Mental Health vs. Spiritual Warfare: How to Tell the Difference!
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Is this a demon or just my trauma? Learn the difference and what to do.
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Dr. Tim Yonts grew up near Cincinnati, OH, in a Christian home. He became a follower of Christ at the age of 12 and surrendered to teaching ministry at age 19. He holds a Master of Divinity from Liberty University and a PhD in Theological Studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, where he specialized in ethics. Dr. Yonts is currently an adjunct professor at Liberty University, where he teaches courses in theology, worldview, apologetics, and ethics. He’s also the co-host of the Psych & Theo podcast, a show that tackles contemporary issues at the intersection of psychology and theology.
Sam Landa is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC) and teaches undergraduate psychology courses at Liberty University. He has taught at almost every level of education, starting from middle school all through the graduate level. He has been teaching online and residential psychology courses for the last 12 years. Sam is currently working on a doctorate degree in Counselor Education and Supervision. His research interests include attachment, God attachment, resilience, shame, religious doubt, religious coping, forgiveness, and trauma.
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Additional Reading:
Psych and Theo Podcast: https://spoti.fi/42HdNCB
It's Only a Demon A Model of Christian Deliverance: https://a.co/d/fVJUQ2l
Demonic Foes: https://a.co/d/0WG09Bq
#mentalhealth #spiritualwarfare #podcastclips #biblepodcast
- 00:00
- Hello. Hello. Welcome to biblically speaking. My name's Cassane Blino, and I'm your host. I am beyond excited today to now host my first ever group session with the
- 00:09
- Psych and Theo podcast. Welcome to the show guys. I am so excited for today's topic. I wanted to discuss the fine line between mental health and spiritual warfare with you
- 00:19
- Sam Landa, the licensed counseling professional and Dr. Tim Jahnst. And this is something that's come up for me as someone that loves therapy, but also someone that's very aware of the spiritual realm and kind of the attacks that Satan can put on us.
- 00:32
- And I think it's important as Christians to know, you know, when do we call our doctor and when do we go to church? And is that the same thing or are there differences here?
- 00:40
- And a lot of the conversations that we discuss today are going to be based on the episode you guys covered, which is the intersection between faith and psychology.
- 00:47
- So I'm really excited for this discussion to lean on your guys's expertise. All that to say, welcome to the show guys.
- 00:54
- How are you guys feeling? Doing great. Cool. You guys did an episode on this.
- 01:00
- What was the thinking behind how you guys structured that conversation? It was one of our earliest episodes, right
- 01:06
- Tim? And I think even the concept of psych and theo kind of came about in addressing these topics, which is there are a lot of cultural issues going on and they have counseling or psychological concepts.
- 01:20
- And there's also these biblical pieces as well, especially for Christians trying to understand both of those and how to make sense of all that.
- 01:27
- So Tim being the expert in his field and me in mine, we just thought, well, how do we tackle these topics and have a discussion around them?
- 01:34
- So it was the same thing with the statistic of church and mental health is that there's always been this divide between the church and counselors, like you stay in your lane and we'll stay in our lane and we don't need to interact with each other.
- 01:47
- But there's actually a lot of overlap as we'll probably discuss today between both of them because there's a lot of things that we do in the church that have psychological benefits.
- 01:57
- So we'll talk more about that in a little bit. Absolutely. One of the things that I do want to get into is kind of like where that intersection starts because I think that it's becoming an older concept that you're feeling this type of way, you're feeling depressed or you're feeling anxious, you just need to pray more.
- 02:15
- And it feels almost rude to tell someone to do that when they could go get professional help, they could go get the therapy they need.
- 02:22
- Therapy changed my life and I can't imagine the shame that I would feel if I was trying to process my trauma by simply just going to church and kind of feeling invalidated through that.
- 02:31
- But first, before we jump in, would you guys like to kind of flex your muscles? Like how did, like, I'll start with you,
- 02:37
- Sam, as a licensed counseling professional, how did you start dissecting this with a theological lens as far as like mental illness from a biblical perspective?
- 02:50
- Yeah. It actually started very interesting because I grew up in a church that was very traditional, had a negative view of psychology because our pastor actually came from a psychology background.
- 03:04
- But he was studying psychology like when it was very liberal and the consul was mainly,
- 03:10
- I mean, the main theorist at the time was Freud and that's all he knew and that's all he learned about. So now
- 03:16
- Christian counseling started to make a, kind of create its own lane within the counseling field.
- 03:21
- I was learning new things. I was learning, hey, you know, there is overlap here. There is an aspect of the fallenness of man.
- 03:28
- That's why we're impacted by these mental health issues. So as I became more open to the idea of, hey, counseling probably has a lot of benefits and there is a lot in scripture that we hear or that we see, counseling, or a lot of issues specifically.
- 03:43
- So entering the field, being Latino, being from a conservative background, like those things were already working against me.
- 03:51
- So I had to kind of make sure that I really understood why I was going into this field.
- 03:56
- So it was a calling. It's an area that I wanted to teach in. So yeah, God just kind of opened the doors.
- 04:02
- And as I've been talking about it more and more, I've been seeing more of these overlap between the two fields.
- 04:08
- And then now I mostly work with college students. I've worked with adults before, and I've seen the power of connection, which is the biggest thing, right?
- 04:16
- God made us for relationships with each other. And that's been pretty much the focus of how
- 04:21
- I approach counseling, you know. Did you experience any pushback by approaching theological ideas with psychology?
- 04:31
- I did, but it was mostly in class. So one of the, because we would have people who came in from maybe a more ministry approach.
- 04:39
- So they were going into the counseling program. And then there were some of us who grew up just kind of in a traditional background.
- 04:44
- We're kind of curious about what this actually looks like for us. And then there were those who were just always sold to, hey, psychology is its own field.
- 04:51
- We're going to help people with their mental health issues. We don't really need scripture as much. We need to just focus on psychology, right?
- 04:57
- So we had kind of these three spaces. And I was kind of like in the middle trying to figure out, okay, is there overlap?
- 05:03
- Well, what does this look like? But one of my favorite authors, Dr. Larry Crabb, you know, he passed away a couple years ago. I've read a lot of his books, and he was one of the first to enter the field considering psychology because he had a background in biblical studies and ministry.
- 05:20
- And he was moving into this psychology field, and he was getting hammered on both sides, right? So the Christians were telling him, hey, don't include psychology in matters of the church.
- 05:29
- And then psychology, same thing. Don't bring church or God into the mental health space.
- 05:35
- So he talks a lot about that and how he must have been on the good side if he was considered getting hit from both sides, you know?
- 05:44
- That's a great point. Yeah. I can't imagine that it would have been easy for someone to say, like, it's okay to not use
- 05:50
- God for 100 % of your issues, and maybe it's time to go get professional help. And like I said,
- 05:56
- I feel like we're like coming out of that belief system that seems outdated of like, it's okay, and it's difficult to go get professional help.
- 06:03
- I mean, at least that's my perception of it from like the outside. Like you guys are the experts, and I'm like the peons that just kind of experience it and question it.
- 06:10
- The church seems to be much more receptive to the idea of counseling. And I have shared this with Tim, and I think
- 06:16
- I've shared it on the show as well. My main issue within the church is that the pastors don't take a self -help mental health approach to teaching scripture, right?
