A Word from Bob 

I’ve been interacting with Sean Perron on Twitter/X regarding Perron’s criticisms of biblical counselor, Jason Kovacs, for Jason occasionally using the word “client.” You can read a blog post about this discussion here: Is the Word “Client” on the 2024 Naughty List? I note in that post that we all need to be very careful not to disobey God’s command to avoid foolish quarrels about words (2 Timothy 2:14).

“Non-Wooden Sufficiency of Scripture” 

After I posted Is the Word “Client” on the 2024 Naughty List?, Sean Perron posted on Twitter/X, doubling-down on his views. Among other comments, Perron made the statement that:

“If someone says the word ‘counselee’ isn’t technically in the sufficient Word and therefore I shouldn’t use it, they have misunderstood how sufficiency works. The sufficiency of Scripture is not that wooden. Jesus is our Wonderful Counselor, and therefore we are his counselees. It must logically follow.”

Some reflections on Perron’s post.

1. First, “counselee” is not “technically” not in the Bible. Instead, “counselee” is not actually in the Bible.

2. Second, I’m not sure who said Perron “shouldn’t use it,” as I certainly said in my post that “counselee” could be used, and that I have used it.

3. Third, I followed up with Perron on Twitter/X. Here is part of my initial response.

Personally, I’ve used “counselee.” I’m sure I’ve used “client” from time to time. I’ve used “spiritual friend.” I’ve used “parishioner.” I’ve used “child of God.” I’m not hung up on one word. Increasingly, I’m using the concept of “soul care” for the pro bono personal ministry of the Word I do with pastors, biblical counselors, and missionaries. So, I tend not to call the people I minister to “counselees.” But if others do use that term, that’s okay with me.

Jesus is the Wonderful Counselor, and those He ministers to in the Bible are called by many names, such as: His children, little children, His sons and daughters, saints, followers, disciples, sheep, flock, lambs, learners, believers, servants, dearly loved, Christians, etc. Since Jesus used many words for those he ministered to, but never once used the word “counselee,” I’m not hung up on anyone having to use “counselee.” In today’s world, “counselee” has a clinical, professional sense of a client or even a customer. When Jesus spoke one-on-one with Nicodemus, he wasn’t in a fifty-minute appointment in an office with a counselee, customer, or client, but was in a caring relationship with a religious-but-unsaved Jewish man in need of a Savior. When Jesus spoke one-on-one with the woman at the well, he wasn’t in a meeting with a counselee, or a customer, or a client, but was engaged in a caring spiritual conversation with an irreligious-unsaved Samaritan woman in need of a Savior. Jesus says to us, “I have called you friends” (John 15:15), not, “I have called you counselees.”

Paul is perhaps the greatest human soul care giver, and those he ministered to in the Bible are described in many ways, such as: heirs of Christ, brothers, children, disciples, followers, a holy nation, a royal priesthood, fellow members, fellow citizen, fellow worker, member of God’s family, Christ’s workmanship, God’s temple, living stone, chosen people, etc. Since Paul used many words for those he ministered to, but never once used the word “counselee,” I’m not hung up on anyone having to use “counselee.”

To insist on the preference for a word—“counselee”—that is not in the Bible (while judging a fellow biblical counselor who sometimes uses the word “client”), when the Bible offers us a plethora of better words, is to move dangerously close to quarrelling about words (2 Timothy 2:14). Words matter. Words used by God’s Word shape our thinking about each and every issue. Insisting on the use of a word (“counselee”) that comes from the secular world of therapy is not an argument I would expend my time on.

Opening Pandora’s Box? 

It is important that we trace and assess Perron’s logic of “non-wooden sufficiency” as his source for the use of the word “counselee.”

1. Perron’s non-wooden sufficiency illustration states that Jesus is the Wonderful Counselor, therefore, it must logically follow that we should be called His “counselee,” and we should call those we minister to our “counselees.”

2. As I’ve stated, I do not have a problem with the word “counselee.” However, historically and etymologically, “counselee” is derived from the secular world, not from the biblical world or from the world of church history. Modern Christians integrated “counselee” from non-Christians; they did not develop it from the Bible.

