5 Biblical Counseling Sustaining Skills: GRACE, Part 9

Note: I’ve developed the follow post from my book Spiritual Friends. In Part 1 and Part 2, we learned about Grace Connecting. In Part 3 and Part 4, we learned about Rich Soul Empathy. In Part 5 and Part 6, we learned about Accurate Listening. In Part 7 and Part 8, we learned about Caring Spiritual Conversations. 

In this ten-part blog mini-series, we’re learning five biblical counseling skills of sustaining by using the acronym GRACE.

• G—Grace Connecting: Proverbs 27:6

• R—Rich Soul Empathizing: Romans 12:15

• A—Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: John 2:23-4:43

• C—Caring Spiritual Conversations: Ephesians 4:29

• E—Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Isaiah 61:1-3

Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Sustaining Biblical Trialogues—Isaiah 61:1-3

Spiritual conversations use broad theological concepts to prompt people to ponder more deeply their walk with God.

Scriptural explorations use specific applicable biblical passages to help people to relate God’s truth to their circumstances.

Isaiah 61:1-3 provides the purposes for sustaining scriptural explorations:

• Preach good news to the poor.

• Bind up the brokenhearted.

• Proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners.

• Proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor and the day of vengeance of our God.

• Comfort all who mourn.

• Provide for those who grieve in Zion—bestowing on them:

• A crown of beauty instead of ashes,

• The oil of gladness instead of mourning, and

• A garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.

• Call and envision people as:

• Oaks of righteousness and

• A planting of the LORD.

• Display the LORD’s splendor.

Notice the ultimate purpose of all soul care—helping your spiritual friends to display God’s glory by trusting in His goodness in the midst of life’s badness.

Specifically for sustaining, empathic scriptural explorations relate God’s truth to your spiritual friend’s life to encourage candor, complaint, cry, and comfort/communion. Imagine that you’ve connected with Alonzo. He senses that you’re in his casket with him. You sense that you understand something of what he’s going through. Having heard some of the depths of his soul through listening to his words, you’re praying silently for opportunities for the two of you to listen together to God’s Word.

In a natural, friend-to-friend manner, you long to help Alonzo to invite God back into the picture, into the casket with him. Your quest requires a loving understanding of Alonzo, biblical wisdom about the character and purposes of God, and biblical knowledge of Scripture. It also requires a wise, humble, and bold commitment to helping Alonzo to connect with God—his ultimate Spiritual Friend.

To get there, Alonzo needs to face life. He has to look in the mirror and acknowledge the ashes. Like the Jews of old, he must tear his garments and cover his head with ashes. He must mourn and grieve, singing the psalmists’ laments. He has to face life so he can face God. In other words, he needs to practice biblical candor, complaint, cry, and comfort.

How do you help Alonzo to experience candor, complaint, cry, and comfort? You could tell him—“Cry now!” Not so wise.

Or, you could teach him the four stages of biblical suffering. “Alonzo, for you to heal there are some biblical stages that we see evidenced in person after person throughout the Bible: candor, complaint, cry, and comfort. Let me share the passages and teachings that show us why we should do these, how we should do them, and the help they offer.” Better—in a given situation, in a given way. However, still not best.

The most helpful, effective way is the way of trialogues that use scriptural explorations to encourage personalized candor, complaint, cry, and comfort.

With Alonzo and others, you can use the following trialogues as a basic pattern for exploring biblical narratives/stories, psalms, or passages together.

• How do you react to this biblical story/psalm/passage?

• How is it different from your situation? How is it similar?

• How have you been responding differently? Similarly?

• What in this story/psalm/passage would you like to add to your response? How could you do that?

• Imagine writing a story/psalm/passage somewhat like this one regarding your current suffering.

• What would your relationship to God be like in your story/psalm/passage?

• What role would you play in your story/psalm/passage?

• Who else might be in your story/psalm/passage?

• Are there any characters in this story/psalm/passage who remind you of any people in your life?

• How would God give you strength in your story/psalm/passage?

• What would the theme of your story/psalm/passage be?

• How might your story/psalm/passage turn out?

• How would God work out your story/psalm/passage for good?

