know because God has not changed and the covenant is with mankind, not with individuals only. In the same way that an omelet is a collection of eggs, but made up of individual eggs, so the covenant is with mankind and is made up of individual people. Third, this is important because what happens to one part of the covenant, especially the leader, happens to everyone in the relationship. The omelet is still a good example of this. If you have one rotten egg, you have an icky omelet. This is why when Abraham was circumcised, his whole household was circumcised (Gen 17) and when Abraham was blessed his whole family line was also blessed (Gen. 12). It also explains why when Achan took the sacred things in battle, but was not supposed to, he and his whole household were killed (Josh 7) and when Adam sinned we all sinned in him (1 Co. 15:22). Fourth, here is the reason it is all so important. Jesus died and took our punishment because he was our covenant leader or head. The Bible says when he died we died and when he rose from the dead we rose from the dead (Rom. 6:4; Eph. 4:2-6; Col. 2:12). This happened and was possible because of the covenantal union we have with Christ as our head.

In Christ—This covenant relationship explains all the passages in the Bible that talk about our being “in Christ,” “in him,” etc. Our relationship to Christ, because of the covenantal nature of humanity with God, means that when God sees us, he sees us through Jesus (Jn 3:17; Eph. 2:13-17). This is how we can be saved. When Jesus, who did not sin, became sin on our behalf, God recognized our sin in Jesus and killed him, pouring out his judgment and wrath on Jesus. Jesus took our punishment and he took God’s wrath (1Jn. 2:2). But we also died when he died (Lk. 9:23), because we were “in him” when he died. We also were raised from the dead, when he was raised because we were “in him” when he was raised. Because he lives, lives a new life, we too live new lives “in him.” This is why this is all good news.

By Faith—The way we receive all this is by faith. The Bible tells us that faith is a gift from God (Eph. 2:8). It also commands us to believe (Acts 17:30; Jn 14:1; Acts 16:31). So faith is a gift and it is something we choose to do. But what is faith? It is important in the counseling process to know that, depending on the context, the same Greek word—pistos—is translated into three different English words; faith, belief, and trust. If you believe something, you have faith that that thing is true. If you believe something you trust that what it is claiming is true. How do you go from not believing something to believing something? You change your mind. The Bible tells us that our minds and hearts are blind to spiritual things (Jn. 9:39; Lk. 6:39) so unless and until God reveals the truth to us we can’t believe. What does this mean? It means we present the Gospel to people, ask God to open their eyes, and tell them to open their eyes. “I am sending you to open their eyes, so that they may turn from darkness to light and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me” (Act 26:17-18). When a person hears the gospel and believes it, they have been saved.

The Spirit and New Life—The result of having believed is that the person is ushered out of the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of light. The old is gone, the new has come. He is a new creature. He is a Christian. But this is not simply a statement of blank, but empty fact. God is at work in all of this. The Holy Spirit has opened their eyes; they can understand things they could never understand before. More than that the Holy Spirit of God takes up residence inside the new believer and begins a transformation process in him that will make him more like Jesus. In addition, he has a real personal relationship with God which means that when he prays God listens and answers. Because he is in the presence of God in a new way, his personality changes, he begins to talk differently; he begins to love people; to have peace with himself, others, and the world in new and exciting ways; he starts thinking differently about everything. And this is the task of counseling—to help people move along this relational path with the living God so that God can change him and make him more mature in Christ.

The Task of the Counselor

The task of the counselor is often to help the counselee see and understand these things on his own, without telling, preaching, teaching it to him. Sometimes people need to discover their need on their own. The following questions are a means to do that:

1. What was going on in this particular event?
2. What were you thinking of feeling as this event was unfolding?
3. What did you do as a result? Or perhaps what did you not do?
4. What were you seeking to accomplish when you finally did what you did? What were you trying to have happen as a result of what you did? What were your goals? Why that and not something else?
5. What happened as a result? Did you get what you were trying for? Or something else?
6. What would God have asked you to do if you were ever in that situation again?
7. What might we do to prepare for the “next time”?

