Category Archives: Theology of Biblical Counseling

A Proposed Mechanism for Relating “Psychology” and “Biblical Counseling”

20 Friday Apr 2018

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(The following is a draft of a tool for analyzing the common grace elements of psychology. It will be for the second half of an article on the usefulness and limitations of common grace for counseling in a manner which is consistent with the claims of Scripture).

As will be set forth at length below, I propose the following rubric for utilizing the results of “common grace” in social sciences, particularly psychology as an academic discipline; and a means for rejecting certain other ideas as incompatible with a consistently biblical position for soul care. This position is begins with both a scriptural understanding of common grace, and an understanding of the biblical of the nature and end of human beings before God. This position recognizes both the extent to which common grace can provide insight into the natural world; and the fundamental limitations of common grace when it comes to human problems.

A fundamental problem which takes place concerns what is meant by the word “psychology”. The range of meaning assigned to this word has exacerbated the disagreements between Biblical Counselors and those who hold one of the various positions commonly labeled as “integrationist” (and yes, there are a variety of labels which are utilized here; and often there is a rejection of label by Christian counselors, but the word will work well-enough for present uses).

I propose three categories of information which move from information most accessible to common grace to information which cannot be known by common grace.

 

Common Grace Special Revelation
Category One:  Observations The physical environment; including the human body. This includes study of the nervous system, functioning of the senses, et cetera.

Information from this level is often leveraged as an attack upon the Biblical Counseling position as unscientific for “refusing” information learned here.

 

  

 

 

 

 
Common Grace is most effective here.

Common grace does permit one to see the environment, the understanding is limited by the failure to take God’s creation and providence into account. However, due to the ability of unbelievers to ‘borrow’ from Christian presuppositions, reasonably accurate observations.

 

Thus, human physiology can be observed and reported. This area of “psychology” (neuropsychology, the operation of senses, et cetera) can be utilized with the normal sort of skepticism necessary for review of any scientific work

 

 Special Revelation: Informs us of the fundamental nature and existence of the physical environment, but does not provide much detail. We know that it is the creation of God and maintained by providence, but the mechanics of the operation are not treated in detail. This is the place where Special Revelation offers the least information and common grace the most.

 

 

 

 

 
Category two:

Social science observations. With a markedly lesser degree of reliability, social scientists can make observations of patterns in human behavior and internal psychological states. Thus, we can see that people under certain circumstances, and/or with certain physiological conditions, will have a tendency to display certain behaviors and/or expressions.

 

  
Common grace makes it possible to make observations patterns.  However, there are serious limitations on the usefulness of such information.

These observations are fundamentally limited by (1) the inability to observe the internal workings of the human heart (observations of neurology and one’s self reported subjected experience are of some value, but cannot correlate to the depth of the human heart); (2) these observations are fundamentally limited that they cannot include the effects of the Godward relationship of the human being (observations which are commonly accounted as “the psychology of religion” are limited to objective observations and cannot provide information about the working of God); (3) these observations cannot take into account the effects of the “flesh” and the Spirit (this is related but not perfectly coextensive with point (2)).

 

 

 

  

Special revelation is critical at this stage, particularly in any attempt to “make sense” of social science observations. Understanding the deceitfulness of sin, for instance, may help to make an observation understandable.

The biblical counselor can use such observations as data points: for example, a study may suggest a line of inquiry; knowing that there is not a determinative relationship between one environmental circumstance and a future manner of life — even if there is a positive tendency toward a certain outcome.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Category 3

This category consists of what most people mean when they say “psychology”. Here we find theories which concern the matters are both (1) inaccessible to common grace and (2) are explicitly theological anthropology, teleology and methodology for change (ATM). These are the aspects of human life which are most directly affected by the breach between God and man.

While this category may make reference to elements of category 1 & 2, it goes further and assigns values. This aspect specifically concerns “spiritual” concerns:  matters of sin and sanctification, the action of God (and even evil spirits) upon human beings: these are precisely the matters which the Scripture claims as for its authority.

When biblical counselors reject “psychology”, they are referring primarily to information from this category.

 

  
Common grace is least valuable at this stage. Common grace  was not given to heal this aspect of the Fall.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Special Revalation is needed for work here

First, this concerns anthropology: What constitutes a human being: this is beyond observations concerning the human body and human behavior. It is consists of the “manishness of man” to use Francis Schaeffer’s phrase. This concerns the human heart: the spiritual aspects of humanity and in particular human interaction with God.