The Rest of the Story 

In our final post in this blog mini-series (not so mini!), Part 10 will share sample scriptural explorations for candor, complaint, cry, and comfort.

Join the Conversation 

Consider a difficult situation in your life. How would you use some of the trialogues questions in today’s post to relate a specific passage to what you are going through?

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

Tags: Biblical Counseling, Empathy, Spiritual Friends, Sustaining, Trialogues

5 Biblical Counseling Sustaining Skills: GRACE, Part 8

Note: I’ve developed the follow post from my book Spiritual Friends. In Part 1 and Part 2, we learned about Grace Connecting. In Part 3 and Part 4, we learned about Rich Soul Empathy. In Part 5 and Part 6, we learned about Accurate Listening. In Part 7, we introduced Caring Spiritual Conversations.

In this ten-part blog mini-series, we’re learning five biblical counseling skills of sustaining by using the acronym GRACE.

• G—Grace Connecting: Proverbs 27:6

• R—Rich Soul Empathizing: Romans 12:15

• A—Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: John 2:23-4:43

• C—Caring Spiritual Conversations: Ephesians 4:29

• E—Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Isaiah 61:1-3

The Practice of Spiritual Conversations

Our desire in spiritual conversations is to help our spiritual friends to live coram Deo (face-to-face with God). Our quest is to help our friends find God in the midst of their suffering. We want to send them on a God-quest where they bring God back into the center of their life journeys. Spiritual conversations in sustaining are a quest to encourage spiritual friends to invite God into their casket.

Spiritual Conversations and a Quest to Face God

I’m often asked, “Can you employ spiritual conversations with “unspiritual people,” with unbelievers, with pre-Christians?” Yes. The following sample spiritual conversations are especially appropriate when working with an unbeliever because they probe and plant seeds.

• I’m interested in how your spiritual values relate to this issue.

• I’m interested in how you are relating your spiritual values to this issue.

• Has your loss made any difference in your spiritual life?

• How are these problems influencing your view of God?

• How are these issues influencing your relationship to God?

• Has the issue you want to resolve made any difference in your feelings about God?

• What source of strength have you turned to in your distress?

Spiritual Conversations and a Quest to Face What Was Lost: “Life is Bad!”

Sufferology teaches that before our spiritual friends can see how truly good God is, they have to first be brutally honest about how horribly bad life is. Therefore, we want to engage our spiritual friends in conversations that help them to face what was lost. We might call these “casket questions and integrity conversations.” They help our spiritual friends to muster the integrity to explore honestly their disappointments and damages from a triune relational perspective—how it affects their relationships to God, others, and themselves.

• I’m so sorry you’re going through this.

• I can see and feel your grief and pain.

• What is this loss like for you? What are you feeling right now?

• What do you wish were happening instead of what you’re going through?

• Have you ever faced a loss like this before?

• What has been robbed from your life due to this? What is missing?

• What are you grieving over the most? What hurts the most in this situation?

• What do you fear the most in this situation? What if that happened?

• What’s the worst-case scenario? What if that happened?

Spiritual Conversations and a Quest to Face God in Loss

First, trialogue about how bad life is. Next, trialogue about bringing God into the center of the loss.

• What are you doing with God in your suffering?

• Where is God in all this?

• What might God be up to in all of this?

• Have you been able to share your heart with God? What have you said?

• What are you sensing from God?

Spiritual Conversations and a Quest to Wrestle with God

Biblical characters like Jacob, Job, David, and Paul, among many others, not only knew that life was bad. They not only knew that God was good. They also wrestled with the tension between a good God who allows evil and suffering. Spiritual friends encourage their friends to do the same.

• What do you think the Bible says about feeling and expressing anger or disappointment toward God?

• What Scriptures could we look at that illustrate how God’s people have talked to God when they felt that He was not hearing their cry?

• If you were to write a Psalm 13 or a Psalm 88 to God (Psalms of Lament and Complaint), how would it sound? What would you write?

• How would you compare your response to your suffering to Jacob’s response to God in his suffering? To Job’s response? To David’s response? To Paul’s response?

• If you painted a picture of how you sense God right now, what would you paint?

• What is it like for you when God seems deaf to your cry?

