Lies My Therapist Told Me

Psychology, Anthropology, and the Mind-Body Distinction

Welcome once again to the Conversations That Matter podcast, I'm your host John Paris. One of the things that you've heard me talk about over the years, and lately I've talked about it a little bit more, is this problem of psychology being integrated into Christian theology, specifically through counseling.

And I'm not saying that all psychology is necessarily bad, we'll get into that in this podcast a little bit, but there is an assumption that comes with humanist philosophies that can be very destructive to a biblical understanding of anthropology, who humans are, how they work, how they function.

Currently you've heard me talk about this issue in terms of the Southern Baptist Convention and their efforts to prevent abuse. Some of their strategies are not necessarily strategies that would arise from the Bible, let's say.

And so I want to talk about that today, and also I want to talk about counseling and psychology more broadly with a first-time guest. Dr. Greg Gifford is a professor at the Master's, sorry, it's Master's University now, Master's University in California.

He is also the host of the Transform Show at Fortis Institute. Welcome Dr. Gifford, thank you for being here to discuss this.

Thanks John, thanks for having me.

So you just came out with a book on this topic, and I know it's through a major publisher, which is impressive to me that a major publisher would take an interest in this topic. Why do you think people are so interested in this topic now?

Do you think it's because of the Maha movement and wanting to seek healthful food options, but now it's also into the realm of psychology and therapy?

Yeah, I mean, I think the Maha movement definitely is part of it, because there is a de-pathologizing, where not everything has a body issue, and a lot of the more naturalistic, holistic perspectives definitely feeds into that.

But the real issue is more of the epidemic levels of mental illnesses, diagnoses, incentivized diagnosing, where you have children that are being diagnosed, some as early as five, with the most common mental illnesses being depression, anxiety, and ADHD.

The reality is that we've never had this many mental health workers in America. Psychiatrists, therapists, counselors, psychologists, there's never been this many, and yet diagnoses have never been this high.

We're all reaching a point of skepticism, and there's a sense of over-diagnosing, where normal behavior is stigmatized, and abnormal behavior is de-stigmatized. And DSM, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, it is this encyclopedia of symptoms that keeps changing over time, and it kind of changes based off the spirit of the age.

So it's hard to then prove empirically and objectively that you have a mental illness, and then consequently it's hard to say who doesn't have a mental illness, especially if there's incentivized reasons for having one.

So it's like, what's the popularity? Why would a big publisher pick up something like this? It's like, well, one in six people have a mental illness, and one in 10 are on psychotropics. And this book was written towards Christians primarily, and Christians are just starting to say like, wait a minute, is there something else?

Is there a better answer? What does the Bible, what does my worldview, what does salvation, what does your inner person, what does all that have to do with what's being called mental health? And that's really the center point of the issue.

I think so many people are corralled, whether it's the physical health or quote unquote mental health, into these labels where now you have a certain regimen you're supposed to do because you are ADHD, you are, I don't know, you have some kind of a predisposition to some allergy, and now it's like, we don't do any more study, you just do this.

And your book is Lies My Therapist Told Me. Where can people go find that, by the way? Where would you like them to go?

Sure.

Yeah, you could find Lies My Therapist Told Me, any major retailer. Typically people are looking on Amazon, but Barnes and Noble has it, Walmart has it, Target has it, and anywhere that you guys want to go.

Just Google it and Google where you typically buy your books, and Lies My Therapist Told Me will be there.

That's wonderful. That's wonderful. HarperCollins, of course, is the publisher. Go check it out. What are some of the things that motivated you, as you're looking at this issue, to want to put out a biblical message on a popular level?

How do you think it'll help people, what you're saying?

Yeah.

I mean, the book morphs. As you write something, you start with one idea, and then by the time it's done, it is generally in the same sphere, but it's a little bit different. And as an academic, sometimes we just want to be very theoretical and kind of like high-level, upstream conversation.

So the original thought was, let's dissect why so many people are being diagnosed. Let's dissect why so many people are on psychotropics. Let's dissect why the pharmaceutical companies are making billions and address the ideas that undergird that.

And that's where the research of how we got here, the history of the mental health movement, that was really the start. And as I began to research, I found that the mind and the brain were being confused and used interchangeably.

And when you're saying mind, some people hear brain, and they're just assuming the organ inside of your cranium is what we're talking about. And then all of a sudden, you're medicalizing the mind. So what takes place over time is you have an anthropology that's not clear.

