Ask the Counselor: What About “Spiritual Formation” and “Spiritual Disciplines”?

As a biblical counselor, I’ve been asked:

“What do you think about “spiritual formation” and “spiritual disciplines”?

In response to that legitimate question, consider the following eight principles for responding to questions related to the terms we use to describe our ministry.

1. Understand the Bigger Picture Behind the Question

This is really a question about the legitimacy of using “extra-biblical terms.” Not “un-biblical terms,” but “extra-biblical terms”: words or phrases not directly found in the Bible.

In using “extra-biblical terms,” the answer is not: “The word/phrase must be used directly in the Bible for it to be legitimate.” We couldn’t use the word “Trinity” if that were the case. And even if the term were in the Bible, we’d have to use the exact Hebrew, Aramaic, or Greek word to be exact. Even then there would be questions about whether our use of the exact word was accurate to the original usage.

The answer must be: “Is the person defining their word/phrase biblically and providing biblical support for their usage?”

2. Don’t Just “Defend Our Terminology Turf”

Sometimes in the modern biblical counseling world (see Powlison and Lambert for historical overviews of modern biblical counseling) we seem hyper-focused on “defending our terminology turf.”

That is, it’s okay for us to coin terms that we do not directly find in Scripture (“halo data” by Adams and “volitional beings” by myself are just two examples). But then we get nervous when others use terms, such as spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines, for which we don’t detect a direct biblical counterpart.

3. Define Our Terms

If we choose to criticize a modern extra-biblical term, whether it’s spiritual formation, spiritual disciplines, biblical counseling, or biblical psychology, the person critiquing others must first provide an “operational definition” of the term they are critiquing. That is, we need to craft a careful and specific description of how we are using the term. We need to be careful about blanket, generic, abstract statements like, “Spiritual formation is a non-biblical term that reflects Eastern mysticism.” Really? By whose definition and whose usage?

David Powlison provides a tremendous example of defining his terms in his discussion of six usages of the term “psychology” (click here for a video interview). With Powlison’s operational definitions in hand, now he can intelligently interact with others about “psychology.”

4. Allow the Other Person to Define His/Her Term

Once we have our definition clear, then we need to be clear and fair about how others define their terms. Far too often we critique a straw man. Rather than allowing others to define what they mean by spiritual formation or spiritual disciplines (from their own writings and teachings), we embed and load their term with what every other person in history has ever said about the term.

It demonstrates common courtesy, academic honesty, and biblical/exegetical excellence to read in context what others mean by their use of a given term. Let’s not be sloppy and lazy in our critiques of how other people use extra-biblical terms. Let’s engage their work specifically from their definitions and developments of their terms.

5. Be Careful of False Guilt by False Association

What we sometimes hear when people critique terms such as spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines is, “So and so, who is outside our ‘camp,’ used the phrase, so anyone inside our ‘camp” who uses that phrase has obviously capitulated to that unbiblical usage.”

Let’s be more specific. In the Evangelical world, it might read like this, “Those Catholic and Eastern Orthodox mystics in the Dark Ages used spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines, so if this Evangelical is using those terms, he is obviously guilty of non-Evangelical mysticism.”

Or, in the biblical counseling world we might hear, “Those ‘integrationists’ use ‘psychology,’ so any biblical counselor who uses that term is obviously guilty of being an ‘integrationist.’”

How does one know if it is true guilt by actual association or false guilt by false association? Fair question.

Some people assume the answer is, “See, they quoted someone outside our camp!”

Are we saying by that: “Only those inside our camp are always right (which they are not), and those outside our camp are always wrong”? We seem to insist on practicing secondary and tertiary separation even in the scholarly quoting of those outside our group.

A more accurate assessment asks: “Is this person defining their term biblically or using the term with a ‘whole-hog graft’ from others who may not have defined the term biblically to begin with?” That is a legitimate, fair, and vital question to ask.

6. Be Willing to Reclaim Legitimate Terms

Have some extra-biblical terms become embedded with unbiblical definitions? Yes. Psychology is an example.