- 06:28
- The pastor is to edify the church, is to build them up, but not to give self -help and you know, mental health talks from the pulpit.
- 06:36
- That's my perspective. So they're open to it. So I have seen pastors say, hey, if you need help, and it's in this mental health space, you're struggling with depression or suicidal thoughts, go get help.
- 06:46
- And they encourage the congregation to go and seek help. So that I have seen more of. So that's been good.
- 06:52
- I do appreciate that. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's good that they're kind of drawing a line between that.
- 06:57
- I mean, like I always go to the extreme of like, well, they used to like, I don't know, go to the bishops back in the medieval ages and it's like, well, you're dying because there's ghosts in your blood, you know, like at least we're moving out of that like horrible time where like people are acknowledging the body and like how medicine works.
- 07:13
- I would kind of love to get into a timeline. I love what you guys did on your episode of like, when did that period of God is in charge of everything end?
- 07:22
- And then it entered into, okay, there's a difference between like going to church and going to the doctor. I don't know which one of you, we're going to be ping ponging a lot in this because I know that you guys both spoke on this.
- 07:32
- You guys both know. But from a theological and a timeline perspective, when do we see the introduction of psychology and kind of the exit of like, everything is a demon and it's bad and hurting your body?
- 07:42
- Well, Sam can speak more so to specifically to psychology and how the industry developed.
- 07:47
- But in general, with the start of the Enlightenment, which is you think the 18th century, so 1700 is typically when historians see the peak of the
- 07:58
- Enlightenment happening. This is a time where there's a newfound interest in science or the sciences, scientific method.
- 08:07
- Francis Bacon is a really one of the famous philosophers and scientists of the day. He's the one that's credited with the scientific method.
- 08:15
- And during this period, there is this push to ground knowledge in the sciences.
- 08:24
- So what we can know, we can know by doing the scientific method, that's methods of observation and testing and retesting and things like that.
- 08:33
- Along with that is this major skepticism toward religious things. So the Enlightenment is coming off the heels of the
- 08:40
- Protestant Reformation and then the wars between the different Protestant denominations and the
- 08:47
- Catholic Church even. So there's a great feeling that religion causes a lot of problems in the world.
- 08:55
- And so we need to actually demystify the world of religious beliefs and become rational people.
- 09:01
- So there's this emphasis on rationalism. So rationalism, which is we can know things by our reason, the exercise of our reason, and then empiricism, which is things are known because they are observable.
- 09:13
- We can observe and we can test them out. So it's empirical. That is, you can touch it and you can test it.
- 09:19
- So that's that period, the 1700s into the 80s, you see this waning of authority from religious institutions and a movement of authority and credibility to, let's say, scientific institutions or maybe the university and things like that.
- 09:38
- So with that came an emphasis on the material. So there's a worldview called materialism, which is that the world is just made up of material matter.
- 09:46
- There's nothing beyond that. What usually goes along with that is a worldview called naturalism, that the natural world is all there is.
- 09:54
- There is no supernatural. So belief in the supernatural, supernatural things, is just superstition.
- 10:00
- You can't test it. You can't touch it. It's ultimately irrational. And so why believe in it?
- 10:05
- And so a lot of the leaders of the Enlightenment were quite materialistic, atheistic, although they didn't always come out and say that they were atheistic because back in the day that wasn't safe to do.
- 10:15
- But now it is. And so by the time you get to the 20th century, there is a hardcore entrenched worldview of materialism, naturalism, and atheism that dominates the universities, dominates all of the scientific endeavors.
- 10:30
- And so that actually influences how we study things like psychology. So Sam can speak more specifically to the discipline of psychology and where that shifted from religion to the material body.
- 10:42
- But essentially, that's a big shift, is that the human being is not a spirit, soul, and body like a trichotomy, as Christians would say.
- 10:51
- No, they would say we are a material substance descended from, or a primate, we're descended from the primate families through a long line of evolution.
- 11:02
- The world is just a material thing. So things that happen to us, even in our minds, are material at their core.
- 11:09
- And so that there's no spiritual causality to what's going on in the brain. And so that's a worldview at work.
- 11:17
- So we have to push back on that without falling back into a mindset that every mental problem, every mental disease or psychological disorder is some sort of spiritual problem, because it might not be.
- 11:31
- There is a physical element to these things. Yeah. Sam, any comments on that? Just because that seems like we almost went from one extreme to the other, of everything is from God to now nothing is from God.
- 11:42
- Everything is materialistic. And now we're trying to find that middle ground of spiritual warfare is very real. But also, if you need to take meds, you should definitely take those meds.
- 11:51
- Sam, how would you approach? Is there a rule of thumb? Or is there just something that you're seeing within that department of, yeah, these are the things you should go to the doctor for, but these are the things you should stop at your priest first before you come to the doctor?
- 12:05
- Yeah. It's interesting because the whole concept of psychology, at least when it first started, was study of the mind or the study of the soul, actually.
- 12:15
- And then it moved to the study of the mind. And then it's like, oh, we can't really measure these different things. We can make observations and start to look at how people's thoughts are affected.
- 12:24
- But really, then it became what it is present today. It's more like kind of behavior, observational behaviors, like what are people doing and why are they doing that?
- 12:32
- So they're conducting all these different studies and so on. So I do that with couples, with individuals. But yeah, the idea was that you want to help people manage their thoughts in order to manage their emotions.
- 12:47
- This immaterial piece, and Tim kind of alluded to this, this immaterial piece has always been intriguing for people.
- 12:53
- They want to understand their thoughts. They want to understand what's going on with their spirit. They want to understand their emotions, the material piece.
- 12:59
- But most of the time, the material part, the body, is what affects those things.
- 13:05
- So for example, you see this a lot in the, whether it be foster care system or in hospitals when people are dying, right?
- 13:14
- They can be the happiest person in the world prior to being at the hospital, right? But they get this diagnosis, they get this medication, and they realize that they're going to die, right?
- 13:25
- So that, their body, feeling the physical pain of cancer or some other disease, starts to mess with their minds.
- 13:33
- They start thinking, what's going to happen with my kids? What's going to happen with, you know, who cares about me, right?
- 13:38
- So it's interesting how something that happens to us physically affects your emotional and mental state and vice versa.
- 13:45
- If you're thinking a certain way or if you're feeling a certain way, that can ultimately affect how your body starts to feel, right?
- 13:51
- People who are anxious all the time, they have very difficult times sleeping. So they start getting, you know, more stressed and they are more easily irritable.
- 14:00
- So it's interesting seeing just that dynamic play out between the body and how that impacts the mind and emotions and vice versa.
- 14:07
- So that's always been kind of the war back and forth is who's in charge of what, right? So again, the battle is between the either
- 14:15
- Christians or the religious world and the psychological world. Like the religious world believes we should take care of the spirit and we should take care of the mind and the emotions, right?
- 14:27
- You and the psychology, you need to take care of all the other stuff, the physical stuff, the meditation, the mindfulness, take care, you know, of all these other things that have to do with the body.
- 14:37
- You shouldn't, there should not be any overlap. But what we're seeing is that there is a lot of overlap between the two.
