Christian Counseling

Definition and Meaning

Christian counseling is a form of counseling that helps individuals or families with psychological, relational, and spiritual difficulties from the perspective of the Christian faith and the Bible. In the church, the term covers both pastoral counseling, in which a pastor cares for members of the congregation, and counseling provided by professional counselors trained in both theology and psychology. Even when it uses the methods of secular psychological counseling, Christian counseling often incorporates prayer, Scripture, and the search for the spiritual meaning of suffering into the counseling process.

Biblical and Historical Background

Passages frequently cited as a basis for Christian counseling include the following:

• Isaiah 9:6: The coming Messiah is called "Wonderful, Counsellor." A counselor is one who gives advice.
• Galatians 6:2: "Bear ye one another's burdens."
• Romans 15:14: Believers are described as "able also to admonish one another."

The church has long cared for the souls of its members through pastoral visitation and personal exhortation. As modern psychology developed in the twentieth century, a movement arose, centered in the United States, to introduce clinical training, such as hospital practicums, into theological education. In contrast, Jay E. Adams advocated a Bible-centered "nouthetic counseling" in his 1970 book Competent to Counsel. Today, an integrationist approach, which seeks to draw on both psychology and theology, continues alongside biblical counseling, which holds that Scripture alone is sufficient for counseling.

Practice in the Korean Church

The oldest and most widely practiced form of counseling in the Korean church is pastoral visitation (simbang). Pastors and cell group leaders visit homes, listen to members describe their circumstances, and pray with them. Later, many theological universities and graduate schools established programs in pastoral counseling and Christian counseling, and related academic societies now issue counselor certifications. These are private credentials rather than state-recognized qualifications. Large churches sometimes maintain counseling offices or family ministry departments, and many organizations operate Christian counseling centers outside the church.

Approaches to counseling differ more by scholar and institution than by the official positions of denominations. Some within Reformed circles emphasize biblical counseling. In churches with Pentecostal or charismatic leanings, counseling is sometimes practiced together with prayer, divine healing, and inner healing ministry.

Criticism of Christian counseling comes from two directions. On one side, critics contend that it treats mental illnesses such as depression solely as a lack of faith or a spiritual problem, thereby delaying medical treatment. On the other side, critics worry that it relies too heavily on psychology and loses the distinctive perspective of the faith. Confidentiality and counselor ethics are also regarded as important issues. Cult counseling, which helps people leave heretical groups, differs in character and is treated separately.