However, we can, and I believe, should, reclaim those terms. The Church Fathers (such as Tertullian) and the Puritans (such as Edwards) did just that. They developed a “biblical psychology”: a biblical way of understanding people (Creation), problems (Fall), and solutions (Redemption).

The same is true with spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines. Luther is a prime example. For my dissertation, I studied Luther’s pastoral counseling. Given his place in church history, Luther was very careful about any false form of spiritual discipline. He vehemently rejected any notion of spiritual disciplines that were practiced to earn God’s grace. However, he accepted and encouraged others to practice spiritual disciplines when they were practiced as a response to God’s grace and as a means of being responsive to the Spirit’s work in their heart.

I believe we ought to reclaim a phrase like spiritual formation rather than running and hiding. We’ve abdicated far too many words. Let’s stop surrendering. Spiritual formation, biblically defined, is the goal of biblical counseling: our inner lives increasingly reflecting the inner life of Christ. We call it Christlikeness through progressive sanctification. We could also call it “spiritual formation.”

Frankly, any time a biblical counselor moves from “the indicative” to “the imperative” and starts talking specifically about “put off/put on,” that biblical counselor is involved in the process of spiritual formation. And, when that biblical counselor suggests a specific “put off/put on,” he or she has moved into the realm of spiritual disciplines: biblical truth applied specifically to a unique person in their specific circumstances.

If people would rather use the phrase “progressive sanctification” instead of “spiritual formation,” that’s fine. And if people would rather use the phrase “biblical counseling homework,” instead of “spiritual disciplines,” that’s fine, too. But carefully and biblically defined, those are overlapping terms theologically and methodologically.

7. Be Wise in the Implementation of Spiritual Growth Practices

People also need to be careful with the adage, “Jesus did not practice _______, nor did His Apostles. So that spiritual practice is obviously unbiblical.” Ponder the implications of that philosophy.

• Where do we have biblical warrant from the example of Christ and the Apostles for a sixty minute meeting (often fifty minutes) once per week for biblical counseling?

• Where do we see “homework” at the end of those once a week meetings?”

• Taking it to broader categories, where do we see warrant for much of what happens in our Sunday worship services? Or even for something as basic as Sunday School or Children’s Church?

It is an illegitimate argument to declare a particular spiritual discipline to be wrong simply because it was not specifically practiced by Jesus or the Apostles.

Rather, the legitimate question would be: “Do we have a theological basis for what we do and for what we don’t do in the particulars of progressive sanctification, putting off and putting on, and being formed by the Spirit through the Word increasingly into the image of Christ?”

8. Define Extra-Biblical Terms Using Biblical Categories

Principle eight has been implicit in all the preceding principles. The term itself is not the crux of the issue. Whether the term is biblical counseling, progressive sanctification, growth in grace, soul care, spiritual direction, spiritual formation, or spiritual disciplines, the core question relates to how the extra-biblical term is defined biblically. Much could be shared here, but two main points summarize the biblical categories.

• Is the term developed based upon comprehensive theological categories?

Is the term developed with a biblical anthropology (Creation): A comprehensive biblical understanding of how God designed the soul?

Is the term developed with a biblical hamartiology (Fall): A comprehensive biblical understanding of the impact of sin, fallenness, depravity, the world, the flesh, and the devil?

Is the term developed with a biblical soteriology (Redemption): A comprehensive biblical understanding of salvation, grace, our new nature, and sanctification?

• Is the term developed based upon a Gospel-Centered biblical understanding of salvation and sanctification?

This second question was hinted at in the last part of the previous question.

Is the term developed based upon a comprehensive understanding of Christ-centered salvation: grace, faith, justification, reconciliation, regeneration, redemption, union with Christ, and the biblical gospel indicatives?

Is the term developed based upon a comprehensive understanding of grace-based sanctification that builds the imperatives upon the indicatives?

Teaching You to Fish Instead of Giving You a Fish

The preceding eight principles do not tell you what to think about “spiritual formation” and “spiritual disciplines.” Instead, they share ideas about how to think about those terms and any other extra-biblical terms.

Do I think there is an “Evangelical and a non-Evangelical theology of spiritual formation and practice of spiritual disciplines?” Yes. There are biblical ways and unbiblical ways of understanding growth in grace.

