How to Counsel God s Way. Study Guide

Transcription

1 How to Counsel God s Way Study Guide Introduction 1. They (churches and church leaders) are relying more and more on and less and less on the of the of. 2. What is the two-fold approach of the book stated by the author? Chapter 1 1. What is the irreplaceable starting point for counseling God s way? 2. How does the author describe true counseling? 3. As David trusted in the Lord to and his life, he allowed God to function as his. 4. What is the common tendency in seeking counsel? 5. How do we express our dependence upon Him? 6. Where in Isaiah does it state that God is our Wonderful Counselor? Reference 7. What verse answers the question, how wonderful would the Lord be as a counselor? Verse and reference 8. What does counseling involve? 9. What are the major implications of this fundamental truth that the Lord is the counselor? Chapter 2 1. What is necessary to establish a biblical perspective on counseling? 2. True godly counseling must be related to the. 3. How can the attempt to remove the edge off the pain of a situation be a negative thing? 4. What are the benefits of allowing needs to arise in our hearts? 5. What are the two terms of discipleship? 6. What is the obstacle to following Jesus? 7. Why is self-esteem counseling considered to be 180% off course?

2 Chapter 3 1. Define what sanctification means. 2. What does the truth of future sanctification build in a believer s life? 3. How does Sanctification differ from psychological theory? 4. As we counsel, we are not looking at helping people cope or helping them indulge their own desires. What do we want to assist them to do? Chapter 4 1. In what ways does God use to get His counsel to us? 2. There are eight abilities of the Word of God described in Psalm 19:7-11. What are they? 3. What are the six characteristics of the Word mentioned in Psalm 19:7-11? 4. What is the kingdom of God founded upon? Where is it revealed? 5. What is essential to making God s Word reality in our lives? 6. What is essential for a believer to function as a genuine disciple of Jesus Christ? 7. There is in the truth of the Word of God. 8. Every Christian comes out of the spiritual grave of sin and death and blindness with numerous layers of. 9. What is required if we want to see others living for God s glory rather than their own? 10. According to the author what is the more accurate name for social sciences? What explanation does he provide? 11. What is the tragedy of All truth is God s truth? 12. The author states that all Christians should be like the Bereans of Acts 17:11. Why? 13. What is the primary fallacy in the all truth is God s truth cliché? 14. What are we to rely on in order to counsel God s way? 15. The Word of God stresses the, but it also clearly identifies that which is. Chapter 5 1. What is a more accurate translation of the term Helper?

3 2. What are the two fundamental types of counseling we should be ready to give? 3. Describe the role of the Holy Spirit in every counseling session. 4. In what manner should ministry and counseling be done? 5. How does man s earthly concepts compare to the heavenly, life-giving, life-changing words from God? 6. How does the author answer the cliché Life s problems are too complex today to be using only the Bible and the Holy Spirit? Chapter 6 1. What is the third means in which God makes His counsel available? 2. What does prayer express? 3. What is the safest and most reliable prayer of all? Why? 4. List and explain the two prayers of Paul that are mentioned for those who are seeking or giving counsel. 5. When we offer counsel what is the goal for people to see and become? Chapter 7 1. What does the reference to church life refer to? 2. What is Nouthetic Counseling? 3. In 2 Corinthians 1:3-4 the word comfort in the original is from the verb parakaleo. What does it mean or speak of? 4. In order to understand whether a person should receive confrontation or grace what must we consider? 5. What does the law of God reveal, what does it demand, and what is its great purpose? 6. What is the highest purpose of the grace of God? 7. Summarize Sections One and Two. Provide the key points mentioned in those two sections (chapters 1-7). Chapter 8 1. Who should be involved in the counseling ministry? What verse supports this? 2. Where does the competency to counsel come from?