And then all of a sudden, you have this movement founded upon kind of an unclear anthropology. And that is what got me kind of like started on the book. So the mind-brain distinction was really the starting point.

And then from there, think of that like the cascade. I then begin to address all of the outworkings of mental health, mental disease, children diagnosed with unverifiable illnesses, symptom-based diagnosing.

But the real issue is anthropology. And to be exact, do we really understand the difference between the mind and the brain?

What is the difference?

Hey, thanks for setting me up for that one. And the next 40 minutes of our conversation, I'm just going to talk about that.

Probably good in one go, yeah. Maybe put it in a nutshell.

Yeah, I hope you have like a control of my microphone so you can just mute me. But I'll try to make it quick. The reality is that the Bible talks about your mind as being immaterial. And what's easy for every Christian, even if we have a rudimentary understanding of.

We understand Romans 12, too, that you're transformed by the renewing of your mind. And God is doing that work of mind renewal. And when we talk about your mind, it's the center of your intellect and cognition.

Some would even include like your volition. But just think of like your reason. Your mind is immaterial, meaning it's not part of your body, your outer man.

It's part of your inner man.

And your brain is the organ that is housed inside of your cranium. I am not a brain doctor, just to be clear. So any of those things that start to come up, I'll say talk to a neurologist, neuroscientist.

Like that's not my lane. But we do know the organ of the brain is an outer man organ. Just like a lung or the heart. Or even just think of like your skin and fingers. Like that's part of your physical body.

And your mind, according to the scripture, is different from your brain. And obviously they interrelate. But your mind is not your brain. And what's easy for Christians listening and watching this. Just remember, for most of us, this is a very easy way to delineate.

When I am brain dead and my physical body ceases to work and function. There are diagnosable criteria to diagnose brain death. We know that I will still be thinking, 2 Corinthians 5. I will be in the presence of the Lord.

And I will still have rationality. I will still have reason, intellect, cognition. My mind will still be operational even though my brain has ceased to exist. And when I say that, most Christians are like, oh yeah.

Like what's being renewed? Not our brain. Our brain can actually be deteriorating. Our mind is being renewed. That's progressive sanctification. And what happens at the moment of brain death, my mind is still operational.

And I'm awaiting that time where my body will be resurrected to include my brain. So let's create those overarching categories to start. And then you can start to tease out what's the relationship of the two.

And is this a brain issue or a mind issue? And then what about those things that have no seeming medical verifiability? Those are all the secondary conversations. But if you don't get clarity on the mind and the brain, then it's really hard to have those secondary conversations.

Symptom-Based Diagnosing and the Limits of Psychiatry

Fascinating. So this anthropology problem, I assume your thesis is that we've gotten wrong the human nature by conflating these things. And that has put us into a situation where people are approaching the mind like they would an arm or any other physical organ.

And assuming there's a chemical problem when maybe it's just a problem that's spiritual. I mean, that's what psych and psychology means soul, right?

Right.

So just anyone watching this and John, I'm open to your feedback on this as well. Just think the way that medical, excuse me, that mental illnesses are diagnosed. The way that they're diagnosed, even if you're meeting with a medical doctor and psychiatrists are medical doctors, you're sitting across from them on a desk and you are describing what your symptoms are like.

And they're going to say, are you sad? Do you struggle with motivation? How long has this been going on? The psychiatrist, and inevitably someone out there will say, wait a minute, one psychiatrist out of a hundred will do a brain scan.

And it's like, totally. And I totally support that. But by and large, you verbally describe what's taking place and then your psychiatrist makes a medically sounding diagnosis based off of the symptoms that you just described.

That means that there wasn't actual medicine that was practiced. It was me describing my symptoms. And symptom-based diagnosing is not good medicine. It's not even sound logic if we think it through.

I may not be truly understanding what's going on and I may not be the best person to describe my symptoms. That's where I need help interpreting some of it. So you're sitting with a psychiatrist and you're describing your symptoms and then they say, it sounds like you are depressed or it sounds like you have generalized anxiety disorder.

And even for children, there is testing that's done, but none of that testing is brain scans, lab results. When your child at public school is asked to take a special test to see if they have a learning disability or ADHD, what are they doing?

They're often taking a written test and answering questions verbally. That's not a medical evaluation. And then at the end of that, it's like, yes, your seventh grade child does have ADHD or the symptoms.

So let's get them some medications and let's get them a smaller classroom. And what I'm saying is I totally think that what we call ADHD can exist and not be a mental illness. And I totally think depression can exist and not be an illness of your mind.