Should we be concerned about our theology and practice of spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines? Absolutely. I spend 750 pages developing my biblical approach to those vital matters in Soul Physicians and Spiritual Friends.

I want us all to be wise, discerning Bereans (Acts 17:11) and not carnal, divisive Corinthians (1 Corinthians 1:10-17) when it comes to discernment about spiritual formation and spiritual disciplines.

Join the Conversation 

• “What do you think about “spiritual formation” and “spiritual disciplines”?

• What principles would you add for helping people to assess extra-biblical terms?

• Which of the eight principles resonate with you? Which do you disagree with? Why?

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

What Biblical Counseling and Spiritual Friendship Is NOT!

It’s Supernatural to Mature

Note: This is the seventh and final post in a blog mini-series asking the simple question: Is there a biblical model for spiritual friendship, one-another ministry, biblical counseling, and pastoral counseling?

Read Part 1: Spiritual Map Quest, Part 2: God’s Treasure Map, Part 3: Biblical Soul Care for Suffering, Part 4: Climbing in the Casket, Part 5: Celebrating the Empty Tomb, and Part 6: Dispensers of Grace.

I’m summarizing these posts from Spiritual Friends.

God’s Biblical Counseling GPS # 4: Guiding—”It’s Supernatural to Mature”

Biblical counselors have the privilege of guiding believers to realize that it’s supernatural to mature. Our task is to guide faith by strengthening our spiritual friends to understand, depend upon, and apply Christ’s resurrection power.

We start the process by understanding new life in Christ—our new nature (regeneration) and our new nurture (reconciliation). We look inside our struggling spiritual friends and see the power of sainthood—a new creation in Christ, and the presence of sonship—a new relationship to God.

Growth in Grace: Stir Up the Gift of God

We enlighten our spiritual friends to the truth that God’s grace not only saved them for all eternity, but also changed them for life now. In Christ, they have everything necessary to live a godly life (2 Peter 1:3). Thus it is neither impossible to mature, nor is it natural to mature. Maturity is the supernatural work of God implanted in us at salvation and growing daily in sanctification (2 Corinthians 3:18; 2 Peter 1:3-11; 3:18). We grow in grace by grace because God is gracious.

We continue the guiding process by envisioning the work of God within our spiritual friends (2 Timothy 1:5-7; Hebrews 10:24-25). Paul realizes that he does not need to create spiritual power, love, and wisdom within his disciples. All he has to do is stir it up. Provoke it. Fan it into flame.

“For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline” (a sound mind, wisdom) (2 Timothy 1:6-7, emphasis and parenthesis added).

In fact, according to the author of Hebrews, one of the prime directives for Church life is mutual provocation.

“And let us consider how we may spur (provoke) 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 10:24-25, emphasis and parenthesis added).

We draw out what God has already placed within.

The Goal of Guiding

Notice what we draw out—love. The goal of guiding is not to make life easier. The purpose of biblical spiritual direction is not to change circumstances. The focus is to equip and empower our spiritual friends to love—holy living through Christ-like loving.

Created for Paradise, our friends find themselves in a desert of suffering. Tempted to dig broken cisterns (self-sufficient idols of the heart and false lovers of the soul), they repent and receive Christ’s grace. Turning to God, they drink from the Spring of Living Water. Streams of living water overflow into the lives of others (John 7:37-39). Empowered by the Holy Spirit, our spiritual friends become shepherds in a jungle. In the jungle of fallen life in a fallen world, they exalt God by loving him and loving others.

God’s Roadmap; Our Treasure Map

God really has left us His roadmap, our treasure map. Discovering it, we uncover His plan for offering biblical soul care and spiritual direction through sustaining, healing, reconciling, and guiding.

How to, of course, does not imply easy to. It does not suggest a one-size-fits-all, mechanical, soulless process.

Consider sustaining, healing, reconciling, and guiding like the four points on a compass. They inform you what direction you are heading and what direction to head. However, there’s still the journey. The dance. The art of biblical soul care and spiritual direction (1 Thessalonians 2:8).

The Rest of the Story: Be Equipped with 22 Biblical Counseling Skills

To learn twenty-two biblical counseling skills of sustaining, healing, reconciling, and guiding, visit RPM Ministries’ Spiritual Friends Page.

