Parenting On Purpose will lay a foundation that can provide for better and more informed choices. However, ultimately, children will eventually exercise their God given right to choose. Now a look at the foundations. Children do change our lives. They change our lives dramatically because of the very nature that children have, which is one of total dependence upon us to care for them. Most of us know, from a serious viewpoint, that it is a great privilege to have children and a   privilege to  raise them. It is a wonderful thing to see your children succeed, grow and hopefully become better than what you ever dreamed you could become. Most parents I talk with have great dreams and hopes for their children. Unfortunately, children have their own agenda, and at times can stray in unpleasant even dangerous directions.

This course is based on How to Handle Adversity by Charles Stanley. When troubles come, we usually ask why. But the more significant question is “How should I respond?” This course can help you personally and can provide a Biblical resource for you in counseling with others.

This book will answer your deepest questions about emotions in the Christian life – from a biblical and Christ-centered perspective. How can I bring my emotions under control? Did Jesus have emotions? Are my emotions important to God? Is it really possible to know true peace? How come some Christians have a glow about them? Why am I always afraid? Some people seem so masterful; how do they do that? Why did Jesus’ weep? Where do emotions come from? How can I express

Christian Counseling is providing guidance and instruction based upon the principles set forth in the Bible and taught and adhered to by Jesus Christ. The tenets of Christian Counseling are:  The Bible is the eternal, unchangeable Word of God and provides the sole authoritative source of the model of man and the principles that dictate and govern man’s behavior.  There is a moral and ethical right and wrong, and these are clearly defined in the Word of God.  Man is held accountable to the moral and ethical principles found in the Bible

The word itself means the study of the soul. Minirth and Meier give a broader definition in their Introduction to Psychology and Counseling, ”Psychology is the scientific study of the behavior of organism. Basically psychologists try to find out what makes people tick and how their minds work. Psychology might be thought of as the study of how living creatures are able to interact with their environment and each other, and how they cope successfully or unsuccessfully with that environment” (p. 15). In other words, psychology is the study of how people live, why they do what they do and what can be done to help them live better ,’Christian’ psychology are fast approaching the status once reserved  for Scripture. Yet, it is important that we analyze that movement in the light of the Word.

In our world today, faith-based crisis counseling is unfortunately misunderstood and underutilized and during times of grief, apprehension, violence, disasters and terrorism. Faith based crisis counseling has primarily been associated with church attendance. Many have the misconception that if they don’t attend or belong to a specific church, counseling is not available.  Faith based crisis counselors who become part of the survival process far out reach that concept today.  Faith based crisis counselors potentially provide much needed support in times of crisis and disaster to anyone who needs it, whether they are part of the same faith or not.

There is likely no stickier area of pastoral ministry than counseling. Traps abound. Mistakes will be made. The counseling pastor is in great demand today. How can a devoted pastor combine Biblical teaching with the counseling touch? Archibald D. Hart, Gary L. Gulbranson, and Jim Smith combine decades of experience in pastoral counseling to give the student of a wealth of godly wisdom. “The counsel of the LORD standeth for ever…” (Psalm 33:11)

Serving as an altar counselor can be an exciting and rewarding spiritual experience: You have the opportunity to “reap” spiritual fruit for the Kingdom of God.  As a minister shares God’s Word, he is actually “sowing” it in the hearts of those who listen. At the conclusion of the service when he provides opportunity for listeners to respond to his challenge, a great spiritual “harvest” is ready to be reaped. As an altar worker, you serve as a counselor to those who respond to the altar call made by the minister. You are working with the minister to “reap” the spiritual fruit of men, women, boys, and girls who have received and acted upon the Word of God.

The need for pastoral counseling in the local church appears to be growing rapidly. Yet, few pastors have received adequate training in the field of counseling. In addition, there is a dearth of Scriptural based materials that a pastor may study and use in order to have the basic tools for counseling.

Many of the books written in recent years have little practical value to the average pastor. In fact, some of the proposed methods and techniques are not only inadequate but unbiblical and sometimes dangerous for the counselee. It is a fact of life today that Christians may be affected with all the sinful practices and maladies to which human flesh is heir and that we will retain this potential until the day we are received into glory.

Beck was researching depression under the psychoanalytical understanding that depression resulted from anger turned against the self and was examining dream content in order to find this ‘retroflexed anger’.  However, what caught his attention was that depressed clients had a pronounced negative bias in their interpretations of themselves leading to strong self-disparagement. He came to believe that systematic errors in logical thinking caused depression. These thoughts were understood to be ‘automatic’, derived from generalizations of past experience.