- 14:42
- You've got to find that middle ground. Absolutely. And that was a perfect transition into my next topic.
- 14:47
- So thank you for that. The next thing I want to look at is how common biblical characters experience psychological issues and kind of, again, that overlap of what we see in theology happening today.
- 15:02
- And I'm going to use both of you guys to really dissect this, but I think that one is from a theological perspective, how can we interpret what this character went through?
- 15:11
- And from a psychology perspective, how can we treat this? Is this trauma? Is this something that like, when we see ourselves in Jonah, what do we do?
- 15:19
- Or see ourselves in Job? And I know that we'll eventually talk about trauma. I don't mean to jump ahead because I loved how you guys cover this in your episode.
- 15:26
- But theologically, is this something that is more of an attack or something that like everybody will experience and we can't just chalk it up to Satan?
- 15:34
- But just to start out is the suicide of Elijah. You know, he lived an amazing life as a prophet in the
- 15:40
- Old Testament. But even after, you know, essentially defeating Baal, we still see this moment where he wants to give up and he turns to God and God hilariously offers him a nap and a snack, which relatable.
- 15:53
- But again, he wanted to die. He wanted to give up. Is that something that we should be taking lightly?
- 15:58
- Is that just one element of the story? Or from a theological perspective, is this a major pinpoint that we can say,
- 16:05
- I'm Elijah? Tim, how would you interpret the suicidal thoughts that Elijah was experiencing from a theological perspective?
- 16:14
- Well, I think it shows that even the most spiritual among us, or at least the ones that are experienced the power of God, and you can have high moments where you experience the blessing of God, the presence of God, God moving in crazy ways.
- 16:30
- And you can go from that to moments of despair. And a human being, a human soul is capable of both in a very short period of time.
- 16:40
- I think that's what that shows. I don't, you know, we need to be careful to, when we read that passage, to say,
- 16:46
- I am Elijah. Because we're not. But what we can say is Elijah is a human being.
- 16:51
- And even if Elijah can struggle with despair and the feeling of wanting to give up, then we're capable of struggling with that too.
- 17:02
- Now, that doesn't mean we should stay there. It just means that if that's what
- 17:08
- Elijah experienced is within the range of possibility of what human beings are capable of experiencing.
- 17:15
- Sam, do you have any comments on that? Yeah, I mean, Tim hit it on the nail. I mean, basically, you know, and you gave a bunch of examples of other, you know,
- 17:24
- Bible characters who have experienced mental health issues as well, whether it be depression or anxiety or in this case, suicide, is that we just see the real human experience.
- 17:33
- And that's why it's so relatable to us, that we can see that, that someone who is close to God still experience these feelings and these emotions and these thoughts, but still continue to press into that relationship that they have with God.
- 17:48
- So why would it be different, in a sense, for us as believers today to experience the same things, but still kind of have that same desire to press into God during those moments of difficulty, right?
- 18:00
- So it just speaks to the human experience. And, you know, one thing that I did know when I was doing one of my first, because we had to have a theological approach to how we wanted to address counseling, but there were five things that I had noticed prior to the fall that speak to the human experience.
- 18:19
- So first is that everyone seeks a relationship with God, right? So Adam, relationship with God, he had that freedom.
- 18:27
- They were always relating to each other, right? Then comes Eve, so you have the first marriage established, relationship to each other, right?
- 18:34
- You have work, them having to take care of the garden, you have rest, and you also have openness and vulnerability, right?
- 18:43
- So all those five spaces that I just mentioned, each of those was impacted by the fall.
- 18:49
- Those are the same spaces that today create a lot of the mental health issues that we're discussing, is that they feel disconnected from God.
- 19:00
- In the words of secular people, they might say, oh, my higher power, I don't want to have anything to do with your
- 19:06
- God, right? So they have that. They have broken relationships with family members, broken relationships and romantic relationships, right?
- 19:14
- Work, work provides meaning, it provides a sense of significance. Sometimes you can contribute to the world.
- 19:20
- Who rests today? Everyone's always on the go, right? So all of these five areas that we see prior to the fall have been impacted on the opposite side where either people don't want to work or don't find significance in the work that they do.
- 19:34
- So it was just very interesting to kind of notice those things prior to the fall. Whoa, that is such a great observation.
- 19:42
- But then even leading to the fall, is it that disconnect from God that kind of led us to this moment of shame?
- 19:47
- Is that where you're going with that? Well, one of the things that we see right away, right after the fall is that they hid from God.
- 19:56
- So the primary relationship that they had prior to the fall was with God, right?
- 20:03
- Sin enters the world and they immediately hide from God. And what are people doing today? They want nothing to do with God or they're trying to find
- 20:09
- God through different means. So that's why you have all these different religions. You know, a couple of years ago, New Age was a big thing.
- 20:15
- It's probably still a big thing, but I haven't heard as much of it as I did like three, five years ago. The New Age was, as someone put it, they say it's the buffet of whatever you want from God.
- 20:26
- So whatever you want from God, you can get it in the New Age space. It's a great definition.
- 20:32
- I definitely know a lot of people in the New Age right now. There's a couple of people that I even want to talk to about it. I'm just like, it's so much more than just crystals, but kind of that buffet of God, of like, this is where I heal and this is where I connect.
- 20:44
- But this is, I don't surrender here and this I'm not giving up, but that that's a really great point.
- 20:50
- And you're right. I think that this is the human experience. The human experience includes the suicidalness of Elijah or the depression of Job from losing everything, the anxiety of Jonah not wanting to be obedient towards God or just the anxiety of Jesus sweating blood before he was crucified.
- 21:07
- All of these are, I mean, I wouldn't say that that's part of the human experience, thank God. But, you know, that that anxiety and that fear.
- 21:13
- You know, I feel like I go through a range of these emotions throughout the day. But what's that to say about like trauma?
- 21:19
- I mean, by no means do I think that Job lived a normal life. And whether this is a true story or an allegory or just like a story that was come up,
- 21:27
- I've spoken to different scholars and kind of everybody has their own interpretation. That's neither here nor there. Let's move forward with the assumption that it's 100 percent true and it's not just a story.
- 21:35
- But Job lived this life and it was all taken away. His family, his property, his wealth, his bodily comfortability, being covered in sores.
- 21:43
- To me, that's already a trauma. I think. With that, it was inflicted by Satan.
- 21:50
- So I think I'm trying to piece together, you know, OK, what is the devil and what is on earth?
- 21:57
- But I have the feeling from you guys, it's going to be a both. And when you guys look at somebody like Job or any other character that has experienced huge trauma, but also inflicted by Satan, how do you how should we as Gentiles, Jews, you know, people of 2025, how should we interpret that?
- 22:16
- Should we say that like if I'm going through a Job period of my life, I just need to go to church more? Or is it you need to get on meds?
- 22:23
- Well, I think if you're asking if I'm experiencing like a mental like a mental disorder or some sort of psychological disorder, is that what you're more so asking?
- 22:34
- Because it could be like I had a car wreck. We're like, you don't need to go to church to go to a mechanic. We'll get to the intense stuff as far as like schizophrenia and like disorders.
- 22:43
- But I think it is like like what you guys were saying in your episode as far as like trauma and sin and how that separation from God, but also sometimes trauma isn't our fault.
