Whatever Happened to Truth?

Whatever Happened to Truth?

Do you need a theological foundation for your people-helping ministry?

Do you want to know the seven topics every person must master if they are to do truly biblical ministry?

On the first page of my first book, Soul Physicians (http://tinyurl.com/d8grf6), I describe why we need a theological foundation for people ministry. I also outline the seven-part foundation we must understand if we are to have a comprehensive and compassionate approach to the personal ministry of the Word of God.

The Physician’s Desk Reference

Two books are standard in any physician’s office: The Physician’s Desk Reference (PDR) and The Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy (Merck). Both are considered “Bibles of medical knowledge and practice.”

With its 3,223 pages of prescription drugs, the annually updated PDR is the most comprehensive, widely used drug reference available. It details the usage, warnings, and precautions for more than 4,000 prescription drugs.

Merck is the most widely used medical text in the world. It provides the latest information on the vast expanse of human diseases, disorders, and injuries, as well as their symptoms and treatments. Intended for physicians, it is still useful for the lay person. As one sage has commented, “a must for everyone in a human body.”

The The Soul Physician’s Desk Reference

If the PDR and Merck are the Old Testament and New Testament for physicians treating the body, then the Bible is God’s final, authoritative word for soul physicians treating the soul. It is the soul physician’s desk reference manual for dispensing grace. It’s “a must for anyone who is a soul.” God’s Word provides not only the latest, but the eternal, lasting information on the soul’s design and disease, as well as its care and cure.

What do we discover as we read the pages of the Soul Physician’s Desk Reference (SPDR)? We learn what makes Christian counseling Christian. We learn our Great Physician’s authoritative truth about:

1. Nourishing the Hunger of the Soul: Preventative Medicine—God’s Word

2. Knowing the Creator of the Soul: The Great Physician—The Trinity

3. Examining the Spiritual Anatomy of the Soul: People—Creation

4. Diagnosing the Fallen Condition of the Soul: Problems—Fall

5. Prescribing God’s Cure for the Soul: Solutions—Redemption

6. Envisioning the Final Healing of the Soul: Home—Glorification

7. Dispensing God’s Care for the Soul: Spiritual Friends—Sanctification

These seven biblical categories are essential for developing a theology of soul care and spiritual direction. In Soul Physicians (http://tinyurl.com/d8grf6), we examine them meticulously, as a physician would the skeletal structure of the human body.

Watered-Down or Nourished with the Spring of Living Water

Christianity today is all-too-often watered-down. You can attend church and not even need to bring a Bible. You can attend seminary and not even be equipped thoroughly in biblical studies and biblical languages. You can go through training in biblical counseling and not even open your Bible!

However, if you want to do truly biblical counseling, then you must have a biblical foundation. The bare minimum includes the seven content areas listed above.

Seven Questions Every Biblical Counselor Must Answer

If we are to do God’s work in God’s way, with depth of insight, then we need to be able to ask and answer the following seven questions:

1. Do I know how to use God’s Word to change lives?

2. Do I comprehend how the Trinity serves as the foundation for how I relate to others?

3. Do I understand people—biblically?

4. Can I diagnose problems—biblically?

5. Can I prescribe God’s solutions—biblically?

6. Do I grasp how our eternal future makes all the difference in how we live today?

7. Am I able to dispense God’s grace and care for others competently?

Truth and Love

If we can’t answer these questions, then we need to go back to “soul school”!

It was the Apostle Paul who prayed that our love would abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight (Philippians 1:9). Society today says, “Let your love abound more and more in more love!”

No. We need truth and love—love grounded in God’s truth.

We have no “love life” if we have no “truth life.” We need both, with our love founded in God’s Word.

Do you need a theological foundation for your people-helping ministry? I do!

Do you want to know the seven topics every person must master if they are to do truly biblical ministry? I do!

*Quick Link to your copy of Soul Physicians on RPM Ministries: http://tinyurl.com/d96hc6

A New Friend, An Old Issue, A Fresh Perspective

A New Friend, An Old Issue, A Fresh Perspective

Yesterday, as I was putting the finishing touches on my updated Mission, Vision, Passion, Commission (MVP-C) Statement for RPM Ministries, the phone rang.

Thirty minutes later I had a new friend. During our talk, my new friend and I commiserated over the state of current Biblical/Christian counseling. Like me, my new friend bemoaned the fact that extremism seems to rule the day.

Either we have people claiming to be Christian counselors who do not build their models of counseling on the Bible, or people claiming to be Biblical counselors who do not relate to those who disagree with them in a Christlike way.

Hmm . . . Christian counselors who are not so very Biblical. And Biblical counselors who are not so very Christian.

Disappointing indeed.

It's an old issue. Sadly, few seem to be able to combine truth and love in Biblical/Christian counseling.

The ironic part? This issue of comprehensive truth and love was exactly what my updated RPM Ministries MVP-C Statement highlights.

In summary:

RPM Ministries exists to change lives with Christ's changeless truth through writing, speaking, and consulting focused on comprehensive, compassionate, culturally-informed Biblical/Christian counseling and spiritual formation.

It's not rocket science. It shouldn't be this hard. It shouldn't be so rare.

My new friend and I long for the day when Biblical/Christian counseling "integrates" truth and love.

My guess is, so do you.

My suspicion is, many people are growing weary of these "counseling wars."

My hunch is, many of us want to find a community of Christian/Biblical counselors who love the Word of God and who love the people of God.

I'd be glad to hear from others like my new friend.

In fact, I'm sure there are many who would like to hear from each other. Perhaps we could build a community of loving/truthing Christian/Biblical counselors.

Let's share our stories. Let's share our horror stories of not feeling like we fit anywhere because we refuse to join one "camp" or another. And then let's share our encouraging stories of our commitment to comprehensive, compassionate, culturally-informed Christian/Biblical counseling.

Deep Teaching/Preaching and High School Wrestlers

If we listen to the so-called experts, we are forced to believe that “young people” (Gen Y, Post-Gens, teens/twenty-somethings) want absolutely nothing to do with content. All they want is experience.

I beg to differ.

Talking with my 18 and 21 year-old children, they consistently express the frustration that churches are dropping the content ball. “Dad, it’s all fluff.” “The pastor treats the congregation as if all they want is entertainment.” “Where do you go in Evangelical circles to find deep-thinking preaching and teaching related to life?”

Perhaps you think my kids are oddities.

Well, I also happen to coach public high school wrestlers. They don’t want experiences. They don’t want fluff. They don’t want to “just have fun or be entertained.” They want content--they want to know wrestling moves and do what it takes--the hard stuff, to learn those moves.

Wherever I go, “young people” are begging for content. For depth. For expertise. They are sick and tired of being told that truth does not matter to them.

They want to know, as I want to do, who these so-called experts are talking to.

Truth matters.

Content-starved teens and young adults crave truth-applied-to-life.

Whether it is college students or high school wrestlers, it is about time that we reject the silly notion that working with young people means finding some quickie ice breaker, preparing a five-minute “talk” (or worse yet, refusing to prepare and talking off the cuff).

It’s about time that we do the hard work of relating truth to life, which, of course, means believing that Truth exists and doing the hard work of finding the Truth and sharing the Truth--changeless Truth for changing times. Not fluffy experiences for supposed dim-witted young people.

Sorry, had to get that one off my chest . . .