 

Second, this category concerns teleology: what is the purpose of being human. For instance when a psychologist speaks of what is “healthy” for human sexuality, the psychologist is speaking to what is the purpose of a human being. The purpose of a human being cannot be known by observations, since, as Jay Adams notes: we are living in an abnormal environment under abnormal conditions (being on this side of the Fall).

 

Third, this concerns methodology: those things which are necessary to change the direction of the human heart.

 

 

Toward and Exegetical Practical Theology, Joshua Clutterham

13 Friday Apr 2018

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Joshua Clutterham’s article in this edition of the Journal of Biblical Soul Care develops a point which is crucial to any effective pastoral work (and by that, I limit pastoral work to work which takes Scripture seriously). The Bible is not merely a book of facts and propositions (although it does contain such). The words are there not merely be read and recognized. The information does not exist merely so we can pass some hypothetical Bible knowledge trivia test. The words of the Bible are given to do something to us; to change us.

The Bible must not be merely thought of as a basis for systematic theology. Even preaching must not terminate in what the Scripture means as a proposition, but what that proposition does.  The Bible is given to not merely inform, but also to change people. This changing people is a matter of practical theology.

This matter of application is admitted by most preachers (indeed, many very bad sermons are merely a string of applications: Cheer – up! You’ll do great if you try!). There is another group who deliver an enormous volume of information, but with no point. Great, I can answer questions about the economy of Egypt, but I’m not sure why that matters.

The point of Bible’s information is to transform human beings in conduct, knowledge and affection: to make people different than they were before they read.

This matter of using the Bible to change people is also the purpose of counseling. And thus we should merely think of counseling as private exegetical practical theology. Preaching largely differs in the number of persons present.

What Joshua further proposes is that we take care to notice the rhetorical structure of the Scripture’s application: When we apply the text, we should note how the text functions and rely upon that rhetorical structure to help deliver the application. As Joshua writes, “We [must] consider the method of delivery of Scripture along with its meaning.”

The article itself is quite detailed. He develops and explains the rhetorical structure of the Scripture’s application — giving many examples and helps.  The article contains a number of proposals for future development, and explains the relationship between preaching and counseling.  This brief bit merely provides the slightest introduction to his work.

You can get your free subscription to the journal here:

http://www.masters.edu/jbsc

Three Articles on Depression (The Difficulty of Understanding Human Psychology)

23 Friday Feb 2018

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, Psychology, Theology of Biblical Counseling, Uncategorized

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Vincent_Willem_van_Gogh_002

(Van Gogh

Here is the difficulty in thinking about depression (in particular) and psychological difficulties in general.

In the first article, a study in Great Britain concludes that antidepressants are under- prescribed. The authors of the study argue that at least 1,000,000 more Britons should be prescribed antidepressants:

Prof Carmine Pariante, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience and spokesperson for the Royal College of Psychiatrists, said: “This meta-analysis finally puts to bed the controversy on antidepressants, clearly showing that these drugs do work in lifting mood and helping most people with depression. Importantly, the paper analyses unpublished data held by pharmaceutical companies, and shows that the funding of studies by these companies does not influence the result, thus confirming that the clinical usefulness of these drugs is not affected by pharma-sponsored spin.

In the second article, researchers determined that depression was the result of an amino acid deficiency:

Reduced levels of an amino acid found in blood samples have been linked to major depressive disorder, according to a new study in Finland.

Researchers with the University of Eastern Finland and Kuopio University Hospital studied 99 adults aged 20-71 with diagnosed major depressive disorder and 253 non-depressed control adults in a report published Wednesday in the Journal of Affective Disorders.