- 22:52
- You know, like it's not really on us to go out and seek something that's traumatic. Sometimes sometimes our house just burns down.
- 22:58
- And I feel like that's pretty relevant for right now. But when that happens, are you supposed to be like, that's clearly an attack from like heat caused these
- 23:06
- California fires or like that is part of life. And I need to depend on God through this while also processing the trauma of losing everything
- 23:14
- I've ever known. Yeah, I mean, it's it's really hard for us to say if something when something bad happens, that the devil's behind it.
- 23:21
- I think to make that conclusion, we need multiple lines of evidence to make.
- 23:27
- You know, it's it's easier to say, oh, like something bad happened. It must be the devil, you know, or it must be a demon.
- 23:33
- You know, people say, not today, Satan, when something like something like temptation comes their way, like they like want to eat a second cookie and like, not today,
- 23:42
- Satan. It's like Satan doesn't care about the second cookie. I'm telling you, he doesn't care about that. I don't think. OK, so we need we need multiple lines of evidence to determine if something is really a spiritual attack.
- 23:54
- But because we need to understand we live in a fallen world. We live in a world that is broken.
- 23:59
- And yes, some of that brokenness, even in the natural order, is is done by the forces of darkness.
- 24:05
- I mean, Satan, he does have the power over whether he does have the power to do things like that.
- 24:11
- We just can't say like definitively, like if something bad happens, that that's Satan or that's
- 24:17
- God. You know, like I remember when Katrina hit New Orleans, Christians came out of the woodwork to declare that God was judging the city of New Orleans.
- 24:25
- But then again, when the hurricane just hit North Carolina and Tennessee and the southern states a few months ago, the conspiracy theories online weren't about God judging those states.
- 24:36
- It was about some New World Order controlling the weather and creating superstorms.
- 24:41
- But then when the fires hit California, well, now we're back to God judging those godless Californians out there.
- 24:47
- And so it's just not helpful to slap on spiritual labels that are it's almost it's like spiritual conspiracy theory, you know, our people do that.
- 24:58
- We need to recognize that we live in a fallen world that is broken. There's volcanoes, there's earthquakes, there's storms, there's fires, there's hurricanes.
- 25:07
- These things can happen. And sometimes tragedy hits. Part of the Christian life is learning not to callously let go of your things, because that's that's really a dismissive way to talk to someone who's been through tragedy.
- 25:19
- But ultimately, when we go through tragedies, the Lord is wanting us to see that the things of this world, as 1
- 25:27
- John 2 says, the lust, the things that are in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, these things are not of the
- 25:35
- Father, but of the world. And the world and its lust or its desires are passing away. But those who love the
- 25:41
- Father have eternal life. And it's not to say that my house is having my house is like a lust of the flesh, a lust of the eyes, or a pride of life that is the pride of possessions.
- 25:51
- But material things, we have to be able to let go of when tragedy does strike.
- 25:58
- It's hard, but I think a lot of the Christian life is a marathon of learning to reorient our loves back toward the
- 26:08
- Father and away from things in the world. So I'm going long here, but we just need to recognize that sometimes bad things happen, and it's not always a spiritual attack.
- 26:18
- But when they do happen, we have to, well, here's a word, we have to be resilient to bounce back from those tragedies.
- 26:25
- And we can do that through spiritual disciplines. They do help us a lot. Therapy can help too. It just, you know, it just depends on the person and circumstances.
- 26:34
- I heard that, Tim, because one of the interesting things that I actually learned throughout my studies was that when it comes to trauma, there's a huge difference between the impact of trauma for something like we just mentioned, like the hurricanes, the fires, anything like that, things that are out of your control that happened to you.
- 26:51
- Yes, they have the impact of trauma and they do affect the person. But it's,
- 26:57
- I forget how much more time, maybe like five times, seven times more impactful when it's an interpersonal relationship, right?
- 27:03
- So this, we're going into spaces of abuse or sexual trauma, things like that, that they have a much more heavy impact on the person that experiences that than do these natural disasters.
- 27:16
- Now that's not to minimize the impact of natural disasters, just to kind of give a range of what the impact is on the person.
- 27:22
- That is common also in being able to cope or to have resilience throughout those traumatic events is what kind of strong social support the person has.
- 27:32
- So strong social support prior to the event, during the event, or after the events, right?
- 27:39
- They need to have strong social support. If you have it before the event, that's great because you're already going into it where people are going to join you and say, hey,
- 27:46
- I'm so sorry that you've gone through this, we're here for you, we're going to help in any way that we can, right? So that's a huge buffer to how much impact that trauma, the traumatic situation is going to have on a person.
- 27:57
- Some people come during the traumatic event. So something traumatic happens and maybe you didn't have a good social support system, but your church sees a need and they start coming to you and they, hey, how can we help you?
- 28:08
- What can we do for you? Right? So there's help there. And there's after the traumatic event. You don't share it with anyone.
- 28:14
- You don't say anything, but there's a day where you feel just like being open and you share with someone. And then after the event, you have people come and provide the social support.
- 28:23
- So social support is the number one factor that helps people cope with their trauma and helps them become more resilient.
- 28:30
- And from that, I started digging a little bit more into that. And one of the things that I noticed too, is that if you see the type of meaning that people gain from their trauma, right?
- 28:42
- So you have people who are in more collectivistic cultures, notice how they go through the worst type of experiences, no food, you know, they're, they've been robbed, they've been, you know, their family members were murdered, all these different things.
- 28:56
- And then you talk to them and it doesn't seem like that traumatic event had such a big effect on them. So you ask yourself, why was that?
- 29:03
- Well, because it's a collectivistic culture. As a community, they're already drawn to provide that strong social support.
- 29:09
- So they're able to cope with things a little bit better. They're still affected by the trauma, but they're able to cope with it a lot better.
- 29:16
- Now compare that to our individualistic culture, where you have to do things on your own and you don't always have that strong social support, the impact of mental health issues,
- 29:26
- I mean, everything is trauma, which is not helpful for the person to cope well, right?
- 29:32
- So it was very interesting seeing how culture also plays a huge role in that and how we cope with these different things.
- 29:39
- And the main thing to take away from a situation with trauma is, what kind of meaning is the person making out of that traumatic event, right?
- 29:49
- So what kind of narrative is that person continuing to repeat to themselves about that specific event?
- 29:56
- So that, that's, yeah, that, I mean, that's a huge factor too, is some people would see it as this traumatic event impacted me so much,
- 30:03
- I'm not able to do anything anymore, or it's affecting all of my relationships and I'm not able to change, this is just the way that I am, right?
- 30:11
- So from an individualistic culture, you can see why that would be the push is that you have to be who you are, but in a collectivistic culture, you have to adjust to what's going to benefit the community.
- 30:23
- So again, there's going to be arguments on both sides, like, well, is that really healthy, is that not? Well, what I'm looking at is, well, how are they coping better?
- 30:31
- And it does seem that those in collectivistic culture seem to cope better with traumatic events than do those in individualistic cultures.
