November 30, 2023 Show with Dr. Joseph C. Morecraft III on “The Importance of Nouthetic Counseling”

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Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer

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George Duffield, 19th century gospel minister George Norcross, and sports legend

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Jim Thorpe, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs, chapter 27, verse 17, tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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And now, here's your host, Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet

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Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

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This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on this 30th day of November, 2023.

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And today is a bittersweet day because the sweet aspect of it is we are going to have on the program today one of my dearest friends and favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio who has become extremely popular by many people in the

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio audience according to the correspondence I receive from my listeners informing me how much they love this brother and hearing him on the show.

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His name is Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III, and he is the pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church in Cumming, Georgia, and he's also the author of an eight -volume commentary on the

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Westminster Larger Catechism titled Authentic Christianity. We are going to be addressing a very important theme, the importance of newthetic counseling, using the inerrant

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Bible as the blueprint for all we do. But today, the bitter part, the sad part, is that we just learned this week that Biblical Counselor Lou Priolo has passed and has entered into eternity with Christ Jesus, our

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Sovereign Lord God Savior and King. Obviously, that was no bitter news to Lou Priolo when he passed into the eternal presence of Christ, but those who knew him and loved him on this earth are going through a period of mourning, and one such person is my guest,

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Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft, who was a dear friend of Lou Priolo, and today we are not only going to be discussing the importance of newthetic counseling, but we're also going to be paying tribute in loving memory of Lou Priolo.

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And just to give you a little bit of the background of Lou Priolo, he was a graduate of Calvary Bible College and Liberty University, as well as holding a

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Doctorate of Divinity from Calvary University, and he was a full -time biblical counselor starting in 1985 and was the author of several books, including

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The Heart of Anger, which I actually, when I worked part -time for Calvary Press Publishing, who originally published that book,

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I had the privilege of having many conversations over the phone with Lou Priolo.

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But he also authored The Complete Husband, Teach Them Diligently, Pleasing People, and Resolving Conflict, and he was the editor of the

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Resources for Biblical Living, and this was a series of booklets published by PNR Publishing, and he was a member of the

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International Association of Biblical Counselors, a fellow in the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors, and was

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Director of Biblical Counseling at Christ Covenant Buckhead in Atlanta, Georgia, and he, as I mentioned, was already, was the founder,

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I should say, of Competent to Counsel International, and he is survived by his wife,

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Kim, who had been married to Lou since 1987, and also their two grown daughters,

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Sophia and Gabriella. But it is my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio to address an important subject and to pay tribute to a wonderful brother in Christ, now in heaven, in paradise with Christ, my dear friend,

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Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III. It's always a privilege and enjoyment to be on your program,

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Chris. And let me right away give our listeners our email address if you have questions for Dr.

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Joseph C. Moorcraft III. It is, send your emails to chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com,

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and as always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

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USA. Well, first of all, before we get into the primary themes of our show today, if you could once again let our listeners know about Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia.

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Our church is a small congregation in Cumming, Georgia, and it is a member of the

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Reformed Presbyterian Church, Hanover Presbytery. We are devoted to the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture.

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We're devoted to the original Westminster Confession of Faith and Catechisms, and we are devoted to the

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Great Commission. Our people come from all over the place, all kinds of backgrounds, all kinds of races, and God has woven them into one, and they come to our church because they know what they're going to get.

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They want to hear the Reformed faith and the Word of God, all of it, nothing but it.

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So it is a delight being the pastor of this church. Yes, and it is an honor and privilege for me to be blessed by the generosity of this fine church for quite a while now, and to air advertisements for this wonderful congregation on a daily basis, and I hope to do so for years to come.

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And this is a church that I highly recommend everyone listening to this program who lives in the

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Cumming, Georgia area, or who is traveling through on vacation perhaps, or perhaps you have family, friends, and loved ones living in that area.

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I strongly urge you to contact them, to pay a visit to this congregation, worship with them, and also investigate more of the details that they offer on their website, heritagepresbyterianchurch .com,

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heritagepresbyterianchurch .com, and hopefully we'll be remembering to repeat that information before the program is over.

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Well, I think perhaps we should start off with a bit more of a tribute and loving memory of Lou Priolo.

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Perhaps tell our listeners how you came to know Lou and come to develop a wonderful friendship with him, and why you wanted to dedicate this program today to him.

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I first met Lou Priolo, oh, I don't know, 40 some years ago.

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He and a handful of other people were members of a

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Southern Baptist church in a community outside north of Atlanta, and they came into the understanding of the

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Five Points Calvinism. And so some way or another they knew me, so they asked me if I would come and teach a

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Bible study that would go into all the aspects of the reformed faith. And I think that's the first time

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I ever met Lou Priolo since then. I've had him at my church.

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He's a wonderful, was a wonderful speaker. His books are very biblical, very readable, and J.

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Adams was the most important teacher of counseling in the 20th and 21st century.

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Then when he died, that position went to Lou Priolo, who in my opinion was the most important counselor and teacher of biblical counseling in the

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United States. I think somebody told me this week that he counseled some 40 ,000 hours.

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Wow, and people have already been asking me after hearing about his death through the promotion of today's program in social media, how

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Brother Lou died. And from what I understand from you, the only thing you know about that is that it was a rare and mysterious blood disease, correct?

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Well, we found out that it was sepsis. And it was blood poisoning.

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We don't know how he got the blood poisoning. Was he in the hospital? That's what

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God used to take him to heaven. Wow. Was he in the hospital before he had the sepsis?

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I do not know. Okay. Yes, my 76 -year -old brother,

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Andy, who's in a nursing home, recently survived sepsis.

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And every nurse that I spoke with or woman who had experiencing in a nursing home told me that they never witnessed a patient who developed sepsis and lived.

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And thanks be to God, my brother, Andy, survived his bout with sepsis.

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I don't even know for certain, even though he's been told, if he realizes the magnitude of that and how seriously life -threatening his situation was.

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But I'm hoping that the Lord uses this to bring him, my brother, to himself and that he gives evidence of true saving faith in Christ.

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Yes, sir. And I appreciate all of my listeners praying for that.