In the third article, Andrew Sullivan argues that the opioid crisis has been caused not merely by the physical effects of the ever-more-powerful opioids available, but perhaps more so by the social destruction of American culture:

One of the more vivid images that Americans have of drug abuse is of a rat in a cage, tapping a cocaine-infused water bottle again and again until the rodent expires. Years later, as recounted in Johann Hari’s epic history of the drug war, Chasing the Scream, a curious scientist replicated the experiment. But this time he added a control group. In one cage sat a rat and a water dispenser serving diluted morphine. In another cage, with another rat and an identical dispenser, he added something else: wheels to run in, colored balls to play with, lots of food to eat, and other rats for the junkie rodent to play or have sex with. Call it rat park. And the rats in rat park consumed just one-fifth of the morphine water of the rat in the cage. One reason for pathological addiction, it turns out, is the environment. If you were trapped in solitary confinement, with only morphine to pass the time, you’d die of your addiction pretty swiftly too. Take away the stimulus of community and all the oxytocin it naturally generates, and an artificial variety of the substance becomes much more compelling.

One way of thinking of postindustrial America is to imagine it as a former rat park, slowly converting into a rat cage. Market capitalism and revolutionary technology in the past couple of decades have transformed our economic and cultural reality, most intensely for those without college degrees. The dignity that many working-class men retained by providing for their families through physical labor has been greatly reduced by automation. Stable family life has collapsed, and the number of children without two parents in the home has risen among the white working and middle classes. The internet has ravaged local retail stores, flattening the uniqueness of many communities. Smartphones have eviscerated those moments of oxytocin-friendly actual human interaction. Meaning — once effortlessly provided by a more unified and often religious culture shared, at least nominally, by others — is harder to find, and the proportion of Americans who identify as “nones,” with no religious affiliation, has risen to record levels. Even as we near peak employment and record-high median household income, a sense of permanent economic insecurity and spiritual emptiness has become widespread. Some of that emptiness was once assuaged by a constantly rising standard of living, generation to generation.
But that has now evaporated for most Americans.

This final article by Sullivan is particularly quite well-written and is worth you time to ponder.

It would be possible to find numerous articles which take ever more positions on depression. This gets to a fundamental trouble with psychology. Human beings are subject to untold numbers of physiological and environmental effects. The delineation and interaction of these effects is almost endless. Moreover, scientific analysis assumes a deterministic relationship between the variables, which rules out any sort of personal decision.

Moreover, any such analysis ignores the entire spiritual aspect of being a human being — which unquestionably affects one’s expressed psychological state. I would contend that the spiritual state of the human being is the single most important aspect of human psychology: this does not mean that I deny the importance of the human body or the human environment; it means that neither body nor environment can be understood in isolation from the spiritual and that the spiritual must be given priority.

Pelagius on the Human Will

07 Sunday Jan 2018

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[Some more from the draft of an article on the psychological effects of the Fall and whether common grace can provide a sufficient response]

Indeed, Pelagius held that the human will is wholly within one’s own power. While the matter under consideration is particularly the question of whether one can lead pleasing to God, do not fall prey to the mistake that the ability to obey God’s law is some sort of bare behavior or “spiritual” decision which does not affect the rest of the person. True obedience to the law of God requires one’s conduct, cognition, affect and will.[1] Accordingly, the ability to obey the law entails a properly functioning psychology.[2]

In his letter to his “Letter to Demetrias”, Pelagius writes:

When I have to discuss the principles of right conduct and the leading of a holy life, I usually begin by showing the strength and characteristics of human nature. But explaining what it can accomplish, I encourage the soul of my hearer to the different virtues.[3]

He explains the strength as an absolute liberatarian freedom of will, “You should not think that humanity was not created truly good because it is capable of evil and the impetuosity of nature is not by necessity to unchangeable good…The glory of the reasonable soul is located precisely in its having to care a parting of the ways, in its freedom to follow either path.”[4]

If the power to do good lies within the human will, why then do any follow a corrupt path. It is not any inherent original sin which has perverted the human psyche: rather, it is the result of sociological and psychological patterns gained from the environment. “Doing good has become difficult for us only because of the long custom of sinning, which begins to infect us even in our childhood.”[5]

Conversely, the manner of becoming “good” is a process of cognitive-behavioral psychology; granted Pelagius was rudimentary in his development, but he was on the “right path” (some might say): “If you therefore you want your way of life to correspond to the magnificence of your resolution …. Apply yourself now so that the glowing faith of your recent conversation is always warmed by a new earnestness, so that pious practices may easily take root during your early years.” (In short be mindful of what you think and what you do, so that through repetition you may become what you resolve to be).

The transformation of the human life is contingent upon God granting a new nature; rather, transformation is a matter of the right therapeutic practice.