• When your soul shouts, “Where is God now? Where are His great and precious promises when I need them?” and the Scriptures teach that God is everywhere present and always faithful, which do you believe? How do you go about choosing which to believe?

Spiritual Conversations and a Quest to Cling to God

Wrestling with God is biblical (biblical candor and lament). As our spiritual friends wrestle, they must cling.

• What is your suffering teaching you about God’s power and your weakness?

• How could your agony cause you to cry out to God for help, love, strength, joy, peace, or deliverance?

• If you knew that God would say, “Yes,” to your prayer about your situation, what would you be praying?

• If God were to immediately answer, “Yes,” how would you respond?

• What Scriptures could you turn to in order to understand God’s perspective on your suffering?

• What passages have you found helpful in gaining a new perspective on your suffering? To find comfort as you go through your suffering?

• When else have you experienced suffering similar to this? What did you learn about God in that situation? What would you repeat and what would you change about your response to that situation?

Spiritual Conversations and a Quest to Not Lose Faith/A Quest to Sustain Faith

Historically, one of the main roles of sustaining has been to help believers to draw a line in the sand of retreat. To say, “My faith has been shaken, doubts have arisen, but I will not give up. I will not surrender to despair. My hope will remain. My faith is sustained.”

The following trialogues, in addition to helping believers to explore and sustain their faith relationship with God, can be helpful when relating to the unsaved.

• Has your loss made any difference in your feelings about God?

• It feels like your faith is slipping away from you and that’s scary for you.

• Tell me your perspective on the age-old question, “Why do bad things happen to good people?”

• It’s hard to feel anything but sadness because of your son’s death, but some part of you would welcome genuine faith and consolation.

• How does your faith in Christ fit into your feeling and thinking about the loss of your son?

• One part of you wants some genuine relief from your deep sorrow, but you don’t feel open to the peace and assurance that your faith might give.

The Rest of the Story

In Part 9, we’ll learn about Empathetic Scriptural Explorations.

Join the Conversation 

What are some of the trialogues from today’s post that most resonate with you?

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

Tags: Biblical Counseling, Spiritual Conversations, Spiritual Friends

5 Biblical Counseling Sustaining Skills: GRACE, Part 7

Note: I’ve developed the follow post from my book Spiritual Friends. In Part 1 and Part 2, we learned about Grace Connecting. In Part 3 and Part 4, we learned about Rich Soul Empathy. In Part 5 and Part 6, we learned about Accurate Listening.

In this ten-part blog mini-series, we’re learning five biblical counseling skills of sustaining by using the acronym GRACE.

• G—Grace Connecting: Proverbs 27:6

• R—Rich Soul Empathizing: Romans 12:15

• A—Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: John 2:23-4:43

• C—Caring Spiritual Conversations: Ephesians 4:29

• E—Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Isaiah 61:1-3

Caring Spiritual Conversations: Sustaining Theological Trialogues—Ephesians 4:29

People in pain need whispers, not shouts. Don’t holler curses; whisper grace.

In caring spiritual conversations, we use biblical wisdom principles to engage our spiritual friends in discussions that help them to think through their external and internal situation. The core relational competency necessary for this soul care art is the ability to trialogue.

In monologues you speak to me; in dialogues we speak to each other; and in trialogues together we listen to God. In trialogues, we want to make the presence of God the central dynamic in our conversation. We interact in Jesus’ name helping people to face personal issues on a personal level.

Our personal relationship with them helps them to deepen their personal relationship with Christ. Spiritual conversations invite our spiritual friends into an exchange so they can experience the passion of having been changed. They invite our spiritual friends into a vivid, robust experience of grace narratives through grace relationships.

Consider just a sampling of biblical passages that depict trialogues:

• “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them” (Matthew 18:20).

• “See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called ‘Today,’ so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness” (Hebrews 3:12-13).

• “Let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith . . . And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching” (Hebrews 10:22, 24-25).

The Nature of Spiritual Conversations

The tongue has the capacity to offer life-giving resources that nourish the soul, or to be a power for life-draining energies that poison the soul. “Words satisfy the mind as much as fruit does the stomach; good talk is as gratifying as a good harvest. Words kill, words give life; they’re either poison or fruit—you choose” (Eugene Peterson, The Message, Proverbs 18:20-21). Spiritual conversation is simply good talk about our good God in the midst of our bad life.

“Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen” (Ephesians 4:29). Spiritual conversations are grace conversations. Law conversations crush people and destroy relationships (compare Matthew 23). Grace conversations edify people and build relationships.

“Unwholesome” words are corrupt and rotten like decaying fruit. They’re putrid, defiling, and injuring words. They’re toxic speech—words that poison others, making their spirit sick. Paul’s emphasis is clear in the original language: “All words of rottenness, do not let come out of your mouth.” Spiritual friends restrain themselves, refusing to speak until they understand what words will be:

• Helpful: Good because they flow from moral character and promote beautiful living.

• Strengthening/Building Up Others: Edifying words that bring improvement and promote maturity.

• According to Their Need: Carefully chosen words that specifically fill up a need, meet a lack, minister to a want, or express care in a difficulty, where it is most necessary.

• Beneficial/Ministering Grace: Attractive speech that helps others to receive God’s love poem and become God’s love poetry. They are gift words—generously given, freely granted words that accept, that free, that empower, and that give hope.

To the Colossians, Paul writes, “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone” (Colossians 4:6). Grace words are words of connection, giving, affirming, accepting, freeing, and justifying. They are seasoned with salt—they preserve relationships with God, others, and self.

James, after describing the fiery and poisonous nature of words (James 3:1-8), notes that, “with the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness” (James 3:9). In James 3:10-16, James teaches that Satan is the ultimate source of cursing words—harmful, hurtful, damaging words that wish a judgment upon someone. The most harmful words involve cursing conversations, law relationships, and condemning speech filled with wrath and scorn. Grace words, by contrast, are motivated by purity, pursue peace, and produce the fruit of righteousness (James 3:17-18).

The Careful Use of Spiritual Conversations

Throughout Spiritual Friends, you will read literally thousands of sample spiritual conversations. Because of the nature of the printed word, you will not be able to hear the inflection and tone of these sentences. You also will not be able to fully sense the spontaneity and individuality necessary in the skillful use of spiritual conversations. In other words, if you simply repeat to your spiritual friends these samples, then you will come across wooden, generic, academic, and out of touch. The samples are simply meant to stir your imagination, not to limit your creative, individual, personal interaction with your spiritual friends.

Additionally, be careful in the use of questions. I put many of the dialogues/trialogues in question form because they need to be so generic. However, think of spiritual conversations more as a quest to invite Jesus in, not as questions that push Jesus out and people away.

It is wise to question the use of questions, especially the poor use of questions. A few principles might help.

• As a spiritual friend, you’re not an interrogator. You’re not like Detective Joe Friday saying, “Just the facts, Ma’am. Just the facts.” Spiritual friendship is a conversation, not a cross-examination.

• Be aware that questions can cause your spiritual friend to feel like an object to be diagnosed or a lab specimen to be dissected.

• Never use questions as an excuse to avoid intimacy.

• Don’t use questions as filler because you’re unsure what to say. Instead, simply say, “I’m not sure where to go from here.”

When you do use questions, consider some suggestions for using them effectively:

• Always ask yourself, “Will this question further or inhibit the flow of our relationship, of our conversation?”

• Normally ask open-ended questions—ones that can’t be answered with a “Yes” or “No.”

• Use indirect questions that imply a desire for further exploration, without having a question mark at the end of your sentence. “That must have been hard when your wife left the room.” “I bet a million thoughts were going through your mind when your boss said that.”

The Rest of the Story 

In Part 8, we’ll learn The Practice of Spiritual Conversations.

Join the Conversation 

Who trialogues with you—listens together to God with you? Who do you trialogues with?

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

Tags: Biblical Counseling, Spiritual Conversations, Spiritual Friends, Trialogues

5 Biblical Counseling Sustaining Skills: GRACE, Part 6

Note: I’ve developed the follow post from my book Spiritual Friends. In Part 1 and Part 2, we learned about Grace Connecting. In Part 3 and Part 4, we learned about Rich Soul Empathy. In Part 5, we introduced Accurate Listening.

In this ten-part blog mini-series, we’re learning five biblical counseling skills of sustaining by using the acronym GRACE. 