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Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (Heb 4:14-16)

Introduction

In the last lecture we saw the importance, in the counseling process, of loving the counselee. In this lesson I would like to help you understand how to get to know the counselee in such a way that you will be able to enter into their life and be able to help them in a deeply godly way.

The Wonderful Counselor

This text tells us that Jesus is the wonderful counselor because he understands our weaknesses, our fears, our trials, our circumstances. In another passage we are told that he even understands our sin, because he took our sins on his person and became a perfect sacrifice on our behalf (2 Cor. 5:21). In addition, Jesus knows and understands what we are going through and this makes him a great counselor. But he knows our weakness in two ways. He knows it because he suffered too, but he also knows it because he suffered until the temptations finally petered out. He experienced the full range of suffering, whereas we usually collapse before it is over. In the same way that Jesus knows us and our weaknesses, we need to get to know our friends and their weaknesses. We are not getting to know their weaknesses so that we can know things, but so that we can help them know themselves from a different vantage point—God’s vantage point.

Assumptions and Conclusions

When listening to a person telling their story, a couple of temptations need to be avoided. First, don’t assume anything. If you don’t know what a person means by a phrase, word, or idea simply ask them to clarify what they are talking about. Most of the time, you will be coming to a counseling situation from a very different place. They might be old, you young; they might be man, you a woman; they might have spent their early years in poverty, you in comparative wealth; there are any number of differences between you and every other person you will talk to and you want to be very careful that you don’t assume you know what they are talking about. Ask a lot of clarifying questions.

These clarifying questions come in at least three areas: First, clarify terms and terminology. What are they saying? What does it mean? Are they speaking English at all? Second, ask them to illustrate what they are talking about. Part of the process of data gathering is to get to know people through the stories of their life. Asking the counselee to give you a real-life example of what they are talking about will both make it clearer and will give you something to refer to later in the counseling process. Third, you will want to go into more detail later, perhaps, but it is often helpful to ask why people do what they do in the story they tell.

Data Gathering Questions

Be careful not to ask questions that can be answered with a “Yes,” “No,” or an “I don’t know.” What were you thinking? What happened? What did they say then? What were you feeling? What kinds of things were you trying to have happen as a result of what you did? ‘What’ questions make it almost impossible for the counselee to answer with short, meaningless, and useless answers. From these primary kinds of questions, you can move on to the standard why, how, how often, and when kinds of questions.

In addition to questions that lead to answers that actually help the process, it is usually good to ask questions in a logical order. The next question should come from the previous answer until the topic is expended or explained. Sometimes the situation might be pretty intense, and you will feel the need to jump around from topic to topic, just to keep things moving. But make note of those times and get back to them in the future. Sometimes counselees will attempt to distract you if you get too close to revealing their heart. People often want help, but they don’t want all the help God wants to give.

“X-Ray Questions” by David Powlison: (http://www.ccef.org/product-download/x-ray-questions-drawing-out-whys-and-wherefores-human-behavior)

Observing the Data

Once you have all the information, now what do you do? First, remember why you are here. You are here to help the counselee draw closer to God so that God can change her heart and make her more Christ like.

Second, with this in mind, begin translating everything into Biblical terms. If the counselee has been psychologized, this is a little bit more difficult, but I try to reconstruct everything and put it all into terms found in the Bible. For example, if the counselee is a young women who says she is bulimic. I might ask her to explain that in Biblical terms. Of course bulimia is not in the Bible, but self-love is. She might not know that is what is happening, so it gives me the opportunity to dig a little bit deeper when she explains what bulimia actually is. She throws up. Why? Because she thinks she is fat. Why? Because she isn’t as thin as her favorite movie star. Why is that important? Who says? Who says she should be as thin as her favorite movie star? Who says throwing up is a good idea? Where is God in all this? What would God say about who she is? Bringing the conversation to the Word of God helps clear up the problem from the fluff and in the end we see that she thinks wrongly about herself in a number of different ways and she is getting her information from all the wrong sources.

