Lecture 5: Marriage and Family Counseling

00:00:00.000 | There's one more slide that we have to deal with when it comes to dealing with the goals

00:00:11.280 | of counseling, and it's a slide that really helps us to set things up for the next part

00:00:20.500 | of our class, which deals with the process of dynamics of marriage and family counseling.

00:00:27.660 | And this particular slide really has to deal with the overall eight I's.

00:00:34.220 | Now this is just something that was developed to help us to remember key areas of the counseling

00:00:42.580 | process, and it has to do with really the issue that Ephesians 4 talks about, beginning

00:00:51.160 | in verse 22, putting off and putting on, the counseling process, in a sense, is dedicated

00:00:59.520 | to that.

00:01:01.040 | And our purpose here is, in the early part of counseling, to get at the root issues of

00:01:05.940 | people's hearts, address these with what the Bible says is going on, diagnose them properly

00:01:13.320 | when there's been a problem between a husband and a wife, and then help them, obviously,

00:01:18.700 | to change, because all counseling has that in common.

00:01:23.560 | We want to change so that people will bear good fruit.

00:01:28.600 | Well, the first aspect of that, putting off, requires involvement with the family.

00:01:35.640 | That is, creating that type of relationship where they know, in the depths of their heart,

00:01:42.360 | that we have their long-term interests, first and foremost, in mind.

00:01:46.440 | We've gained involvement when that has happened.

00:01:49.520 | When they know that we have their long-term interest in mind, we can't just assume that.

00:01:54.320 | These may be people that have been a part of our church for many years, and we can't

00:01:59.120 | just assume that they believe that we are their good friends.

00:02:05.760 | They may not assume that.

00:02:07.040 | They may not think that we have their long-term interest in mind in relationship to what is

00:02:14.040 | godly and what is righteous and what is Christlike.

00:02:17.400 | So we have to gain involvement with them.

00:02:19.240 | That's vitally important.

00:02:20.800 | Secondly, has to do with inspiration.

00:02:23.160 | We have to give them hope.

00:02:24.720 | Most people who have been struggling with marital problems or family problems have lost

00:02:28.700 | a lot of hope.

00:02:29.960 | They're discouraged.

00:02:33.960 | They're unhappy.

00:02:36.280 | And they've tried to resolve their problems in the past, and there hasn't been a whole

00:02:40.080 | lot of success in resolving them.

00:02:42.460 | So they've lost a lot of hope.

00:02:46.360 | So you spend a good deal of time ministering hope, biblical hope to them.

00:02:50.100 | Help them to understand that God intends only good to come out of this.

00:02:55.520 | It's kind of that same thing that Joseph said to his brothers in Genesis 50-20.

00:03:00.760 | You intended this for evil, but God intended it for good, the saving of many lives.

00:03:05.440 | So people and circumstances may be evil in our lives, but God ends up taking that evil

00:03:12.700 | and turning it around to that which is best for us, for you and me.

00:03:18.780 | And so in counseling, it's vitally important that we communicate that kind of hope.

00:03:22.960 | One of the best verses to do that is 1 Corinthians 10-13.

00:03:26.980 | "There is therefore now no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus."

00:03:31.580 | Oh, I'm actually quoting Romans 8-1.

00:03:37.940 | "No temptation has taken you except for what is common to man, and God is faithful.

00:03:42.940 | He will not allow us to be tempted above what we're able."

00:03:47.700 | So 1 Corinthians 10-13 communicates a lot of hope.

00:03:52.900 | In other words, there's nothing that we're facing in life that's absolutely unique.

00:03:56.780 | Other people have faced it, and they've been able to face it successfully, and they've

00:04:00.700 | been able to handle these type of problems successfully with God's help.

00:04:06.220 | Romans 8-28-29 is another couple of verses that are oriented towards hope.

00:04:12.740 | Or Romans 15-4, "The scriptures were given to us so that through our study of them and

00:04:19.080 | through perseverance, we might have hope."

00:04:23.460 | So there's no reason that we shouldn't have hope.

00:04:28.380 | I don't care what the problem would be as long as God is behind the problem.

00:04:32.700 | Sometimes I say to counselees in this inspiration phase of counseling, so to speak, I say, "Your

00:04:38.620 | problem looks like a gigantic mountain in front of you, right?"

00:04:41.940 | Oh, yeah.

00:04:42.940 | This is huge.

00:04:43.940 | This is huge in my life.

00:04:46.220 | But I want you to be able to lift your eyes above and behind that mountain and see God

00:04:51.580 | standing.

00:04:52.580 | He's bigger than this mountain.

00:04:54.700 | This problem looks like a gigantic mountain, but I want you to see God standing behind

00:04:58.780 | that mountain.

00:04:59.780 | He's bigger than this mountain in your life.

00:05:02.780 | And that's when they begin to have hope, when they lift their eyes above their problems

00:05:06.780 | and look at God in the picture.

00:05:09.580 | So that's when inspiration actually takes over.

00:05:14.220 | Then if we really truly are concerned about resolving their problem, then that brings

00:05:18.160 | us to the third area here, which has to do with inventory.

00:05:23.260 | Inventory is where we do a lot of data gathering.

00:05:28.180 | Proverbs 13:15 talks about the fact that a man who speaks before he hears is a fool.

00:05:36.220 | And we don't want to be foolish in our counseling.

00:05:39.660 | We want to listen carefully to where people are coming from.

00:05:42.580 | We want to listen carefully to their problems.

00:05:45.660 | I had a young lady earlier in one of our college classes today ask me the question about the

00:05:51.740 | fact, what do you do if you have a friend or somebody that comes to you and they share

00:05:55.620 | with you some information about someone else and you attempt to help them from the word

00:05:59.700 | of God deal with this problem?

00:06:02.060 | And remember that from a biblical perspective, it's not gossip if you're a part of the problem

00:06:07.580 | or you're a part of the solution of the problem.

00:06:09.740 | It's not gossip.

00:06:11.300 | But if you're just listening to bad things about other people, that's gossip.

00:06:15.420 | And this gal moved right in and wanted to help her friend.

00:06:18.860 | Well, the other person in the party also came along and started talking with her.

00:06:23.220 | And she was asking me the question, how do you keep from being prejudiced in those kind

00:06:28.340 | of situations?

00:06:31.140 | And my answer to her was Proverbs chapter 18 and verse 17, where it says, "The first

00:06:39.900 | to plead his case seems right until another comes and examines him."

00:06:44.400 | So when you're data gathering, especially in a family counseling situation, you've got

00:06:49.800 | to listen to all sides of the story.

00:06:53.940 | And boy, that's especially true in marital conflicts.

00:07:00.160 | I've had husband or a wife come to me and start describing what's going on in their

00:07:04.480 | marriage.

00:07:05.480 | And when they got done, I thought that their spouse was the worst person to walk the planet.

00:07:11.320 | All right, then later on, I had a chance to talk with their spouse.

00:07:17.400 | And all of a sudden, that changed the whole picture.

00:07:21.120 | Now I understood this a little bit better.

00:07:22.640 | I got a different perspective on what was going on between them.

00:07:26.520 | But just looking at one side of the story seemed to distort the whole thing.

00:07:31.600 | So you've got to do proper data gathering.

00:07:38.040 | I had said earlier that that other passage was Proverbs 13, 15.

00:07:43.240 | It's actually Proverbs 18, 13, "He who gives an answer before he hears, it is a fall and

00:07:48.680 | a shame to him."

00:07:49.960 | That's the importance of good data gathering and counseling.

00:07:53.200 | We don't want our counselees to have fools for counselors.

00:07:58.380 | And how's that going to happen?

00:08:00.560 | Well, we're going to ask a lot of questions.

00:08:03.400 | We're going to collect a lot of information.

00:08:05.360 | We're going to make sure we get all sides of the story.

00:08:08.520 | We won't jump to conclusions, or we won't allow ourselves to become biased or prejudiced

00:08:14.320 | in one way or another.

00:08:17.360 | And that's another thing, by the way, oftentimes you have to say to a husband or a wife, "Listen,

00:08:21.720 | I'm not on your side, Tom.

00:08:24.680 | And Terry, I'm not on your side either.

00:08:29.060 | I'm on God's side.

00:08:31.240 | I want God to win out here."

00:08:33.660 | It's not important whether or not Tom wins out or Terry wins out.

00:08:37.720 | What's really important here is whether or not God wins out.

00:08:42.480 | That's the side that I'm on.

00:08:43.920 | So you've got to collect a lot of good information.

00:08:45.760 | Well, after you've collected it, then what are you going to do with it?

00:08:48.400 | Which brings us to number four.

00:08:50.240 | Then you have to take that information and you have to spend a little bit of time thinking

00:08:53.080 | through it.

00:08:54.160 | That's part of interpretation.

00:08:56.500 | How are you going to interpret what's going on in that marriage?

00:08:59.200 | What are the core problems?

00:09:01.760 | And then you have to prioritize those core problems.

00:09:04.020 | What are the things that I need to address first and what do I need to put off and address

00:09:07.400 | later?

00:09:08.940 | Sometimes expediency rules and you have to address some external issues before you can

00:09:14.720 | really get down to the hard issues that are important issues.

00:09:19.840 | Just to sort of get those things out of the way, so to speak, so that they don't cause

00:09:23.840 | any more additional damage.