• G—Grace Connecting: Proverbs 27:6

• R—Rich Soul Empathizing: Romans 12:15

• A—Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: John 2:23-4:43

• C—Caring Spiritual Conversations: Ephesians 4:29

• E—Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Isaiah 61:1-3

Listening with Relational Competence: LISTEN

We can use the acrostic LISTEN to remind ourselves of basic components of competent spiritual listening.

• L— Loving Motivation: Proverbs 21:13

• I—Intimate Concern: Galatians 6:1-3; Colossians 4:6; James 3:17-18

• S—Slow to Speak: Proverbs 18:13; James 1:19

• T—Timing: Proverbs 15:23; 25:11

• E—Encouraging: Hebrews 3:7-19; 10:24-25

• N—Need-Focused Hearing: Ephesians 4:29

Loving Motivation: Proverbs 21:13

“If a man shuts his ears to the cry of the poor, he too will cry and not be answered” (Proverbs 21:13). Relationally competent spiritual friends are motivated, like God, to listen for, hear, care about, empathize with, and respond to the hurts of the wounded. Neither secular theory nor human curiosity drives careful listening. Care does. Concern does. Compassion does.

Intimate Concern: Galatians 6:1-3; Colossians 4:6; James 3:17-18

Paul (Galatians 6:1-3; Colossians 4:6) emphasizes the humble, spiritual, gentle, and gracious concern that ought to accompany spiritual listening. James (James 3:17-18), in a context sandwiched between the use of the tongue and the cause of quarrels, explains that true wisdom for living flows from a heart that loves people and peace, a heart that is considerate and submissive, impartial and sincere.

Slow to Speak: Proverbs 18:13; James 1:19 

James is quite emphatic. “My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry” (James 1:19). Solomon explains why. “He who answers before listening—that is his folly and his shame” (Proverbs 18:13). Relationally competent spiritual friends hear their friend’s story before they tell God’s story to their friend.

Timing: Proverbs 15:23; 25:11

“A man finds joy in giving an apt reply—and how good is a timely word!” (Proverbs 15:23). “A word aptly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver” (Proverbs 25:11). “Apt” means fitting, timely, given in due season—words said at the right time, in the right way, for the right reason because of right listening.

Exploring: Hebrews 3:7-19; 10:24-25

Both Hebrews 3 and 10 speak of encouraging and clearly imply the necessity of exploratory listening before profitable encouraging. Before encouraging, spiritual friends tune into, see, listen, and hear what is going on in the heart of their spiritual friend.

Need-Focused Hearing: Ephesians 4:29

To benefit others, spiritual friends listen for specific needs. “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen” (Ephesians 4:29). Spiritual friends ask, as they listen, “What is it that my spiritual friend most needs? What are his hurts and wounds? What are her fears and scars? What wholesome words relate to her specific situation? Specifically, given his situation, what words will benefit him?”

The Rest of the Story

In Part 7, we learn about Caring Spiritual Conversations.

Join the Conversation 

Using the LISTEN acrostic, rate yourself on each of the six aspects of listening. How could you improve your spiritual listening skills, especially in those areas where you rated yourself lower?

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

Tags: Biblical Counseling, Listening, Spiritual Friendship

5 Biblical Counseling Sustaining Skills: GRACE, Part 5

Note: I’ve developed the follow post from my book Spiritual Friends. In Part 1 and Part 2, we learned about Grace Connecting. In Part 3 and Part 4, we learned about Rich Soul Empathy. In this blog mini-series, we’re learning five biblical counseling skills of sustaining by using the acronym GRACE.

• G—Grace Connecting: Proverbs 27:6

• R—Rich Soul Empathizing: Romans 12:15

• A—Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: John 2:23-4:43

• C—Caring Spiritual Conversations: Ephesians 4:29

• E—Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Isaiah 61:1-3

Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: Faith-Drenched Alertness—John 2:23-4:43

Think of spiritual listening as reflective paying attention. It is passionate love that says, “I am not the center of my attention. God is. You are. I am third.” As Deitrich Bonhoeffer teaches:

“The first service we owe to others in fellowship is to listen to them. If we fail to listen, there are spiritual consequences. He who can no longer listen to his brother, will soon be no longer listening to God either.”

