Amateurs Let Loose!

By: K. B. Napier

If a Christian has a specialist problem with, say, finance, or a spot of bother with paying bills, he might legitimately go to see someone at the Citizen’s Advice Bureau...local churches do not always have the expertise in their membership to be able to cope with such immediate and pressing problems. Obviously, if there is such expertise, then we ought to use it, rather than go outside our Brethren.

But, when it comes to the need for counselling, the situation is very different. Those who are familiar with my writing will know that I am against the sending of Christians to the psychiatric profession for help, because psychiatry is based on humanism and eastern religious theories. This refusal has often landed me in strife from Christians who cry hot tears, demanding relief from their emotional symptoms. This merely strengthens my resolve, for I do not believe in the existence of so-called ‘mental illnesses’ either...only in sins that produce certain types of behaviour that the world calls ‘mental illness’!

Mental illness exists because theorists grandly reject the idea of sinful Man. They have to explain-away the behaviour of their fellows who act strangely, so they come up with mental ‘illness’! To deal with this massive trade in emotional cover-up, there must be professional dealers – therefore, we have a huge band of people ranging from rank-and-file nurses, to social workers, to consultant psychiatrists, all dedicated to ‘relieving’ a mythical category of human ills.

Professional Talkers

Amongst these professionals are those called ‘psychotherapists’. Some are nurses or social workers who, already working in the invented world of psychiatry, wish to specialise in this ‘talking therapy’. They have a driving desire to ‘help’ people... though their actual motive might be rather more basic. That is, some folk are naturally garrulous. They will talk and talk, to anyone who will listen! Others have a natural sleuth’s mind and love to unravel emotions and problems. Others love the idea of having people in their power – and when someone is vulnerable because they are ‘spilling the beans’ to a stranger, they are very vulnerable indeed; there is actual power in being the ‘counsellor’ in these situations. And some just like to be nosey.

As one who was a ‘professional’ in this field, I was more than able to manipulate people, their emotions, their minds and their resolve. When I realised the reality behind my activity, I stopped and would never return to such a ‘profession’ again. At first I excused myself by hiding behind my professional title. Then, I came to see that my ‘profession’ was of no value in God’s eyes and my activity was all a sham. I was not being ‘Christian’ at all – I was just being one sinful human-being using sinful means to promote even more sin. (I will explain that later).

Amateur Meddlers

Now we come to another category of ‘professional’ – the person who ‘trains’ to be a counsellor outside the usual psychiatric setting. A large number of training institutes have been set up to offer training in psychotherapy and counselling, including those that are ‘Christian’. Some are based, directly or loosely, on the work of Jay Adams. I am very familiar with his work, and the work of other Christian counselling ‘experts’. Much of what they say is acceptable and good.

Many churches now insist that their counsellors be ‘trained’. In terms of their acceptability amongst other, psychiatrically-trained counsellors, these ‘outside’ counsellors are amateurs. Those within the psychiatric setting are the ‘professionals’, because they work, day in and day out, with the hard-core ‘mentally ill’. Within the terms of this profession they are perfectly correct. For my own part, for example, I trained for three years in a psychiatric hospital on all kinds of wards. This was ‘hands-on’ training backed by continuous on-site advice and practical experience given by senior staff. And regular block release in nurse training school gave me sessions from senior nurses, psychologists, social workers and psychiatrists, supplemented by my own intensive reading and activity.

On the wards we had daily case conferences where the condition of patients was debated and discussed in detail, alongside drug and therapy regimes. When qualified, this intensive training was topped up by training in psychotherapy, again in actual settings with psychologists and psychiatrists alongside. In my time at the hospital I was exposed to several major psychotherapeutic theories.

Now, put the ‘training’ of home-based ‘counsellors’ alongside that, and there is no comparison! One is a paid therapist working daily amongst all kinds of mentally ill patients with continuously updated information and training. The other is, for example, a housewife who sees her friends now and then and thinks a bit of occasional ‘training’ will do the same job. It will not, for very obvious reasons.

I’m No Advocate!

By now, the reader will have come to the conclusion that I am advocating in-depth full-time training for counsellors. He or she might also think that because I am trained I wish to see others equally highly trained. You would be very far from the truth!  In the context of psychiatry I was ‘highly trained’...but in what? I was highly trained in humanistic theories that covered an invented category of human failure. In Christian and Biblical terms, all of that was worthless.

The only thing I can point to of worth was the learned ability to speak openly and honestly, and a logical approach to problems. But even this only helps me in academic work. I also encountered people who had shown and experienced the full range of sinfulness, from incest and lies to murder, and an even wider range of signs and symptoms. It is for this reason I once referred to psychiatric hospitals as the devil’s playground.

Want to Help? Why?

