Biblical Counseling Explained
Biblical Counseling has been described as, “A personal ministry of the Word to help those struggling with personal and relational problems.” By ‘Personal Ministry’ it is generally meant that counseling from the Word of God is something that each individual Christian is called to do. Throughout Scripture we see commands for church members to ‘instruct one another’ (Romans 15:14) , ‘exhort one another’ (Hebrews 3:13), ‘encourage one another’ (1 Thessalonians 4:18), ‘build up one another; (1 Thessalonians 5:11) and to confess our sins to one another and pray for one another so that we may be healed (James 5:16).
But then, we must ask, where does this commitment to counsel from the Word of God come from? Biblical Counseling comes out of a conviction that when Paul tells Timothy that, “16 All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, 17 that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17) that he means exactly that. The telos of Biblical counseling, then, is for the ordinary people of God to minister to one another; to point their brothers and sisters in Christ towards the Great Physician who is able far more abundantly to bring healing to the cares and worries of everyday life and to bring healing to the deep places of the soul.
In Ephesians 4:15-16, Paul writes, “15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. We don’t just speak for the sake of speaking, but we counsel from the Word of God for the purpose of equipping the saints and calling those around us to grow into maturity and Christliness. I get that this sounds like an impossible task. In a sense, you are absolutely correct. Apart from the Word of God made flesh, Jesus Christ and the transforming power of the Holy Spirit, this is indeed an impossible task. Jesus affirms this in Matthew 19:26 when Scripture tells us, “26 But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” We live in a culture that has been deeply impacted and shaped by the professionalization of therapeutic counseling. However, when we get down to its simplest parts, all counseling whether secular or Biblical is essentially evangelism and discipleship guided by Spirit and Truth.
Biblical Counseling, as evangelism, seeks those who have not confessed Jesus Christ as Lord. For these lost souls, Biblical Counseling offers the healing balm of the Gospel to radically reorient their lives. It provides the opportunity for those outside of the covenant community of Christ to hear his voice, repent of their rebellion and place their trust in Christ. It recognizes that outward (behavior) change can only truly happen through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit as He regenerates and renews the fallen heart. The Word of God applied by the Spirit of Truth grants a new identity that radically reorients the trajectory of the individual’s life.
Biblical Counseling as discipleship continues this work of sanctification in those who are walking in the Way of the Lord. Often times we stray from the path. ‘All we like sheep have gone astray.’ Either we are lured and enticed away by our desires or we willfully step into a season of rebellion against the Lord. As discipleship, Biblical Counseling offers the message of hope; repent of your sins and return to the Gospel. It calls brothers and sisters in Christ to remember their first love and to return to right worship of the Lord or it helps our brothers and sisters in Christ to recognize that they may be sinning unintentionally; they may be young enough in the faith that they don’t realize that certain things are sin. Each time that we are offering the hope of the Gospel, calling one another to repent and believe or sharing Scripture we are in fact counseling Biblically.