[1] Matt. 5:22 & 5:28, 21:28-32, 22:36-40, 23:28; John 3:16, 14:21; Acts 2:38; Rom. 10:8-17; Col. 2:8; et cetera. “True religion, in great part, consists in holy affections.”Jonathan Edwards, Religious Affections, ed. John E. Smith and Harry S. Stout, Revised edition., vol. 2, The Works of Jonathan Edwards (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009), 95.

[2] Again, I am using the word “psychology” deliberately to push back against the idea that there is some “spiritual” aspect of a human being which independently of one’s psychological state. Pelagius is quite right to put the full power to obey the law of God within the human being’s psychological being, his capacity, volition and action. No honest atheist would hold that a Christian’s belief, affection, conduct and volition toward God are somehow divorced from the Christian’s psychology. The atheist may think the Christian diseased, defective, neurotic or whatnot. But only a Christian trying to preserve some sort of fictitious barrier between religious/spiritual life and psychology would attempt such a thin

[3] J Patout Burns, ed., Theological Anthropology, ed. and trans. J Patout Burns, Sources of Early Christian Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1981), 40.

[4] J Patout Burns, ed., Theological Anthropology, ed. and trans. J Patout Burns, Sources of Early Christian Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1981), 42.

[5] J Patout Burns, ed., Theological Anthropology, ed. and trans. J Patout Burns, Sources of Early Christian Thought (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1981), 50; Benjamin Warfield, “Augustine and the Pelagian Controversy,” in Studies in Tertullian and Augustine (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2003), 295 (“It was only an ever-increasing facility in imitating vice which arose from so long a schooling in evil; and all that was needed to rescue men from it was a new explanation of what was right (in the law), or, at most, the encouragement of forgiveness for what was already done, and a holy example (in Christ) for imitation.”).

At this point it must be noted that modern psychology would often include a substantial element of physiology: disease of the central nervous system and its effects upon thought, emotion and conduct (whether there such thing as volition in such a regime of pure physiology as a cause, I will leave for others to debate). There is no dispute that the central nervous system can be diseased, and that such disease will have substantial obvious effects. The decay and death of the body are promised results of Adam’s sin. Gen. 2:17 & 3:19. No one disputes that various drugs can and will affect one’s psychology. Drawing a precise line between what is physiological and what is psychological are extremely difficult for everyone involved. There is also the question of responding to one’s physiology (unless with a materialist, there is something more than the brain at issue)

Pelagic Psychology and Integration

04 Thursday Jan 2018

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In research the question of the psychological effects of the Fall (essentially, the Fall fundamentally transformed human psychology: our cognition, affections, behavior and will have all been changed as a result of the Fall; therefore, only a remedy which addresses the injury of the Fall will be sufficient to remedy the psychological damage), I came upon this discussion by Augustine of the psychology of Pelagius.  Pelagius held to the position that one’s will and conduct are independent of God’s control (God creates us as independent beings); in essence the psychological functioning of a human remains unaltered as a result of the Fall.

Any psychology which does not take Christian claims seriously will necessarily hold that human psychology operates independently of one’s relationship to God (except perhaps as the subjective concept of “God” operates upon one’s psychology; the “truth” of God would be the subjective effect of the belief, not the objective working of any “God”). This makes any Christian’s use of such psychology fundamentally problematic.  Any Christian who holds to an easy integration of such psychology with a Christian add-on is thus operating on a Pelagian understanding of human psychology.

[For those who do not know, Pelagius is an arch-heretic in the history of Christianity:

A two-pronged attack by Augustine and Jerome (a powerful combination) led to Pelagius’s condemnation by two African councils in 416, a decision upheld by Pope Innocent I, who in 417 excommunicated Pelagius and Celestius.

J.D. Douglas, “Pelagius,” ed. J.D. Douglas and Philip W. Comfort, Who’s Who in Christian History (Wheaton, IL: Tyndale House, 1992), 547.]