00:09:26.160 | You can't always just go into counseling and go right after a hard issue.

00:09:31.460 | So that's the interpretational phrase.

00:09:33.080 | And once you get to that, then you have a pretty good idea what's going on at the root

00:09:38.040 | of this marital conflict or this problem at the root.

00:09:42.040 | What is going on in the heart?

00:09:44.440 | Then you need to address this and putting on the good fruit through instruction.

00:09:49.740 | That is bringing the word of God to bear upon it.

00:09:52.420 | Not only does the word of God help us to diagnose the problem, but it also gives us the remedy

00:09:57.040 | or the cure for the problem.

00:09:59.720 | So our instruction, our teaching at this point, helps them to understand what they need to

00:10:04.320 | do in this issue.

00:10:07.100 | Then number six has to do with inducement.

00:10:10.800 | And then that means it's not enough to just merely teach them the word of God.

00:10:16.840 | We have to encourage them, persuade them to follow the word of God.

00:10:25.720 | The apostle Paul was fond of using the word "urge."

00:10:29.860 | "I urge you."

00:10:33.040 | And when he uses that word "urge," he's trying to be persuasive.

00:10:38.320 | He's turning up the emotional pressure on them.

00:10:41.960 | He's saying, "You need to follow this.

00:10:45.400 | I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice.

00:10:52.720 | I urge you."

00:10:53.720 | Why is he doing that?

00:10:55.620 | That's inducement.

00:10:56.620 | It's not enough to just teach factual things about the Bible and expect your counselees

00:11:02.720 | to naturally respond.

00:11:04.400 | You've got to encourage them, persuade them, induce them, urge them.

00:11:11.640 | You have to be persuasive.

00:11:16.480 | Just the way you would put together a sermon to be persuasive to your congregation, you

00:11:20.760 | have to put together the data for your counseling to be persuasive to people.

00:11:26.580 | So it's not just enough to just teach the Bible.

00:11:29.900 | You've got to be persuasive with the Bible.

00:11:33.340 | Now there's a difference between being persuasive and being manipulative.

00:11:38.460 | You know that you're becoming manipulative when you're issuing threats, especially personal

00:11:45.180 | threats.

00:11:46.820 | No, you're not being, you're not supposed to be manipulative.

00:11:52.180 | As counselors, we don't do that.

00:11:55.660 | We're supposed to be persuasive.

00:11:58.860 | This has got to make sense to them because this is going to be hard for them to do to

00:12:03.620 | make these changes.

00:12:05.560 | So inducement is number six, implementation is number seven.

00:12:09.780 | Then you need to show them and teach them how they can take these biblical truths and

00:12:14.940 | really implement them for life change in their life.

00:12:19.660 | Now you're getting to some very practical things, very practical suggestions.

00:12:27.460 | How can I implement this so that my life will really change?

00:12:30.700 | What is it do I need to, what do I need to change on a motivational level?

00:12:35.220 | What do I need to change on a thinking level?

00:12:37.500 | What do I need to change on a behavioral level?

00:12:42.940 | How am I going to go about that particular change?

00:12:47.260 | So you need to help them to implement those changes.

00:12:52.620 | And then last of all, number eight is integration.

00:12:56.800 | That is, this is sort of a Galatians chapter six and verse one process where you're trying

00:13:05.060 | to restore them back to good functioning as a husband and a wife, as a family, back into

00:13:13.360 | the church.

00:13:15.820 | This particular sin has paralyzed them and it's broken them down.

00:13:20.420 | They're no longer functioning well and now you've showed them what they need to do to

00:13:25.260 | change and they've begun the process of change and the restoration has come around.

00:13:32.420 | Now what do you do?

00:13:33.500 | Now you need to integrate them right back into the body life of the church, back into

00:13:41.620 | normal functioning, only probably for the first time ever in their marital life or in

00:13:48.140 | their family are they really responding and interacting with each other in a biblical

00:13:53.580 | way.

00:13:54.740 | So you need to spend time integrating them back into the body life of the church, back

00:14:05.460 | into normal life again where they're ministering and serving God and serving other people in

00:14:13.260 | such a way that people are blessed.

00:14:24.100 | People actually are benefited from their service.

00:14:33.020 | Now they have ceased being a liability in your church and now they've become an asset

00:14:38.900 | to your church because you have taken them through that restoration process.

00:14:45.520 | So that's what we mean by the eight I's.

00:14:49.140 | Those eight things are key for putting off the old way of life, putting on the new way

00:14:54.700 | of life and bringing about lasting biblical change.

00:15:01.480 | Now that helps to set us up to talk about the process dynamics in counseling and we're

00:15:08.420 | going to take these eight I's and sort of break them down for marriage and family purposes

00:15:13.660 | into a little acrostic CAPT, I talked about that in our last class period.

00:15:20.740 | The first one C actually stands for what is the context, A has to do with assessment,

00:15:28.660 | P has to do with how to make those things permanent and T has to do with when do I know

00:15:37.280 | that it's a good time to terminate counseling and graduate them from counseling.

00:15:42.220 | So let's deal with C first of all.

00:15:44.620 | What about context?

00:15:46.920 | This is where you're trying to nurture a conducive atmosphere in which a relationship may grow.

00:15:53.980 | You cultivate rapport, hope, involvement and inspiration of the eight I's is what you're

00:15:59.320 | interested in here with a marriage and a family couple.

00:16:08.220 | Well how do you do that?

00:16:09.220 | Number one, you have to build the session tasks, build the session tasks.

00:16:17.840 | That involves establish a definite time and a place to meet.

00:16:26.840 | That time should be a time where they can be alert, they're not tired, it's not something

00:16:36.220 | that's late at night where they're ready to go to bed and they're really sleepy.

00:16:41.780 | They can be alert, they can interact with each other well, it needs to be a time like

00:16:51.820 | that.

00:16:52.820 | And then they need to have the right kind of place and this is usually a place without

00:16:58.900 | distractions.

00:16:59.900 | No phone calls or cell phones or children interrupting them.

00:17:07.780 | Sometimes it's helpful just within an American or European culture to get them to come to

00:17:13.420 | an office at the church.

00:17:15.660 | Because if a person has to leave their home and go to an office, it's just much more,

00:17:22.500 | they're in much more of a mood to do business, to really get down and work on things.

00:17:29.180 | If they're in the comfort of their own home, they have a tendency to be a little bit more

00:17:35.020 | lazy, slothful and follow through.

00:17:43.900 | Now can you counsel people in their homes?

00:17:46.500 | Yes, you can.

00:17:48.300 | And certainly according to Acts chapter 20 and verse 20, that's what Paul did, he went

00:17:52.620 | from house to house.

00:17:54.520 | So you can do that, it's not a bad thing to do it.

00:17:59.180 | It's just that within our culture, sometimes people view the home as a place of relaxation,

00:18:05.100 | escape from the pressures and stresses of the world.

00:18:08.700 | It's a place where I really don't do anything real, real serious.

00:18:13.860 | But if they have to get out and leave the home and go to somewhere like a church, a

00:18:18.500 | church building and sit down in an office across from a person at a desk, then they're

00:18:24.340 | much more alert, much more active, much more engaged in the counseling when they have to

00:18:28.700 | do that.

00:18:31.000 | Sometimes I found that that's actually a preferable atmosphere.

00:18:34.220 | I would tell people, you know, I'll spend a session or so with you in your home, but

00:18:38.380 | eventually I want to move over to my office.

00:18:40.460 | Because one of the big things is, I have at my fingertips all the books I need, if I want

00:18:46.060 | to pull off books and I want them to study something, they're right there.

00:18:49.100 | I have homework all set up in my drawers for them so I can pull that homework out and give

00:18:53.500 | it to them.

00:18:55.980 | And then sending it home, send them home with that homework to finish.

00:19:00.540 | So I have a lot more at my fingertips.

00:19:05.660 | If I'm in my office setting and I've got my Bible there and all my teaching tools there

00:19:11.100 | and a whiteboard there and I can use that, that's going to be very helpful.

00:19:16.340 | So establish a definite time and place.

00:19:19.740 | Yeah.

00:19:20.740 | >> Kind of a practical question.

00:19:21.740 | How do you keep yourself above reproach if there's a woman, you know, and say it's a

00:19:32.740 | small church, you know, and your office is, you know, upstairs in the church or something?

00:19:39.540 | >> No, that's a very practical question.

00:19:41.460 | How do you keep yourself above reproach if you're a pastor and there's a woman that needs

00:19:48.580 | counseling in your congregation?

00:19:50.700 | Can a pastor, there's a fundamental question that's kind of behind that.

00:19:54.100 | Can a pastor counsel a woman?

00:19:56.100 | And I want to say absolutely yes.

00:19:57.940 | If you don't, then you're cutting off half of your congregation from the person who's

00:20:02.920 | supposed to be theologically trained.

00:20:07.060 | And that's not good.

00:20:09.100 | That doesn't mean that there can't be other people within the congregation who can eventually,

00:20:14.700 | if you train them right in the Word of God, counsel them.

00:20:18.260 | But you're cutting them off from the theological expert and that theological expert is the

00:20:23.620 | person who should know how to counsel their problem well.

