BOOK: SPIRITUALITY IN CHRISTIAN COUNSELING

Spirituality in Christian Counseling



A 4-MAT Review: Spirituality in Christian Counseling

Abstract

McMinn tensions the significance of the use of the Christian belief in the psychological therapy. Concentrating on the functional facet of the integration of theology, psychology and spirituality in counseling, the scribe devotes functional demonstrations of how these localities can be incorporated in alignment to assist one supreme reason; to assist persons (McMinn 1996).

Many counselors seriously want to help their client, and they lack the ability to incorporate Christian principles in to the therapeutic relationship. McMinn addresses this issue and helps by showing practical ways in learning how to use spiritual disciplines. By providing the definitions and how psychology, theology, and spirituality are similar yet also have their differences. He shows how a counselor can learn to multitask these three disciplines, and when a counselor begins to learn to utilizing these categories into counseling it can be rewarding for the counselor and their counsels.

As McMinn (1996) states, many counselors and Christian counselors in particular very rarely use the Bible in their counseling practice. In addition, he explains how hard-core Christians, such as Jay Adams, very seldom look to psychology in their work. The book bridges this gap. He does not only insist on the use of Scripture, study of the Biblical texts, prayers and sacraments in counseling practice, but also gives practical advice, aiming to help to apply all this in practice. McMinn (1996) underlines the power of Scripture and enumerates all positive effects of the use of Scripture in counseling. Unfortunately, modem counselors seldom turn to Scripture in order to support their counseling models. McMinn (1996) does his best in order to correct this fault and attract the attention of counselors to the importance of the use of Scripture (McMinn 1996).

McMinn (1996) believes that to be an effective counselor means acknowledging that counseling is an intensely personal process that reflects the counselor's spiritual life as well as his or her educational and experiential background. McMinn's study whether to pray with a client, use of confession and scripture memory in the therapy process is also very interesting. Traditionally, counselors try to avoid any mention of religion in their practice. This type of attitude can have negative consequences, as most emotional disturbances can be related to sin, and confessing those sins in the privacy of the counseling a necessary part of the healing process. McMinn (1996) argues that integrating the notion of sin and the process of confession in to the counseling practice can help clients grow spiritually. McMinn has tried to integrate psychology and theology and it seeks to explore how to utilize spiritual disciplines in the counseling techniques of psychotherapy. He shows the importance of integrating prayer, forgiveness, redemption, restitution, and worship into the techniques of helping a counselee.

McMinn (1996) discussions on the topic of forgiveness and redemption is also interesting. The concept of forgiveness as McMinn (1996) described is not one of simple emotional relief. In contrast to psychotherapy, forgiveness and redemption involves empathy, self-awareness ...