Here is the language from Augustine:

CHAPTER 4.—PELAGIUS’ SYSTEM OF FACULTIES

In his system, he posits and distinguishes three faculties, by which he says God’s commandments are fulfilled,—capacity, volition, and action:4 meaning by “capacity,” that by which a man is able to be righteous; by “volition,” that by which he wills to be righteous; by “action,” that by which he actually is righteous. The first of these, the capacity, he allows to have been bestowed on us by the Creator of our nature; it is not in our power, and we possess it even against our will. The other two, however, the volition and the action, he asserts to be our own; and he assigns them to us so strictly as to contend that they proceed simply from ourselves. In short, according to his view, God’s grace has nothing to do with assisting those two faculties which he will have to be altogether our own, the volition and the action, but that only which is not in our own power and comes to us from God, namely the capacity; as if the faculties which are our own, that is, the volition and the action, have such avail for declining evil and doing good, that they require no divine help, whereas that faculty which we have of God, that is to say, the capacity, is so weak, that it is always assisted by the aid of grace.

 

CHAPTER 5 [IV.]—PELAGIUS’ OWN ACCOUNT OF THE FACULTIES, QUOTED

Lest, however, it should chance to be said that we either do not correctly understand what he advances, or malevolently pervert to another meaning what he never meant to bear such a sense, I beg of you to consider his own actual words: “We distinguish,” says he, “three things, arranging them in a certain graduated order. We put in the first place ‘ability;’ in the second, ‘volition;’ and in the third, ‘actuality.’1 The ‘ability’ we place in our nature, the ‘volition’ in our will, and the ‘actuality’ in the effect. The first, that is, the ‘ability,’ properly belongs to God, who has bestowed it on His creature; the other two, that is, the ‘volition’ and the ‘actuality,’ must be referred to man, because they flow forth from the fountain of the will. For his willing, therefore, and doing a good work, the praise belongs to man; or rather both to man, and to God who has bestowed on him the ‘capacity’ for his will and work, and who evermore by the help of His grace assists even this capacity. That a man is able to will and effect any good work, comes from God alone. So that this one faculty can exist, even when the other two have no being; but these latter cannot exist without that former one. I am therefore free not to have either a good volition or action; but I am by no means able not to have the capacity of good. This capacity is inherent in me, whether I will or no; nor does nature at any time receive in this point freedom for itself. Now the meaning of all this will be rendered clearer by an example or two. That we are able to see with our eyes is not of us; but it is our own that we make a good or a bad use of our eyes. So again (that I may, by applying a general case in illustration, embrace all), that we are able to do, say, think, any good thing, comes from Him who has endowed us with this ‘ability,’ and who also assists this ‘ability;’ but that we really do a good thing, or speak a good word, or think a good thought, proceeds from our own selves, because we are also able to turn all these into evil. Accordingly,—and this is a point which needs frequent repetition, because of your calumniation of us,—whenever we say that a man can live without sin, we also give praise to God by our acknowledgment of the capacity which we have received from Him, who has bestowed such ‘ability’ upon us; and there is here no occasion for praising the human agent, since it is God’s matter alone that is for the moment treated of; for the question is not about ‘willing,’ or ‘effecting,’ but simply and solely about that which may possibly be.”

 

Augustine of Hippo, “A Treatise on the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin,” in Saint Augustin: Anti-Pelagian Writings, ed. Philip Schaff, trans. Peter Holmes, vol. 5, A Select Library of the Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church, First Series (New York: Christian Literature Company, 1887), 218–219.

Counseling from Psalm 39, Part 2

25 Wednesday Oct 2017

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Continuing on with the prayer of verses 4-6. Weiser, in his comment upon this prayer, states as follows:

…in the midst of his physical and mental suffering. It is in this connection that the knowledge of the transient nature and futility of every human life and of all human effort in the sight of God is first fully brought to light. …for it is inly in that perspective which sees everything as God sees it that the only trustworthy criterion and compass for the true nature of man can be found….The most common prejudice, from which the psalmist himself did not escape, is the general tendency to overestimate one’s one importance. Man sees his relation to the reality of God in its right proportions only if that prejudice is radically eliminated — if  man sub specie aeternitatis Dei which he grasps in the light of his end of his life, comes to realize that his life and work are ‘much ado about nothing’, and has lost his rebellious self-assurance. The fact that the worshipper is so serious-minded and so courageous that he is even prepared to accept the radical result of that perspective which ruthlessly puts an end to any attempt at trying to hold on to what is only ephemeral.

Artur Weiser, The Psalms, trans. Herbert Hartwell (Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 1962), 329.