Join the Conversation

Who has stirred up the gift of God in you? Who has fanned into flame spiritual growth in your life?

What is your biblical model for spiritual friendship, one-another ministry, biblical counseling, and pastoral counseling?

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

Dispensers of Grace

Note: This is the sixth in a blog mini-series asking the simple question: Is there a biblical model for spiritual friendship, one-another ministry, biblical counseling, and pastoral counseling?

Read Part 1: Spiritual Map Quest, Part 2: God’s Treasure Map, Part 3: Biblical Soul Care for Suffering, Part 4: Climbing in the Casket, and Part 5: Celebrating the Empty Tomb.

I’m summarizing these posts from Spiritual Friends. 

God’s Roadmap Marker Number Two: Biblical Spiritual Direction (Noutheteo)

Recall that God’s roadmap, our treasure map, provides two directional markers: biblical soul care (parakleo) and biblical spiritual direction (noutheteo). The absence of either lens leaves our biblical counseling out of focus, distorted.

Some counselors focus only on the evils we have suffered: the damage done to us. They tend to ignore or minimize the sins we have committed: the damage we have done. Comprehensive biblical counselors, on the other hand, also focus on the truth that “God is gracious even when I am sinful.” They are disciplers who practice the ancient art of fraternal correction—concerned confrontation and challenge encouraging core heart change.

Biblical counselors understand spiritual dynamics and discern root causes of spiritual conflicts.

• They understand anthropology—God’s original design for the soul.

• They grasp sufferology—the effect of being sinned against in a fallen, hurtful world.

• They comprehend hamartiology—sin, our fallen nature, and the horrors of personal sin against God and others.

• They apprehend soteriology—salvation, sanctification, and the process of growth in grace.

Biblical counselors use their discernment to provide loving wisdom that reconciles and guides people. Their reconciliation and guiding emphasizes the same ultimate purpose of sustaining and healing—communion with Christ and conformity to Christ. They want to empower and equip people to fulfill the great commandment of loving God and loving others.

God’s Biblical Counseling GPS # 3: Reconciling—“It’s Horrible to Sin, but Wonderful to Be Forgiven”

Some counselors who focus on sin fail to focus on grace. They are quick to quip, “It’s horrible to sin.” But slow to grasp, “It’s wonderful to be forgiven.” We must focus on both.

Satan loves to foul and fool us. Even as regenerate believers with a new heart, Satan dupes us into believing that we are his slaves. He tempts us to curse God, condemn others, and experience contempt for ourselves. It requires tremendous biblical wisdom and personal discernment to sort through his pack of lies and cling to God’s Word of truth.

The truth is, it is horrible to sin. Sin alienates us from God, separates us from each other, and dis-integrates us from our own selves (Romans 1:18-32; Ephesians 2:1-3; 2:11-19; 4:17-32). Due to sin’s deceitfulness (Romans 7:11; 2 Corinthians 4:4; Ephesians 4:17-20; Hebrews 3:13) we need spiritual friends. We need biblical counselors who can ask and answer the question raised in James 4:1. “What causes fights and quarrels among you?” Only biblical counselors like these can fulfill the ministry description provided in Hebrews 3:12-13.

“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.”

We also need biblical counselors who can use the living Word of God to expose the thoughts and attitudes of the heart (Hebrews 4:12-13), and to teach, rebuke, correct, and train in righteousness so that God’s people are equipped for every good work (2 Timothy 3:16-17).

As biblical counselors, we are like the Puritans who practiced the art of loading the conscience with guilt. Like them, we know that to break the habitual web of sin’s deceit, people need to experience the horrors of their sin against God and others.

We also need to be like the Puritan soul physicians in practicing the art of lightening the conscience with grace. How sad that many counselors de-emphasize grace. It is wonderful to be forgiven. Forgiveness by grace is the dynamic God uses not only to cleanse our lives, but also to change our love. Christ woos us back to God by grace (Romans 2:4; 3:1-5:21; 1 John 4:7-20).