3. Among scores of biblical titles for Christ, is the title, “Wonderful Counselor.” The Bible provides scores of words to describe those to whom Jesus ministered, such as: little children, children, children of God, born of God, children of light, child of promise, friend, sons, brethren, brothers, saints, sheep, lambs, flock, accepted in the beloved, treasured possession, salt and light, , overcomer, forgiven prodigals, followers, disciples, learners, followers, saints, servants, believers, little ones, branch, bride of Christ, Christians, etc. However, never once in the sixty-six books of the Bible did God’s Word ever use the word “counselee” for those Jesus, or anyone else, ever ministered to.

4. Never once in 1,920 years of church history did any Christian ever use the word “counselee” for those to whom they ministered. Classic books on the history of Christian soul care such as Pastoral Care in Historical Perspective, Classical Pastoral Care, Physicians of the Soul, A History of the Cure of Souls, and A History of Pastoral Care in America reveal the names of care givers and recipients of care. As a sampler: care givers were pastors who shepherded their flock/sheep; they were soul physicians ministering to pilgrims in need of soul care and spiritual healing; they were comforters consoling the sorrowing, grieving, and hurting; they were reconcilers of broken sinners; they were spiritual guides of saints on a journey; they were, according to Luther, to be like a mother with her children; they provided “devil craft” for those tempted by Satan, they were spiritual directors for inquirers, disciples, and learners; they were soul care givers for troubled people with a wounded conscience in need of sustaining, healing, reconciling, and guiding; they were ministers to parishioners and members; they were one-another ministers to brothers and sisters in Christ; they were confessors of penitents. Throughout church history, the recipients of soul care were many things; however, they were never counselees.

5. The first known historical use of “counselee” in all of human history was in the secular Journal of Proceedings and Addresses of the Conference of the Association of American Universities in 1920. The word “counselee” then begins appearing more in the 1920s in secular literature for the person being professionally The word “counselee” was subsequently popularized in the world of secular therapy. At some unknown point in the 20^th century, some Christian first borrowed this secular term and applied it to Christian counseling, integrating the secular idea of “counselee” into a Christian context. According to the Dictionary of Pastoral Care and Counseling, “counselee connotes a person seeking help from a professional counselor implying the payment of a fee. The minister who calls the recipient of pastoral care or counseling a counselee relies on secular disciplines for name and structure. The term implies the helper’s superior knowledge; limited, contractual relationships with the person; and monetary payment for counseling. The term lacks ecclesiastical referents, and the secular rootage makes the spiritual dimension of pastoral counseling seem superfluous.”

6. According to Perron’s non-wooden sufficiency model, modern biblical counselors should use the word “counselee,” which is never used in the Bible, or in church history until the advent of modern secular therapy, and was invented and popularized by non-Christians, and then integrated by Christians.

7. I’m not sure that logic even constitutes common grace, much less sufficiency of Scripture. As Jay Adams would ask, “How did the church survive for 1,920 years without the secular invention by non-Christians of the word ‘counselee’?”

8. If you, me, Perron, or anyone else wants to use “counselee,” that’s fine. But let’s not make the theological argument that using a secular term originated by non-Christian educators in the 1920s, then used by secular therapist beginning in the 1920s, and later integrated by Christians from non-Christians in the 20^th Century, is somehow related to, dependent upon, required by, or supported with the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture—“wooden” or “non-wooden.”

9. This concept of non-wooden sufficiency, as Perron is illustrating it with “counselee,” allows for secular concepts and vocabulary to trump biblical concepts and vocabulary, and moves in the opposite direction of Perron’s recent statements on the limits of common grace. It appears that in Perron’s desire to argue for biblical counselors using the secular word “counselee,” that he may have inadvertently opened the proverbial “Pandora’s Box” for anyone to integrate the Trojan Horse of secular concepts into biblical counseling.

Misunderstanding and Misapplying Sufficiency 

In raising the issue of non-wooden sufficiency, Sean Perron is addressing an important theological concept. Jordan Steffaniak, in his article, What Does Sufficiency Mean?, explains what theologians mean when they talk about the nature and scope of sufficiency. He even describes how sufficiency, rightly understood, deals with “the wooden sense” of “something being in the Bible” in an “absolute/word-for-word only” sense. Steffaniak also summarizes the dangers of abusing the doctrine of sufficiency.