The housewife’s wish to ‘help people’ simply does not bear comparison against such a gamut of experience and knowledge. Yet, all that experience and knowledge does not help in the churches! Though I went on to gain psychology degrees, none of it aided the churches. Yes, I could reason and talk in depth. Yes, I could use logic and observe with a trained eye. Yes, I had knowledge others did not have. And yes – folk would approach me as if I had something wonderful to help them. But I did not!  God works by His own rules and they do not include the mumbo-jumbo of humanistic psychiatry. I had nothing to offer.

I therefore stopped playing the game taught by psychiatry. God was not in it. The housewife (symbolic of all in our churches who want to ‘have a go’ at counselling) who ‘trains’ in counselling in order to help her fellow Believers is, it must be said, merely an amateur in Satan’s profession! She is dabbling in an area she does not really understand and can do untold damage. Earlier I said that I was being used to promote even more sin. Let me explain, for even our housewife counsellor comes in to this statement.

Playing Satan’s Game

By ‘counselling’ on a professional or amateur basis, we are doing what Satan wishes. By learning human techniques and human answers to human problems, we are grounding everything on ‘training’. Because such training uses theory and techniques it is not, by definition, of the Holy Spirit, for the Spirit deals quickly and with immediate results. Whenever we use techniques and human resources we are playing Satan’s game, in which he is the ultimate professional. Those of us who try to be ‘counsellors’ are just bumbling amateurs who are complying with his wicked deceits; unaware of the part we play in expanding his hold on sinners.

Whether we use the highly detailed work of Jay Adams, or of lesser known experts, we are unwittingly falling in to a trap. The trap is that in an attempt to ‘help’ others we are using the ways and means of other human beings. It does not matter if this gives you a ‘certificate’, or affiliation to a ‘professional’ organisation, or not. It is still human beings following human beings. The addition of scriptural texts is irrelevant.

In my own writing – including this article – I ask readers to think for themselves and not to rely on me. Whatever I have done was for my own life. There might be something in that life that might help others. But not necessarily. What I have written on counselling is a warning not to follow other men and not to put technique above Holy Spirit guidance.

The Human Approach

It would be very easy for me to develop a ‘Christian’ approach to counselling, a system to be copied, and then to open some kind of institute, which would offer ‘training’. But this would not be appropriate in a Christian world already bursting at the seams with ‘professional’ and other ‘training’ opportunities that are, really, of no worth unless they only serve as pointers and not as actual remedies.

I do not set myself up as a ‘counsellor’, even with such a wealth of training and experience behind me, yet I have counselled folk Biblically for many years. Over those years, I have watched with dismay as fellow Christians have attended their training sessions in counselling, because I know that by doing what they are doing, they are already proving they have not been called by God to counsel! How can I say that?

It can be said because I have gone through the same self deception, which told me that I had something to offer people. The desire to help is nothing like the calling of Almighty God, through the immediate guidance of the Holy Spirit. The lowliest, meanest, poorest, least articulate Christian, can turn another life around, whereas the highest, mightiest, most trained person cannot. The difference is the Holy Spirit.

I know many who think they are ‘counsellors’. Some have ‘trained’ and some have not. And I also watch as people flock to their doors, crying bitter tears and spilling the beans on the most intimate details of their lives. Friend, if YOU are in this position and people come to you for help, please take stock of what you are doing. Let us look more closely at the situation...(and I hope that pastors who read this will take note and gently stop their fellow church members from acting out an ungodly activity).

The one who people flock to for counselling – look at that one.

A woman who people turned to, was, in truth, just a busy-body. She pretended her illness was severe, when it was not, to elicit sympathy. She spent all her time gossiping and prying in to the lives of everyone in her church. By prying she got to know many details... then she proceeded to ‘give advice’.

Sadly, this ‘advice’ was taken to be genuine ‘counsel’, when it was nothing of the sort. It was simply a gossip feeding her own information-bank and ego!  People often were heard to extol her ‘virtue’... see how she selflessly helps others when she is in so much pain! See how people turn to her! But, when people were not around, she was ‘miraculously not in pain and acted normally! And she talked about everybody behind their backs, spreading gossip and, at times, malicious lies, all in the name of ‘counsel’.

That person was NOT a ‘counsellor’ by any stretch of the imagination, yet that is the kind of person who is accepted in many churches as the one to go to with their problems! In my own case I never offered counselling, but if others came to me needing help I would give it if the Holy Spirit prompted me to do so. Otherwise I would not get involved. I am NOT a ‘counsellor’ – I am just another Christian who might, at times, be given a word of wisdom or encouragement to pass on to others. I can also, at times, be given a word of rebuke, for both are part of the Christian’s daily practice.