00:20:28.180 | So the answer is yes, but you're exactly right because even though your intentions may be

00:20:35.820 | absolutely 100% pure, you want to avoid the appearance of evil of anything that happens.

00:20:43.220 | So it's always been a policy and it even is here at the Master College and Seminary in

00:20:50.340 | my offices that, in fact, we have a policy hanging on the wall that says a male faculty

00:20:58.260 | member cannot counsel a female without another person present, especially another female

00:21:03.620 | present whether it be an admin assistant or someone has to be there in order for that

00:21:09.860 | to take place.

00:21:10.860 | And when that happens, then the window on their door has to be opened, all right.

00:21:16.180 | In other words, there's nothing covering the window so people walking by can see everything

00:21:20.380 | that's going on in that office.

00:21:22.580 | If you come to my office, there's a big window there and you can see what's going on and

00:21:26.660 | if there's a gal in there, then that window is always open.

00:21:29.660 | People can always see what's happening there.

00:21:32.380 | And that you always station yourself on one side of a desk and she's on the other side

00:21:37.100 | of the desk.

00:21:39.220 | Now I know that there are some pastors who say, "I don't counsel women because too many

00:21:42.860 | pastors have fallen that way."

00:21:44.140 | And that's true.

00:21:45.140 | A lot of pastors have fallen that way, but a lot of pastors also have fallen with secretaries

00:21:49.260 | too.

00:21:50.260 | So are we going to rule out secretaries?

00:21:51.260 | I know of pastors who have fallen in the ministry by going house to house evangelism.

00:21:57.100 | So are we going to stop evangelism too based upon that same rationale?

00:22:00.420 | No, I don't think so.

00:22:02.300 | I don't think we're going to do that.

00:22:04.340 | All of this is dealing with the personal lives of people.

00:22:07.020 | No, but you have to set it up in such a way where there is no temptation or there's no

00:22:13.180 | hint of temptation that's going on there.

00:22:17.760 | So I don't want to cut off half the congregation from the person who's supposed to be theologically

00:22:24.900 | trained.

00:22:27.340 | Those women need answers.

00:22:29.140 | Now, later on, when you get into a church and you train up a group of women in your

00:22:32.860 | church who are just as competent as you are dealing and handling the Word of God, then

00:22:38.780 | you don't have to counsel women anymore.

00:22:40.580 | It's great, man.

00:22:41.620 | You've got them all trained up.

00:22:43.100 | Some of the women in my congregation were actually better counselors than I were.

00:22:47.460 | And I would have a tendency to deal real gently with some of these women.

00:22:52.380 | I mean, my goodness, they would go after the juggler vein.

00:22:57.620 | They'd really go after him.

00:22:59.660 | They wouldn't cut him any slack at all.

00:23:02.460 | And they were really good at it.

00:23:05.040 | They didn't let him slide by on their excuses.

00:23:07.740 | So sometimes it may take you a while to train those kind of people up that will really take

00:23:16.620 | on that kind of administering, and until you do, you've still got to be able to minister

00:23:19.980 | to people.

00:23:21.580 | Let me show this to you.

00:23:23.580 | Go over to Colossians 128.

00:23:26.460 | Colossians 128, Paul talks about the fact of his own personal ministry.

00:23:40.900 | And actually, Colossians 128 is about his counseling ministry primarily.

00:23:47.260 | He says, "We proclaim him admonishing," there's our word, "nuthateo," admonishing, warn, instructing,

00:23:53.460 | counseling every man, teaching every man with all wisdom so that we may present every

00:23:59.340 | man complete in Christ.

00:24:02.660 | Now mankind here is used generically, so he's talking about both men and women.

00:24:11.900 | That's what he would do.

00:24:14.140 | He would admonish men and women in his congregation.

00:24:16.840 | He would teach men and women in the congregation so that he might present every man or woman

00:24:22.020 | complete in Christ.

00:24:26.580 | So that was Paul's desire, that's what he wanted.

00:24:32.340 | So I don't think it's wrong that a guy can counsel a woman in a congregation, but you

00:24:41.580 | do have to set up safeguards so no failure occurs.

00:24:50.300 | And that your congregation understands those safeguards.

00:24:54.600 | If you have secretaries in the church, they understand all the procedures.

00:24:57.300 | You have other staff members in the church, they also understand the procedures.

00:25:02.180 | And again, your motivation may be absolutely 100% pure.

00:25:10.060 | Let me give you another example.

00:25:11.760 | Back several years ago, I know of a situation where a pastor, his wife had been sick for

00:25:22.440 | a long period of time, and the entire congregation was praying for her.

00:25:27.460 | So this was common knowledge among the congregation.

00:25:30.940 | She was at home in bed for many weeks.

00:25:37.440 | And this pastor one night got a call from a woman in the congregation saying, "Pastor,

00:25:42.960 | I need your help and I need it now.

00:25:44.880 | I'm in terrible trouble and I need for you to come over and help me."

00:25:50.060 | So the pastor said, "Okay, I'll be over."

00:25:52.720 | And as soon as he hung up, he called up one of the elders in his church and got him out

00:25:57.400 | of bed.

00:25:58.400 | This was like two or three o'clock in the morning, and said, "Hey, Joe, you need to

00:26:02.900 | go with me.

00:26:04.680 | This woman in our congregation has got problems and we need to go over and help her."

00:26:10.160 | She was a single woman.

00:26:13.360 | And so, this is a true story.

00:26:17.360 | They showed up at her apartment complex.

00:26:18.920 | She lived on the second floor, and they went up to the second floor and knocked on her

00:26:23.160 | door.

00:26:24.160 | And as soon as they knocked, she threw the door open and she was standing there in a

00:26:29.080 | negligee, and she wrapped her arms around the pastor and had a person standing behind

00:26:32.960 | her to take a picture.

00:26:36.280 | And right in the middle of that picture was the elder, smiling.

00:26:44.320 | If that pastor had not taken that elder, she was out to frame him.

00:26:48.440 | That would have totally ruined his entire ministry.

00:26:52.400 | She was out to destroy his ministry because there was something in the church that she

00:26:55.760 | didn't like.

00:26:58.000 | And he was just there, genuinely, to help this woman.

00:27:03.280 | So you may have an absolutely pure motive in helping, but you have to set it up so that

00:27:12.920 | those things don't happen.

00:27:14.460 | You can easily lose your entire ministry if somebody sets you up for that.

00:27:20.880 | So that's the reason those policies are not just to protect you against your own flesh

00:27:25.320 | or that other woman against her own flesh and its desires, but that policy there is

00:27:33.160 | to protect you from the wrong intentions of other people and the wrongdoings of other

00:27:38.720 | people.

00:27:40.200 | So that needs to be there.

00:27:41.200 | So you asked a good question.

00:27:44.520 | Any other questions about that?

00:27:47.200 | All right, well, so you have to have the right kind of time, you have to have the right kind

00:27:53.680 | of place, and it needs to be a place that's not filled with distractions.

00:27:59.960 | I was working with a person back a few years ago who was trying to get their certification

00:28:09.040 | in counseling, and in the process of getting their certification, they set up a counseling

00:28:13.640 | appointment in a restaurant.

00:28:16.360 | That's one of the worst places in the world to do counseling, and every five minutes the

00:28:24.680 | waitress is coming up asking, "Hey, do you need anything more to drink?

00:28:27.520 | Can I help you anymore?"

00:28:29.560 | You can't do that.

00:28:30.720 | You can't do that in counseling.

00:28:31.840 | You're constantly interrupted.

00:28:33.680 | There are a thousand things that are going on, friends walking by the table, people you

00:28:37.160 | don't expect to be there, all kinds of...

00:28:39.480 | That's a terrible environment.

00:28:41.080 | You need an environment, hopefully, that where you can meet with your counselee, there's

00:28:47.560 | some chairs there, and you can pull yourselves up to a table, and you can lay your Bibles

00:28:52.120 | on the table, you can lay your notebooks on the table, and you can really work on problems.

00:28:59.960 | Let me mention one other thing about time.

00:29:02.760 | Most counseling appointments should not exceed an hour.

00:29:07.640 | Now, there's nothing in the Bible that says that.

00:29:11.680 | It's just within our culture, people start to tune out after that.

00:29:19.400 | Maybe an hour and a half at the longest, but from that point on, after you've gone 90 minutes,

00:29:28.560 | you get decreasing returns on your counseling.

00:29:34.640 | People get tired.

00:29:36.880 | You've been focusing and concentrating on issues, and working on change, and showing

00:29:41.800 | them what the Word of God has to say.

00:29:44.520 | And our temptation is to give them the entire boatload of everything that they should know

00:29:50.360 | from the Bible about their problem in one session.

00:29:53.920 | That's our temptation.

00:29:54.920 | That's mine.

00:29:55.920 | Maybe it's not yours, but it's mine.

00:29:59.280 | And so, I'm just going on, and I'm going, "Let's go to this passage.

00:30:02.200 | Let me explain to you this.

00:30:03.280 | Let me go to this passage.

00:30:04.280 | Let me explain to you this.

00:30:05.280 | And we'll go over here and answer all your problems and explain to you this."

00:30:07.920 | And all of a sudden, that time just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger.

00:30:11.160 | You know what's going to happen?