Our affections, our love and hate are judgments, evaluations: when we love a thing, we think it somehow good and desirable. Our hatred sees something as dangerous, loathsome and to be avoided or destroyed. The less intense responses are the same quality though not of the same quantity.

The distress of the Psalmist thus lies in his false evaluation of the circumstance. It does not mean that the difficulty which he faces is not real. Indeed, the reality is necessary because God is using it as a means of transforming the Psalmist. The trouble is not in the objective thing itself, but in the inability to judge it rightly.

Make me know how vain all this life is! Make me know how fleeting are my days. Let me see that not only my own life, but all this great world are shadows.

We fight over things we think valuable. I knew of a case involving two homeless men fighting (to the point of extreme violence) over the “right” to comb through certain trashcans. I dare say that no one else even thought about such a “right”. But to these men, the trash was valuable. To those who walked by everyday, it was trash.

The Psalmist has been in distress because he was unable to see through his pain and circumstance. Only by seeing it as God sees it could he rightly judge the thing.

This Scripture applies this principle in a number of ways. For example, James — in a section concerning conflict — writes:

James 4:13–16 (ESV)

13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— 14 yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes. 15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.

Our obtaining wealth, our business is all in the hands of God: and even those efforts are fleeting, because we are mere breath. It is “arrogant” to think otherwise. In James 3:16, he has said that such “selfish ambition” is “demonic” and results in “every vile practice”. James 3:15.

Psalm 39 tells us that even if we gain such wealth, that we have been in “turmoil” “for nothing” and we do “not know who will gather”.  Solomon in Ecclesiastes speaks of the vanity of gathering wealth to leave it to another. Ecco. 2:18-19.

 

Is Psychology a Science?

02 Saturday Sep 2017

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Caveat: this is not a fully developed thesis, just some notes for later.

First, there is the problem of the scope of “psychology”. There are things within the scope of that word which are unquestionably “science”, particularly those matters which pertain to physiology. But the word has such a great scope that there are many things which cannot reasonably be called scientific.

Second, there is the question of what can be captured by scientific methodology. Isolating and test for a particularly variable (some agent of action) is difficult enough when we are considering matters involving the functioning of the human body.

The question becomes more complex when we consider various systems of the human body — such as the interactions between various parts of the nervous system.

When it comes to gross-level human experiences the sheer complexity of the nervous system is likely beyond any ability to model.

When it comes to human behaviors, it is unquestioned that environment has effect upon observable human experience covered by “psychology”. The complexity of the environment when coupled with the complexity of physiology makes “scientific” analysis of human psychology extraordinarily complex.

There is then an additional issue: the matters of physiology and environment do not exhaust the human being: there is the entire spiritual, God-ward aspect of human life which is not even considered. However, that spiritual aspect is the most important aspect of human life. Yet, all “scientific” analysis of human psychology purposefully ignores the single greatest element of human psychology: that is like trying to study daytime while excluding all consideration of the sun.

Finally, human psychology has been profoundly affected by sin (our own sin, sins against us, the effects of sin generally). Sin is irrational and thus not capable of scientific methodical analysis: you cannot make reasonable that which is unreasonable by definition.

There are other aspects of this argument (such as pre-commitments)– and it is obviously not a full theory.

Thomas Manton on helps to obedience

15 Thursday Jun 2017

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Thou has commanded us to keep thy precepts diligently. Ps. 119:4

In this fifth sermon on the 119th Psalm, Manton begins by providing a help to obedience. There would be no need to speak of obedience, if it were “natural” to use. What then keeps us from obedience? Manton begins here:

Doctrine 1: To gain the heart to full obedience, it is good to consider the authority of God in his word.

Manson makes three points: the first two concern our benefit in obedience; the third, the necessity of obedience.

Our profit:  Obedience to God’s commands is both reasonable and profitable: our good lies in in obedience:

First, it is reasonable to obey God. “If we were left at our liberty, we should take up the ways of God rather than any other: Rom. vii. 12, “The commandment is holy, just, and good.”

Second, it is to our benefit to obey God, both in this life — and more even more so at the judgment. Obedience, “will bring in a full reward for the future.”

God commands:

The next motive is that of the text, to urge the command of God. It is a course enjoined and imposed upon us by our sovereign lawgiver. It is not in our choice, as if it were an indifferent thing whether we will walk in the laws of God or not, but of absolute necessity, unless we renounce the authority of God.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 39.