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And I also want to thank all my listeners, again, who were praying for my brother's healing and deliverance from this deadly condition he was in.

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And I'll never be able to adequately thank my listeners for lifting up my brother to the

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Lord's throne of grace. But that is a good place to segue into what we are discussing today in regard to the importance of euthetic counseling.

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And if you could define that, because to many people, that might be a whole new word to them.

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It might not be in their current dictionary in their brain. So why don't you let our listeners know what exactly is euthetic counseling?

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Euthetic is an English word that comes from a Greek word meaning admonish or exhort.

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And I want to read two verses from the 15th chapter of Romans where that word in the

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Greek occurs. And that's Romans 15, verses 13 and 14, that give you the basic qualifications for somebody that's going to counsel.

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And then it tells you what kind of counseling. Here's what it says. Now may the

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God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope by the power of the

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Holy Spirit. And concerning you, my brethren, I myself also am convinced that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able also to counsel, euthetically counsel one another.

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In the New American Standard Version, it says admonish, but it could also mean to counsel.

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And J. Adams was one of the pioneers in this over 50 years ago. He was a friend of mine, a great guy.

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And he was tired of people calling their

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Christian counseling, their counseling Christian counseling, just because they use some

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Christian words and baptize pagan psychiatry and psychology with baptized words, with Christian words.

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But the content was simply a mixture of pagan psychologists.

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So much of what goes under the head of Christian counseling today is not.

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It's just a baptized paganism. It's just using biblical terms, but defining them with humanistic meaning.

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And so I would recommend that the only kind of counselor, if you need counseling or you know somebody that needs counseling, the only kind of counselor that you want to go to or send anybody to is a euthetic counselor.

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Everything else is counterfeit and synthetic. That is a mixture of Christianity and of humanism.

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And J. Adams tried to be consistently and exclusively

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Christian and biblical in every aspect of his psychology and approach to counseling.

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His whole counseling technique is based on the inerrancy and sufficiency of scripture.

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That the Bible, whatever the Bible asserts to be true on any subject is true.

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And it's divinely authoritative in everything about which it speaks.

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And in principle, it speaks about everything. So that basic presupposition undergirds every aspect of euthetic counseling.

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You don't need to go to anybody else, any other famous psychologist or counselor to get your information for counseling one another.

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I want you to notice something else about this verse. Paul says, and concerning you, my brethren, and he's talking to the church, the believers in Rome, and concerning you, my brethren,

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I myself also am convinced that you yourselves are competent to counsel.

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So the people, all Christians are competent to counsel if they have these distinct characteristics.

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Every preacher ought to be able to counsel. Every Christian ought to be able to counsel. And we are competent to counsel if we have these three basic characteristics.

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Number one, in verse 13, now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound in hope by the power of the spirit.

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So somebody who's competent to counsel is somebody who's going to be abound in hope

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Hope in the Bible means confident assurance that God will be faithful to every promise that he's made in Holy Scripture.

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That when we look at life, we don't look at it in pessimism. We don't try to understand life and determine our attitude to it by what we see around us.

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We don't walk by sight. We walk by faith. We know that God will be faithful to everything he has said in the

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Scripture. And without that abundance of hope, we're not going to be effective counselors.

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I had a young man come to my church one time, and this is about the only time. And he came from a background where they were not reformed.

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And I asked him one time why he came to our church. And he said, because you're so hopeful, because you have so much hope.

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For the transformation of people's lives, the transformation of society. So people are looking for that hope.

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People that come for counseling are people who are relatively hopeless to one degree or another.

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And one of the first things I do when I counsel somebody is

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I read to them that verse in Corinthians that says that God is faithful to give answers and solutions to every situation we have in life, that there's no situation in life that will be too heavy or too grievous for us to bear if we're trusting in the living

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God and walking by his Word. That the problems that people face, thousands of people face the same problems, millions face the same problems.

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And they are problems that God is faithful to help us live through and learn from as long as we are getting our solutions from the

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Word of God. And just reading that verse, and that was not the verse, that was a paraphrase. But just reading that verse or pointing to that verse in 1

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Corinthians 10 gives hope to people before you even start talking about their problems.

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Because they've been told by psychiatrists there's no such thing as solutions.

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Psychiatrists, psychologists, cure is not in their vocabulary.

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They don't expect any cure to the various psychological problems people face today.

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I had a man, 70 -some -year -old man, his wife called me on the phone.

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I'll intersperse throughout what I'm saying with illustrations from my own life. This woman called me and said that her husband who was 70 -something, he worked hard for 40 years as an executive in a big business.

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And he'd been retired for four years and he won't get out of bed. He won't do anything.

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He just has no motive for living, stays in bed. And they had spent a couple hundred thousand dollars on psychologists and counselors.

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And so they said, Mr. Morgrath, you're just a last -ditch hope. I said, well, you can't beat my price,

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I don't charge. And so they, I went to see this man, very intelligent man.

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And I asked him, do you have any physical maladies? And he said, no.

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I said, what do you feel guilty about the most?

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And he started crying and he said, well, I used to write my daughter letters every month.

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I had a good hand, I would write good letters. But I have not written her a letter now in months and months and months.

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So I got a piece of paper and a pencil and I handed it to him. And I said, what would you write to your daughter if you were to write her a letter?

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He told her, he told me, he said, I would ask forgiveness for not writing her and not being a good father.

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I said, I want you to write that letter right now. And he said, I can't.

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I said, what do you mean you can't? You got a broken arm or something? What do you mean you can't? I want you to write that letter.

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And here's a pencil, here's a paper. So he sat there looking at that paper for a little while. And then he started writing this letter to his daughter.

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And the whole time he was saying over and over again, my doctor said

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I couldn't do this. My doctor said I couldn't do this. Wow.

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So so modern counseling doesn't offer much hope. And so if you're going to be an effective counselor, you've got to abound in hope.

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All right. What's the second trait? Verse 14 of chapter 15. And concerning you, my brethren,

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I myself also am convinced that you yourselves are full of goodness. That is, you've got to be a dedicated

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Christian. You've got to have more than knowledge. You've got to be applying that knowledge to your life and seeking to live a godly and a holy life according to God's law, by the power of the spirit of God.