00:30:12.160 | Even though you can be incredibly helpful to that counselee during that time, and you

00:30:15.720 | give them amazing insights into the Word of God to help them with their problem, they're

00:30:20.680 | going to be reluctant to come back.

00:30:22.560 | You know why?

00:30:23.560 | Because they remember, "That was a long session.

00:30:28.080 | That was long."

00:30:29.080 | They're going to be really reluctant.

00:30:32.080 | So an hour, an hour and a half at the longest, then cut it off.

00:30:39.200 | Say, "Hey, we'll pick up there next time."

00:30:43.240 | Let them go home and digest what you've given them.

00:30:46.200 | Don't give them too much.

00:30:47.200 | I don't care how intelligent they are.

00:30:49.880 | Don't overload them.

00:30:54.760 | Just like a baby.

00:30:55.760 | You feed a child too much, and guess what that child's going to do?

00:30:59.120 | They're going to spit it back at you, okay?

00:31:03.560 | And that's what these counselees are going to do, too.

00:31:06.040 | You overload them during one session with too much, and they can't handle it.

00:31:12.400 | They'll lose it.

00:31:14.760 | You can't do that.

00:31:16.160 | Jesus understood that.

00:31:17.800 | I mean, you remember how the disciples used to press him about who he was and the aspects

00:31:23.240 | of his kingdom?

00:31:24.240 | And he kept saying to them, "It's not the right time.

00:31:28.720 | It's not for you to know now, but later."

00:31:33.400 | In other words, what is he doing?

00:31:35.360 | At the right time, he timed the revelation of himself and his will out even while he

00:31:42.200 | walked the earth.

00:31:43.200 | He didn't give it to them all in one session.

00:31:47.560 | It's not for you to know this at this particular time, he would say.

00:31:52.640 | We'll come back.

00:31:53.640 | We'll re-engage later.

00:31:57.760 | So be careful of the time in that sense.

00:32:02.120 | It goes without saying, if you're really going to do good counseling, you've got to be friendly,

00:32:07.960 | and you've got to be compassionate.

00:32:12.440 | I like the biblical term for compassion there in Ephesians 4:32, because literally it means

00:32:18.440 | to be tender-bowled.

00:32:19.440 | That's compassion, tender-bowled.

00:32:26.560 | The bowels were the seat of the emotions.

00:32:30.920 | So to be tender-bowled meant to be compassionate, to be emotionally compassionate with people.

00:32:41.320 | If we're going to be good counselors, we've got to show people emotionally that we really

00:32:52.160 | care for them.

00:32:55.680 | I think this is no better expressed than in Romans 12, if you want to grab your Bible

00:33:02.360 | and go over there for a moment, Romans chapter 12, and verse 15 where it says, "Rejoice with

00:33:15.640 | those who rejoice and weep with those who weep."

00:33:21.040 | That's a person who demonstrates emotions.

00:33:23.280 | It's not bad to show emotions.

00:33:26.120 | There are many, many times I've wept with my counselees, and there are many, many times

00:33:32.040 | that I have rejoiced with them.

00:33:38.080 | And you need to do the same thing.

00:33:42.160 | Emotional expressions that are appropriate, not artificial, not fake, but appropriate

00:33:53.560 | emotions is the right way to be.

00:33:57.360 | You've got to be friendly.

00:33:58.360 | You've got to be compassionate.

00:34:01.720 | It's very easy, after you've been in the ministry for a little while and worked with real serious

00:34:06.520 | people problems, to view people as a problem with two legs.

00:34:12.200 | That's very easy to begin to view them that way.

00:34:14.820 | They're not a problem with two legs.

00:34:17.400 | They are people.

00:34:20.660 | They are people created in the image of God.

00:34:24.200 | They have emotions like you have emotions.

00:34:26.900 | They have likes and dislikes the way you have likes and dislikes.

00:34:33.780 | In Matthew 6, Jesus talks about that, or actually in Matthew 7, we're supposed to do unto others

00:34:44.040 | as you would have them do unto you.

00:34:46.520 | Why would he say that?

00:34:48.520 | Because we're really in touch with the way that we want people to treat us.

00:34:58.760 | We understand that real well.

00:35:01.080 | I want you to treat me nice.

00:35:03.640 | I want you to give me lots of leeway and lots of mercy and lots of grace because I know

00:35:11.160 | I need it.

00:35:12.560 | Well, that's exactly the way we need to be with other people.

00:35:16.680 | We need to be friendly and compassionate with them.

00:35:20.120 | Furthermore, we need to answer questions about counseling.

00:35:25.040 | Why?

00:35:26.320 | What it is?

00:35:27.320 | How long is it going to take?

00:35:28.960 | What's the purpose of the counseling?

00:35:32.280 | Your counselees are going to ask you those questions.

00:35:35.400 | Now, when a person asks me the question, "Why is counseling necessary?"

00:35:42.440 | I always give them the Galatians 6.1 answer.

00:35:48.160 | Counseling is necessary because you've been struggling with this thing for a long time

00:35:53.400 | and all your efforts have failed, so you need somebody to come alongside you and help you.

00:36:01.440 | In your marriage, you've been struggling with this particular conflict for a long time and

00:36:08.360 | you haven't seen any resolution to this particular problem, then you need somebody to come along

00:36:12.620 | and help you.

00:36:16.760 | When they ask the question, "What is it?

00:36:18.440 | What is counseling?"

00:36:20.160 | Counseling is a process whereby we take the Word of God and use it as a diagnostic tool

00:36:28.600 | to understand a problem and find the remedy to that problem in the Word of God, and then

00:36:36.840 | we change our lives accordingly with the ultimate goal of honoring and glorifying the Lord

00:36:46.480 | Jesus Christ, becoming Christ-like.

00:36:49.360 | That's counseling.

00:36:54.360 | How long will it take?

00:36:56.760 | Well, I don't know, but most problems, I tell them, usually do not exceed 40 days and 40

00:37:04.000 | nights if you're really working on them.

00:37:07.720 | That's about six weeks.

00:37:09.920 | If you're really working on a serious problem and every week you're doing what needs to

00:37:15.440 | be done, most problems can be resolved in about six weeks.

00:37:20.880 | I would say that that probably is 95% of all the problems that are out there.

00:37:25.640 | Takes about 40 days and 40 nights to resolve that problem.

00:37:31.400 | But there are some exceptions.

00:37:35.000 | There are some problems that come up that may take longer, and more often than not,

00:37:42.040 | when you start to deal with one particular problem in a person's life, five more show

00:37:47.040 | up, maybe even worse.

00:37:50.720 | So you start to uncover and peel back what's going on in their life, then you find out

00:37:55.160 | underneath the surface there's a lot more going on here than what I first suspected.

00:38:02.320 | So then it's going to take a little bit longer.

00:38:06.320 | You take a particular issue that's happened in a marriage, a husband or wife, or in a

00:38:12.600 | family between parents and kids, your average problem takes about six weeks, 40 days and

00:38:20.560 | 40 nights to resolve.

00:38:25.960 | Well furthermore, you need to prepare proper arrangements and materials as well.

00:38:32.600 | When you do a counseling session, it's important that you have at your disposal a Bible, a

00:38:44.280 | notepad whereby you can take notes for that counseling session.

00:38:48.800 | You need to have at your disposal some potential homework assignments.

00:38:55.680 | In this particular case, dealing with marital problems, then it would be homework assignments

00:39:00.160 | around marital problems, books that you can recommend that maybe they can read.

00:39:09.560 | First and foremost, you want to get them into Scripture because that's where their real

00:39:12.880 | help and hope is going to come from.

00:39:15.120 | But then there is some, not all, most of the Christian material that's written about counseling

00:39:22.200 | that's out there in the Christian bookstore is horrible material.

00:39:26.800 | It's horrible material because it's written from a Christian psychological standpoint.

00:39:31.600 | It's not written from a Biblical standpoint.

00:39:34.780 | But as years go by, there's more and more Biblically oriented material out there that's

00:39:40.400 | good, that will kind of supplement what the Bible says.

00:39:45.280 | That's not a good word.

00:39:46.280 | I don't like to use the word supplement.

00:39:48.000 | It's not going to supplement it.

00:39:49.520 | It's going to help them see how to use the Word of God better, how the Word of God should

00:39:56.760 | change their life, how they should view their problem.

00:39:59.600 | So you've got to have the proper materials.

00:40:02.320 | Then you need to prepare your heart by prayer and meditation between your counseling sessions

00:40:07.720 | and before you have a counseling session.

00:40:10.560 | Prepare your heart with prayer and meditation.

00:40:13.480 | Give directions to the meeting place.

00:40:14.880 | Make sure they know where to meet.

00:40:16.520 | It's amazing how sometimes this is left out.

00:40:20.220 | And then after the initial session and before each subsequent session, record your goals

00:40:25.080 | for each upcoming session.

00:40:26.920 | What are your goals?

00:40:29.920 | We talked about the importance of goal in the previous class.

00:40:33.240 | Well, what are they?

00:40:35.000 | What do you really want to do?

00:40:37.680 | Where do you want to take your counselee from here?

00:40:41.600 | What issues in their life really needs to be addressed biblically?

00:40:48.720 | Try to enunciate those goals as clearly as possible and you actually end up prioritizing

00:40:54.640 | those goals in the process.

00:40:57.720 | Okay, let's move on to our next section here where it talks about determining the session.