That person was NOT a ‘counsellor’ by any stretch of the imagination, yet that is the kind of person who is accepted in many churches as the one to go to with your problems! In my own case I never offered counselling, but if others came to me needing help I would give it if the Holy Spirit prompted me to do so. Otherwise I would not get involved. I am NOT a ‘counsellor’ – I am just another Christian who might, at times, be given a word of wisdom or encouragement to pass on to others. I can also, at times, be given a word of rebuke, for both are part of the Christian’s daily practice.

The Cult of Selfism

I have also observed another type of ‘counselor’. This one also has people turning up at her door. She (again, ‘she’ is representative of all Christians in this position, male or female) also eagerly offers counsel. This eagerness is a clue to any pastor to beware. I am very wary of giving counsel and certainly will not jump forward to offer myself, or to ‘give advice’ or ‘counsel’, even if it is hedged around by apt scriptural texts!

The person of this type will delve deeply in to the person’s past, looking for ‘reasons’ for present emotional disorders. She will keep on searching until she feels she has found the answers. She will talk about the person’s ‘body language’ and the way she looks or speaks. Then, she will patch-together all this observation and come up with ‘counsel’.  (In reality her ‘observations’ are actually her own interpretations, which are coloured by her theories and chosen therapy background influence).

Friends, none of this is evidence of God’s help! It is yet another example of someone ‘having a go’ - and badly at that. Christians ought not delve in to the life of another to winkle-out past sins and to expose them. If there are past sins, then the Holy Spirit will deal with them, not the avid ‘counsellor’. Such a counsellor is very intimidating, for she always boasts to others how she can tell this or that from body language, or from the way someone speaks or acts. Such a counsellor is very forward in telling everyone she has the ability to counsel! Immediately, that makes her the least qualified!

Christians are just like anyone else and are easily swayed by the claims of others. They will accept as true the claim that a person is a ‘counsellor’ just because he or she says so, and appears to be able to delve deeply in to their lives. Thus they will flock to that person for advice and counsel. It is inevitable and it is wrong. It is nothing but prying, to delve deeply to uncover hidden sins. If there are sins, then let God deal with them, not the ‘counsellor’.

On many occasions those who wanted my help have actually offered to give me many secrets of their lives, including sexual information. But I refuse to listen. At times, such information is a way of off-loading guilt on to the listener. It can also be a way of feeding information that is really not needed. Or, it can even be thrilling to the counsellee to tell another person of his or her most intimate sexual activities.

Others make a habit of ‘confessing’ – this, too, is wrong, as the person continually ‘confesses’ to sins but rarely ever does anything about them. But the false counsellor cares nothing for these facts. She just loves to take people’s lives apart so that she can re-assemble them in her own image!

All Christians Can Counsel

What I am saying, then, is this – pastors truly called by God are automatically given the office and gifts to counsel in a godly way.  All Christians are given wisdom and knowledge to help their fellow Christians. It is a fallacy that there must be ‘special’ people set apart as ’counsellors’. You will not find anything of this kind in God’s word. Rather, you will find ordinary Christians who help each other. Thus, today I will be used (by God through the Holy Spirit) to counsel you. Tomorrow, you will be used to counsel me. That is God’s very simple way of dealing with matters within the churches.

It is true that some Christians will be gifted especially to help others. But, this is a gift and calling, not simply a desire to ‘help’. Such gifting is done quietly and without fanfare. The one used will not go around her church telling everyone about body-language or deep sins that need probing and bringing to light! That is just human interference and sinful pretence.

Beware, pastor, of allowing such folk to meddle with the flock of Jesus Christ! They are wolves, even if they are Christians. They are promoting Satan’s ideas, and are not acting out the will of God. And they intimidate others, making them afraid to open their mouths in the supposed ‘counsellors’ presence. They can even cause others to stop attending meetings.

Beware, fellow Christian, if you have such an one in your midst. Do not give credence to the person by letting her convince you of her own worth! Do not let double talk of body language, counselling, therapy and solving mysteries of the mind, persuade you to think of that person as being an ‘expert’. She is an amateur in Satan’s own profession and she is being duped, just like you for listening to her!

Don’t Feed Satan

Do not feed that ‘counsellor’ with information. Just cut short any conversation in which she tries to illicit personal details from you. Tell her that body language cannot be divorced from many other details, such as personality, state of mind, level of knowledge and education, general intelligence, and a multitude of other factors she is very unlikely to understand or know about.

The one who continually tells others of her counselling skills is the very one to avoid if you have a problem! Better to keep quiet and suffer than go to her. Seek God’s counsel and He will either show you by way of His own word in the Bible, or He will point you toward the pastor, or he will arrange things in such a way that you will suddenly be introduced to the Christian who will help. And that person will NOT be the local church’s self-proclaimed, humanly-trained ‘counsellor’.