Dispensers of Grace

Christ calls biblical counselors to be dispensers of grace meeting human guilt with God’s grace and forgiveness. Grace is God’s medicine of choice for suffering and sin. Grace is God’s prescription for our disgrace.

Notice how the author of Hebrews exposes grace in the context of exposing sin. After exposing sin in Hebrews 3:12-13, he shifts to grace in 3:14. “We have come to share in Christ if we hold firmly till the end the confidence we had at first.” We detect the same pattern in Hebrews 4:12-16. After discussing the power of the Word to expose evil in 4:12-13, he immediately focuses on grace in 4:14-16.

“Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (emphasis added).

We expose our spiritual friends’ sins and Christ’s grace. We speak the truth in love to them, softening their hardened hearts. We invite them to drink from Jesus their Spring of Living Water who is the Friend of sinners—even of sinners who dig broken cisterns that can hold no water.

The Rest of the Story

I invite you to return for Part 7 where we learn about Biblical Counseling through Guiding: “It’s Supernatural to Mature.”

Join the Conversation

Who has been a dispenser of grace in your life?

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

Celebrating the Empty Tomb

Note: This is the fifth in a blog mini-series asking the simple question: Is there a biblical model for spiritual friendship, one-another ministry, biblical counseling, and pastoral counseling?

Read Part 1: Spiritual Map Quest, Part 2: God’s Treasure Map, Part 3: Biblical Soul Care for Suffering, and Part 4: Climbing in the Casket. 

I’m summarizing these posts from Spiritual Friends.

God’s Biblical Counseling GPS # 2: Healing—“It’s Possible to Hope”

In sustaining, we said that we should not be ignorant of our friend’s earthly story of suffering. In healing, we are saying that neither should we be ignorant of God’s larger story of hope.

When we are ignorant of God’s story, then we allow Satan’s lying story to win the day. His story proclaims, “Curse God and die.” His story reads, “Life is bad and so is God. Life is bad because God doesn’t care about you.” Before our friends buy the lie, they need healing.

What if our friends do buy the lie? What if we leave them in the casket? They know we care, but that’s all they know. Sustaining faith is an awesome starting point, but an awful finish line. Notice how Paul moved from the casket of despair to the resurrection of hope.

“But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:9b).

Like Paul, in healing we’re sharing the power of Christ’s resurrection.

We need to stretch our spiritual friends to God’s eternal story of hope. They need to know that “it’s possible to hope because God is good, even when life is bad.” We encourage our spiritual friends in the biblical sense of that word—to stir up courage to face life with God and for God.

We encourage through extensio animi ad magna—stretching the soul to great things. Soul stretching is necessary in the midst of suffering because when life stinks, our perspective shrinks. Created for Paradise, we find ourselves in a desert. Naturally, we’re parched, thirsty. In our thirst, Satan tempts us to forget to remember God (Job 1-2). We feel as though Father has skipped town, abandoned us to this evil world, and left us orphans.

Seeing with Spiritual Eyes

So, we need spiritual eyes to see life from God’s eternal perspective.

“Therefore we do not lose heart. Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:16-18).

Spiritual friends learn how to perform spiritual laser surgery on their friends by engaging in spiritual conversations that invite God back into the picture. They create a greater God awareness by developing a spiritual curiosity. “I wonder where God is in this? I wonder what he’s up to? I know he always has a plan. He amazes me how he works stuff out. Where do you see him at work even in this?”

Their spiritual curiosity causes them to see what others might miss and pursue what others might ignore. They scope out and share ways their spiritual friend is already connecting to God. “Jim, how in the world have you been able to cooperate with God to survive and thrive like you have? It’s amazing to me what a loving, together man you are. God sure has been doing a great work of healing in your life over the years.”

When we’re at the end of our rope, there’s less of us and more of God. When we embrace and face our suffering, then we can embrace and face our need for God. As in Paul’s soul, so in ours:

“This happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:9).

During the dark night of the soul, as we trudge through the valley of the shadow of death, God is present. He does care. He comforts. He heals and delivers—in his time and in his way—but he always heals. “He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us” (2 Corinthians 1:10). Paul knows that God has a good heart.

Did you notice who Paul hopes in? “God who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:9, emphasis added).