00:41:04.520 | Now remember, all of this is a part of setting the proper context for good counseling to

00:41:10.360 | occur.

00:41:11.360 | I'm not going to spend a long time on this.

00:41:15.400 | Some of this is common sense, but other parts of it are oftentimes parts that people neglect

00:41:23.160 | and it ends up hurting your counselee.

00:41:25.720 | For example, starting on time.

00:41:30.080 | If you waste a lot of time and you don't start on time, then your counselees will learn.

00:41:38.160 | Just like I learned as a professor.

00:41:39.800 | If you don't start a class on time, your students automatically learn, "Hey, listen, I've got

00:41:43.520 | 10 minutes more," because he's really not going to get started until 10 after.

00:41:47.880 | So they'll come drifting in later and so you're starting later and later and later and you

00:41:52.040 | lose good segments of your class.

00:41:54.000 | You've got to start on time.

00:41:55.380 | You've got to start your counseling on time.

00:41:59.680 | And greet your counselees warmly and enthusiastically.

00:42:02.580 | Tell them you're really glad they're here.

00:42:04.560 | And that's not artificial.

00:42:05.560 | I'm not talking about putting on a fake smile.

00:42:07.840 | I'm not talking about being overly jovial.

00:42:11.240 | No, no, no.

00:42:13.400 | We're talking about letting them know that you believe that there is real hope in this

00:42:19.840 | session and you're really happy to see them there because you believe the Word of God

00:42:26.080 | is going to bring about change.

00:42:32.200 | Then always begin and end your counseling sessions with prayer if it is appropriate.

00:42:42.240 | Now there are times where it is not appropriate.

00:42:52.120 | For example, if you have a very rebellious teenager in for counseling and they're not

00:43:08.100 | in any mood to pray, it's not appropriate to do.

00:43:12.200 | It would be very awkward and everybody's focus is not going to be upon the Lord.

00:43:17.400 | It's going to be upon that kid and his rebellion.

00:43:22.120 | But your average counseling session should begin with prayer.

00:43:24.960 | It's the first thing I always do.

00:43:28.440 | People come in and have a seat and I say, "It's great to see you.

00:43:32.080 | I want to really get down and start getting into the Word of God with you.

00:43:35.200 | Let's have prayer first."

00:43:36.900 | Okay, so we bow for prayer and then the very next thing after prayer is I take a look at

00:43:43.280 | homework.

00:43:44.280 | "Let's take a look at your homework."

00:43:47.000 | So they get into this habit that they know we're going to have prayer and then he's going

00:43:50.000 | to look at my homework and I've got to make sure my homework's done.

00:43:55.680 | And then at the end of the session, I tell them, "Listen, let's bow for prayer.

00:44:00.960 | Let's commit this session to the Lord."

00:44:04.400 | So if it's appropriate, begin and end with prayer.

00:44:08.400 | Practice all your involvement skills.

00:44:10.480 | That means being kind, gentle with people, personable with them.

00:44:20.280 | Sometimes you have to adapt yourself to the personality and mood of your counselee.

00:44:26.640 | If your counselee comes in really depressed and sad, then you don't want to be overly

00:44:35.040 | jovial.

00:44:36.040 | "How's it going?"

00:44:37.440 | No, no, that's just totally inappropriate.

00:44:40.800 | No.

00:44:42.320 | You have to match yourself and adapt yourself to your counselee's mood at that moment.

00:44:46.880 | If they come in and they look like they're down or they're depressed, you say to them,

00:44:50.960 | "Hey, Tom, it's good to see you.

00:44:53.080 | I'm really happy you're here.

00:44:54.200 | I'm looking forward to getting in the Word of God with you.

00:44:56.600 | So have a seat.

00:44:57.920 | Let's talk about this."

00:45:00.920 | So even though they're depressed and sad, I'm not overly excited, I'm not overly...

00:45:07.320 | But I'm adapting myself, but I'm still optimistic.

00:45:10.560 | I'm not going to buy into their depression and I'm not going to be depressed, too.

00:45:14.640 | If Tom's depressed, I'm not going to act, "Okay, Tom, it's really great to see you today."

00:45:20.600 | "Well, there's a lot of hope in that."

00:45:24.400 | No, you don't want to do that.

00:45:27.120 | So match yourself, however.

00:45:33.300 | Sometimes you have to mirror their body image or body language, I should say.

00:45:39.680 | Imitate their posture and their gestures and match their tone of voice and their rate.

00:45:49.080 | If you can tell that they're having a slow day and they're having a hard time expressing

00:45:54.120 | themselves, and so they're talking very slowly, then match yourself to that, all right?

00:46:03.840 | You're not going to try to dump too much on them or talk really fast.

00:46:10.600 | I think you're exercising true biblical love when you're doing that because you're placing

00:46:15.760 | their concerns and what's going on in their life above the way you want it to be.

00:46:23.360 | That's really a Christlike person.

00:46:27.760 | Now here's a biggie here.

00:46:31.640 | You've got to adapt yourself to their personality and moods, as I say, but also avoid power

00:46:37.400 | struggles, adversarial relationships.

00:46:46.400 | Again, this is not a time to say, or even to act like you're going to take sides in

00:46:57.520 | this issue.

00:46:59.400 | They'll want you to, they'll try to draw you to their side or their perspective, but you're

00:47:07.160 | not going to take any sides except God's, all right?

00:47:11.680 | That's the only side that I'm on.

00:47:14.200 | I'm on God's side.

00:47:15.200 | I'm not on his side or her side or the kid's side or the parent's side.

00:47:19.640 | I'm on God's side.

00:47:22.120 | Sometimes when you take that neutral point of view, most parents working with kids' situation

00:47:26.760 | always, by virtue of the fact that they are the parents, want me to take the parent's

00:47:30.160 | side.

00:47:31.160 | Well, the parents aren't always right.

00:47:34.480 | There's occasion where the kids are right, and I can't take the parent's side because

00:47:40.800 | that's not right.

00:47:41.800 | It's not what the Bible says, but they want you to, but don't get into those power struggles.

00:47:53.680 | The bottom line is you're really not siding with the kids.

00:47:56.400 | You're not really siding with the parents.

00:47:58.280 | You're siding with what God says.

00:48:00.760 | That's the important thing.

00:48:05.000 | Pace your session rate, that is, to your counselor's ability to follow you fully or pace your session

00:48:20.920 | rate.

00:48:21.920 | For example, let's say you have a 70-year-old man who's alert, but he's a little bit slow.

00:48:31.220 | He's not as quick as you're normally used to.

00:48:35.880 | He stumbles around and stutters here and there.

00:48:42.800 | Sometimes you have to, with a person like this, slow down, repeat yourself more often,

00:48:53.840 | review things and clarify things more often than you would do with an average counselee.

00:49:01.600 | Why?

00:49:03.940 | Because that person's a little bit slower.

00:49:05.440 | How do you find that out?

00:49:06.640 | One of the best ways to find that out is ask them to read something.

00:49:12.760 | By the way, don't just assume that your counselee can read.

00:49:19.080 | I've embarrassed people like that.

00:49:20.680 | I've handed them the Bible and said, "Okay, I want you to read this verse out loud," and

00:49:25.480 | they eventually look up to me and they say, "I can't read."

00:49:31.480 | Really?

00:49:32.480 | Okay.

00:49:33.480 | Well, let's have your spouse read this.

00:49:45.280 | You've got to pace your session to the counselee's ability to follow you fully.

00:49:51.000 | Furthermore, you have to pace your session to the amount of time that you have for counseling

00:49:59.120 | and giving appropriate homework in counseling.

00:50:05.800 | You can say to them, "Listen, I have an hour to spend with you, so I've got to have to

00:50:14.480 | be careful of my time, and every now and then, I'm going to have to slow you down or ask

00:50:21.640 | you to stop."

00:50:22.640 | In fact, you know what the greatest word in counseling is, don't you?

00:50:28.080 | It's "whoa."

00:50:29.680 | That's the greatest word in counseling.

00:50:32.600 | Not "stop it," but "whoa."

00:50:35.560 | All right?

00:50:38.260 | You say, "Whoa."

00:50:39.920 | "Whoa" means halt, stop talking, so that...because, you know, there are some people who will talk

00:50:49.760 | and talk and talk and talk.

00:50:51.320 | My mother used to have that expression.

00:50:52.680 | They go around the barn, around the barn, and around the barn without going in the barn,

00:50:56.400 | okay?

00:50:57.400 | And they just talk, and they review things the same way over and over and over again,

00:51:01.680 | and they get into this cyclical pattern, and some people's circles are wider than others,

00:51:08.360 | so it takes you a while to identify that they're circular in their thinking.

00:51:12.320 | Some people are very narrow little ones, and they keep rehearsing the same things a lot.

00:51:19.560 | So at some particular point, you say, "Whoa, I've already heard this.

00:51:23.080 | You've reviewed this already; I understand what you're talking about there.

00:51:27.240 | Now, I've been listening to you all this time.

00:51:30.120 | You need to listen to what the Word of God says.

00:51:31.800 | It's time for you to listen."

00:51:33.960 | So you get your pen and your notebook out, and we're going to talk over some key passages

00:51:39.000 | here in regards to your problem.