“But it [sufficiency] is liable to be abused like any other doctrine. And it’s liable to be misunderstood in both liberal and conservative directions. We can end up rejecting it or we can end up expanding it beyond its proper scope.”

It appears to me that Perron has either misunderstood, or misapplied, in both directions, what theologians mean by wooden or non-wooden sufficiency.

Expanding Sufficiency Beyond Its Proper Scope 

First, as I summarized above, I believe Perron has mistakenly expanded sufficiency beyond its proper scope. Here’s how.

In order to win an unnecessary argument over whether “client” or “counselee” is the better word, and by insisting on the secular word “counselee,” Perron has allowed secular concepts and vocabulary to trump biblical concepts and vocabulary. This moves in the opposite direction of his recent statements on the limits of common grace. Perron is arguing from modern practice back into Scripture, and making one modern word woodenly wrong and another modern word woodenly correct. In doing so, he may have inadvertently opened the proverbial “Pandora’s Box” for anyone to integrate the Trojan Horse of secular concepts into biblical counseling.

Ironically, what Perron is doing is actually wooden sufficiency. Gregory of Nazianzus (329–390) explained that wooden sufficiency involves being “dreadfully servile to the letter.” It is wooden-sufficiency to claim that the word “client” is associated with secular counseling and, therefore, is not biblical, while simultaneously claiming that another word—“counselee”—that is also associated with secular counseling, is biblical. It is wooden sufficiency to claim that because Jesus is called the Wonderful Counselor that, therefore, it is only logical that we are His “counselees,” and “counselee” is the officially preferred word used by modern biblical counselors.

I have no need to be wooden about this. Personally, while I tend not to use either word “client” or “counselee” much anymore, I am fine with people using either word, especially when they define the word—like Jason Kovacs does. I do not believe that a word must be in Scripture in order to be useable by Christians. As I’ve said, we should all be careful unless we sin against the biblical command not to quarrel and quibble about words (2 Timothy 2:14). I am fine with allowing Jason Kovacs to use “client” as he occasionally does. I am fine with Sean Perron using “counselee,” as long as he does not woodenly demand that his modern secular word is the preferred word for all biblical counselors.

Narrowing Sufficiency in an Unbiblical Way 

Again, ironically, Perron’s reference to non-wooden sufficiency enlightens us to how Perron and others are narrowing sufficiency in an unbiblical way. For instance, Francine Tan, in her ACBC Journal of Biblical Soul Care article, states,

“Thus, I propose that biblical counselors ought to revisit how we define CG and make a few qualifications to the traditional Reformed view of CG…. CG should not be understood as the positive contribution made by unregenerate men through discoveries, insights, or ‘good deeds’” (Common Grace in Debate, 84).

To understand sufficiency of Scripture, biblical counseling, and common grace, as taught by Reformed theologians, I would encourage you to read this 35,500-word collation of primary source material: Common Grace and Biblical Counseling. To understand how Perron and Tan are unbiblically narrowing the theological meaning of sufficiency, we first need to understand what Reformed theologians actually mean by the concept of wooden sufficiency. To summarize this, we’ll return to Steffaniak’s article.

It is significant that theologians use this concept of non-wooden sufficiency to insist on the value of natural theology and the potential usefulness of common grace insights. Steffaniak illustrates repeatedly how Reformed theology teaches that there is useful information in nature discerned through God’s common grace which is not found explicitly—word-for-word in a wooden way—in Scripture.

For instance, Turretin argued at length against the Socinians “who deny the existence of any such natural theology or knowledge of God…. The orthodox, on the contrary, uniformly teach that there is a natural theology, partly innate (derived from the book of conscience by means of common notions) and partly acquired (drawn from the book of creatures discursively).”

Perron misapplied non-wooden sufficiency by woodenly insisting on his preferred modern word for those ministered to by biblical counselors. Reformed theologians, on the other hand, encourage us to use the theological concept of non-wooden sufficiency to beware of unbiblically limiting God’s sovereign use of common grace.

I am thankful for Perron reintroducing us to non-wooden sufficiency, even if he misapplied the concept. Given the current discussions in the biblical counseling world about common grace, it would be beneficial if we understood the Reformed idea of non-wooden sufficiency. It would assist us in understanding the biblical relationship between common grace, natural theology, and the sufficiency of Scripture.