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That you're not going to be an effective Christian counselor if you're a hypocrite, if your theology is all in your head and none of it's in your heart or your life.

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So we're not going to be effective counselors if we cannot point to people, here's what this has done for me.

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Here's how this has changed my life and my family life. We've got to be full of goodness.

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And then the third trait. It's also in verse 14. We're not only to abound in hope and to be full of goodness.

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But we are to be filled with all knowledge. That is, we must be a real disciple and the meaning of the word disciple is learner.

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We must always be learning the word of God, increasing our knowledge of that word on everything.

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It says to be filled with all knowledge, just not on those areas that satisfy curiosity or that we have a particular interest in.

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But we are to constantly increase and deepen and broaden our understanding of the word of God on every area of life because it does apply to every area of life.

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And so if we're not constantly studying the scriptures and trying to understand it in its breadth and depth, both

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Old and New Testament, we're not going to have anything to counsel with.

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That the shorter catechism and the larger catechism both say that the will of God is to be found in both

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Testaments, in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. If all we read is the

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New Testament, that's better than nothing. But we're going to get a perverted view of the gospel if all we read is the

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New Testament. So we must read and study the Old Testament.

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We must read and study the New Testament and constantly be filling our minds and our hearts with all aspects of biblical knowledge.

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And then when we abound in hope, when we're full of goodness, when we're filled with all knowledge, then we are competent to counsel.

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And Jay Adams wrote a paperback book that I highly recommend to all of your listeners explaining the difference between biblical counseling and all other forms of counseling.

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It's called Competent to Counsel. It's a paperback. It's very readable.

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I don't think it has one footnote in the whole book. It's a couple of hundred or so pages long.

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And if you really want to know what the distinctives are of euthetic counseling, of biblical counseling, you must read that book,

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Competent to Counsel. The second book, and that's by Jay Adams. The second book by Jay Adams that everybody should have and read and reread and go back to time and again, is called the

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Christian Counselor's Manual. And it goes through all kinds of problems that we face in the modern world.

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Family problems, personal problems, racial problems, all kinds of problems.

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And he shows us how to diagnose those problems in a way differently than the world does.

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And how to work toward a solution to those problems. One of the great things about Jay Adams' approach is that he believed that most of the diagnoses of mental illness were not mental illness at all.

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But as a result of staying in that life, a failure to look at life God's way, or a failure to respond to life

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God's way. And so it is a good book to show you why he said, and this is one of the places where he's criticized the most, where he said that most cases of mental illness are not mental illness.

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They're caused by sin. I'll give you one extreme example. There was a young woman who would always sit on the floor in a fetal position.

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She would not talk. She would not relate in any way. She was in her 20s, and she would just sit on the floor in a fetal position.

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To the point that all counselors had given up on her and put her in a mental institution.

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One of the members of the family didn't want to give up on her, so he called Jay Adams. And he said, would you come and visit my daughter or cousin or whoever she was?

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So Jay Adams goes into a room in the mental institution and asks the nurses to see her physical medical charts.

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He wanted, first of all, to see if there was anything physically, diagnosably wrong about her.

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And she was in good health. She wasn't taking medicine or anything. There wasn't anything physically, anything wrong with her.

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So he asked the nurse to go get two chairs and put in the room. And he sits in one room, the one chair.

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And he puts the other chair in front of him. And he says to the young woman, Susie, get up off of the floor and quit acting like a baby and sit in this chair like an adult.

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She gets up off the floor. And go sit in the chair.

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Wow. Because she was Jay Adams was the first person to consider her a responsible, accountable person, not somebody that's middle, not mentally ill, but somebody that is a maiden image of God and that is accountable, fully accountable to God for all of her actions.

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In fact, I want to follow up on that woman when we returned from our first commercial break. That's all

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I know. We'll have to go to something else. OK. OK. And we already have some listeners waiting to have their questions asked and answered by you.

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But if anybody else would like to join us, please get in line by submitting a question to Chris Arnzen at gmail dot com.

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Chris Arnzen at gmail dot com. As always, give us your first name, at least city and state and country of residence.

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Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. And I could readily understand this subject today since it involves counseling.

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I could readily understand that this subject may evoke questions that are intensely personal and private.

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So we will definitely grant your request to remain anonymous. But please, if it's a general question, give us your first name, city and state and country of residence.

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We'll be right back. Don't go away. Hello, I'm Phil Johnson, executive director of Grace to You with John MacArthur.

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That's royaldiadem .com. Always mention that you heard about them from Chris Arnzen of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We are now back with Dr.

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Joseph C. Moorcraft III, and we are talking about the importance of euthetic or biblical counseling.

40:14

And if you have a question, send it to chrisarnzen at gmail .com and give us your first name, at least city and state and country of residence.

40:21

Only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter. Before I go to any listener questions,

40:26

Joe, I have heard from euthetic counselors that when people are searching for a

40:38

Christian counselor, the one thing that they should not do is arrange a meeting with someone who only specifically uses the phrase

40:54

Christian counselor as the way to identify themselves. That may sound strange to our listeners, but the term

41:03

Christian counselor is a huge umbrella. And as you've already mentioned, there is a lot of heresy under that umbrella very frequently, and that you must look for biblical counselors or specifically euthetic counselors.

41:19

Am I correct in stating that? I would agree with that, because even some of the famous names of counselors today, evangelical counselors, are more humanistic than they are

41:33

Christian. So you want to ask, first of all, for euthetic counselors, do you practice euthetic counseling?

41:42

And that will limit it greatly. But they're around.

41:50

And even though some of the disciples of J. Adams have compromised on some of his basic biblical principles because they were too strong or too demanding upon people.

42:10

But you want to ask, do you practice euthetic counseling, or what do you think of J.

42:16

Adams? That's a good way to do it. Okay, and by the way, folks, euthetic is spelt

42:22

N -O -U -T -H -E -T -I -C. Yes, sir, that's it.