Jesus listened spiritually to Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman. John places a “narrative marker” just before these two encounters. “He did not need man’s testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man” (John 2:25). Jesus knew the scriptural, universal nature of human nature. He also tuned into the unique nature of individuals. Jesus could not have encountered two more unique individuals. His approach to them was idiosyncratic—uniquely fitting for each. Jesus listened to their souls and knew their individual stories. To follow His model, spiritual friends:

• Listen to Biblical Principles of Spiritual Listening: God’s Word about Human Words

• Listen with Relational Competence: LISTEN

Listening to Biblical Principles of Spiritual Listening: God’s Word about Human Words

Listening carefully to people’s words is biblical, not secular. God’s Word teaches that:

• Words Are Powerful

• Words Are Meaningful

• Words Convey Soul Messages

• Words Are Worthy of Soulful Attentiveness

• Words Reflect One of Two Life Interpretations

Words Are Powerful: Proverbs 18:21

“The tongue has the power of life and death” (Proverbs 18:21). That’s power. The tongue, says James, is a small body part with power far beyond its size (James 3:1-5a). “Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole person, sets the whole course of his life on fire” (James 3:5b-6). That’s power. Listen carefully to the powerful, life and death words of your spiritual friends.

Words Are Meaningful: Proverbs 18:4; 20:5

“The words of a man’s mouth are deep waters” (Proverbs 18:4). “The purposes of a man’s heart are deep waters, but a man of understanding draws them out” (Proverbs 20:5). Words carry the soul’s longings, beliefs, purposes, and feelings. Through careful, caring listening, you perceive the depth of the soul. Through active, accurate listening, you draw out the meaning of the soul—the hidden desires, convictions, goals, and emotions.

Words Convey Soul Messages: Psalm 39:1-3; Matthew 12:33-37 

“Out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks” (Matthew 12:34). Spoken words flow out of the depths of the heart revealing the content of the heart. The good heart bears nourishing fruit conveyed by wholesome words, while the evil heart bears poisonous fruit conveyed by unwholesome words. If you want to know your spiritual friends, then listen skillfully to their words.

Words Are Worthy of Soulful Attentiveness: Proverbs 18:13; James 1:19

“He who answers before listening—that is his folly, that is his shame” (Proverbs 18:13). “My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry” (James 1:19). The caring soul carefully listens to words spoken from the soul.

Words Reflect One of Two Life Interpretations: Job 42:7 

“After the LORD had said these things to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, ‘I am angry with you and your two friends, because you have not spoken of me what is right, as my servant Job has’” (Job 42:7). Job and his three friends witnessed one situation, but derived two vastly different interpretations. The set of information involved Job’s life experience. The first interpretation consisted of the works, condemnation, cursing, and shame narrative of life inspired by Satan. The second consisted of the grace, faith, openness, and acceptance narrative inspired by God. According to God, Job got him right; Job’s friends got God all wrong.

Whenever you listen, you listen for three sets of stories. Listen for your spiritual friends’ life stories—listen attentively to what they’re saying about what they’re experiencing. Then listen to two possible interpretations of their stories. Listen attentively for signs of Satan’s narrative creeping in. Additionally, listen attentively to God’s narrative gaining dominance. These competing interpretive frameworks are at work in every life story.

The Rest of the Story

Join us for Part 6 as we learn to LISTEN—six basic components of relational listening.

Join the Conversation 

What application could you make to Bonhoeffer’s quote? “He who can no longer listen to his brother, will soon be no longer listening to God either.”

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

Tags: Biblical Counseling, Listening, Spiritual Friends

5 Biblical Counseling Sustaining Skills: GRACE, Part 4

Note: I’ve developed the follow post from my book Spiritual Friends. In Part 1 and Part 2, we learn about Grace Connecting. In Part 3, we began to learn about Rich Soul Empathy. In this blog mini-series, we’re learning five biblical counseling skills of sustaining by using the acronym GRACE.