Third, I take the different events that have come up in conversation and I organize them according to how I think they will help me show the counselee her own heart. If she does not see her need for Christ in her life in specific ways, she will not be really helped. She might stop doing the things that are getting her in trouble or causing the presenting problem, but if she doesn’t go the heart of the problem, those symptoms of heart disease will come back again like before—perhaps stronger (Mt. 12:45), or they will just pop up again in some other manifestation. This organization might be the most emotional event first or the least. It might be the most recent historically, or it might be the most distant. I try to read the situation and seek God’s guidance and wisdom on how hard to push and how gentle to be. Sometimes people appreciate you not dumping the whole load at first, sometimes they get angry with you for taking so long when you knew all along.

Dealing with an Event

An event is a series of actions at a particular time, involving the counselee and some action, thought, or emotion that was sinful. The event focuses on the counselee. If there were others involved in the event, they are secondary to the counselee and what they did, said, felt, or thought. Keeping this distinction helps narrow down the event so that you can talk about it with the counselee in a controlled and dispassionate way.

I ask seven primary questions when I want to pursue an event: First, what was going on in this particular event? I’m simply trying to get the facts here. What happened, when, who was involved, where was it, etc.? Sometimes, one event turns in to several smaller events and each one can be talked about separately, but I try to talk about one at a time.

Second, I ask, what were you thinking or feeling as this event was unfolding? What I’m looking for here are motives, reasons, lords, rulers, slave drivers, things the counselee might blame her action on. I want her to begin to notice that she wasn’t just reacting. She was thinking and feeling things. Her response to those thoughts or feelings were what she chose to do based on something deeper within her. She is not automaton reacting like some kind of machine.

Third, I ask her, what she actually did. Based on what was happening, What did you do? Or perhaps what did you not do? This one is pretty straight forward. The stress was rising, the wire was getting tighter and tighter, things were getting hotter and hotter, everything finally snapped. And wham! All Hell broke loose.

Fourth, why did you pick that thing to do out of all the different things you could have done? What were you trying to have happen as a result of what you did? What were your goals? Why that and not something else?

Fifth, what happened as a result? Did you get what you were trying for? Or something else?

Sixth, what would God have asked you to do if you were ever in that situation again? This questions brings God into the story in a way that is very natural and doesn’t take all that much boldness. At this point, if you have picked good events and enough of them the counselee is pretty ready to talk about some solutions that don’t involve terrible consequences. At this point in the session the counselee has seen that her way of dealing with problems is not a very helpful solution and in fact usually causes more problems than they solve.

Finally, we ask, what might we do to prepare for the “next time.” How can we work with God’s way of doing things to ensure a godly outcome next time instead of the train wreck that has been the counselee’s life up this point. This is where real counseling begins. When the counselee sees their need for something bigger than themselves, they are usually ready to listen to the Word of God and to do what God has for them to do.

A Quick Word About Emotions

There has been much confusion over how emotions work. Some people think emotions lead us or guide us. And sometimes they do. But what is really happening is that emotions follow thoughts and intentions of the heart. Unless there is something wrong physically, emotions are expressions of thoughts. When a person thinks of something happy, his emotions kick in and he feels happy. When he thinks about something he doesn’t like, his emotions might kick in and he feels angry. But initially, emotions follow thinking. When strong emotions are elicited quickly and with great force, they may appear to be leading the charge, but this is a misunderstanding. It is most often a sign of a lack of self-control for a person to be led by their emotions. They aren’t really being lead this way, they are simply passing the buck and avoiding taking the responsibility for their thoughts and intentions. Emotions follow thinking. Sometimes the thinking doesn’t take very long to produce the emotion. Some people have pretty short fuses, but though it is quick, emotions still follow thinking.

Reading

X-Ray Questions, can be found on-line or as one of the chapters in Seeing with New Eyes, by David Powlison

Instruments in the Redeemer’s Hands, by Paul Tripp

Feelings and Faith: Cultivating Godly Emotions in the Christian Life, by Brian Borgman

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