The Heart of Pastoral Counseling


Book Description

"The Heart of Pastoral Counseling: Healing Through Relationship, Revised Edition lays the foundation for utilizing the pastoral counseling relationship to bring about positive change as it explores topics such as observation, listening, communication, handling transference, and termination of therapy. Dr. Richard Dayringer explores these topics through research from the disciplines of psychiatry, psychology, marriage counseling, family therapy, and pastoral counseling to help pastoral counselors understand how to use the relationship to bring about the desired ends in the therapeutic process." --Book Jacket.




Passions of the Heart


Book Description

Enticed by rage, sensuality, or pride, anyone can become caught up in previously unimaginable acts. Experienced biblical counselor John Street takes a hard look at the heart idolatries that lead even Christians to commit egregious sexual sin . . . showing how to bring lasting change by identifying the underlying motivations of the heart. Here there is hope: any sin can be forgiven, and Christ gives men and women the grace to mortify fleshly desires and to humbly live for him.




When Hearts Become Flame


Book Description

Whatever else he or she does, the pastoral counselor, same as the priest at the Divine Altar, enters into a call and response relationship, invoking Gods presence and seeking to be receptive to Gods activity unfolding in the here and now. The intention of pastoral counseling must be to offer Christ to the other (and receive Him) while serving at the altar of the human heart.




The Pastor and Counseling


Book Description

Pastors spend much of their time counseling people in crisis—a delicate task that requires one to carefully evaluate each situation, share relevant principles from God’s Word, and offer practical suggestions for moving forward. Too often, however, pastors feel unprepared to effectively shepherd their people through difficult circumstances such as depression, adultery, eating disorders, and suicidal thinking. Written to help pastors and church leaders understand the basics of biblical counseling, this book provides an overview of the counseling process from the initial meeting to the final session. It also includes suggestions for cultivating a culture of discipleship within a church and four appendixes featuring a quick checklist, tips for taking notes, and more.




Strategic Pastoral Counseling


Book Description

Therapeutic counseling in a Christian context can be highly effective when it maintains narrowly focused goals in a time-limited setting. The details of this proven model of pastoral counseling are described in this practical guide. This second edition of Strategic Pastoral Counseling has been thoroughly revised and includes two new chapters. Benner includes helpful case studies, a new appendix on contemporary ethical issues, and updated chapter bibliographies. His study will continue to serve clergy and students well as a valued practical handbook on pastoral care and counseling.




Heart & Habits


Book Description

"In this distinctively Christian approach to habits, Greg Gifford makes the case from Scripture that both heart motivations and godly practice are critical for growth in Christ. He shows that progressive sanctification travels on a bidirectional highway between our hearts and our habits-we do what we love and we love as we do! Filled with concrete examples and exercises to address our hearts and habits in the various spheres of life, Greg helps the reader put into practice the fear of the LORD (Psalm111:10) in everyday life."-MICHAELR.EMLET, M.Div., M.D., Dean of Faculty and Counselor, Christian Counseling & Educational Foundation (CCEF), and author of Saints, Sufferers, and Sinners: Loving Others As God Loves Us




The Star Book for Pastoral Counseling


Book Description

A practical new volume in the best-selling ¿Star Book¿ series from Judson Press! Rev. Dr. Jason Curry brings his experience as pastor, university chaplain, and pastoral counselor to bear in offering church leaders a compact and comprehensive overview of pastoral counseling as a critical aspect of pastoral care. Dr. Curry covers topics from a foundational definition of pastoral counseling to the unique considerations in counseling women, African Americans, and others. One chapter is devoted to the most common types of pastoral counseling in the parish setting: premarital, grief, and addictions, while other chapters explore group dynamics in counseling couples and families. This pocket-sized volume provides categories for the intake interview, suggestions for planning the counseling session, instructions for creating a genogram, and brief discussions of legal and ethical issues. Includes a chapter about designing a pastoral counseling program in your own church!




