The Law and Church Counseling: Part Four—Quality of Care

Posted on 2/13/2012 by Bob Kellemen

Note: You’re reading Part Four in a blog mini-series on The Law and Church Counseling. Read Part One Caring Carefully (embed link), Part Two The Legal History and Climate (embed link), and Part Three Scope of Care (embed link).I’m summarizing these posts from material in chapter twelve of Equipping Counselors for Your Church. To learn more about the book, visit Equipping Counselors (embed link http://bit.ly/EC4YC4E).

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How do you know when someone is truly sorry?

Posted on 2/8/2012 by Leslie Vernick

 They do not cry out to me from their hearts but wail upon their beds.   Hosea 7:14

As biblical counselors, sometimes it’s hard to discern if someone is truly repentant. Tears are often the language of the heart, but when one is crying in the counseling office, it’s important to hear what the person’s heart is really saying.  The apostle Paul speaks of two kinds of sorrow, worldly

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Thesis 28 -- The Qualitative Distinctions of Love

Posted on 2/6/2012 by Elyse Fitzpatrick

 There is simply nothing like God's love. God's love is so high above ours, so powerful and transformational, there's really no comparison. I suppose that living in the veritable "light" of that love is what will make heaven as wonderful as it will be.

Here's thesis 28: The love of God does not first discover but creates what is pleasing to it. The love of man comes into being through attraction to what is pleasing to it.

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Marriage Preparation

Posted on 2/1/2012 by John Henderson

Excerpt from the Preface of Catching Foxes (2012), a new resource from the Association of Biblical Counselors

Go forth, O daughters of Zion, and gaze on King Solomon with the crown with which his mother has crowned him on the day of his wedding, and on the day of his gladness of heart.

(Song of Solomon 3:11)

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Psalm 27: Why Bother?

Posted on 1/30/2012 by Paul Tripp

"I am confident of this; I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." (v.13)

I consider
the brokenness of the world
and I think,
"Why bother?"
I look 
at the corruption all around me
and I cry,
"Why bother?"

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The Church Needs You As Much As You Need It

Posted on 1/27/2012 by Chandler Fozard

What, according to Scripture, may we reasonably expect from the Church?  What do you do when you feel the church has failed you?  When is it right to leave?  People who came to faith or rededicated their lives while they were incarcerated are often forced to learn the Bible in isolation from any clear, consistent teaching.

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Developing a Family Discipline of Memorizing Scripture

Posted on 1/25/2012 by Brad Hambrick

Most Christian parents want their children to grow up knowing and memorizing Scripture.  We believe it is a good thing.  We just tend not to do it.  It falls on the “good intentions” list.  This post cannot give you the will to follow through on good intentions.  Hopefully, what it will do is give you a clear enough plan to motivate you to begin and thorough enough to keep you going.

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Psalm 27: Productive Delay

Posted on 1/23/2012 by Paul Tripp

"Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord."

For years I just didn't get the biblical concept of waiting. Waiting seemed a meaningless drag, forced onto us by the fact that Someone else is in charge of the narrative that is our lives. We hope, we dream and we wait. We cry, we plead and we wait. We run, we work and we wait. We minister, we serve and we wait. We think, we study and we wait. Sometimes we wait, we wait and we wait.

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