Biblical Counseling and Mental Illness: Promoting Compassionate, Comprehensive Care for the Whole Person 

You’re reading Part 3 of a blog mini-series on biblical counseling and mental illness. I was motivated to address this issue by many factors, including David Murray’s post Maximizing and Minimizing Mental Illness. In David’s post, he labeled the biblical counseling view of mental illness the “sin maximizing” view. 

In Part 1, Are Biblical Counselors “Sin Maximizers”?, I examined the historical and cultural background behind Jay Adams’ launch of the modern nouthetic biblical counseling movement. In summary, I concluded that: 

• Modern biblical counseling did not originate from sin maximizing, but from the call to awaken the church to its duty to provide pastoral shepherding and one-another soul care. Modern biblical counseling launched with a focus on sanctification maximizing and shepherding maximizing. 

In Part 2, Counseling Built Entirely Upon Christ’s Gospel of Grace, I examined first, second, and third generation biblical counselors, as represented in part by the leadership of the Biblical Counseling Coalition. In summary, I concluded that: 

• Modern biblical counseling, rather than seeking to be sin maximizers, seeks to be Christ/Gospel/Grace maximizers. The modern biblical counseling movement has gone on record that the benchmark for biblical counseling is Christ’s gospel of grace that calls us to be Christ-centered, grace-focused, gospel-saturated shepherds and soul care givers. 

Today, I’ll address: 

1. The power of labels. 

2. The biblical counseling calling to be compassionate, comprehensive whole person maximizers. 

Labels Reify 

You may wonder, “Bob, why this focus on one term that David used—sin maximizers? Isn’t that nit-picking?” 

That’s a fair question. It deserves an explanation of the difference between nit-picking about terminology versus challenging labels that stereotype. 

When I was working on my Ph.D. in Counselor Education at Kent State University, I frequently heard and read about the danger of “reification.” Don’t let that word intimidate. To reify simply means that labels can become the reality; labels can take on a life of their own; labels color how we see reality—including ourselves and others. 

Interestingly, in secular counseling circles, they were quite concerned about mental illness labels and the danger of reification—you become your diagnosis. They would say, “Better to see myself as ‘struggling against depression,” than to see myself as “a depressive.” (More about that danger in future posts when we talk about mental illness diagnoses.) 

I think the label of “sin maximizer” can take on a life of its own. It can stereotype biblical counselors as “those people who myopically focus only on sin spotting.” It is more than just terminology. Intended or not, innocent or not, such a label becomes a way of positioning others into a camp—the bad camp of those sin maximizers. 

I’m sure that if I were to say that some Christian counselors were “sin ignorers,” that would not be a welcomed label. 

I think the label of sin maximizer is an inaccurate stereotype and an anachronistic (old) stereotype. It’s like a dad with a struggling teenage. The dad chooses and uses the label, “Rebel.” The son thinks, “Is that all I am? Is there nothing I do that is loving and right?” Still, convicted, the son begins to change. Over months and years he changes a good deal. But when the son is 25, the dad still sees him through the grid of “Rebel.” That label has taken on a life of its own. The dad believes it about his son even when his son is more than that and growing different than that. Others who hear the dad describe his son that way begin to look at the son through rebel-colored glasses. 

Biblical counselors are seeking to grow and change. Biblical counselors are wanting to look at themselves, at life, and at mental illness through the grid of sanctification/shepherding and through lenses colored by Christ/gospel/grace maximizing. 

When we fail to do that, we deserve to be challenged. 

Biblical Counselors: Seeking to Be Compassionate, Comprehensive Whole Person Maximizers 

Biblical counselors do have some concerns about some ways that the label mental illness is used and applied (and how it reifies). I’ll discuss those concerns in future posts. However, that is not to say that we are brain illness minimizers or sin maximizers. 

Here’s the challenge that I think we biblical counselors need to address: 

• How do we speak compassionately and comprehensively about mental illness and about the complex interaction of the brain/body/mind/soul? 

• How do we address any concerns about root causes of life struggles without being heard to say that we are ignoring the whole person or lacking empathy for social factors and physiological issues? 

To address those issues, I agree with David Murray—we need to speak clearly and emphatically about our desire to be compassionate and comprehensive care givers. 

Samplers from the BCC Confessional Statement 

We tried to speak emphatically about compassionate, comprehensive care in the Biblical Counseling Coalition Confessional Statement. Here are a few samplers. 

Biblical Counseling Must Be Founded in Love 

We believe that Christ’s incarnation is not just the basis for care, but also the model for how we care (Hebrews 4:14-16; John 13:34-35). We seek to enter into a person’s story, listening well, expressing thoughtful love, and engaging the person with compassion (1 Thessalonians 2:8). The wise and loving personal ministry of the Word takes many appropriate forms, from caring comfort to loving rebuke, from careful listening to relevant scriptural exploration, all while building trusting, authentic relationships (1 Thessalonians 5:14-15; 1 John 4:7-21). 