42:29

And I didn't finish telling you about the guy, but I had to write a letter. Okay, yeah, go ahead. He wasn't mentally ill, and he wasn't physically sick.

42:39

So what did I finally tell him? He worked hard for 40 years, and he'd been retired for about five years and had done nothing.

42:50

I said, sir, let me give you a verse. If a man doesn't work, neither should he eat.

42:56

Okay. That if a person works hard all his life and then stops any kind of work whatsoever, he'll be dead in just two or three, four years.

43:10

So you need to go to work. You need to do something, get out of bed, whether you feel like it or not, and go to work, because that was his basic problem.

43:20

Worked hard all his life and then quit working. What do you expect in a person's life?

43:26

Other than losing control of himself. So the

43:32

Bible does work. I guarantee it works. I have been using

43:39

New Theta Counseling for at least 50 years, and I can testify that it does work and that modern approaches to counseling do not work.

44:01

They don't expect them to work because they want their $100 a half hour for their counseling.

44:14

So find out, first of all, if your preacher is a counselor. In some states, because biblical counseling is so threatening, some states have made it illegal for preachers to call themselves family counselors.

44:32

You mean just to use the title? Yeah, you can't use the title. So tell your preacher not to be intimidated by these people, right, that he's the only counselor who can really counsel families.

44:49

Also, some states have outlawed conversion therapy for homosexuals.

44:57

They've made it against the law to tell a homosexual that he can change his homosexuality and not be homosexual anymore.

45:10

And, of course, that's the way we approach homosexuals, is that it's not

45:15

DNA, it's not genetic, it's not something natural at all. It is the result of a defiant decision, and Paul says, no homosexual can enter the kingdom of heaven, but such were some of you.

45:33

Amen. And so in some states, it's illegal to say that.

45:38

Wow. But tell your preacher not to be intimidated by these people.

45:44

Now, there have been Christians and churches and individuals, pastors and so on, who have trivialized the magnitude of the concept of repentance.

46:06

And, you know, there's a slogan that had become famous, I'm not even sure who coined it, but pray the gay away as if,

46:15

I mean, obviously, the Lord transforms people through prayer. But to put it in such a way, it almost sounds like a magical spell, where, you know, if you pray, you're automatically going to be transformed out of being a homosexual or a practitioner of it.

46:34

Yeah. And of course, there are many evangelicals who treat salvation itself that way.

46:39

They go forward and recite a prayer and you will be saved as if salvation is under the control of an individual.

46:47

How do you respond to that? I mean, and also, I'm assuming that you would agree that not everything that would call itself conversion therapy when it comes to homosexuality is good, safe, healthy, or biblical.

47:06

All right. Biblical conversion therapy includes faith in Christ alone for salvation and the turning from sin to a renewed obedience to God's law.

47:19

So repentance is not optional. It is something that's absolutely required if we're going to be saved.

47:27

I was back when I was in college and seminary. I didn't have a car because I couldn't afford one.

47:34

So whenever I went anywhere to preach, I would hitchhike. And since I was bigger than anybody to pick me up,

47:42

I wasn't worried about anybody beating me up. And so I got picked up by this young guy and I was sitting there in the front seat.

47:53

I noticed between us there was a copy of Campus Crusades for Spiritual Laws.

48:00

So I hadn't told him I was a Christian yet. I thought I'd give him an opportunity to practice on me.

48:06

And so I didn't tell him I was a Christian. I didn't just say anything. I said, what's that little pamphlet on the seat between us?

48:14

Well, he took that as a great opportunity to witness. And so he went through every law for spiritual laws.

48:22

And God loves you. Jesus died for you. Have Jesus into your heart, et cetera.

48:28

And so after he got through, I looked at him and I said, you know, there's something you didn't say that I've heard people say.

48:41

And I've heard people talk about repentance. Why didn't you say anything about repentance?

48:48

He said, oh, we don't get to talk about repentance until we get people saved. And so I quoted to him.

48:56

Jesus said, I tell you nay, but except you repent, you shall all likewise perish. I preached the other day a sermon in which

49:04

I said, conversion today is so easy. It is a you make a cool, calm, collected intellectual decision to follow

49:15

Christ. And it is so easy today. But repentance is not easy.

49:22

And believing in Jesus is not easy. And living the Christian life is not easy.

49:28

So when you if you go to a church and everything is so easy and so cool and so intellectual,

49:35

I would go to another church because repentance includes changing from whatever you believe in whatever kind of life you live before you were a

49:46

Christian to an entirely different kind of life demanded by the law of God, empowered by the

49:54

Holy Spirit to live. And without repentance, faith isn't really faith.

50:00

The first great mark and proof of faith in Christ is you want to serve him and bow down to him as your

50:08

Lord and turn from the sins in your life that that are displeasing to him.

50:16

So repentance plays a very important part in counseling. When when we counsel people, many of them, the reason that they're having the problems that they're having is usually because of some sin in their life, because some act of disobedience, because some approach to life, some way of looking at life that's contrary to the word of God, some way of living life that's contrary to the word of God.

50:49

And to solve that problem, repentance is absolutely necessary. In fact, there are three primary characteristics.

50:58

And by the way, could you go could you go through those three primary characteristics when we return from the midway break?

51:05

Sure. And folks, just keep in mind that you have to be patient with us because the midway break is a little longer than the other breaks, because Grace Life Radio 90 .1

51:17

FM in Lake City, Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because they are required by the

51:22

FCC to localize this program geographically to Lake City, Florida, and they do so with their own public service announcements and other things while we simultaneously air our globally heard commercials.

51:36

So please use this time wisely, not only write down questions and submit them to chrisarnsen at gmail .com

51:45

for Joe Moorcraft about our discussion today on the importance of nuthetic counseling, but also please write down as much of the contact information as you possibly can for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully respond to our advertisers.

52:04

Keeping in mind, we absolutely positively rely upon our advertisers to exist.

52:12

We need the finances that comes through our advertisers to remain on the air. So please either purchase their products and use their services and visit their churches, or when it's absolutely impossible for you to do any of those things for one reason or another, please at the very least thank our listeners for sponsoring

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Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. That should go a long way to convince them that their money is not being spent in vain and that their money is helping to bless the lives of thousands of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio listeners.