- 30:39
- So much to think about. If I'm, you know, kind of digesting all of this all at once, it seems like trauma is external, it happens to you, and depending on what kind of society, either individualistic or a collective society, you can either process it better or for worse, but at the end of the day, this is the human experience, and from that trauma, sprouts these very natural reactions like anxiety, suicide, depression, guilt, betrayal that we see in these
- 31:07
- Bible characters that we're having the human experience, and I think that adequately and appropriately outlines these mental issues that we see today.
- 31:17
- It was no different for them back then. To take us one level deeper, and again, thank you, Sam, for the amazing transitions into my next topics, is one level deeper is where do we draw the boundary, the boundary between something that is not just the human experience.
- 31:33
- It's now beyond this world, something that we need to be praying against. And you guys know,
- 31:38
- I love talking about the unseen realm because I believe we're at war and I don't mean to do it to give demons a platform and to only talk about them.
- 31:46
- I feel like we don't talk about them enough, so we're not praying against them. I believe that we're not just going through a season of temptation.
- 31:52
- I think every second of the day, I am tempted. I am separated from God, at least through attempts of that.
- 31:58
- I wake up in the morning and I'm hit with feelings of not being enough. I'm hit with feelings of anxiety and like worry.
- 32:04
- And I don't think that's my identity. I'm a child of God. So to me, it feels like a spiritual attack, not just a trauma based human experience.
- 32:13
- So when you guys look at the Bible, are there instances that are very clear or, you know, not even the
- 32:19
- Bible, when you look at patients that are having these very disruptive disorders like schizophrenia, and maybe you do deal with patients like that, maybe you don't,
- 32:29
- Sam, where's the boundary between the human psyche and the spiritual warfare? So speaking in regarding schizophrenia, my very,
- 32:35
- I think it was my first or second client was schizophrenic, bipolar, and severely depressed. And I was barely, it was,
- 32:42
- I was in my practicum. So that was my first experience. And I had a great supervisor who kind of guided me through the process and so on.
- 32:49
- But maybe I've seen two more clients who struggled with that. And you know, with the first client that I had,
- 32:54
- I did see progress and they were able to cope. But we talked about all these things that we've been discussing, right? Who's your social support?
- 33:01
- He was kind of a little bit more odd and, you know, a little bit out there. So he didn't have a lot of strong social support.
- 33:07
- But when he started working and I think he found one person who was able to kind of connect with him in some way,
- 33:13
- I mean, you just see a difference within a couple of weeks, just how that impacted him. So again, that goes back to the importance of the relationships, right?
- 33:22
- That God created us for relationship with himself, relationship with each other. So it's finding those spaces, you know, where can
- 33:29
- I get this person connected to the church, to another person, someone, right? You're just trying to build some sort of relationship with them.
- 33:38
- And obviously the counselor -client relationship is super important for them, too, because it's one model that they can take outside to, you know, to the world around them and see,
- 33:47
- OK, so here's what a healthy relationship could look like. How do I replicate this out in the real world with other people so I can become healthier?
- 33:55
- So the relationship piece is a huge piece. Then it's, is it that they have, that they feel distant from God, right?
- 34:02
- Because sometimes they come to counseling and they'll talk about, you know, I've been praying and I feel close to God, but I'm still having anxiety.
- 34:10
- So it's not that we need to address anything about their relationship with God because it seems that they're doing all the things that any other
- 34:16
- Christian would do. So could it be, right? We have to ask ourselves the question, could it be something else?
- 34:21
- So we ask them to go get a physical, to go get checked up by a doctor, to see, to go see a counselor and so on.
- 34:27
- So the way that I look at it is, is we look at the physical, we look at the mental, the emotional, the spiritual, right?
- 34:36
- All of these factors. And the one that seems to be missing most often is the one that we ignore as Christians is the body, is the physical piece, right?
- 34:44
- We think it's mostly just your emotions and what you're thinking, but we don't really consider how someone who hasn't been sleeping well, someone who doesn't exercise, someone who doesn't eat well, right?
- 34:55
- All these things impact how you feel about yourself and how irritable you can be, right?
- 35:01
- So we tend to ignore the physical aspect and we place much more emphasis on the mental. If you just think differently, well, it doesn't matter if you think differently and you're not sleeping well and you're eating horrible food, right?
- 35:11
- So it's that overlap of the physical and the emotional, spiritual and mental.
- 35:20
- So it's just a filtering out process. Very interesting. I, my sister's a therapist and obviously my whole family's
- 35:28
- Christian. So we talk a lot about kind of like her patients without breaking any confidentiality laws and just kind of like talking about her work.
- 35:35
- And she has had a couple of patients that she felt, and this is like all alleged, this was just her being a
- 35:41
- Christian and picking up on, she felt that she had a few patients that just had some demonic activities of just like knowing things about her.
- 35:49
- She never admitted. And this is like a patient who's six years old, you know, these, these types of like extreme anger and extreme, like, it just doesn't make sense.
- 35:59
- It doesn't fit within that diagnosis of they're just depressed. They're just addicted to their iPad.
- 36:04
- Like it wouldn't make sense. So when I look at, you know, scriptures about like Legion, you know, when he has like a
- 36:11
- Legion of demons in him and he's so ostracized and like feared by society, he's like chained outside of the town.
- 36:18
- And I feel like this is more of like a Tim question of like, where do we need to recognize and start praying?
- 36:25
- Like where and when does it, is it more helpful to go to church that, that you might see this in today's like mental health crisis?
- 36:32
- Yeah. So in the world of deliverance ministries and exorcisms, there's three telltale signs of demonic or demonization, whether it's possession, obsession, oppression, whatever.
- 36:44
- There's three telltale signs that a person is heavily demonized. And this comes from both Catholic and Protestant sources, though.
- 36:52
- They all talk about these three things. Not that it's only these three, but these are like big calling cards.
- 36:58
- The first is a supernatural strength or some sort of supernatural ability to defy the laws of nature.
- 37:05
- So levitation or a tiny little person, like a tiny little girl being able to throw a grown man across the room.
- 37:12
- Like those things don't happen, you know, naturally. Another one is what you just mentioned, supernatural knowledge, where someone has knowledge or the ability to know things that they, it's impossible for them to know.
- 37:22
- And there's lots and lots of cases of that. In fact, I've had friends who have had experiences like that with people and there's too many firsthand accounts of this happening to throw out the supernatural completely.
- 37:33
- We'll get to that in a second. And then the third is aversion to holy things or sanctified things.
- 37:40
- So if someone starts praying, the person will get agitated or uncomfortable. You know, the
- 37:45
- Catholics have different modes or ways of testing for that as well with their various sacraments, holy water and things like that, relics and things like that, which we don't have to get into that whole tangent.
- 37:56
- But yeah, basically in the world of deliverance ministries, those those three are big, big calling cards.
- 38:02
- But there could be other things, too. That's just an observance of the person. There could be a sense of discernment within Christians themselves, and that could be confirmed by two or three
- 38:13
- Christians all feeling or sensing the same thing. It's a controversial thing, but there is something that seems to be legitimate.
- 38:21
- I don't know if you want to call it a gift, but certain tend, they call it seeing or being a seer in the
- 38:27
- Christian world. We're not talking like divination or sorcery or something like that. Talking in the
- 38:32
- Christian world, people who deal in deliverance ministry, usually there's a couple of them.
- 38:38
- If they if they work together, they'll see or sense the same thing about this person. Like I'm like I'm sensing like this person has is about to do this or there's something in their background.