4 3. Who are the true experts in counseling? 4. What verses give insight into the provision of God to develop expert counselors? 5. What type of gifts are those that are mentioned in Romans 12:6? What do they allow the recipients to do? 6. A physical branch cannot bear physical fruit unless it draws its life from the vine. How does this apply to counseling? 7. The vine is the 8. What must people seeking counsel find in the one they are seeking counsel from? 9. What is the result of counsel with a loveless heart? 10. What is the primary fruit of the Spirit? 11. Since we had to receive spiritual life from the Holy Spirit in order to be born again, how should we now walk? 12. How should the entire life in Christ be undertaken? 13. What should be guiding our prayer life? 14. How can every believer have their usefulness greatly enhanced? Chapter 9 1. What verse sets forth the basic arrangement that God instituted for equipping us for the ministries to which He has called us? 2. What does equipping speak of? 3. Saints refers to whom? 4. Equipping through the word must be seen as and. 5. What does it mean that all of the Scriptures are inspired by God? 6. In 2 Timothy 3:16-17 Paul describes what the Word does in believers lives. What are the four key words and what do they mean? 7. What must one do that desires to be used of God to counsel His way? 8. God calls His servants to be in the word, taking time to it, on it, about its meaning, and its implications. 9. What is one of the more important benefits that derive from being equipped by the Scriptures? 10. What are the safeguards for spiritual ministry? 5 things 11. What is the heart of what growing is all about?

5 12. The grace of the Lord is what He supplies to all who look to Him. 13. God s grace includes daily and and. 14. What is the greatest need all of us have? Chapter Compare the heating of gold ore to how God uses circumstances in our lives. 2. In James1:2-4, it does not say trials will come but they come. 3. When times are tough, God wants us to fully rely upon this truth. What is the truth? 4. We need to that the testing of our faith produces. 5. In trials, our flesh is, while our faith is. 6. What is the difference between how psychological theory and God deal with the flesh? 7. In 2 Corinthians 1:9 what are the three words that assure us that our seemingly futile trials can head toward a valuable conclusion? 8. Why does God put us in extreme situations? 9. After the necessary suffering has run its course, God Himself concludes the entire process by imparting those effects that only He can produce. He us, making us more mature spiritually. He us, granting us more assurance in our Christian walk. He us, leaving us more forfeited by the resources of Christ. He us, giving us a more settled relationship with Him. 10. What is the three-fold promise God gives us in the very ways in which we are needy? 11. Apart from the Lord living in us and working through us, we cannot adequately produce what life demands or what God demands. How is this humbling and liberating? 12. What does experiencing God s guidance involve? 3 things 13. Who are those that qualify as recipients of the might that comes from God? 14. Why do too many struggling men and women fail to find the strength they are desperately searching for?

6 15. Whenever we acknowledge our lack of and admit that God must be our, waiting upon the Lord becomes the means of access to His. 16. What does waiting on the Lord involve? 3 things 17. What must occur if our faith is to grow and develop? 18. How are the people of God able to run with endurance the race that is set before them? 19. What is the great way to be prepared to counsel others? Chapter Where should all ministry flow from? 2. What should we depend upon to guide and work in the counseling situation? 3. What aspect of counseling does Philippians 4:6 support? 4. What aspect of counseling does Proverbs 18:13 support? 5. What is God s highest priority for man? 6. What does following Jesus as a disciple involve? 2 things 7. What should be the paramount aspect of any counseling situation? Why? 8. What sets biblical counseling a world apart from man s opinions and suggestions and theories? 9. What is the key to being used in counseling? 10. What does the Holy Spirit bring to remembrance? 11. What causes a growing reservoir of truth to develop in our hearts? 12. What should our goal be in counseling others? 13. What is biblical meditation? Chapter What are the three terms used in reference to identification? 2. What are the two heavenly realities which enable people to increasingly live as Christ-like overcomers? 3. What does the gift of righteousness allow sinful sons of Adam to do? 4. What was the divine dynamic at work in Paul s life that made him the effective and victorious Christian that he became? Where in Scripture is that found?