And if we're using symptom-based criteria, then wouldn't we want to just pause and say, hey, look, they didn't do any medical observation. What is really going on here? Is it an issue of my body or is it an issue of something else?

Would I be open to what's going on in my mind and not just immediately jumping to naturalistic conclusions?

Pastoral Care, Scripture, and Mental Health

So obviously this audience is primarily composed of Christians and Christians used to consult their pastors. I think some still do when they have a crisis in their lives. I just got a call this morning, actually, from someone connected to my church who had a bout of depression, which I think is common in the holidays, especially as you're going through them.

And this is the first holiday without his dad around. So at that moment, you have an option, I suppose. Are you going to send them to the therapist and say, you might need a bottle of something to get you through this?

Or are you going to give them comfort from scripture? Or both, I suppose. And I think a lot of pastors out there do actually send them to a therapist, depending on the level of severity. And they say, well, I'm not the specialist here.

I'm just a pastor. I can't handle the general things. I can't handle the deep, dark night of the soul type issues. That's on a special level. I think what you're saying sounds to me like actually the specialist in mind-related issues should be the pastor, should be the person who knows the word of God, who is close with God in their walk, and then can assess spiritual condition.

Is that right?

Yeah. So there's inevitably someone listening to this and being like, wait a minute, I should go to my pastor about depression and about ADHD and anxiety. Like, hang on, John. Hang on, Greg. Like, what are you guys talking about?

So here is like, let's think precisely about this. Congregant comes and then we say, have you gone to your medical doctor for an evaluation recently? So if someone's struggling with depression, like you just mentioned, a good pastor is going to say, you should talk with a medical doctor who's going to evaluate you medically and rule out anything going on, any weird physical anomaly.

And yes, sometimes a CT and MRI cost money, but you want to rule those things out, and you want to make sure there's not something going on in the organ of your brain. And once that work has been done, then the corner, you turn the corner to say, would you be open to addressing what you've been thinking about here lately and what you've been placing your hope in and how your circumstances changed, and that's influencing your moods and encouraging you to be sad.

And those are not brain issues. What you place your hope in is not a brain issue. And what you're thinking about all the time is not a brain issue. Those are mind issues. And who is the expert in the mind?

It is the pastor who is trained in the Bible. Seriously, like, this is the reality. Who knows the mind better? A secular psychologist who doesn't believe in an immaterial part of you, a secular therapist who doesn't believe in redemption, a secular psychiatrist who doesn't believe in Jesus Christ, or the pastor who has a biblical worldview to help you understand what your mind is, what's happening in your mind, and then how to renew your mind with the truth of Scripture.

And I would say all day, this isn't like junior varsity. Well, you know, our pastors are well-intended, and that's cute. Well, let's give them a shot and kind of let them help. It's like, I think your pastor actually knows a lot more about the mind than that secular counselor that you've been going to for years.

Let me bring this into a very applicable and cutting-edge issue, and that is social media, specifically phones and the Reels and Instagram pictures and all of this. There's a lot of Gen Zers out there struggling, not just them, but especially them with peer pressure and depression and anxiety.

And some of this has been linked, even in major media stories, to the use of phones and how that is affecting you with the blue light, which knocks your circadian rhythms off, the fact that there's a dopamine hit when you get a notification, and it creates an addiction.

At the same time, though, what you're talking about sounds like it dovetails here because what are you placing your hope in? Is it people's approval? Is that why you're living for this? Is that why you're on this?

Is there a dual issue going on here? Is it the brain and the mind? Is it one or the other? How would you suggest pastors approach an issue like that, social media addiction?

Yeah, sure.

In the book, I talk a little bit about addictions, and I want to be candid. I want to draw a line. I've often said I think psychologists have overstepped their boundary. They're moving into the jurisdiction of pastors, and I want to make sure that I don't overstep my boundary and move into the jurisdiction of neuroscientists, neurologists, actual medical doctors studying the brain.

So I'll do my best to give you the biblical parameters and then kind of stop at the science. The reality is why does a person use social media, first of all? Why do they go to it, first of all? It is not because their brain overpowered their body and they grabbed their phone, created an Instagram account, and they were under compulsion by their brain to do that.

Their brain hijacked them. Why did you open the Instagram account, the TikTok, the Snapchat? Why did you do that? That is a mind issue. What were you wanting? What were you thinking about? What were you desiring to happen by getting an Instagram account?