00:51:44.480 | So you have to pace yourself to the amount of time that you have for counseling and giving

00:51:48.080 | the appropriate kind of homework.

00:51:50.680 | Don't just use up your entire time just in instruction phase.

00:51:59.380 | You got to leave time to give them good homework and explain to them why you're giving them

00:52:04.120 | this homework, which says this.

00:52:14.720 | Homework says that counseling is not magic hour of the week.

00:52:22.640 | There are a lot of people who think that counseling is magic hour.

00:52:29.160 | I'm going to go into counseling, and some magical things are going to happen.

00:52:34.560 | No.

00:52:36.760 | Change occurs not just in counseling, but change occurs every day of the week.

00:52:42.560 | And homework brings that change into every day of their life.

00:52:47.960 | It teaches them to go to the Word of God to solve their problems every day of the week.

00:52:55.360 | So you give them homework to get them into the Bible every single day of the week.

00:53:07.420 | So change and growth occurs.

00:53:14.080 | Furthermore, avoid at all costs partiality or taking sides.

00:53:23.320 | Avoid partiality or taking sides.

00:53:25.420 | Why?

00:53:26.420 | Well, it's just like that passage that I referred to earlier in our class period there in Proverbs

00:53:34.680 | chapter 18 and verse 17, "The first to plead his case seems right until another comes along

00:53:41.080 | and examines him."

00:53:44.800 | Rarely in any kind of home, family, or marriage problem is it one-sided.

00:53:53.320 | Rarely is that ever the case.

00:53:57.680 | You may need to say in an especially tense situation, "Listen, I'm not on Barbara's side

00:54:02.900 | and I'm not on Bill's side.

00:54:04.720 | I'm seeking to be on the Lord's side and my goal is to help the two of you to be what

00:54:09.120 | God wants you to be or to have the marriage that God wants you to have or to have the

00:54:16.360 | family and home that God wants you to have.

00:54:19.120 | That's what I'm after."

00:54:24.760 | So you've got to avoid at all costs partiality and taking sides.

00:54:31.720 | If you are a partial counselor, then people are not going to trust you and they certainly

00:54:43.360 | are not going to share the most intimate parts of their lives with you in order to solve

00:54:47.800 | any problems because they'll consider you to be very, very biased.

00:54:53.040 | So avoid partiality.

00:54:55.160 | Furthermore, you need to manifest confidence and competence.

00:55:00.360 | Now this is not in yourself.

00:55:03.880 | That's what Alfred Adler would say out in the secular counseling world.

00:55:08.540 | You need to have self-confidence.

00:55:10.240 | You need to have self-competence.

00:55:13.600 | I'm not talking about that.

00:55:17.000 | I'm talking about manifesting confidence first in the Scriptures.

00:55:30.480 | Confidence and competence in the Scriptures, that the Scriptures has the answers to this

00:55:34.440 | problem.

00:55:38.080 | I trust the Scriptures.

00:55:39.480 | In fact, sometimes I'll say to my counselees, "I don't trust me.

00:55:43.160 | If I gave you what John Street had to say about a problem, you're really in trouble.

00:55:48.920 | But if I'm giving you what God says about this problem, now that means you've got hope."

00:55:57.120 | And you can have assurance that God brings about real change as a result of that.

00:56:05.480 | Furthermore, you need confidence in their ability to change.

00:56:14.520 | That you don't care how deeply ingrained this problem is.

00:56:26.120 | You don't care how old they are.

00:56:29.120 | They can still change.

00:56:34.040 | You know, the old man comes in to you for counseling and sits down.

00:56:37.520 | And you start talking with him about the changes that he needs to make in his life.

00:56:41.440 | He says to you, "Well, you can't teach an old dog new tricks."

00:56:48.060 | You need to say to him, "You know what?

00:56:49.760 | You're right, but you're not a dog.

00:56:52.640 | You're made in the likeness and image of Jesus Christ.

00:56:56.800 | That means that you have the capacity to change."

00:57:02.240 | But he thinks, because of his old age and the fact that this has been a pattern for

00:57:06.080 | such a long time, he thinks that he can't change.

00:57:11.120 | And he can.

00:57:13.160 | Furthermore, because God is in control of these things, you have to manifest confidence

00:57:20.000 | and competence in the hope for the future because God stands behind this process.

00:57:38.480 | I trust what God is doing.

00:57:48.920 | Proverbs 4, verse 18, Solomon here describes, if there ever is an Old Testament

00:58:07.480 | verse that deals with progressive sanctification, it's got to be this verse.

00:58:13.680 | But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn that shines brighter and brighter

00:58:17.860 | until the full day.

00:58:20.080 | That is a great verse on progressive sanctification.

00:58:28.320 | The path of the righteous, this is where God is leading the righteous, is like the light

00:58:35.880 | of dawn, like the sun coming up over the horizon that just gets brighter and brighter and brighter

00:58:42.920 | as it rises.

00:58:46.360 | That's the way the righteous are.

00:58:53.680 | While we're still in the Old Testament, we can go back to Psalm 119.

00:59:04.680 | In verse 73, "Your hands made me," the psalmist said, "and fashioned me."

00:59:17.320 | Give me understanding that I may learn your commands.

00:59:22.240 | Your hands made me, that's in the Hebrew past tense, but the word fashion is the imperfect.

00:59:28.780 | In other words, your hand continues to fashion me.

00:59:36.080 | God continues to fashion me.

00:59:39.800 | There's the hope in the future.

00:59:41.720 | You're manifesting confidence and competence in the hope in the future.

00:59:45.280 | God is the one who's continuing to work on me.

00:59:49.840 | Here's another great progressive sanctification verse in the Old Testament.

00:59:59.340 | Let's go over to one other verse in the New Testament.

01:00:01.020 | Let's go to 2 Corinthians 3, verse 18.

01:00:15.780 | Paul expresses this well when he says, "But we all, with unveiled faiths, beholding as

01:00:21.440 | in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory

01:00:26.300 | to glory, just as from the Lord the Spirit."

01:00:37.400 | So there's the process of progressive sanctification.

01:00:51.400 | There's a good description of it.

01:00:52.680 | So that's the reason why we have faith in the future, or at least in what God is doing

01:01:02.720 | in the future, or we have hope that God's going to bring about a good result here.

01:01:11.040 | Now next, you also need to be thorough in data gathering.

01:01:18.060 | We're going to talk about more of this a little bit later, but you need to be doing this all

01:01:23.640 | the time.

01:01:25.540 | And of course, prayer is vitally important here.

01:01:29.240 | And we already mentioned Proverbs 18, verse 13, "If a man speaks before he hears, he's

01:01:35.760 | a fool."

01:01:36.760 | We don't want to do that.

01:01:38.280 | We want to listen carefully and gather all the data that we can.

01:01:44.680 | One of the ways you can do this is by using good data gathering homework assignments.

01:01:51.520 | You don't necessarily have to gather all the data during a counseling session.

01:01:57.880 | If you give good data gathering homework assignments, then that will actually leave you more time

01:02:03.640 | for instruction within the counseling session.

01:02:09.320 | So don't spend all your time just data gathering in a session.

01:02:17.080 | Furthermore, communicate a deep trust in the Lord and the thorough and practical knowledge

01:02:22.480 | of His Word.

01:02:29.680 | You need to always have your Bible up in front of you.

01:02:32.720 | It needs to be open.

01:02:35.360 | You need to read it regularly in counseling.

01:02:38.400 | You need to have the counselees look up things in their Bible and have them read it in counseling

01:02:45.000 | so that they get the idea that the source of your advice and counsel is not your own

01:02:52.240 | ideas.

01:02:53.240 | This comes from God.

01:02:54.240 | It's God's ideas.

01:02:56.480 | To the degree that you rightly represent what the Bible is saying is the degree at which

01:03:01.360 | you have divine power behind your counseling.

01:03:06.100 | That power is the very power of God changing people's lives.

01:03:13.480 | So use the Bible, have your counselees read the Bible.

01:03:18.320 | That's what needs to happen.

01:03:25.880 | Then furthermore, you need to demonstrate good analytic and instructive skills.

01:03:36.760 | Analytic skills are how perceptive you are during the counseling

01:03:48.540 | process with all that data that's coming at you in guiding that process to an efficient

01:04:00.720 | and effective end.

01:04:03.280 | You don't just let it drift and wander.

01:04:06.600 | In the process, you show good analytic skills when you don't allow generalities.

01:04:15.960 | There are some counselees who will say to you, "Well, I don't always treat my wife

01:04:26.240 | well."

01:04:28.480 | You know how that is.

01:04:29.480 | You know.

01:04:30.480 | I usually say to them, "No, I don't know.

01:04:33.640 | Tell me about that.

01:04:34.640 | What do you mean by that?"

01:04:35.760 | "Well, you know, I don't love her enough."

01:04:37.360 | "Well, what does that mean when you say you don't love her enough?"

01:04:41.920 | "That's a big, warm, fuzzy.

01:04:44.240 | For me, not loving her enough?

01:04:48.240 | Does that mean you don't emote enough emotionality towards her?"

01:04:52.000 | "I love you now."

01:04:53.760 | "All right.

01:04:54.760 | Is that what you're saying?"

01:04:56.000 | "Well, no."

01:04:57.000 | "Well, then what are you saying?"