He then supports this point with three considerations:

First, God is not our equal: He is our creator, therefore he has the right to command. He is our judge and therefore has the power to enforce his commands by punishment or reward.

Second, God has not suggested but commanded:

Unless you mean to renounce the sovereign majesty of God, and put him besides the throne, and break out into open rebellion against him, you must do what he hath commanded: 1 Tim. 1:9, ‘Charge them that be rich in the world,’ &c., not only advise but charge them. And Titus 2:15, ‘These things exhort, and rebuke with all authority.’ God will have the creatures know that he expects this duty and homage from them.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 40.

Third, God has given us precise directions that must be followed, “precepts”.

Christians, if we had the awe of God’s authority upon our hearts, what kind of persons would we be at all times, in all places, and in all company? what a check would this be to a proud thought, a light word, or a passionate speech?—what exactness would we study in our conversations, had we but serious thoughts of the sovereign majesty of God, and of his authority forbidding these things in the word!

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 41.

At this point, Manton stops and considers the various hesitations, doubts, questions or weaknesses which could beset his hearers. He asks, Why should I consider the authority of God? This is a key point of the best preaching: it does not merely drop information before the hearer, but it helps the hearer process in the information. The preacher anticipates questions, uncovers motives, et cetera.

The very best preaching and the very best counseling are the same: helping another to understand, to digest, to live in accordance with God’s will.

1  We take God without the seriousness deserved: it shows in how we live:

Because then the heart would not be so loose, off and on in point of duty; when a thing is counted arbitrary (as generally we count so of strictness), the heart hangs off more from God. When we press men to pray in secret, to be full of good works, to meditate of God, to examine conscience, to redeem time, to be watchful, they think these be counsels of perfection, not rules of duty, enforced by the positive command of God; therefore are men so slight and careless in them. But now, when a man hath learned to urge a naughty heart with the authority of God, and charge them in the name of God, he lies more under the awe of duty. Hath God said I must search and try my ways, and shall I live in a constant neglect of it?

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 41.

2  Obedience requires appropriate fear: disobedience comes from taking the commands of God too lightly:

The heart is never right until we be brought to fear a commandment more than any inconveniencies whatsoever. To a wicked man there seems to be nothing so light as a command, and therefore he breaks through against checks of conscience. But a man that hath the awe of God upon him, when mindful of God’s authority, he fears a command

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 41.

3 If God has commanded the duty, then God will make obedience possible. We need not doubt our ability, because God stands behind the obedience. If someone thinks they will fail, they almost certainly will:

Many times we are doubtful of success, and so our hands are weakened thereby. We forbear duty, because we do not know what will come of it. Now, a sense of God’s authority and command doth fortify the heart against these discouragements

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 41.

4  The purpose or profit behind some commands are not immediately obvious. Why should God command that I not eat from this tree? Why should God command such and such a morality, a behavior? Why should God command faith? We do not need to quibble at God’s reasons when we know that it is God who commands.

5  God does not need our bare behavior. When God commands us he is seeking the  voluntary submission of our will to his:

Obedience is never right but when it is done out of a conscience of God’s authority, intuitu voluntatis. The bare sight of God’s will should be reason enough to a gracious heart. It is the will of God; it is his command, So it is often urged: 1 Thes. 4:3, the apostle bids them follow holiness, ‘for this is the will of God, your sanctification.’ And servants should be faithful in their burdensome and hard labours; 1 Peter 2:15, ‘For so is the will of God, that with well-doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men.’ And 1 Thes. 5:18, ‘In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.’ That is argument enough to a godly Christian, that God hath signified his will and good pleasure, though the duty were never so cross to his own desires and interests. They obey simply for the commandment sake, without any other reason and inducement.

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 42.

How Far May Sin Be In A Blessed Man, A Child of God? (Thomas Manton)

08 Thursday Jun 2017

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, Sin, Theology of Biblical Counseling, Thomas Manton, Uncategorized

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In sermon IV from his sermons on the 119th Psalm, Manton, “How far may sin be in a blessed man, a child of God?” The verse under consideration reads, “They do no iniquity: they walk in his ways.” Having discussed the blessing which comes from avoiding sin (for instance, “In them true happiness has begun.” — for all our sorrow comes from sin, thus avoidance of sin is the beginning of true happiness), he comes to this question.