In sustaining, our calling is to climb in the casket. In healing, our joy is to celebrate the empty tomb!

In his excellent book Mourning into Dancing, Walter Wangerin teaches us to embrace our daily deaths so that we can experience daily resurrections. Death is always experienced as separation. So every event of separation (divorce, job loss, empty nest, fractured relationships, illness, etc.) is a “mini-death.”

When we invite God into the casket of our mini-deaths, then we can experience daily resurrection. Every day is Easter when we hope in God. Again, as Paul reminds us:

“Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened so that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead” (2 Corinthians 1:9, emphasis added).

The Rest of the Story 

I invite you to return for Part 6 where we learn about Biblical Counseling through Reconciling: “It’s Horrible to Sin, but Wonderful to Be Forgiven.”

Join the Conversation

Who has helped you to see life with 20/20 spiritual visions? With spiritual eyes? With God’s eternal perspective?

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

Climbing in the Casket

Note: This is the fourth in a blog mini-series asking the simple question: Is there a biblical model for spiritual friendship, one-another ministry, biblical counseling, and pastoral counseling?

Read Part 1: Spiritual Map Quest, Part 2: God’s Treasure Map, and Part 3: Biblical Soul Care for Suffering.

I’m summarizing these posts from Spiritual Friends.

God’s Biblical Counseling GPS # 1: Sustaining—“It’s Normal to Hurt”

Knowing that life lived in a fallen world can be raw, we communicate to one another, “It’s normal to hurt.” We weep with those who weep, refusing to blame people for hurting or shame them for feeling pain. We join them in the fellowship of their suffering.

Created for Paradise, our hurting spiritual friends now live in a desolate desert. Our first calling is to sense their earthly story of suffering. We empathize with their agony, engaging them in their despair.

How? We offer compassionate commiseration, a term flowing through the pages of Church history. Co-passion feels another’s passion, shares a friend’s suffering. Co-misery becomes a partner in our spiritual friend’s misery and woe. Such empathy is not simply understanding with someone’s pain, but sharing in and experiencing his or her pain.

Shared Sorrow

Shared sorrow is endurable sorrow. As Jonathan with David, the binding of our hearts together exponentially and miraculously enables us to endure what otherwise would overwhelm. Ponder Paul’s words.

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same suffering we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort” (2 Corinthians 1:3-7).

In order to provide compassionate commiseration, we need to practice dual listening: listening to our friend’s earthly story while listening to God’s eternal story. Spiritual friends tune into their friend’s smaller story that communicates “Life is bad” (sustaining). Spiritual friends also tune into God’s larger story that communicates “God is good” (healing).

In sustaining, our empathy promotes our spiritual friend’s grieving. Paul commands us to grieve within the context of hope (1 Thessalonians 4:13). Without hope, grieving terrifies. Faced with what appears to be nothing but a black hole of unending pain, we back away. We deaden ourselves; deny. We refuse to grieve and groan. Often to start the “chain of grieving” we must grieve for our spiritual friends before they can grieve for themselves. Our weeping allows them to weep. Grieving is the bridge toward healing. When we grieve and groan we admit that we are not God, that we cannot control life, and that we need God (Romans 8:18-27).

Climbing in the Casket

Spiritual friends understand the essential principle for sustaining faith in the goodness of God: we have to climb in the casket with our spiritual friends. Life is a series of multiple deaths, daily crucifixions. We need the courageous compassion to climb in the casket with our friends in the throes of death, in the valley of the shadow of death. When they sense us there with them, when they see our courageous hope, then they’re encouraged to face death so that they can face life again. As Paul wrote to his friends in Corinth:

“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death” (2 Corinthians 1:8-9a).

Sometimes it appears that our “default” response is to “spot sin.” Instead, let’s be biblical counselors who understand suffering. Let’s not be ignorant of our friends’ earthly stories of suffering. Let’s not miss their hearts. When we do, we tend to cram God in. Instead, we want to encourage them to invite God into the casket with them.

The Rest of the Story

I invite you to return for Part 4 where we learn about Biblical Counseling through Healing: Celebrating the Empty Tomb.

Join the Conversation

Who has climbed in the casket with you in your suffering?

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