01:05:00.560 | "I don't do things for her."

01:05:05.440 | "Do what?

01:05:06.440 | Do what?"

01:05:07.440 | "I don't help her out around the house very much."

01:05:10.000 | "Oh, you mean like picking up after yourself and after other people?"

01:05:15.000 | "Oh, yeah.

01:05:16.000 | I don't do that."

01:05:17.440 | "Not helping her with the dishes?"

01:05:19.440 | "Oh, yeah.

01:05:20.440 | I don't do that either."

01:05:23.440 | "With all those little projects that she wants you to do and you just totally ignore

01:05:27.080 | them?"

01:05:28.080 | "Oh, yeah.

01:05:29.080 | Yeah."

01:05:30.080 | All right.

01:05:31.080 | Now, that's getting down to specifics.

01:05:32.520 | Don't allow them to exist in generalities.

01:05:35.760 | The more concrete you are, the quicker you're going to see change in your counselee.

01:05:41.440 | Don't let them...

01:05:43.320 | Our old associate pastor, his name is Rick Wilson.

01:05:45.760 | Rick Wilson used to say, "Get them out of Vegsville and Fuzzy Land."

01:05:51.000 | That's a good way to describe them.

01:05:53.000 | Get them out of Vegsville and Fuzzy Land.

01:05:55.480 | Don't let them exist in Vegsville and Fuzzy Land.

01:06:00.120 | Don't allow them to use generalities.

01:06:06.680 | My wife's not submissive.

01:06:08.160 | What do you mean your wife's not submissive?

01:06:10.000 | What is that?

01:06:11.000 | That's a big fuzzy for me.

01:06:12.000 | What does that mean?

01:06:15.480 | Force him to describe that.

01:06:17.400 | My husband doesn't love me enough.

01:06:24.560 | What does that mean?

01:06:26.280 | Well, he yells at me all the time.

01:06:29.280 | Well, what does he say?

01:06:35.240 | My one daughter, I remember she came home from third grade with her third grade teacher

01:06:44.000 | saying that her teacher was really, really mean.

01:06:49.360 | And what she meant by that was, "My third grade teacher disagrees with me."

01:06:58.960 | Sometimes when a wife will say to you in counseling, "My husband yells at me."

01:07:03.480 | When you truly try to pin it down, here's a rather, you know, it's not as if this guy's

01:07:08.360 | perfect.

01:07:09.360 | He's not.

01:07:10.360 | But he's a pretty calm guy.

01:07:11.360 | He doesn't look like a reactive type.

01:07:14.640 | And if you pin it down, what she really means is, "He disagrees with me."

01:07:21.160 | So anytime you disagree with me, you're yelling at me.

01:07:24.600 | No, he's not yelling at her.

01:07:33.280 | She spends money like it's going out of style, he'll say.

01:07:36.760 | What does that mean?

01:07:39.400 | Well, look at all those groceries.

01:07:44.560 | Well, do you eat them?

01:07:46.000 | Yeah.

01:07:47.000 | Well, what are you going to eat if she doesn't buy them?

01:07:55.080 | It's almost as if he expects her to manufacture her own money to buy these groceries.

01:08:03.160 | He loves the groceries, but he doesn't want her to spend money.

01:08:06.320 | So what does he want her to do, steal them?

01:08:11.020 | She spends money like it's going out of style.

01:08:12.720 | She's got to buy groceries for you and the family.

01:08:18.080 | Or she don't allow generalities.

01:08:21.440 | Furthermore, be humble enough to ask for confirmation.

01:08:28.600 | That shows good analytical skills.

01:08:34.720 | Every now and then, I'll stop a counseling product, you know, all the data that's coming

01:08:37.740 | at me, and I'll stop and I'll say, "Listen, let me see if I can summarize what you've

01:08:42.080 | been saying up to this particular point, and you correct me where I'm wrong.

01:08:46.760 | Here's what I hear you saying," and I'll just boil down maybe an hour's worth of information

01:08:51.200 | that's come at me.

01:08:52.200 | I'll boil it down in one or two statements.

01:08:54.120 | You're saying da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da, right?

01:08:57.280 | "Well, yeah, but I changed this a little bit."

01:09:00.560 | Okay, okay, good.

01:09:01.560 | So we're on the same page here.

01:09:03.760 | We got it.

01:09:05.900 | So don't be afraid to ask for confirmation on your own conclusions, and don't jump to

01:09:21.900 | conclusion with people.

01:09:25.900 | Furthermore, be sure to invite your counselee's corrections.

01:09:34.820 | You're not a mind reader.

01:09:37.760 | Just because you have a degree in theology after you get out of seminary doesn't mean

01:09:41.740 | that you can read minds.

01:09:43.340 | You can't.

01:09:49.060 | Grab your Bible just for a moment.

01:09:50.060 | Let's go over to 1 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 11.

01:09:53.060 | Paul talks about mind readers there.

01:09:56.380 | 1 Corinthians 2, 11, he says, "For who among men knows the thoughts of a man except for

01:10:05.180 | the spirit of man which is in him?"

01:10:09.060 | The obvious answer to that is no one does.

01:10:14.780 | Now, there are some women who want to give you the impression that because by virtue

01:10:20.780 | of the fact that they're female, they have a special ESP, extra-sensory perception.

01:10:27.300 | They don't, all right.

01:10:31.980 | I just let the cat out of the bag.

01:10:34.460 | They don't.

01:10:35.460 | They don't have extra-sensory perception because the Bible says, "No man among men knows the

01:10:39.860 | thoughts of a man except for the spirit of man that is in him."

01:10:44.140 | God knows those thoughts.

01:10:45.700 | Nobody does.

01:10:46.860 | Now, you can use the Bible as a diagnostic tool to say, "I'll bet you thought this because

01:10:53.980 | of what you know about what's happening in a problem."

01:10:56.740 | And that person will say, "Yeah."

01:10:59.500 | Well, it's not because you actually know what's going on in their thoughts.

01:11:03.300 | It's because you know what the Bible says about people who think similarly.

01:11:10.060 | That's different.

01:11:11.560 | But no man knows the thoughts of a man.

01:11:14.180 | So you don't know that with your counseling.

01:11:16.420 | So you need to invite their correction.

01:11:18.620 | Say, you know, I say to them, "I could be wrong, but this is what I think is really

01:11:22.820 | going on here in your head.

01:11:28.220 | If I'm wrong, you tell me I'm wrong."

01:11:32.500 | This is where I believe, by the way, that I think counseling actually makes you into

01:11:36.180 | a much better preacher.

01:11:39.720 | You know why?

01:11:41.460 | Because you're working with people problems and that starts affecting the way you're putting

01:11:45.840 | your sermons together.

01:11:47.940 | And you know how you're really hitting your congregation is when you're done preaching,

01:11:55.340 | people will come up to you and will say to you, "Pastor, did you have a camera in our

01:12:01.700 | house this week?

01:12:06.060 | Were you listening to what we said at our house?

01:12:09.420 | Were you eavesdropping?"

01:12:10.420 | "No."

01:12:11.420 | "Well, your whole sermon reflected like you knew what was going on in our house this week."

01:12:18.680 | You know why?

01:12:19.780 | Because you work so much with people problems.

01:12:23.280 | You know how people respond to issues.

01:12:26.040 | You know how they deal with issues.

01:12:28.040 | And you've crafted your sermon in such a way that you're speaking to those things.

01:12:31.680 | "Whoa, that's incredible.

01:12:33.880 | That's where I live," they're saying.

01:12:38.020 | Too many guys think that they can kind of prepare their sermons totally detached from

01:12:42.440 | their congregation.

01:12:43.440 | No, no, no.

01:12:46.580 | That's not a pastor.

01:12:47.760 | That's a lecturer.

01:12:48.760 | That's not a pastor.

01:12:52.280 | He's not pastoring from the pulpit.

01:12:54.060 | He's lecturing from the pulpit.

01:12:57.360 | Furthermore, be sure to invite your counselees...

01:13:01.760 | Oh, wait a minute.

01:13:03.280 | Where am I at here?

01:13:04.280 | Be careful about interpreting the influence of the past.

01:13:08.020 | Be careful about interpreting the influence of the past.

01:13:18.380 | In other words, we don't want to become behaviorists where, God bless B.F. Skinner and all of his

01:13:28.760 | behaviorism on how the environment really ultimately determines a person and the influences

01:13:35.400 | of the past and the way that people have been brought up now is determined to the way that

01:13:39.400 | they are.

01:13:40.880 | We don't want to become that way.

01:13:45.360 | And one of the ways that we can avoid that is by letting the counselee confirm our impressions

01:13:52.360 | of what is occurring.

01:13:55.580 | They can confirm that.

01:13:58.800 | So be careful about interpreting the influence of the past.

01:14:03.640 | We don't want the past to override everything in the present and act as if because you've

01:14:10.060 | had this past and maybe it's been horrible that that gives you an excuse to act or react

01:14:15.920 | the way you are.

01:14:16.920 | No, no, no.

01:14:17.920 | That's not the case.

01:14:18.920 | I mean, I don't care what their past has been.

01:14:20.960 | They have choices here and now that they need to make.

01:14:28.040 | They're not determined by their past.

01:14:31.160 | They can be influenced by it, but they're not determined by it.