• G—Grace Connecting: Proverbs 27:6

• R—Rich Soul Empathizing: Romans 12:15

• A—Accurate/Active Spiritual Listening: John 2:23-4:43

• C—Caring Spiritual Conversations: Ephesians 4:29

• E—Empathetic Scriptural Explorations: Isaiah 61:1-3

How to Empathize with the Soul: Climbing in the Casket—Hebrews 4:15-16

Soul empathy involves our capacity for “as if” relating. Ambrose wrote:

“Show compassion for those who suffer. Suffer with those who are in trouble as if being in trouble with them.”

Soul empathy requires compassionate imagination. We need to imagine what it is like for our friends to experience their life stories. To understand others with intimate knowledge, we must read into their experiences asking, “What is it like to experience and perceive the world through their stories?”

Hebrews 2:14-18 and 4:15-16 teach that empathy is not less than, but more than, intellectual. It is also experiential. Biblical, Christ-like empathy shares the experiences of another, connecting through common inner experiences. Such soul sharing occurs by way of incarnation—entering another’s world and worldview.

As a spiritual friend, the more human we are, the more real, the more fully alive and passionate, the more we will tune into others. Then we’ll experience a sympathetic resonance no matter the melody, dirge, minor or major key, or discordant note.

The God of All Comfort

Empathy, however, does not come from sharing the same experience, situation, or suffering. No two people experience a situation identically, nor do they share the identical experience.

Empathy comes from sharing the same dependency upon God. The God of all comfort, comforts us in our specific trouble so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the infinite comfort we receive from the God of all comfort.

I derive a core spiritual friendship principle from these concepts:

We will be empathetic with others to the degree that we are facing our struggles face-to-face with God.

When our soul is attuned to others, then we “pick up their radio waves, the vibes of their inner reactions.” Having accomplished this, we need to go the distance. We need to communicate to our spiritual friends in a way that helps them to “have empathy with our empathy.” They need to feel that we feel with them. Otherwise, their sorrow is not shared, it is simply “understood.” When both our “soul radios” are tuned to the same frequency, then we can share our soul friends’ experiences. We share their sorrows by climbing in the casket with them, and they know we are there.

While death is separation; shared sorrow is connection. It is the stitch connecting the wound. It is the healing balm. However, shared sorrow must never be a healing replacement. It must not replace grief. Shared sorrow does not purpose to eliminate sorrow, to rescue, or to cheer up. Shared sorrow purposes to help another to face and embrace sorrow.

“Levels” of Empathy

Effective soul empathy includes several “levels.”

1. Level One Empathy: “How would that affect an image bearer?”

Here we understand our spiritual friend through God’s eyes. A foundational level of empathy, it builds upon a universal biblical understanding of people.

 2. Level Two Empathy: “How would that affect an image bearer like me?”

Here we understand our spiritual friend through our eyes. A filtering level, we use our life as a filter through which we relate God’s truth to our friend’s life.

3. Level Three Empathy: “How would that affect an image bearer like him/her?”

Here we understand our spiritual friend through his or her eyes. We move from universal to unique empathy. In this final, deepest level of soul empathy we need to:

a. Adopt Our Spiritual Friend’s Viewpoint:

We replace our internal frame of reference with his. We neither condone nor condemn, agree or disagree, at this point. We simply seek to see what it is like to be him—through his mindset and frame of reference.

b. Express Our Spiritual Friend’s Viewpoint:

We express in our own words what we sense that she has said, felt, and thought about the situation. We then seek clarification.

c. Encourage Our Spiritual Friend to Accept His/Her Viewpoint: 

We nudge him to acknowledge his own experience. We help him to verbalize how he sees things and to accept his own perspective.

d. Help Our Spiritual Friend to Evaluate His/Her Viewpoint:

She needs to begin to assess how near or far her viewpoint is from reality.

The Rest of the Story 

The relational competencies of Grace Connecting and Rich Soul Empathizing provide the first two sustaining “skills” necessary to help our spiritual friend’s faith survive. Through them, we build a trusting, mutual, caring relationship.

Having done so, what next? In particular, how do we use the Scriptures to skillfully discuss and explore applications specific to our spiritual friend? In our next post we begin to learn how through Accurate and Active Spiritual Listening. 

Join the Conversation 

Who do you have in your life who empathizes deeply and compassionately with you?

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

Tags: Biblical Counseling, Comfort, Empathy, Spiritual Friends, Sustaining