A church that has a ‘trained’ counsellor is acting very unwisely. God works His will through the office of the Holy Spirit and NOT through trained counsellors. King David, like Samuel and the other prophet-leaders, sat at the city gate to listen to problems. They were guided by God Himself to make answer. But, Absalom, David’s son, desired to be the one at the gate. He wanted others to flock to him with their problems. That made him the least useful of men to go to.

If you need counsel, turn to God, not to men (or women). Ask Him for His help and He will provide the right person...and it certainly will not be the self-confessing ‘counsellor’ who reads her popular psychology books, scrutinises your body language and insists on knowing every intimate detail of your life, including sexual behaviour! If you give her all this information, you are then in her power and will always feel an unhealthy attraction to her, like that of a hostage to her captor.... or a penitent to her local Catholic priest. Yes, we are talking about fellow Christians, here, not about pagans or cultists.

Trained Counsellors Not Needed

The answer is very simple – local churches should not have trained counsellors. They should have a people open to, and obeying, the Holy Spirit. In this way every Christian is a counsellor at some point. God does not devolve His power and authority to one person in a church. He does not require her (or him) to train in human means, even if those means have been developed by Christians.

Not so long ago I received a letter crying out for help, from one of our readers, involving a wayward son who was then in a mental hospital. There was an immediate resonance in my spirit to reply so I prayed for the wisdom to write back, which I did that very same hour. The letter was very brief and did not really take much notice of the various sordid details. It also called the son to repentance and a change of life. The letter was shown to the son and he immediately complied with the word of God, for God had spoken, not me.

The son is now back in his church and is doing fine. None of this was my doing, even though it was a dramatic answer to his parent’s prayers. God pointed them toward me for help. I then pointed them back to God and His word, ignoring the huge variety of human sins that led to the son’s failure. You see, the sins we commit are not the things we ought to focus on. We need to tell the one sinning to stop his sins. He must repent and turn back to God. This requires no knowledge of deep past sins and intimate details. (If they are needed for some reason, then God will bring them forth, not the counsellor).

The most dramatic ‘deliverances’ I have seen are those that were straight from God, immediate, and used few words. When people think they can ‘counsel’ and resort to such things as body-language, and in-depth examination of intimate details, there might be a temporary relief of sorts. But it will not be the triumphant success given by God Himself. Let me say it yet again – if you need counsel, the one you ought to avoid is the one who claims to be a counsellor! If such a person has to tell others he or she is a counsellor, then this is proof that he or she is not a counsellor from God.

Local churches should never encourage a man or woman, though Christian, to be known as a ‘counsellor’ or to train as one. That is because every Christian is a ‘counsellor’, used as and when God sees fit. That means he or she might be used today to counsel someone, but will not be used tomorrow. A highly visible, spectacular ‘success’ with one person, might be the only one God will use a Christian for.

Today, I give counsel, tomorrow you give counsel. God uses every Christian to counsel every Christian. That is how it works. Forget the books and the courses. Instead, read scripture and pray. Meditate on God’s word and do not seek out opportunities to counsel. If you are to counsel someone, God will ensure that the two of you meet at the right time...no need for drawn-out meetings and structured discussions. So, stop that ‘counsellor’ nonsense immediately, or you sin!

Most concerns do not need counsel as such anyway. Christians usually seek ‘counsel’ for emotional problems, and these are mainly caused by sin, either in oneself or in others. The answer is very simple and intimate details are not required. Can you see what I am saying?

Counselling Is Satan’s Domain

Churches who have counsellors are playing Satan’s game without knowing it. Satan is watering-down God’s word in your minds and hearts by off-loading people on to ‘counsellors’. By using human techniques, they effectively show that God does not have the answer to everything. This leads to men and women taking over what God should be doing. In other words, they are sinners, promoting sin, in those who need deliverance from their sin! They are leading Christians away from God, not toward Him.

Often, they do their counselling because they are busy-bodies, or because they have a vaunted belief in their own abilities, or because they just love to find solutions, or because they want power and like to manipulate. I repeat – these are sincere Christians we are talking about, not charlatans or obviously sinning pagans out to ‘get you’.

To counsel others is a privilege and a duty, but it ought not be sought out as a desired permanent activity by well-meaning (and not so well-meaning) Christians in the local church. The ‘counsellor’ does not exist in scripture as a separate person. Counsel should be given by all Christians whose lives and hearts are toward God and who are prompted to give counsel at any particular time. There is no training. There are no books. No certificates. No hovering around seeking out people to counsel. No telling everyone how good you are as a counsellor! God will use whoever He wishes at any time.

Those who wish to clarify their own thoughts on this matter are free to contact me. But first – take a step back and meditate on God’s word. The Holy Spirit will gladly help those who rely on Him. I am only here when that same Holy Spirit prompts a reader to contact me. And when that reader does so, I will point him or her back to God again.

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