- 38:49
- So there's there's that. And you could attribute that to the Holy Spirit. I mean, just because just because the tarot card reader or the seance person down the road can have those abilities doesn't mean that the
- 38:59
- Holy Spirit can't get his people with the same abilities when used for deliverance ministry.
- 39:06
- So there's lots of accounts of Christians having that sense of discernment or knowing or seeing or something like that.
- 39:12
- That's a good indication. These are things that defy probabilities, I guess, to get to the core of the question from an evidentialist standpoint.
- 39:21
- We don't want to begin with just concluding that something is demonic. Like someone says, I have schizophrenia.
- 39:27
- Well, it's a demon. Too bad. You don't want to do that or like,
- 39:32
- I just coughed like not today, Satan, take your night well, OK, you don't want to start with you don't want to start with that.
- 39:40
- Sorry, I just I don't know. I just go there. No, but I think I feel like that's what I'm doing.
- 39:45
- Like, this is very clarifying for me because I feel like I wake up with like low self -esteem some days and I'm like, the devil's on me.
- 39:51
- So do you think that's just me being too much? It's not impossible that it could be.
- 39:56
- So I don't I don't want to dismiss it as like unless things are flying off the shelf, it's it's just me and my brain and brain chemistry, because demons, the analogy that I would some people call them cockroaches,
- 40:09
- I think I think of them as more like predatorial serial killers. Like they're they're these wicked spiritual entities that hide, they hide and they prey on people and they love to torment people.
- 40:22
- Sorry, that's probably a dark analogy, but but bear with me here, OK? Like a demon loves to hide behind things.
- 40:30
- And so they don't want to be found out. And this is true. Like all deliverance ministry people will tell you this, that it's only when they start to pray for the victim and they start to bless the victim and try to try to determine what doors were opened and to cause this demonization, that then the aggression comes out, then the wild stuff starts happening.
- 40:50
- But before that, the person is going through torment and that torment could mimic classical, you know, typical psychological disorders that we see.
- 40:59
- So it's not to say that every disorder is a is a demon. It's not. But there, as we talked about in one of our episodes on this, there tends to be like an overlay between what could be a mental disorder that's physiological based or it could be a spiritual thing.
- 41:15
- And the demons can sometimes hide behind that stuff because that's how they torment people, too. So you have to go through this process.
- 41:21
- Like Sam said, start with the body. Then look at the mind, look at the past trauma and things like that.
- 41:27
- And if you work through those things, then ultimately you get, you get, after all that doesn't work, then we can consider, okay, this might be spiritual.
- 41:37
- You know, there's a friend of mine. His name is Dave Appleby. He's run deliverance ministry for 30 plus years and, but he's also a professional counselor.
- 41:45
- And he's, and I've asked him like, how do you know which is which? How do you know when it's just psychological versus spiritual?
- 41:51
- And he's like, well, usually when they come for deliverance, it's their last stop. They've tried everything else.
- 41:57
- Okay. And even in the Catholic church, in order to go through an official exorcism, the person has to go through a regular rigorous psychological examination.
- 42:06
- So even in these circles, we're trying to rule out what's physiological and psychological first before we conclude something is spiritual, but that's not to say that if you wake up and you're just bombarded with these feelings and thoughts, and you seem to be out of nowhere, that could be a spiritual attack.
- 42:25
- And I would just recommend pray, praying through that, ask friends to pray for you. Um, don't assume that it's don't conclude,
- 42:32
- I guess that it's just demonic because it might just be one's anxiety getting to them, you know, it might be.
- 42:38
- So it's just take some discernment there and maturity not to jump, jump the gun. Yeah.
- 42:44
- I hope that, I hope that. Yeah, that was incredibly helpful. Sam, do you have any comments on that? I feel like my follow up question to that is like, okay, so when we look at scripture, are there parts of psychology that kind of pull us away from scripture that we need to be wary of as Christians?
- 43:01
- Yeah. I mean, I think what came to mind as Tim was sharing that was this idea of going back to what meaning or how does it help you to think of the way that you're currently thinking of it?
- 43:12
- So for example, is it helpful to, to think about your anxious thoughts as being an attack?
- 43:19
- So you would, you would look at them and say, well, yeah, because it makes me realize and identify here's the culprit and that's where I could direct my attention to.
- 43:27
- So that's how I do it. And that's, that helps me cope with that. Right. But for someone else that might not be the way that they cope with that for them, it would be, it could be something like, gosh,
- 43:37
- I'm really having a lot of anxious thoughts. I wonder what all these thoughts, you know what? It's been a really busy week and I have all this stuff that I still haven't talked to my friend about.
- 43:46
- I still haven't addressed this issue over here. So it would make sense why I'm, why I'm feeling so overwhelmed with these anxious, right?
- 43:53
- So they would take it more. Okay. What note taking of what their last couple of days have been. And because they take that note.
- 43:59
- Okay. That's why that makes sense. Why I'm anxious, right? It's like, there was a community who was saying to a bunch of Gen Zers, I think he said, you know, stop complaining about your anxiety.
- 44:10
- Everyone has said anxiety all over the world at every single time. Right. And basically what he's pointing out is that the feeling of anxiety is a common human experience.
- 44:19
- What's not common is how we cope with the anxiety, right? So how do you cope with your anxiety?
- 44:25
- That helps you draw closer to God. It helps alleviate that anxiety, right? For some it's prayer, for some it's journaling, for some it's getting together with other friends, for some it's writing a list and knocking out those things on the list, right?
- 44:38
- Just the way that people, people don't have coping skills to deal with anxiety. They only talk about the anxiety without actually doing anything about it.
- 44:47
- Same thing with depression. You know, one of the things that's interesting about depression is that the more someone talks about it, the more depressed they get, right?
- 44:55
- Some common solutions for fighting off depression is, hey, get some sunlight. It's a simple thing, right?
- 45:01
- Go for a 15, 30 minute walk, but people don't want to do that. So they'll keep talking about the depression.
- 45:08
- Now that's not to diminish the fact that they're feeling depressed, but when you give people solutions to, you know, there's some natural things that we can do that can help with that.
- 45:19
- How's your diet? How's your sleep, right? And again, it just goes back to eliminating certain pieces that you've, that you've filtered out and then implementing some new, new practices.
- 45:29
- But a lot of the way to cope with those things is what kind of meaning do you want to draw from it?
- 45:34
- There's a lot of people experience trauma, but what makes it different between one kid, two kids who grew up in the same home.
- 45:42
- They both experienced the same trauma because they had an abusive alcoholic father, right? But they end up in two completely different places when they get older.
- 45:51
- What contributes to that? There's personality traits. There's the meaning that they drew from that. There's how they cope.
- 45:57
- There's what friends that they make throughout their lives, right? So it comes down to a lot of different choices that people make as well.
- 46:05
- So again, there's a lot of to go into there, but the idea is what kind of meaning do you want to create from the situation and how are you coping with it, right?
- 46:14
- Everyone experiences anxiety. Everyone's experienced depression at some point. Everyone may has had, has maybe had a thought or two of not wanting to be here anymore, but it's what did they do differently that's kept them going, right?