52:47

So please at least thank our advertisers by using their contact information you hear in the commercials.

52:53

And again, send in your questions to Joe Moorcraft to chrisarnsen at gmail .com. We'll be right back. Please do not go away.

53:01

Puritan Reformed is a bible -believing, kingdom -building, devil -fighting church. We are devoted to upholding the apostolic doctrine and practice preserved in scripture alone.

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Every Christian who's serious about the Reformed faith and the Westminster standards should have and use the eight -volume commentary on the theology and ethics of the

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It is much more than an exposition of the Larger Catechism. It is a thoroughly researched work that utilizes biblical exegesis as well as historical and systematic theology.

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Dr. Morecraft is pastor of Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, and I urge everyone looking for a biblically faithful church in that area to visit that fine congregation.

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Joseph Piper of Greenville Presbyterian Theological Seminary sent you. Hello.

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Again, I'm Pastor Anthony Avenio, and thanks for listening. Have you noticed the gap that exists between the

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01:09:31

Before I return to Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III and a continuation of our discussion on the importance of newthetic counseling,

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Please register as quickly as possible, and it is free. I would recommend that you put it on your calendar and register now, even though it's in 2024, because calendars get quickly filled up.

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Christ -honoring, biblically faithful, theologically sound, doctrinally solid church like Heritage Presbyterian Church in Cumming, Georgia, well,

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I have extensive lists of faithful churches spanning the globe, and I have helped many people in our audience all over the world find churches, sometimes even within just a couple of minutes from where they live.

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And that may be you, too, if you're without a church home. So send me an email at chrisarnson at gmail .com—chrisarnson at gmail .com,

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and put, I need a church in the subject line. That's also the email address where you could send in a question to Dr. Joseph C.

01:13:19

Moorcroft III, and we are discussing the importance of New Thetic Counseling.

01:13:25

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Give us your first name at least, city and state, and country of residence. Before the break, you were going to begin to list,

01:13:34

I believe it was three important elements of saving faith or repentant faith?

01:13:40

I can't remember exactly how you phrased it. Yeah, the three distinctives of New Thetic Counseling.

01:13:45

Oh, okay. They all start with C. The first is compassion.

01:13:52

A New Thetic Counselor is somebody who has Christlike compassion for people who are going through troubled times.

01:14:03

He's got to be able to weep with those who weep and to rejoice with those who rejoice.

01:14:11

He cannot be cold. He's got to be somebody who knows what real compassion is and what real sympathy is for sinners.

01:14:22

It's not an intellectual thing. It's something that involves the compassion of the heart.

01:14:30

Second, confrontation. New Thetic Counseling involves confrontation.

01:14:37

Now, confrontation is a word that we use a lot, but it has connotations with it that I think are unhealthy.

01:14:51

For instance, we say we are going to confront somebody or we are going to confront you as if it's always a challenging, direct, hostile thing.

01:15:06

I think what helps with confrontation is if you say it gently. Confrontation.

01:15:13

Because it's not a challenging thing. It's not even a word of rebuke.

01:15:20

It is when you're helping somebody work through their sins so they can turn from it and renew their obedience to God and strengthen their faith in Christ.

01:15:32

It is something that you do. You have to confront them. And so New Thetic Counseling takes courage because it does take courage to confront somebody over his or her sin.

01:15:48

A husband, a wife. It takes courage. But you don't be mean about it.

01:15:54

But you do have to be honest and forthright and understand that counseling involves confrontation.

01:16:04

Point out what it is in their lives that's causing the problem.

01:16:10

And thirdly, it's change. Compassion, confrontation, and change.

01:16:17

When we're having problems in our lives as individuals, as parents, as married partners, or whatever it is, it is always because there's something about our lives that God wants changed.

01:16:33

And so we must help people pinpoint what that is. What are they doing wrong?

01:16:39

How are they thinking wrongly about something? And then show them how to straighten out and how not to get this problem again.

01:16:49

For instance, I do a lot of counseling on all kinds of things. I try not to do counseling over the telephone, but sometimes

01:17:00

I get stuck in doing that. But when it comes to, say, depression,

01:17:08

I've learned through 50 years that 90 % of the cases of depression are not clinical depression.

01:17:21

Now, there are some real causes of depression that require medical treatment.

01:17:29

I don't want to downplay that. Vitamin deficiency, medicine, poor blood circulation.

01:17:40

There are actual physical diagnoses of depression that do require a doctor and do require medical treatment.

01:17:55

But I also have learned that about 90 % of those who are depressed do not need medical treatment.

01:18:04

The last thing they need is medical treatment. And so what I learned through the years, and by studying the scriptures, and by applying the scriptures to people's lives, is that most people who are depressed are depressed because they dwell on thoughts that tend to depress, so that they just spiral into a hole.

01:18:37

There's something happened in their lives, sickness, death, somebody sinned against them, and they just dwell on that.

01:18:45

That's always coming up in their mind. And so whenever that thought of a sin, an injury, a sickness, a death comes into their mind, they drop their shoulders, and they get depressed.

01:19:03

And then they stay depressed because they dwell on that thought over and over and over.

01:19:11

Not in terms of what's a cure for this, what's the solution for this, but they just dwell on that thought that tends to depress over and over and over, spiraling downwards.

01:19:25

So the way you get over that kind of depression is by disciplining yourself to quit dwelling on thoughts that tend to depress.

01:19:37

You can control your mind. You can control your emotions.

01:19:44

And so you can keep from dwelling on certain thoughts. It may take a lot of effort, it will take discipline.

01:19:53

And you may have to work very hard at getting thoughts out of your mind, and you do that by dwelling on other things.

01:20:03

You dwell on good things, on how much your family loves you, on biblical thoughts, and biblical truths, and biblical doctrines.

01:20:14

You let your mind be filled with what is true, and what is good, and what is wholesome.

01:20:21

And you fill your mind with those things. And when you fill your mind with those things, then the peace of God that passes all understanding guards your heart and your mind.