Wise counseling takes into account all that people experience (desires, thoughts, goals, actions, words, emotions, struggles, situational pressure, physical suffering, abuse, injustice, etc.) All of human experience is the context for understanding how God’s Word relates to life. Such awareness not only shapes the content of counseling, but also shapes the way counselors interact so that everything said is constructive, according to the need of the moment, that it may give grace to the hearer (Ephesians 4:29). 

Biblical Counseling Must Be Comprehensive in Understanding 

We believe that biblical counseling should focus on the full range of human nature created in the image of God (Genesis 1:26-28). A comprehensive biblical understanding sees human beings as relational (spiritual and social), rational, volitional, emotional, and physical. Wise counseling takes the whole person seriously in his or her whole life context. It helps people to embrace all of life face-to-face with Christ so they become more like Christ in their relationships, thoughts, motivations, behaviors, and emotions. 

We recognize the complexity of the relationship between the body and soul (Genesis 2:7). Because of this, we seek to remain sensitive to physical factors and organic issues that affect people’s lives. In our desire to help people comprehensively, we seek to apply God’s Word to people’s lives amid bodily strengths and weaknesses. We encourage a thorough assessment and sound treatment for any suspected physical problems. 

We recognize the complexity of the connection between people and their social environment. Thus we seek to remain sensitive to the impact of suffering and of the great variety of significant social-cultural factors (1 Peter 3:8-22). In our desire to help people comprehensively, we seek to apply God’s Word to people’s lives amid both positive and negative social experiences. We encourage people to seek appropriate practical aid when their problems have a component that involves education, work life, finances, legal matters, criminality (either as a victim or a perpetrator), and other social matters. 

Biblical Counseling Must Be Thorough in Care 

We believe that God’s Word is profitable for dealing thoroughly with the evils we suffer as well as with the sins we commit. Since struggling people usually experience some combination of besetting sin and personal suffering, wise counselors seek to discern the differences and connections between sin and suffering, and to minister appropriately to both (1 Thessalonians 5:14). 

Biblical counseling addresses suffering and engages sufferers in many compassionate ways. It offers God’s encouragement, comfort, and hope for the hurting (Romans 8:17-18; 2 Corinthians 1:3-8). It encourages mercy ministry (Acts 6:1-7) and seeks to promote justice. Biblical counseling addresses sin and engages sinners in numerous caring ways. It offers God’s confrontation of sins, encourages repentance of sins, presents God’s gracious forgiveness in Christ, and shares God’s powerful path for progressive victory over sin (1 John 1:8-2:2; 2 Corinthians 2:5-11; Colossians 3:1-17; 2 Timothy 2:24-26). 

Samplers from Christ-Centered Biblical Counseling 

In chapter 7 (“The Spiritual Anatomy of the Soul”) of Christ-Centered Biblical Counseling, Sam Williams and I described people comprehensively as eternal beings, embedded beings, embodied beings, emotional beings, volitional beings, rational beings, relational beings, self-aware beings, social beings, and spiritual beings. 

In chapter 26 (“The Ministry of Soul Care for People Who Suffer”), Greg Cook and I called biblical counseling to a parakaletic focus on compassionate care for the suffering. 

In Chapter 28, psychiatrist and biblical counselor, Laura Hendrickson addressed “The Complex Mind/Body Connection.” At the end of that chapter, Bob Somerville, a NANC-certified biblical counselor and a Council Board member of the Biblical Counseling Association shares his testimony of battling depression—including taking psychotropic medication. 

In Summary 

As biblical counselors, we seek to avoid sin maximizing. And we seek to avoid body minimizing. 

As biblical counselors, we seek to maximize compassionate, comprehensive care for the whole person in their whole life situation so that they can grow toward wholeness in Christ. 

But Are You Really Addressing the Hard Cases? 

Of course, it’s one thing to talk generically about compassionate and comprehensive care. But are biblical counselors addressing the hard cases more specifically—both in writing and in ministry? Two examples begin to answer that important question. 

1. Counseling the Hard Cases 

A number of leading biblical counselors collaborated in co-authoring Counseling the Hard Cases. It is an important read to understand how biblical counselors minister to people diagnosed with issues such as OCD, PTSD, Depression, Anorexia, Bipolar Disorder, Dissociative Disorder, and more. 

2. Vision of Hope 

Vision of Hope is a faith-based residential treatment program for girls age 14 – 28 struggling with unplanned pregnancy, alcohol or drug abuse, eating disorders, or self-harm. Launched under the visionary leadership of Steve Viars, BCC Board Vice President, Vision of Hope puts into practice the biblical counseling commitment to compassionate, comprehensive care for the whole person. 

I agree with David Murray—biblical counselors need to speak compassionately and comprehensively about soul care for the whole person. I believe we are trying to do so. Where we fail, please help us to do better, to think with greater wisdom, to love with more Christlike compassionate. 

The Rest of the Story 

Whew. I thought it would take one brief post to address labels. I was wrong. Moving forward, I hope to engage more specifically with some of David Murray’s challenges to the biblical counseling movement about mental illness. 

Join the Conversation 

What does it look like to care for the whole person compassionately and comprehensively? How could the church do this more effectively? How could biblical counselors do so more effectively? 

RPM Ministries: Equipping You to Change Lives with Christ’s Changeless Truth