- 46:27
- That have committed suicide. One of the questions that we ask is, you know what? I can see why you would want to end your life considering everything that's happened, what's kept you going, right?
- 46:37
- And you make them reflect on, well, they still want to end their life, but they're still here. So what's been that motivator that's kept you going, right?
- 46:46
- So you just build on the things that they've done to keep them alive, right? So again, it's just, where do you direct your mind to?
- 46:53
- What kind of meaning do you want to draw from it and then go from there? This is so nice having both you guys on, because it really does offer that holistic perspective to all my questions.
- 47:01
- So this is great for me. You guys are, you guys are professional podcasters. So this is the easiest podcast ever.
- 47:08
- I feel like this is super helpful because I really like what you said, Sam, as far as like, when you do experience anxiety and depression, like what do you do after that?
- 47:18
- And I think that is where faith begins of like, God, I depend on you. I am going through something, whether I stub my toe or I just feel depressed, regardless of the situation, now
- 47:29
- I turn to you and that's how we go through these difficult periods. And I think it was also
- 47:34
- Josh Waltman who also discussed like when we talked about the unseen realm, he's like, this is like, these demons, they, they exploit it.
- 47:42
- While they may not be the one that's like causing you to be depressed, they'll hide behind it, like you said, Tim, and really use that and leverage that to pull you farther away from God.
- 47:50
- You know, kind of praying into like meeting God and depending on God, regardless of if it's like attached to a demon or not, or whether demons exploiting your depression, but it is very, you guys have done a really great job creating this gray space between it's not just like, well, it's schizophrenia, it's a demon, but also like, no matter what in this human experience, how can we still turn to God?
- 48:11
- And again, like, I think just the way that this conversation has gone, it's been very emblematic of just like the faith isn't black and white, like faith is interwoven to every part of our lives.
- 48:21
- And it's not fair for us to exclude certain parts because it falls within like just the realm of psychology. And this falls within the bucket of church.
- 48:28
- It really does influence one another and we can depend on God through all of it. Um, any final thoughts,
- 48:35
- Tim? I mean, this is like, I'm good. Like, I think my personal recommendation is if anyone is seeking mental therapy that they would, now
- 48:43
- I could say this as a non -counselor psychologist, but, uh, Sam is a professional counselor, but I would say seek out a
- 48:51
- Christian counselor, seek out some, because even your own therapist, their worldview is going to matter.
- 48:56
- It's not that non -Christian therapists aren't qualified to treat illnesses. They certainly are. But if, if you are a
- 49:02
- Christian and you are looking for a holistic solution, you're not going to get that from someone who doesn't share your worldview.
- 49:10
- So seek out someone who shares your worldview and can account for both the physical and the spiritual. Yes, I completely agree.
- 49:18
- I have a personal relation to that because I got therapy starting in 2020 and it was life -changing.
- 49:25
- Like processing my trauma through EMDR was like, I'm a different person. It changed me that much.
- 49:30
- And it was really, really helpful. And I loved my psychologist or my therapist. She had a PhD, like she was just so good at it.
- 49:37
- And I, as you guys all witnessed, went through this faith journey over the last year, like starting in 2023.
- 49:44
- And I started working with her again and we had some great sessions, but I knew she was a new age, more spiritual person than me,
- 49:52
- I knew she wasn't connected in the Christian faith. And for a long time, I was able to balance both that, like we're in my trauma bucket and when
- 50:00
- I sign off, I'm back into my Christian bucket. And that worked for me until it didn't. And she started suggesting coping mechanisms, like a pendulum.
- 50:08
- She said, okay, let's work with a pendulum to see like, this is how it works. And that helps you center on what you want.
- 50:15
- And it was so weird being then in my faith journey of like, I really liked you.
- 50:21
- I really liked you. And while of course she's not at all ever trying to offend me, she's a professional, she's great.
- 50:26
- I had to put up some boundaries of like, I don't think we can work together, you know, and that's not to say that she was bad at her job whatsoever.
- 50:33
- She was incredible. But like, as a, as a Christian, you start feeling these new convictions of like, well, this isn't the type of alignment that I need.
- 50:42
- So I absolutely echo what you said to him, like having, and like, I overlooked all the Christian therapist options because I liked her, but once you hit that wall of like, oh, that's why, that's why you get the
- 50:53
- Christian therapist, because like maybe somebody who wasn't as good as boundaries, they would have, they would say yes, or they would try it out.
- 51:00
- Like, it really is a slippery slope. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good point. Or, you know, they could be, that therapist could be a reductionistic if they're maybe a naturalist atheist in their personal worldview.
- 51:12
- And so you might be thinking, man, this feels spiritual to me, like, or my relationship with God is really important to me and they will,
- 51:20
- I mean, as Sam can tell you as a professional, you know, they won't look at you in a condescending sort of way, you know, they won't look at you in a judging way, but they won't share that same worldview.
- 51:31
- And so they could be reductionistic in their treatments of you.
- 51:37
- Sam, the two of us non -counselors are talking about this and you're sitting over on the sidelines. So go ahead and chime in.
- 51:44
- No, well, I mean, we're talking about our trauma over here. No, I mean, you guys, you guys are on point.
- 51:52
- I mean, because that, I mean, that is essentially what, what happens is that your value system comes into play. I mean, even for the counselor, their value system is going to come into play and they have to determine where a certain value is going to be across for them or for you, you know?
- 52:05
- And it was good that you were able to identify because, again, that's an important part of who we are as Christians.
- 52:12
- So to second what Tim said is that if you're a Christian and you're seeking counseling, I would recommend as well, seek a
- 52:18
- Christian counselor. And even then, right, even then, as you say, seek a
- 52:23
- Christian counselor, then you have to line up values because again, Christian doesn't really mean as much today because everyone has their own definition of what
- 52:33
- Christian means. So is this person going to approach this issue with a
- 52:39
- Christian worldview? And is it going to help me draw closer to God? And you express all those goals, right?
- 52:46
- In your first session or two, you express, okay, what's your goal? My faith is very important to me and here's the issue that I'm struggling with, but I want them to draw me closer to God and, you know, they'll be able to help and it won't be a struggle for them because if they're a believer, they're going to try to guide you to build that relationship with God and with other people.
- 53:03
- So, so yeah, I mean, for clients or for clients specifically, if you're going to a counselor, you are able to filter out a counselor if they don't line up with your values and you can choose someone else, right?
- 53:15
- So choose a Christian counselor. Yeah. Yeah. My, um, I'm curious if you do this,
- 53:21
- Sam, but my sister, who's a therapist, like we talk about this all day long and she's like, well, I'm a Christian therapist and I'm in practice and I'm ENDR certified, like all the things like check, check, check, check, check.
- 53:30
- And she's like, and I advertise that because I want to say like, I'm a Christian therapist and I will pray for you.
- 53:36
- Like imagine having a therapist that's praying for you even after the session. And she's like, is that weird?
- 53:42
- Like, should I include that? I have to check, but I'm pretty sure she includes it. Do you also advertise that Sam?
- 53:48
- Yeah. Yeah. So at our office, we have a, they fill out an intake form. And one of the check boxes that they have is a, do you want to have
- 53:56
- Christian integration as part of your counseling? So most say yes, right. But there will be some who say no.