The Heart Of A Healer


Book Description

Every person you know has either been through situations in their lives that have resulted in trauma or knows someone who has. The church has lost the art of wisely walking with someone as they experience the effects of trauma in their life. We are at a loss when a friend loses a child, a coworker finds out they have cancer, or we hear about someone being the victim of human trafficking. If you're a fireman, nurse, police officer, pastor, counselor, schoolteacher, or any other profession that touches the lives of people, you have encountered people in trauma ... you have probably experienced the effects of secondary or vicarious trauma yourself. You have felt the hopelessness and inadequacies of trying to help someone understand the explainable. As I searched for resources to help me do that from a biblical perspective, I found that there is very little help for the Christian involved in the work of trauma-informed care. Most biblical counseling doesn't adequately address how to engage with someone suffering from trauma, and no secular methodologies can provide the ultimate healing and hope these victims long for. The Heart of a Healer is an attempt from a layman's perspective to combine the wise compassion of a trauma-informed care approach with the authoritative and life-giving truths revealed in the scriptures. This book is neither clinical nor theological in the traditional understanding of those terms. The Heart of a Healer outlines a practical and biblical approach to dealing with trauma. You will learn how to deal with it in your own life and how to effectively help others who are suffering through trauma. This book was born out of much prayer and the searching of scriptures. It is my humble prayer that God uses this imperfect attempt at this important subject as a tool to help those who he calls into this work, and that as a result, many will see your good deeds and glorify our Father in heaven.




Solution-Focused Pastoral Counseling


Book Description

This groundbreaking book, now updated and expanded, furthers its original, effective, time-saving approach that benefits pastors overtaxed by counseling demands. Dr. Charles Kollar presents a departure in pastoral counseling, showing that counseling need not be long-term or depend on psychological manipulation to produce dramatic results. In most cases, the solution lies with the counselees themselves. Using the tested methods found in Solution-Focused Pastoral Counseling, pastors, apart from counselors, will be well equipped to help their counselees discover a solution and put it in motion speedily and productively.SFPC is short-term—typically one to five sessions, in which the counselor seeks to create solutions with—not for—the counselee. The focus is on the possibility of life without the problem through an understanding of what is different when the problem does not occur or is less intrusive. The goal is healthy change, sooner rather than later, by helping the counselee see and work on the solution with God’s activity already present in his or her life.The solution-focused approach does not require the counselor to be a highly trained psychological expert. It requires biblically based sensitivity and common sense. Yet this approach also recognizes its limitations and understands that there are situations in which other professional and/or medical help is required.




Research in Pastoral Care and Counseling


Book Description

Larry VandeCreek, DMin, the author of A Research Primer for Pastoral Care and Counseling (now Part One of the current volume), is the retired Assistant Director in the Department of Pastoral Care, University Hospitals of The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio. He also served as Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Neurology. His research interests and publications focus on quantitative research that elucidates the religious/spiritual needs of hospital patients and the impact of pastoral care. Hilary Bender, PhD, STD, is a clinical and research psychologist in private practice in Brookline, Massachusetts. He is a Boston University Professor Emeritus and is on the faculty of the Massachusetts School of Professional Psychology. His specialty in research and clinical work is the ""all-but-dissertation"" phenomenon and working with the many doctoral students who have completed all requirements for their degrees but the dissertation and become unable to make this final step. Merle R. Jordan, ThD, is the retired Albert V. Danielsen Professor of Pastoral Psychology at the Boston University School of Theology. He is a Diplomate in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors and a Fellow and Approved Supervisor in the American Association of Marriage and Family Therapists. He is the author of Taking on the Gods: The Task of the Pastoral Counselor. Margot Hover, DMin, is an Association of Clinical Pastoral Education supervisor and the coordinator of pastoral research at Duke University Medical Center, Raleigh, North Carolina. She has received the ACPE Research of the Year Award and the Council on Ministry in Specialized Settings Research Paper of the Year Award. She is also the author of Caring for Yourself When Caring for Others.