01:20:35

So depression is not a big monster. That comes upon you uncontrollably.

01:20:42

And you can't do anything about it. Depression is caused by thought mostly.

01:20:48

It's caused by thoughts that tend to depress. And so the way you keep from getting depressed is don't allow those thoughts to dominate your thinking.

01:21:01

When they come up in your mind, turn from them. Even if you have to turn from the same thought 10 times, and fill your mind with wholesome, beautiful, good, true things.

01:21:16

Reading the Bible. If you have a $50 ,000 computer, but it's not plugged into the power, it's not going to do you any good whatsoever.

01:21:26

And that's the way it is with the Bible. That you can have the Bible, and you can call yourself a

01:21:32

Bible -believing Christian, but if you're not plugged into the power of that word, that power is not going to show itself in your life.

01:21:40

So you must be somebody who's reading the scriptures, living in it, going to churches where the word of God is preached, where you have preachers that preach and teach the whole counsel of God, and not just part of it, where they know how to expand it, and they know how to apply it to your life.

01:22:03

So sitting under sound preaching regularly, week after week after week, and reading the

01:22:11

Bible on your own, and having family worship on your own, are all very important, indispensable ways of causing that depression not to dominate your life.

01:22:29

So depression, most of it, caused by thoughts that tend to depress.

01:22:36

You can discipline your mind, you can say no to them. It takes the power of the

01:22:43

Holy Spirit, it takes daily dogged discipline, it takes a life lived out in the word of God, a life dependent upon God for everything in your life.

01:22:58

I have at least one sermon on sermonaudio .com

01:23:04

called How to Handle Depression, and if anybody's out there listening,

01:23:11

I would recommend those sermons. I am definitely going to listen to them myself.

01:23:18

Yeah, How to Handle Depression. And, you know, you were talking about the fact that God has given us an ability to control our thoughts.

01:23:31

I have found it very dominant in our culture for quite a long time, that it is—humanity has fed the lie that the sexual urge is such a powerful element of the human life that it's something that we cannot control, and therefore we should expect single people to be having sex before marriage.

01:24:09

We should expect people to be seeking to fulfill their sexual appetites no matter what those may be.

01:24:19

They may be unnatural and damning, and of course all sexual activity and even thought as far as lust is concerned outside of marriage between one man and one woman is damning.

01:24:34

But this idea that, you know, we have to have sex education in schools, and we have to teach kids how to use condoms, because it's laughably ridiculous to expect that people will not have sex until they're married.

01:24:53

That's another example of non -biblical counseling. In the Bible, you are responsible for your thoughts.

01:25:00

If you have lustful thoughts for a woman in your heart, you've committed adultery.

01:25:06

The Bible says, keep your heart with all diligence for out of it are the issues of life. So why would the

01:25:12

Bible say things like guard your heart if you couldn't guard your heart? You have the power of the

01:25:19

Holy Spirit in your life as a Christian, and you can say no when you need to say no, and you can say it decisively.

01:25:29

And you can say yes when you need to say yes, and you say it decisively. So I was trying to think of another instance, but it'll come to me again.

01:25:41

But that shows our culture does not believe that man is responsible for all of his actions.

01:25:52

It's his environment. It's because his grandmother didn't raise him properly.

01:25:58

It's because of his genes or his chromosomes, or it's because of a dominant external influence on his life that we're not responsible for anything.

01:26:11

We're just helpless victims to all of these influences of society all around us.

01:26:19

So we cannot be blamed. We must always blame other people.

01:26:25

But that's a myth, of course, and it's because we live in a world that does not believe that man has made the image of God.

01:26:34

We live in a world that does not believe that man is accountable to obey the law of God and thought, word, and deed.

01:26:40

And we live in a world where it believes that the law of God is irrelevant. So, for instance, people often talk about, to me, they've come to counseling,

01:26:52

I have this uncontrollable anger that it just comes upon me and I can't control it.

01:26:59

And I'll say, there's no such thing as an uncontrollable anger. There's uncontrolled anger, but there's not uncontrollable anger.

01:27:10

And I said, I'll give you a simple way of proving it. I went to see this family near our church one time, and they were having a big argument.

01:27:23

And I could hear them arguing when I came up to the door and knocked on the door. So when

01:27:28

I knocked on the door and opened it, they saw me. They totally changed. They said, well,

01:27:35

Pastor Markraft, it's good to see you. Come on in. And they'd just been beating each other up verbally before they opened the door.

01:27:44

So don't think there's such a thing as an uncontrollable anger. There's only an uncontrolled anger.

01:27:52

Or another thing is, people often come to me and say, how can

01:27:57

I avoid stressful situations in my life? And I say, there's no such thing as a stressful situation.

01:28:06

There's no situation in your life that causes you stress. Stress is something you do to yourself.

01:28:15

When you're not looking at life a certain way, you're not living life a certain way, you're not trusting

01:28:22

God for what you need to live life, it's not a situation. It's not your work.

01:28:28

You don't have a stressful work. Your work's not stressful. You put this stress on yourself.

01:28:34

You're responsible for this stress, not your work, because of a failure to live or think.

01:28:41

So that appears to be so harsh, so unloving.

01:28:47

That's why a lot of modern humanists do not like New Thetic counseling, because it makes a human being fully responsible for all of his actions.

01:28:59

And we have a listener. And those of you who have been listening to this program long enough to remember my former co -host before he relocated from Carlisle, Pennsylvania, where I am located, and is now a resident of Fitchburg, Massachusetts.

01:29:21

But if you've been listening to this program at least since 2015, when

01:29:26

I relaunched the show after moving from New York to Pennsylvania, you will remember my co -host

01:29:33

Buzz Taylor. Well, Buzz has a question for Dr. Moorcraft. And I must also add that Buzz is an enormous admirer of Dr.

01:29:45

Moorcraft and his writings and his sermons. And his late mother also was always thrilled to hear

01:29:54

Dr. Moorcraft on this program. But Buzz in Fitchburg, Massachusetts, he says, yes, it's me.

01:30:02

He asks, what is your take on mental illness and chemical imbalances, etc.,

01:30:09

as it relates to professional counseling? There is such a thing, obviously, as chemical imbalance.

