\nI love it, and I hate it. It’s exhilarating, and it’s exhausting.<\/p>\n\n
\nPastoral counseling—it’s part of who I am and what I do, yet it often feels\nas if it’s an invasion into my life.<\/p>\n\n
\nNo one does pastoral counseling better than a pastor. Not a psychiatrist,\na psychologist, or a psychotherapist.<\/p>\n\n
\nProfessional counselors, the good and the biblical ones, have an important\nrole to fill. I don’t understand much about schizophrenia, repressed memories,\ncyclothymic disorder, or the treatment of ADHD,\nOCD, or PTSD. Mental illnesses are complex,\nand I’m not equipped even to recognize some of them. My parishioners and\nI have benefited from good counselors, and I consider them my allies.<\/p>\n\n
\nBut they are not my replacements. I’m not prepared to yield to a society\nenamored with Sigmund Freud, B..F. Skinner, Carl Rogers, or Albert Ellis.\nPastors can still do things that professional therapists can’t.<\/p>\n\n
\nAfter all, the prefix psych<\/em> means “soul,” and pastors are tenders\nof the soul. That’s our job.<\/p>\n\n \nPastoral counseling, as I’m using the term, is helping people resolve their\nproblems, facilitating positive changes in their lives, and helping them\ngrow toward greater wholeness. No one<\/em> does that better than pastors.\nHere’s why.<\/p>\n\n \nWhen people come to me with problems, they come to someone who loves them.\nI’m not just a professional; I’m an extension of the love of Christ, a channel\nof his grace. Professional counselors exhibit genuine concern, even love,\nfor their clients-but not as only a pastor can.<\/p>\n\n \nWhen I began pastoring twenty years ago, I studied shepherding<\/em> in\nthe Bible. The Hebrew word is closely aligned to the Jewish word for\nfriend<\/em>. That’s what people need. In its essence, Christianity is nothing\nmore than personal relationships-with God and each other. Within these\nfriendships comfort is best proffered, advice best taken, rebukes best accepted,\nand corrections best made.<\/p>\n\n \nI may not have all the answers, but I can love and listen. I may feel I’m\ndoing little good, but I can pray. Recently I sat in my office absorbing\nthe laments of a young couple. I felt a tide of frustration rising in me,\nand my inner voice muttered, How in the world can I help them<\/em>? My\nouter voice took them to the Scriptures, shared an anecdote from my marriage,\nand prayed with them.<\/p>\n\n \nWhen they left, I sighed, feeling the session had been wasted. But the next\nweek, the wife called. “Thanks for seeing us,” she said. “John said he wouldn’t\ntalk to anyone else, but he likes you. He said you’d understand, and things\nhave been a little better. He said he’d like to see you again.”<\/p>\n\n \nRecently a Bible study leader called and said, “I’m about to leave my wife.\nI’ve gotten involved with a woman at work. But I want to talk to you about\nit.” We met, and after several chin-quivering, heart-throbbing, plain-talking\nsessions, he repented.<\/p>\n\n \nI referred him and his wife to a trusted marriage counselor, but it was the\nfriendship of years that laid the cobblestone path he followed to my door.\nWe had long joined in worship every Sunday. We had butted heads in meetings\nand prayed and planned and consoled one another. I had baptized his children,\nburied his father, and visited his hospitalized sister at all hours. The\nconnections were already in place.<\/p>\n\n \nA therapist recently told me, “You pastors have a real advantage because\nyou’re part of a person’s life more than I can ever be. Counselors get intimate\nwith people quickly; then we’re gone. You are in a person’s life consistently.\nMy role is short-term; yours is long-term, and it’s the long-term role that\nusually proves more valuable.”<\/p>\n\n \nWho but pastors can do incisive, on-the-spot grief counseling at funerals,\nmarriage counseling at weddings, bedside counseling in hospitals, and conflict\nresolution at committee meetings?<\/p>\n\n \nThe apostle Paul said to his elders, “You know that I have not hesitated\nto preach anything that would be helpful to you but have taught you publicly\nand from house to house.”<\/p>\n\n \nOur house-to-house, person-to-person ministry doesn’t stand alone. It rests\non a public role of preaching the Word, correcting, rebuking, and encouraging\nwith great patience and careful instruction. One of the boons of a long pastorate\nis the accumulation of encouraging letters that testify to this, like this\none:<\/p>\n\n \n“I wanted to let you know how much I appreciated your message Sunday\nmorning … I learned Saturday night that my younger brother in Idaho\nattempted suicide after drinking all night Friday. I badly needed your words\nabout troubled loved ones. I want you to know I’m keeping two copies of the\nmessage in our file with important papers, one copy for each of our two sons\nso I can share it with them when they are older.”<\/p>\n\n \nMost people who approach pastors expect us to speak of spiritual realities.\nMany would be disappointed if our Bibles remained closed and our knees straight.\nI can’t reduce everything to an over-simplified, black-and-white,\nwave-the-Bible-at-it problem. Human complexities can be as impossible to\nuntangle as a child’s ball of string. Yet I sometimes wonder if such an\nover-simplified reduction might, in the final (psycho)analysis, prove more\nhelpful than some of the counsel dispensed at $75 an hour.<\/p>\n\n \nEver wonder what a psychoanalyst would have said to Cain? “Let’s talk about\nyour childhood. How did you feel when your father bragged on Abel’s mutton\nstew instead of your vegetable soup? And your mom’s apple pies—what was\nthat problem all about?”<\/p>\n\n \nThe Divine Counselor told him, “Sin is crouching at your door.”<\/p>\n\n \nWhat would a modern therapist have said to the unraveling King Saul? To the\nwoman taken in adultery? To shy young Timothy? To the demoniac of Gadara?\nTo Paul, the intense man?<\/p>\n\n \nThere is no better tool than Scripture for penetrating soul and spirit, joints\nand marrow, thoughts and intents. It is the Bible in all its\nauthority—specifically the promises in all their sufficiency—that revives\nthe soul, makes wise the simple, gives joy to the heart, and light to the\neyes.<\/p>\n\n \nI have the privilege of sacrificing more. Few professional therapists remain\non call twenty-four hours a day. Maybe I don’t either, for over the years\nI have learned to build some safeguards into my schedule and some hedges\naround my family. But I’m still generally more accessible than anyone listed\nin the Yellow Pages under “PSY____.” I have the opportunity\nto hurt more, to care more, to weep with those who weep and mourn with those\nwho mourn.<\/p>\n\n \nFor these reasons, I think I am better at counseling than … well, than\nI think I am. And the final reason why?\nMy fees. I’m free, so to speak. Even that counts for something.<\/p>\nPastors care as friends<\/h2>
Pastors build on an existing relationship<\/h2>
Pastors preach care every Sunday<\/h2>
Pastors give biblical solutions for spiritual issues<\/h2>
Pastors are more accessible<\/h2>
One more reason … <\/h2>