This shows Manton to be a careful pastor and to have an accurate understanding of the human beings in his congregation. A poor pastor would lash his hearers. Manson has seriously exhorted them to holiness and has noted that sin has to rightful place in the heart of a believer. But he now he comes to this question, what of remaining sin.

First, all believers continue with a “corrupt nature, they have sin in the as well as others.” He then compares the remains of sin ivy on a wall. You cut down the branch and new vines grow up in its place: “Such an indwelling sin is in us, though we pray, strive, and cut off the excrescences, the buddings out of it here and there, yet till it be plucked asunder by death, it continueth with us.”

Second, we have “infirmities”; our service is not perfect — it cannot reach the measure which God requires. “There are unavoidable infirmities which are pardoned of course.”

Third,

They may be guilty of some sins which by watchfulness might be prevented, as vain thoughts, idle, passionate speeches, and many carnal actions. It is possible that these may be prevented by the ordinary assistances of grace, and if we will keep a strict guard over our own hearts. But in this case God’s children may be overtaken and overborne; overtaken by the suddenness, or overborne by the violence of temptation.

Fourth, “they may fall foul.”  — But this is no license to make a trade of sin.

Fifth: a peculiar sin. I will quote this at length, because it is very easy to be smug in this issue and to think that another’s peculiar weakness is especially evil — because it is not sin to me! We need gentleness in judging such things:

A child of God may have some particular evils, which may be called predominant sins (not with respect to grace, that is impossible, that a man should be renewed and have such sins that sin should carry the mastery over grace); but they may be said to have a predominancy in comparison of other sins; he may have some particular inclination to some evil above others. David had his iniquity, Ps. 18:23. Look, as the saints have particular graces; Abraham was eminent for faith, Timothy for sobriety, Moses for meekness, &c.; so they have their particular corruptions which are more suitable to their temper and course of life. Peter seems to be inclined to tergiversation, and to shrinking in a time of trouble. We find him often tripping in that kind; in the denial of his master; again, Gal. 2:12, it is said he dissembled and complied with the Jews, therefore Paul ‘withstood him to his face, for he was to be blamed.’ It is evident by experience there are particular corruptions to which the children of God are more inclinable: this appears by the great power and sway they bear in commanding other evils to be committed, by their falling into them out of inward propensity when outward temptations are few or weak, or none at all; and when resistance is made, yet they are more pestered and haunted with them than with other temptations, which is a constant matter of exercise and humiliation to them

Thomas Manton, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 33.

 

 

 

 

Nature is out of joint

07 Wednesday Jun 2017

Posted by in Biblical Counseling, Psalms, Theology of Biblical Counseling, Thomas Manton, Uncategorized

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HAMLET

Rest, rest, perturbèd spirit!—So, gentlemen,
With all my love I do commend me to you,
And what so poor a man as Hamlet is
May do, to express his love and friending to you,
God willing, shall not lack. Let us go in together,
And still your fingers on your lips, I pray.
The time is out of joint. O cursèd spite,
That ever I was born to set it right!
Nay, come, let’s go together.
Act 1, Scene 5
Human beings suffer greatly because we are out of place in the world we have expounded, as Rilke write in the Dunio Elegies, Elegy 1  “and the resourceful creatures see clearly/ that we are not really at home/in the interpreted world.” Ecclesiastes elegantly tell us the world is vain and unsatisfying. The difficulty lies in our place, we cannot be content unless we put the purpose for which we exist:

Use 1. To press you to seek God. The motives are:—
1. It was the end of our creation. We do not live merely to live; but for this end were we sent into the world, to seek God. Nature is sensible of it in part by the dissatisfaction it finds in other things; and therefore the apostle describes the Gentiles to he groping and feeling about for God, Acts 17:27. God is the cause of all things, and nature cannot be satisfied without him. We were made for God, and can never enjoy satisfaction until we come to enjoy him; therefore the Psalmist saith, Ps. 14:2, We are ‘all gone aside, and altogether become filthy.’ Nature is out of joint; we are quite out of our way to true happiness. We are seeking that for which we were created, when we seek and inquire after God.

Thomas Manton, “Sermon III”, The Complete Works of Thomas Manton, vol. 6 (London: James Nisbet & Co., 1872), 23–24.