- 54:03
- And that for me is just like a, huh. I wonder why. And typically what you find is some form of church, right?
- 54:09
- So their parents got kicked out of a church for a certain reason, or they were mistreated in some way, shape or form, or, you know, they're in the process of deconstruction, right?
- 54:18
- So they don't want to address spiritual matters. So I take note of that to see, okay, where they are. I'm still able to address their, you know, their issue, working with them more clinically, but you know, if they describe themselves as being believers, then we're able to touch on that.
- 54:32
- But if they don't want that as part of their counseling, then, you know, we don't necessarily go there. But there's always a way to integrate it in different ways.
- 54:40
- Yeah. In your prayer time, you're like, I can't pray specifically for this person, but God, you know, you know who I'm talking about, uh, in the process before, after, you know, there's some that are really heavy, you know, some, uh, obviously they experienced some severe hurt and you can only feel, uh, bad for them.
- 54:57
- But yeah, I mean, Lord, you know, soften their heart, that they're able to come back and I do a good job as I work.
- 55:03
- Yeah. Wow. I have one final thought. And this is in tradition of the Psychotheo podcast, keeping in our traditions,
- 55:11
- I have two book recommendations for your audience. So one is a book that I've read.
- 55:18
- Um, so it's called, it's by my friend, David Appleby, as I mentioned, it's called, It's Only a
- 55:23
- Demon, a Model of Christian Deliverance. And so if you see the, I'll hold it on the screen here.
- 55:29
- There we go. Is this like how to DIY your own deliverance? No, no, no, not like a
- 55:35
- DIY. Don't do it yourself. Okay. Don't try that. No, it's a, so he wrote this, he wrote, he wrote that book as his, how he's kind of figured out his protocol, his team's protocol for deliverance.
- 55:49
- Now he wrote that, that title is to be catchy because so many people, they, he wrote it to demystify the process because so many
- 55:56
- Christians will attribute so much power, so much terror and authority because they get most of, as I say, they get most of their education on this topic from Hollywood.
- 56:05
- Uh, and that's, yeah, and that's wrong. It's not biblical. And so his, Dave's approach is a very methodical, very sober and non -fantastic, let's say, way of dealing with this.
- 56:17
- Now he, you know, there are, he's, he's seen things, he's seen some pretty crazy things in his, in his time. But this book is a, is a way of, it's like a model for, if there's churches that are curious about how to properly do deliverance, it's sort of explaining that, um, how to do that properly and biblically as a
- 56:34
- Protestant. So, um, as he says in the first chapter, deliverance is a ministry of the church.
- 56:39
- It's something that Christians are given the authority and the responsibility to do. Now that doesn't mean we kind of like ride up on Harleys to the, the nightclub, like walk in there, like busting, busting bottles and exercising demons.
- 56:54
- That's not what we do. But, um, we do, when people come to us for help, we need answers.
- 57:01
- And our answers can't just be, pray about it or go to the therapist. You know what
- 57:08
- I'm saying? Not just anyone could do deliverance as well, is the other thing too. Yeah. Yeah.
- 57:13
- So, so yeah, it's a, it's a great book to read. The other book, which I'm working through right now, but, um,
- 57:20
- I learned through, of it through a podcast. It's written by a Catholic psychologist and psychiatrist. His name's
- 57:26
- Richard Gallagher, and this one's called Demonic Foes. So you can get that on screen. And it's his experience as a psychiatrist dealing with supernatural cases.
- 57:35
- And so he, he, as a psychiatrist, he walks through how does he determine if something is spiritual versus psychiatric?
- 57:42
- So these are two good books to recommend if people are interested in that topic of how, how people in the deliverance space have thought about these things.
- 57:51
- Cause they're not dummies, they're professionals too. And they know the difference between like jumping to conclusions that something is is a spiritual versus actually determining and ruling things out to get to the conclusion that, yeah, this is most likely spiritual in nature.
- 58:06
- That is a good book to read. I'll link both of those in the show notes below. If somebody wants to buy them off Amazon. Sam, do you have any book recommendations?
- 58:12
- I do not actually. I want to honor the psych and theo tradition. I got lots of books behind me too.
- 58:18
- I could just talk about those for days. No, I think truly this conversation with you guys,
- 58:25
- I mean, it's always great just chatting with you guys. But on this topic specifically, I think that it is a very holistic approach of like, it's not black and white, it's an if and, and also like depend on God through all things, especially the human experience and you guys really communicated that so eloquently.
- 58:39
- So thank you for coming on. Everyone's probably obsessed with you guys. They love how you guys communicate. So what's coming up for psych and theo?
- 58:45
- How do people A, get in contact, B, look forward to, and any other things that you guys can really plug in right now?
- 58:51
- I saw what you did there with the whole obsessed comment. Like that's a good pun there. I didn't know
- 58:56
- I was making that pun, but you know, I'll go with that. Sam, what do we, what do we got coming up?
- 59:02
- Well, we have a couple of topics coming up pretty soon, but the one that's going to be released,
- 59:08
- I guess, tomorrow or yeah, tomorrow is going to be on vulnerability between men and when is it appropriate to share and when is it not?
- 59:17
- So that's a big thing. We we've really been, as we've gotten a little bit more understanding of kind of who our audience is, we've kind of touching a lot more on men's issues, but there's a lot of things that we're going to touch on regarding the church.
- 59:32
- There's a big, a lot of talk on vulnerability, which is again, one of the ones that we'll be releasing, but other church issues, things that are coming up, we want to do probably more, more videos, more, we'll probably start doing some lives this, this year as well.
- 59:46
- And, you know, I think you gave us that idea, Cass, about, you know, it'd be cool to just have a live and have people answer, ask questions and for us to answer as best as we can, but we'll give them a topic or something.
- 59:58
- So we'll see how we start planning this whole piece out, but a lot of new things for this year. Stay tuned.
- 01:00:04
- Absolutely. And if I'm not mistaken, we're all doing a live on Instagram coming up. I think it's the 31st.
- 01:00:11
- Oh, maybe not the 31st, which date is it? February, I think.
- 01:00:18
- Oh yeah. February 7th. Okay. Yeah. Tim, you haven't accepted the invite.
- 01:00:24
- So that's awkward. Oh, I'll put tentative. You know, that'll be exciting.
- 01:00:30
- Cause I agree. I think it is so amazing to just have people have this opportunity. Like I'm spoiled that I get to talk to you guys and, you know, ask any of my questions, but I know that other people are obviously in this, so I'm excited for that chat because this is going to come out on Tuesday.
- 01:00:45
- So let's pretend it's Tuesday. It just came out. You guys are listening to this, this upcoming Friday. Anybody listening will have the chance to sit down with Sam and Tim on Instagram, comment, any questions, and it'll be a nice casual conversation as it always is, but extremely illuminating when it comes to the psychological and theological perspective on things.
- 01:01:02
- So as always, it's a pleasure. Thank you so much for this hour and a little bit more to talk.
- 01:01:08
- I appreciate you guys staying up late from East coast hours to accommodate Hawaiian hours. So thank you. And I'm so excited to chat a little bit more and you guys are always welcome back.
- 01:01:17
- So let's find another reason to bring you back on. Awesome. Glad to do it. Thank you. Thank you.