01:30:19

That, first of all, let me say is a catch -all phrase. When a doctor or a psychiatrist cannot figure out what's exactly wrong with you, it must be chemical imbalance.

01:30:32

So in my opinion, a lot of the diagnosis of chemical imbalance is not chemical imbalance.

01:30:38

Though there is such a thing. For instance, when you twist your ankle,

01:30:45

I'm talking from years of basketball experience. If you twist your ankle badly, then you're going to have a sense of nausea as well.

01:30:55

And a twisted ankle causes chemical imbalance. Or jet lag.

01:31:02

I do not handle jet lag very well, coming or going across the Atlantic. But jet lag is a chemical imbalance.

01:31:10

So it's not the end of the world when you have chemical imbalance. There's a way of treating them.

01:31:20

Vitamins, sleep. So the chemical imbalance is not the worst thing in the world.

01:31:26

It can be if it's physically caused by some particular disease or something wrong with your blood or something like that.

01:31:40

And that should require medical treatment. But having chemical imbalance is not an—well, let's put it this way.

01:31:52

Chemical imbalance is never in the Bible said to be a symptom.

01:32:03

Symptoms of chemical imbalance are not disobedient to the

01:32:09

Ten Commandments. So people use chemical imbalance to excuse all kinds of disobedience, but disobedience to the law of God is not a symptom of a chemical imbalance.

01:32:27

It's because of a choice you make in life. Just like homosexuality is not a sickness.

01:32:34

It is a defiant, deliberate choice that a person makes.

01:32:40

So I'm glad he asked that question because I don't want to downplay doctors. I don't want to downplay going to see doctors.

01:32:49

I don't want to downplay taking medicine when it's required. But you've got to think about all these things

01:32:56

Christianly, and you've got to start with the Bible first. Is there anything in my life that's causing me to have these schizophrenic tendencies of wanting to live two different kinds of lives?

01:33:13

Because I don't like the reality as I see it. I want another kind of reality.

01:33:19

I don't like the reality that God has made. I want to recreate reality in a way that satisfies me.

01:33:28

So whereas there are legitimate medical concerns and legitimate use for doctors, we must also, if we think we have something that's medically wrong with us, go to a godly doctor who knows new pedicounseling.

01:33:49

Yeah, you just said... Go ahead, I'm sorry. See if there's anything diagnosably wrong with you, physically diagnosably wrong with you.

01:33:58

And if there is, do what he says. But our problems, nine out of ten, are not caused by sicknesses, but are caused by sins in our lives.

01:34:12

Amen. And you said something key there that may not be the easiest thing to do, finding an

01:34:18

M .D. who is a godly Christian who understands and believes in new things.

01:34:24

How true is that? There are several in and around Atlanta, and one of them, called

01:34:32

Rhett Bergeron, has a Christian medical conference once a year. It has all kinds of people come, with big -name speakers like Martin Selbreedy and others.

01:34:42

Right, I've had the doctor on my show. Yes, you have. And he deals, they deal with all of the various medical ethical issues that we have to deal with today.

01:34:58

Well, this all is connected to a listener question. We have

01:35:05

King in Patrick, South Carolina, and he says,

01:35:11

I'm so glad that you are breaking the stereotype of newthetic counselors, who

01:35:17

I have heard always try to tell people to not seek medical help for the problems of depression or mental issues.

01:35:29

I think this could be extremely dangerous, especially if these ministers or counselors are telling everyone and anyone to stop taking the medication they've been on, etc.

01:35:40

I have known many, many newthetic counselors over 50 years.

01:35:48

I don't know any authentic newthetic counselor that tells people never go to doctors, never take medicine.

01:35:59

I know people who claim to be newthetic counselors, but they don't really know what that is.

01:36:05

Right. They're always on the fringe of every movement. There's going to be these extreme fanatics that causes everybody to look at newthetic counseling as if they were all these extreme people.

01:36:23

But I have never met a newthetic counselor that's a genuine newthetic counselor that has told people never go to doctors, never take medicine.

01:36:33

And this listener, King in Patrick, South Carolina, follows up. The thing that's difficult in knowing when an individual should be on some kind of medication is regaining trust in doctors and the medical community, especially after we have been lied to by doctors over and over again in the media during the

01:36:58

COVID pandemic. We have been told by doctors and scientists to wear masks when we know now that these were useless.

01:37:07

We have been told by doctors and scientists to take the COVID vaccines, which may be involved in the death of more people than we are aware of.

01:37:17

This is a harder task than perhaps it used to be to find a doctor you can trust. I couldn't agree with this man more, that there are doctors that are owned by the state, that are slaves of the culture.

01:37:35

And we must be very careful. I'll tell women, don't go to a gynecologist that believes in abortion.

01:37:44

And that means asking them. That means you got to be courageous. And you ask them their opinion on things like this.

01:37:52

There are great doctors that you can trust.

01:37:59

My son -in -law is a doctor. My other son -in -law is a nurse practitioner.

01:38:08

They both know New Teddy Counseling. They're one of the leading vascular surgeons in Atlanta, who operated in about eight hospitals.

01:38:20

A very famous vascular surgeon practiced New Teddy Counseling.

01:38:26

So they're out there. Yes, in fact, my doctor, Dr. Joel Yeager, here in Pennsylvania, is a courageous, godly, reformed

01:38:41

Christian doctor who is publicly on his website and in his practice when he would counsel patients.

01:38:51

He has always been publicly, openly, and vehemently opposed to masks as a preventative for COVID and other viruses.

01:39:02

He has also been warning about the dangers of the vaccines for the coronavirus.

01:39:08

And I urge anybody who lives in the Pennsylvania area to look up heritagefamilyhealth .org.

01:39:17

Heritagefamilyhealth .org. We have to go to our final commercial break right now. And if you have a question for Dr.

01:39:23

Moorcraft, there are still a couple of people waiting to have their questions asked. So if you have a question, send it in immediately to chrisarnson at gmail .com.