7 5. Only the and can provide a new, liberating, growing, abundant life in His Son. 6. What is Romans 7 about? 7. Any good in our lives must be a result of the work of the of imparting His goodness into and through the new heart of a new creature in. 8. Describe the three ways Jesus is our Total Deliverer. 9. What is the weakness of the law of God? 10. How does Jesus do what the law never could? 11. Where in Scripture is the reason why walking according to the Spirit has such a radical impact upon our experience? 12. Where are the foundational identification truths found? 13. All of man s problems are related to his beginning in the fallen family of race. 14. All of God s remedies for man are found in the provisions available in. 15. How does the Lord deal with the old man in Adam? 16. He creates in Christ a new man through a in His resurrection. 17. We must decide continually whether we will, depending on man s natural capacities, or, relying upon God s supernatural resources. Chapter How can one find out who they truly are? 2. Where in Scripture do we see that Christians receive an entirely new identity? 3. Where in Scripture do we see the Lord described as the True Vine? 4. Why does the Lord give us insight into our spiritual identity? 5. What is the result if we live in dependence upon our vine? 6. What is the basis for experiencing life abundant? 7. All who follow the Lord must be willing to say to the independent self-life. 8. The encouraging, instructive, and faith-building message of who we are in Christ should lead to, not to.

8 9. Even though we have identities, we no longer have identities. 10. As believers in Jesus Christ what is our identity based upon? 11. Who we are in Christ leaves us in an amazing position. How does the author describe this position? Chapter Where in Scripture does God direct us to be transformed by the renewing of your mind.? 2. What does the spirit of our mind involve? 3. What is the result when we view our lives as our own? 4. Describe the sequence found in Romans 12 that leads to such a delightful result? Chapter What are the three major biblical facts related to spiritual warfare that are critical for Christian living and for giving godly counsel? 2. What is our struggle against? Where is that found in Scripture? 3. What does the lust of the flesh include? What happens to these through the enemy s influence? 4. What does the lust of the eyes include? What happens to these through the devil s deceiving activities? 5. What is the boastful pride of life related to? What happens when man falls for the enemy s temptations regarding this? 6. What is another name for self-esteem? 7. How has Jesus dealt with the bondage of fear of death that the enemy holds humanity in? 8. Where in Scripture do we see Jesus victory over demonic forces? Where did this victory occur? 9. Where in Scripture do we see Jesus victory over the world? 10. As we live dependence upon the Lord, we need not fear what the world can bring against us. Jesus Christ, the over the world, is able to us as we walk in this world.

9 11. What will determine whether we experience the benefits of Christ s victory in our lives? 12. What does Ephesians 6:10-14 call us to do in the victory that Christ has secured? 13. The victory is not ours on the basis of what we can accomplish. It is ours through the work of the one enough to do what was necessary to obtain the for us. 14. Who should our attention be upon? Why? Chapter What is the major threat to counseling God s way? 2. What are the two ways that the church forsakes the Lord? What is the result? 3. The battle comes down to the view we have of the word of God. What are the truths the author asks about God s word? What are the results of us believing them? 4. What danger does James 1:21-22 speak of? 5. What did people hear God say whenever Isaiah 9:6 was read? 6. What did people hear God say whenever Colossians 2:3 was read? 7. What did people hear God say whenever Psalms 19:7-8 & 119:24 were read? 8. What did people hear God say whenever John 14:6 & 16:13 were read? 9. What did people hear God say whenever Romans 5-8 were read? 10. What are the results of believers hearing the word but not doing it? 11. In 1 Timothy 4:1, what is the faith? 12. Explain the simplicity that is in Christ. 13. The simplicity includes the additional fact that all of God s provisions in Christ are available to man through a relationship of faith:. Chapter What is the second of the two major threats to counseling God s way in the church? 2. Christians are not to focus their attention upon things on the earth. What would this involve? What are the results of focusing on things of the earth? 3. Where is the ultimate reason why we must seek heavenly things and not pursue earthly things found? What is the reason?

10 4. What is the self-love myth? What Scripture do the advocators of this theory use to support the theory? 5. What are three errors to the self-love myth interpretation of the main verse they use to support the theory? 6. is God s estimation of the wisdom that comes from man s great thinkers. 7. What are the things listed by the author that transforms lives? 8. What is God s pattern for recovery? 9. What verse offered by the author depicts the drastic differences between the flesh of man and the Spirit of God? 10. Where in Scripture did Jesus speak of the critical contrast between flesh and Spirit? 11. Where in the word of God does it strongly prohibit believers from accepting guidance that is based upon the philosophical speculations of a mind doctor?