Christian Counseling

I should have been writing papers and studying for finals but instead I'm reading other books. I just finished "Christian Counseling." The book is written by two professors that teach at Fuller, one is a psychologist and the other a theologian. I just finished writing a paper for one of my classes on the topic of social justice and i have to say i wish i had read this book previous to writing the paper. This book had great things to say about forgiveness and reconciliation!!! The authors say:

'Forgiveness upholds the conviction that grace has, does, and will triumph over judgement since theologically it is God's will that redemptive justice (justice that transforms both the person and context in healing) will finally eclipse retributive justice (justice that repays with equal reward or logical consequence based on equivalency) --an eye for an eye."

These authors quote from and resource theologians like Paul Tillich, Stanley Hauerwas, Richard Hayes, Henry Nouwen, and more...

This is evident in their exploration of the topic of the interrelationship between Love, Power and Justice and when they make comments such as, "The practice of virtues within community provides the matrix for the development of character in community. The authors effectively lay down a theological foundation for Christian counseling and go on to explain how our counseling should be something that fosters forgiveness and builds an ethic of char actor that is focused on the normative life of Christ. They give several examples on how one might be intentional in recognizing the presence of Christ during the counseling session and how the counselor and counselee might talk about that. They then go on to give practical applications about counseling and how it might become incarnational and not just theory. The authors put flesh to their theoretical bones by then discussing topics of mediation, cross culture issues, sex issues and family system issues. Finally the close with the embrace of the emerging postmodern context and a word of encouragement.

Matt you need to read this book so we can talk about it!