01:14:36.940 | So those are some of the analytical skills.

01:14:38.780 | What are the instructional skills?

01:14:40.720 | Let me go through a few of these rather quickly.

01:14:44.000 | Good counselor uses figures of speech, metaphors, and illustrations abundantly.

01:14:50.040 | Don't be afraid to do that as long as they're appropriate.

01:14:54.320 | Use scripture and let them read the scripture frequently.

01:14:59.320 | Use diagrams.

01:15:03.880 | Write them on a whiteboard.

01:15:05.760 | I always, when I do counseling, I always have a whiteboard handy.

01:15:09.560 | Somehow people remember things when you are able to use diagrams.

01:15:14.520 | For example, I'll talk about a husband and a wife, and I'll talk about the fact that

01:15:33.740 | they have a relationship to God, and the closer they are in their relationship to God, the

01:15:46.100 | closer they are going to be to one another.

01:15:50.380 | I want them to see that.

01:15:52.940 | The closer that they have their relationship to God, the closer they're going to be to

01:15:56.660 | one another.

01:15:59.100 | Or we'll talk about the conscience, and I'll say to them, "Imagine that the conscience

01:16:03.300 | is like a triangle, and every time you sin, that triangle spins, and these little edges

01:16:16.500 | of this triangle prick your conscience.

01:16:22.820 | You feel it.

01:16:23.820 | You feel bad because you know you've sinned, but you can also sin to the point where you

01:16:31.580 | wear those points off of your triangle, and even though you're still sinning, and that

01:16:41.220 | thing's still spinning, you don't feel it any longer.

01:16:45.100 | Then you have what the Bible calls a seared conscience, a hard conscience, a conscience

01:16:53.660 | that doesn't feel any longer.

01:16:58.060 | You've done this to your wife, or to your husband so much, you don't even feel bad about

01:17:04.060 | it anymore.

01:17:07.500 | That's where your conscience has been seared, and it's going to require going back to the

01:17:12.940 | Word of God, and allowing the Word of God to retrain your conscience and sharpen it

01:17:19.300 | so that it is sharp again, so that it'll prick you again every time you sin, so that you'll

01:17:28.660 | feel bad about it.

01:17:30.620 | Now, when you use illustrations like that, and you just put them on the board, somehow

01:17:35.140 | they remember it.

01:17:36.140 | I mean, several weeks later, they'll say to you as a counselor, "You remember when you

01:17:39.780 | put that thing on the board?

01:17:40.860 | I can remember what you said about that."

01:17:43.420 | They could describe the whole thing to you, and all you did was draw a little simple picture.

01:17:47.800 | That's all you did, but they remembered that.

01:17:50.180 | They heard you describe it, they saw you write it, it made sense to them, so don't be afraid

01:17:58.700 | to do that.

01:18:00.860 | Use diagrams, all that you can do.

01:18:05.220 | Also use a lot of open-ended questions, not closed questions.

01:18:08.660 | Closed questions only seek a yes or no type of answer.

01:18:14.180 | Open questions, they have to think about how they're going to answer.

01:18:20.380 | So use yes or no questions, or open questions, not yes or no questions.

01:18:28.260 | Furthermore, use role play strategies.

01:18:32.660 | I'll do that frequently in counseling as well.

01:18:35.580 | I'll assume the role of a husband or a wife, and then I'll ask them, let's say we have

01:18:42.020 | Bill or Barbara, I'll say to Barbara, "Okay, Barbara, when Bill says that to you, how do

01:18:52.540 | you think you should respond?

01:18:54.500 | Remember, you told me that your response was one of anger.

01:18:59.580 | You got really angry with Bill when he does that to you.

01:19:06.200 | How should you have responded?"

01:19:09.900 | She sits there and says, "I'm not sure."

01:19:14.380 | And I'll say to her, "Okay, Barbara, you become Bill, and I'll be Barbara.

01:19:21.940 | You react to me the way you see Bill reacting to you."

01:19:25.980 | So she does.

01:19:28.180 | And then I say, "Okay, now I'm you.

01:19:31.440 | How am I going to respond to Bill?"

01:19:34.300 | "Bill, I don't like the way you're doing.

01:19:38.400 | This is not nice.

01:19:40.420 | But you know what?

01:19:41.420 | I love you, and I want to work things out with you, and I think that would be most honoring

01:19:47.780 | to God."

01:19:50.340 | At this particular point, Barbara's got a big smile on her face just like you do, all

01:19:54.620 | right?

01:19:55.620 | But I'll do that in counseling.

01:19:56.620 | I'll just play out the role.

01:19:58.660 | And I'll give them ways that they can respond in a more godly fashion to one another.

01:20:05.380 | And when I do that, it's incredibly memorable for them, all right?

01:20:12.100 | They'll remember that, and they'll take it home and use it, that somehow that sticks.

01:20:19.620 | So role play with them.

01:20:21.020 | Switch roles.

01:20:22.220 | Go back and forth.

01:20:23.920 | Teach them how they should be responding.

01:20:28.220 | You see, that's when you are doing more than just dumping the Bible on them.

01:20:35.260 | You're training them in righteousness.

01:20:39.420 | And that's what we want to do.

01:20:40.880 | We want to train people in righteousness.

01:20:44.040 | So use role play strategies in order to help them.

01:20:58.860 | Furthermore, use worst case scenarios.

01:21:03.060 | What's the worst thing that can happen to you, Bill, in your marital situation?

01:21:08.860 | Well, he said, "Barbara could divorce me."

01:21:13.180 | Well, that would be terrible, but that's not the worst thing that could happen.

01:21:17.740 | "Well, she could take the kids."

01:21:19.380 | Well, that'd be horrible, too, but that's not the worst thing that could happen.

01:21:24.260 | He says, "Well, what could be worse than that?"

01:21:27.020 | I said, "Well, there's something worse than that.

01:21:30.700 | She could get really angry at me and shoot me."

01:21:35.620 | Well, that would be horrible.

01:21:37.820 | If you died, I no longer have a counselee.

01:21:44.140 | But there's something worse than that.

01:21:47.140 | Bill goes, "If I were to die, there's something worse than that?"

01:21:51.060 | "Oh, yeah, absolutely."

01:21:52.260 | Okay, what?

01:21:59.340 | If you were to dishonor God in this situation, that's worse than death itself.

01:22:09.660 | Worst case scenario.

01:22:12.700 | What's a worst case scenario?

01:22:14.140 | What's really important?

01:22:15.380 | Is obeying God more important than life itself?

01:22:24.380 | If it's not, then all those martyrs in past Christian histories died for nothing.

01:22:35.180 | What's more important?

01:22:37.500 | What's the worst thing that can happen?

01:22:40.100 | Use your counselee's involvement in readings and responding to questions and opinions.

01:22:45.300 | Use a lot of encouragement there.

01:22:50.700 | Make plans and follow an agenda, but be ready to scrap them, because you may have plans

01:22:56.460 | for a counseling session, and your counselees come in with some pressing issue that came

01:23:02.580 | up that week that changes the course of this a little bit.

01:23:06.020 | Well, put out that little fire, and then go back to your original plan.

01:23:12.740 | Be appropriately open.

01:23:14.180 | Share your own life with them, how God has worked in your life.

01:23:18.820 | And you can use self-disclosure, but make sure it's appropriate.

01:23:21.780 | You don't want to glorify sin.

01:23:25.980 | We can spend so much time talking about how God has worked in our lives, and how God has

01:23:30.140 | worked through sin in our life.

01:23:31.860 | You don't want to glorify sin.

01:23:34.660 | Or do you want to give the counselee some kind of sense that, "Well, you know, I guess

01:23:39.540 | my counselor participated in that sin, and he's turned out okay, so it's okay for me

01:23:45.420 | to get involved in that sin, because I can turn out okay, too."

01:23:49.300 | No, you don't want to give them that sense.

01:23:52.500 | Keep momentum up by open-ended questions, by stimulating them to analysis, too.

01:23:58.380 | The best kind of counselee you can have is a thinking counselee, when they're using the

01:24:02.500 | Word of God and applying it to their problem, and they're thinking about it carefully.

01:24:14.900 | Don't give the impression you're in a hurry.

01:24:17.180 | Don't do that, because that just undermines hope.

01:24:21.700 | Be appropriately authoritative and directive, as Titus 2:15 says.

01:24:30.140 | You can speak the Word in power, but you need to be appropriate with that as well.

01:24:40.140 | And then allow yourself to identify with and personally experience their pain.

01:24:47.020 | That's what Paul said there in Acts 20, 31, how for night and day, he didn't cease to

01:24:53.060 | aneuthetao each one of them in tears, admonish them with tears.

01:25:00.740 | He was able to experience their pain.

01:25:04.940 | You can see the same thing there that we saw in the Romans 12 passage.

01:25:22.520 | In verse 15, he says, "Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep."

01:25:28.220 | So allow yourself to identify with and personally experience their pain.

01:25:37.700 | You'll gain a lot of involvement with your counselees if you're able to do that.

01:25:42.540 | "

01:25:43.540 | "

01:25:44.540 | Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.

01:25:45.540 | You'll gain a lot of involvement with your counselees if you're able to do that.

01:25:45.540 | "

Lecture 5: Marriage and Family Counseling - Dr. John D. Street

Chapters