Right now, Instagram is doing these teen account pushes, and, John, it's like one of the most ridiculous advertisements of all time. It's like, guys, how about we just have teens not on social media instead of trying to create these accounts where they could be on social media?

Because, to your point, what's happening is these teens are being caught in the current of social media, and unless they're intentional to get out of it, their mind led them to it, and then now there are physiological effects, things like sleep, things like dopamine, or things like your body encouraging you.

Think of the phantom ring where you thought you felt a buzz in your pocket, and then you grab your phone and check it. There is a physiological component to that, and that's where your neurologist is going to be the best to say, like, yeah, here's how habits are formed, and here is how addictions start at the level of your body and how cravings and triggers.

But what I would say, first of all, is remember why you went there in the first place. Your brain did not hijack you and make you log on to Instagram. You went there because of the choices that you were making.

And what you were wanting.

So where do you start for some of the help? You start with focusing on the mind and renewing your mind and taking your thoughts captive and working with someone that's going to help you. Kind of double check why you're using social media in the first place, because if you just put it all on your body in a physiological craving and addiction, I don't really think you're going to see any change.

Abuse, Mandated Reporting, and Shepherding Through Crisis

Yeah, that's fascinating. That means I think some of the strategies for coping with this or stopping this would have to take into account desire. And fundamentally, that gets back to a worship kind of thing.

And what do you think of yourself? What do you think of God? What do you think the purpose of life is? Do you think that and this is kind of you can take this any direction you want, but do you think that Christians and pastors have at least a portion of them veered off by maybe giving wrong instruction or letting the world provide anthropological assumptions to people without challenging it?

In other words, with entertainment Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead.

No, I mean there's the answer is yes. Absolutely yes. But then take a step back and say, but why? Because we could say, well, pastors are lazy or people are lazy, and we could instantly say, well, it's malicious and people are intentionally trafficking in worldly conclusions.

But I don't actually think that's the case. I think we grew up in a naturalistic society thanks to Charles Darwin. And we grew up in the West, in America. We grew up in a medicine, medical first world.

And the more we learn about the Bible, the more discipleship and clear doctrine, the more our anthropology starts to shift from like, wait a minute, my body is not 90 of why I do what I do. So I do think that we have allowed for the world to inform our anthropology.

And part of maturing in the faith is not some gnostic knowledge, like a higher knowledge of anthropology, but it's just saying, well, I grew up thinking everything was physical because of this Western society I live in.

But there's a lot of stuff that don't have physical causation or there's no clear ideology for your body. And that is where we have to grow and say, look, maybe there is a soul issue and maybe there is a mind issue.

And pastors, if they're not careful, they can just, in a very trite and unhelpful way, can just say, well, I don't know, like go talk to the therapist about it. Go talk to your counselor. I'm not really sure what's going on.

And that pastor, they should feel a compulsion not to be everyone's counselor, but to grow in a depth of understanding the scripture and interpreting these problems through the lens of what the scripture says about these problems.

Do you think psychologists and psychiatrists and therapists have anything to offer? In other words, things like data collection?

I do. I actually think there is a third level benefit because people will normally push back and say, yo, Dr. G, are you saying there's no benefit from a therapist counselor? And I don't say that in the book.

I've never said that there's no benefit. I said there is potential benefit at managing symptoms. So just think it through. So John, if you're meeting with an unbelieving psychologist, they don't even have like a close worldview.

No soul, no afterlife, no need for redemption. What does forgiveness actually mean? Like that psychologist is just totally void on really big and fundamental things. But they can teach you breathing patterns.

They can teach you how to like focus in the room and focus on different objects, which is like fruit swapping to a degree and helping with symptom relief. But even that symptom relief may not be excavating the cause of what's going on.

Like, yeah, you've learned to breathe, but you never got at the root of why you have anxiety in the first place. So yeah, what is the benefit? It's usually at that level. It's at the level of symptom relief and symptom management.

But sometimes that symptom is still not eradicated because you never dealt with the root cause.

I want to switch gears if you're fine with it, because I know we only have a few minutes left. But the SBC, the largest Protestant denomination in the country, had a, how do I put this into a nutshell, a bout with the Me Too movement that essentially revolutionized and changed some things in the denomination.

And The Federalist just ran a story that I wrote about this, because recently there was a development where one of the cases, which was one of the star cases, ended up being, it was revealed in some discovery in a court case, that there had been a lot of romantic letters between a quote unquote victim and her quote unquote abuser.

