Biblical Counseling:
The Challenge of Biblical Counseling

Unfortunately, man has a tendency to measure the good life by successful doing things. In other words, if great accomplishment occurs, man thinks his life will be good. Conversely, if he fails to accomplish great deeds, he perceives his life to be a failure. The good life, however, is not measured in doing deeds. It only occurs in the interaction of people where Christ is experienced. For the greatest of deeds means nothing if it is not shared with someone.

In Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, he illustrated this truth by asking them, ". . . what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing?" He answered the question for them, "Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming?" Then, he simply stated, ". . . ye are our glory and joy" (2:19,20).

As stated in his letter to the Colossians, he said the mystery was Christ in you, the hope of glory. With you being plural, the emphasis is again the experiencing of Christ among the people. The hope of glory, or the hope of experiencing the good life, is encountering Christ in the connections with people. It is the fellowship of the mystery or the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations, but now is made manifest to his saints.

In the Ephesian letter, the fellowship of the mystery is connected by Paul to that "which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ" (3:9). This mystery has its ground of being in the beginning of the created world. In other words, it is connected to how man was originally created. The mystery is inseparably tied to the life that man experiences. It is what makes man to be man

The account of the creation of mankind as recorded in Genesis contains the secret of the mystery of man’s existence. In the expanded version of the creation of man and woman (Genesis 2), God had formed man out of the elements that He had already created and then brought life to the man by placing His Spirit within the inanimate form. After placing the individual man in the Garden of Eden, it is recorded that God passed judgment on the life that the first man was experiencing. God simply stated, "It is not good that the man should be alone . . ." (Gen. 2:18). With alone meaning, "properly, separation; by implication, a part . . . ," man’s life was in part, not completed. Although Adam had a powerful relationship with God (sin had not occurred yet), he was lacking in his fulfillment of life.

It is significant to point out that God does not say of the individual man that he is created in the image of God. Nor, does God say that the individual man was created in the likeness of God. He simply stated that it is not good.

It is only after the second person is created that it could be said that the pair, male and female, was created in the image of God and in the likeness of God. With the creation of the second person and the coming together of the two, it created a third entity of creation, the relationship between the two individual persons. It is only in this relationship between the two that the image of God and the likeness of God can be seen.

Although both the man and the woman experienced life because the Spirit of God dwelled within them, they could not experience the full manifestation (image and likeness) of the life of God until they were brought together to express the essence of God, oneness in threeness. Moreover, since God is a spirit, it would take the non-corporeal relationship to reflect his character. The image and likeness of God could not be exhibited by anything that is material, earthly. There had to be a nonphysical entity that would allow the creature to experience the Creator. The individual earthly pair could experience the heavenly because they could inner into a relationship between them.

The challenge of Biblical counseling is to understand and to address the issues of life that always comes about by the interaction between people.  Not only do the problems of life occur in relationship, the solutions for those problems also occur in relationships.  With man being a social creature, the answers for the successful experiencing of life can only be out in the coming of Jesus in your relationships.