01:39:31

chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away. We're going to be right back. I'm Pastor Keith Allen of Linbrook Baptist Church, a

01:39:53

Christ -centered, gospel -driven church looking to spread the gospel in the southwest portion of Long Island, New York, and play our role in fulfilling the great commission, supporting, and sending for the spread of the gospel to the ends of the earth.

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It's such a blessing to hear from Iron Sharpens Iron Radio listeners from all over the world.

01:49:20

Here's Joe Riley, a listener in Ireland, who wants you to know about a guest on the

01:49:26

He really loves hearing interviewed. Dr. Joe Moorcraft. I'm Joe Riley, a faithful Iron Sharpens Iron Radio listener here in Atai, in County Kildare, Ireland.

01:49:37

Going back to 2005, one of my very favorite guests on Iron Sharpens Iron is

01:49:42

Dr. Joe Moorcraft. If you've been blessed by Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Dr. Moorcraft and Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, are largely to thank, since they are one of the program's largest financial supporters.

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Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming is in Forsyth County, a part of the Atlanta metropolitan area.

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Heritage is a thoroughly biblical church, unwaveringly committed to Westminster standards, and Dr.

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Joe Moorcraft is the author of an eight -volume commentary on the larger catechism. Heritage is a member of the

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Their primary goal is the worship of the Triune God that continues in eternity. For more details on Heritage Presbyterian Church of Cumming, Georgia, visit heritagepresbyterianchurch .com,

01:50:45

that's heritagepresbyterianchurch .com, or call 678 -954 -7831.

01:50:52

That's 678 -954 -7831. If you visit, tell them

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Joe Roiligan, Orange Harpins Iron radio listener, and a toy in County Kildare, Arlington, sends you.

01:51:08

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Last but not least, I want to give another plug for our friends at Solid Ground Christian Books. There is another book that I want to highlight today, especially since this program is being conducted in loving memory of the late

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Lou Priolo, who passed on to glory and eternity with Christ this week.

01:52:51

Solid -Ground -Books .com carries his book, A Practical Guide to Biblical Husbanding, A Practical Guide to Biblical Husbanding by Lou Priolo, and you can get that at Solid -Ground -Books .com.

01:53:04

Okay, we have time for at least one more listener question.

01:53:12

We have Violet in Lumber City, Georgia.

01:53:18

How close is that to coming, Pastor Joe? I don't know. Okay, well,

01:53:23

Violet asks, Do you think it's legitimate for a biblical counselor and a pastor and elders when counseling someone to reach the conclusion that they are indeed demon -possessed?

01:53:38

It seems that Reformed Christians in general tend to shy away from such a possibility in our day and age.

01:53:46

Well, that is a good question. I believe in the existence of demons.

01:53:53

I don't believe in some views of spiritual warfare where everything is demonic.

01:54:00

I've been in the pastorate now since 1969. I don't know that I've ever met a demon -possessed woman, person.

01:54:10

Now, maybe there's one woman that I met that came close to being demon -possessed.

01:54:17

But other than that one woman, I don't think I've ever seen a demon -possessed person.

01:54:23

Now, I believe in demon possession. I believe not every—in evangelical circles, there's more said about Satan and demons than the

01:54:33

Bible reveals. And so, therefore, we've got to be careful that we determine all of our views of demons and Satan by the

01:54:42

Bible and not by just our feelings or experiences. And also, many evangelical

01:54:50

Christians give more credit to Satan than they do to Christ himself. But as one man said,

01:54:59

Satan is the good shepherd's sheepdog that he uses to keep his sheep in line, and that he is completely and entirely under the control of Christ.

01:55:11

And by the death of Christ, Satan's power and influences were all greatly curtailed.

01:55:19

So, after saying all that, I think there's such a thing as demon possession. I think the less a culture is influenced by the gospel, the more demon possession you'll see, and the more a culture is influenced by the gospel, the less demon possession you'll see.

01:55:39

So, I believe there's such a thing. I believe there's no kind of trick to expelling them except by prayer, praying that Christ would expel it.

01:55:49

If there's demon possession, that Christ would remove it and cast the demons out without any kind of rituals or any kind of secret little rites or things like that.

01:56:00

But I just don't—I think there's only been one demon -possessed woman I've ever known. Well, I'd like you to summarize what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners today about this subject.

01:56:17

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I can meet, overcome, live with, grow from every situation that life brings before me, knowing that every episode in life is governed by a sovereign

01:56:39

God. God says in Isaiah, I create good times and I create calamitous times.

01:56:49

I am the Lord who does all these things. Hallelujah. Well, I want to remind our listeners, the website for Heritage Presbyterian Church in Cumming, Georgia is heritagepresbyterianchurch .com,

01:57:05

heritagepresbyterianchurch .com. Don't forget, also, about the eight -volume commentary written by my guest,

01:57:13

Dr. Joseph C. Moorcraft III, called Authentic Christianity, the eight -volume commentary on the larger catechism, the

01:57:22

Westminster larger catechism. If you want to find out more about that, go to comprehensivechristianity .com,

01:57:29

comprehensivechristianity .com. You can also go to westminstercommentary .com,

01:57:37

westminstercommentary .com. And folks, please, if you're a man in the ministry, do not forget whether you are a pastor, elder, deacon, power church leader.

01:57:48

I'm having my next biannual free Iron Trip and Zion Radio Pastors Luncheon on Thursday, June the 6th, 2024, 11 a .m.

01:57:59

to 2 p .m. at the Church of the Living Christ in Loisville, Pennsylvania, featuring for the first time

01:58:05

Dr. Joel Beakey, founder and president of Puritan Reformed Theological Seminary.

01:58:10

Please register by sending me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com, chrisarnson at gmail .com,

01:58:16

and put pastorsluncheon in the subject line. And remember, this is for men in ministry leadership only.

01:58:23

You know, Brother Joe, that you have an open door in Iron Trip and Zion Radio studio to return as a guest as frequently as you wish.

01:58:32

I look forward to many future visits from you and interviews, and very soon as well.

01:58:39

I love it. I'll be glad to do it. And I want to thank everybody who listened, especially those who took the time to write.

01:58:44

I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you are a sinner.