And this was framed as an abuse situation. So the reason I want to bring you into this is the largest Protestant denomination made a lot of sweeping changes as a result of stories and a narrative that, some of which has turned out not to be accurate.

One of the things they're still doing, though, is they have a hotline for if you have an abuse situation, an abuse complaint, and you need whatever, you need therapy, you need help, you can call this hotline.

And the hotline is for the Evangelical Council for Abuse Prevention. And one of the things on this hotline or on this website where the hotline is housed, I was reading an article there, is they say that, and this is a direct quote, pastors don't have affairs with parishioners.

And the reason they say that is because they say David did not have an affair with Bathsheba. They say that if you are in a power dynamic where you have authority, you're an abuser, that person that you have the relationship with is the victim.

It's not really adultery. And they also say that you should essentially believe someone because in a preponderance of evidence, 50 -50, you should lean towards the fact that the person making an accusation is probably telling the truth.

So all that said, from a counseling perspective, someone comes into your office, talks about abuse situation, right, and all of the things that go along with that, mental health issues, they say. How does a pastor frame this?

Because there's like three options at least that I see you could do. You could call the police. You could outsource it to the psychiatrist or the therapist or whatever to get over this or to help manage the pain that this has caused you.

You could, as a pastor, counsel them from the Bible. But there's also this element of has there been a crime and not knowing. And so it's incredibly complex. And now we have major Christian denominations trying to navigate this.

How do you navigate that? Because it always starts, the genesis is always someone's making an accusation and saying they've had harm against them and they have problems because of it.

Yeah.

Well, I mean, John, this is like one of the most super complicated problems of our time, you know. Thanks for throwing me an easy one here, bro. First of all, I think I've been a part of maybe eight to ten situations like this in pastoring and counseling.

And there is no winner. There's no winner in these situations. I work with an organization called ACBC. It's the Association of Certified Biblical Counselors. And it was two years ago I presented a lecture.

And in that lecture I talked about, you know, marital separations and divorce. And I think sometimes we view it as like there's the good guy, like there's the firefighter that's going to run into the house and rescue out the abused person.

And then the firefighter is the hero and the abused person loves them. And the reality is when you're in the thick of it and ministering to people that are legitimately being abused and there's an abuser, it's not like that.

It's like you are in a bunker and the enemy is on all sides. And you're trying your best to love everybody biblically that's involved, confront sin accurately, and care for those that are being sinned against.

So as the listener and viewer, it's like we have to just be very gracious and very thoughtful. Abuse situations are super gnarly, super gnarly. And regularly is it not just like this beautiful firefighter rescued you and now you're restored back.

There's a lot of damage and so forth that's done. Okay, so to your options, yes, anything illegal, pastors are reporting. Like you don't have a choice. You're a mandated reporter. And all of our congregants know that, at least implicitly.

It's like if you hear of crime happening, this is not a choice, but this is a requirement. And as a pastor, I would encourage any pastors listening, like you're documenting well and you're getting that police report card that you went and you had to file, and you're keeping that to help protect your church.

And it's not always a popular decision, but it's something that is not even a choice. And then I'm trying to help protect those that are claiming that they are abused. And we're being discerning and we're providing wise, prudent counsel.

And some pastors that have never interacted with this type of situation, seriously, they should work with an experienced biblical counselor who has walked through these situations before. Because there are some things that you can really do wrong in a situation like this and not only hurt that person, hurt yourself and hurt your ministry impact.

So I think if you get overwhelmed, I would look to an ACBC, a biblicalcounseling .com, or I would even encourage people, I help lead Transform Biblical Counseling. Reach out to us and then we could say, hey, here are some people that have worked and walked through this situation.

So that would be the second thing. I would be very careful to outsource to an unbeliever because the unbeliever has a totally different worldview, a totally different perspective of sin. And what do we mean by biblical expectations and relationships as opposed to boundaries?

Like an unbeliever is going to start to say things like cancel and toxic and self-protection. And a lot of those things seem right, but they're 80 off, 20 onto something. And so that's why I would say be very careful outsourcing to an unbeliever.

And then the last thing is, please don't just say, hey, I gave you the LMFT's number. I gave you the LPC's number. We'll be praying for you. Let us know how that's going. Shepherds have a responsibility to help shepherd people through these nuanced circumstances.

And I think if you bail in these very sensitive times of life as a pastor, then what happens over time is that shepherding muscle that you think you have is slowly atrophy. And people are just going to slowly see you as not helpful in a time of real need and crisis.

Whereas if you are actually present and guiding and speaking truth into situations and meeting with people, which all takes time, then what happens is your ministry effectiveness continues to grow. So not only do you care for this family, but you have loved them well and you have cultivated trust with all of those involved in that circumstance, which further helps you stay faithful in the church that you're at.

Whereas if you're seen as being like, no, he punted and sent me to the LPC, and now he just texts me occasionally and says he's praying for me, I really do think your ministry effectiveness is going to be undermined by that.

Identity in Christ and the Freedom of the Gospel

So good. I think a lot of the Me Too stuff ended up creating an environment where people took on an abuse identity. So it became part of who they were, whether legitimate or not. They could have, in the case of Jennifer Lyle, which is the one I was referencing earlier, they could have had an affair for 12 years and then framed it as, well, this person had an authority, they were an authority.

Therefore, I am an abused person and I need mental help. I need all kinds, maybe medication. But it's like this identity you can never get out of. You feel trapped. And I know that I've met other addicts, and not that that's not an addiction, but I've met addicts who speak in similar ways.

Like I was an alcoholic. I'm always an alcoholic, right? AA does this. Maybe help us with that a little, because sometimes it is legitimate. Obviously, there's a lot of real abuse situations where someone really hurts someone, but this becomes a hang-up for the rest of their life, and they define themselves by it.

Is that biblical?

Well, I mean, think of the way we identify as Christians. And biblically, our identity is not in what we do and what others do to us, but our identity is in Christ. Ephesians 1, we're in him, we're redeemed, adopted, predestined, or we are outside of Christ.

And there is no other ground for identity. And that includes good things too, like father, husband, pastor, author, podcaster. Those are not our identity either. So the sins committed against us are not our identity in that way.

And if you have been abused, the identity that you have is in Christ, not in what that person did to you. And that's the freedom that you have. And think of the beauty then of when we say that Christ has the old past away and all things become new, I am not controlled by my past, and I'm not controlled by what someone did to me.

And for someone that's been abused, like you wrestle with feeling dirty, feeling violated, feeling foolish. And what the hope of that person, what they need to hear is that your identity in Christ and the resources you have in Christ, God's spirit, his word, his church, all of that sets you free and that you're not stuck in what that person did to you.

So I would want to be very careful in how I said that, which is we can find the identity. Any of us can find our identity in the wrong thing. And the hope of the scripture is that we find our identity in what it really is in, which is in the person and work of Christ.

The Sufficiency of Scripture Over Secular Therapy

Well, let me switch gears a little bit. I appreciate you allowing me to pick your brain on the Me Too stuff. What's the most important thing that you're hoping people take or things from your book, Lies My Therapist Told Me?

I would hope people would at least zoom out for a second. And I am not trying to shatter a worldview in three pages. But if you're discerning, just moderately discerning, and your 11-year-old was diagnosed without any medical procedure, any medical testing, shouldn't we just pause and say, huh, is that really a medical issue?

In all fairness, if you've been diagnosed with anxiety, and the Bible uses the term anxiety a lot, Philippians 4, Matthew 6, 1 Peter 5. So if I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder, and there was no medical testing to do so, as a Christian, I would at least want to go, oh, that is interesting.

How do they know I have this medical issue if they didn't do any type of medical testing to verify I have this issue? And that's where I would like Christians to just say, look, hey, look, you don't have to agree with me, and you don't have to come to the same conclusions.

But I would at least pause when your school psychologist says, we'd like to have your child tested. I would at least pause and say, huh, and how will you test them? And I would at least pause when my medical doctor says, I think you have depression.

And I say, well, hey, you didn't do any labs. You didn't scan my brain. You don't know anything about my physiology. What makes you come to that conclusion? And the discerning Christian, and remember, the book isn't written towards those that are nonbelievers.

The discerning Christian is going to start to say something like, yeah, that is interesting. There was no medical proof. So what might the Bible actually have to say of this? And that unlocks this whole field of biblical counseling.

That's my world.

That's the world that I live in.

It's like, oh, hey, the Bible does actually talk about depression and anxiety and ADHD and abuse and the complicated things like addiction, totally. So instead of me just defaulting to naturalistic worldview, I'm going to actually move and say, huh, what does the Bible have to say?

And my thesis is the Bible has better answers. The Bible has superior answers. So let the diagnostic inflation right now, one in five of the mental illness, one in 10 on psychotropics, let that lead us to say, hey, what if we gave the Bible a shot?

And I think if you do, you'll see the Bible actually has not just okay answers, but actually superior answers.