Is There Such A Thing As Creationist Counseling? | The Institute for Creation Research

 
Is There Such A Thing As Creationist Counseling?

Recent decades have seen a plethora of Christian counseling centers and ministries spring up around the country. Now, almost every Christian college or seminary, as well as most large churches, include a Christian counseling program.

Unfortunately, these well-intentioned programs frequently miss the mark. Most "credentialed" psychologists, capable of teaching at the university/college level, acquired their doctorates at secular universities—almost without exception based on humanism or New Age concepts. Christian students in such universities are seldom immune from this error, and all too often merely attach Bible verses or concepts to anti-Biblical philosophies. The result? A soft-peddling of sinful practices and passing of personal responsibility for wrong choices onto others.

Heightening this state of confusion is lack of belief in the early chapters of Genesis on the part of counselors trained at even the most prestigious evangelical schools, but almost all Christian doctrine is based on those concepts. What happens when a counselor substitutes any form of theistic evolution or "long day" semi-creation for true Biblical creation?

Consider the heartbroken husband who is watching his dear, Christian wife dying a long, painful death from cancer. Or the parents whose little girl was just destroyed by a drunk driver. Or the one whose once-vibrant parent is stricken with Alzheimer's Disease? What could an evolutionary-based counselor possibly have to say to address these problems?

You see, evolution holds that suffering and death are "good," and have been on earth for hundreds of millions of years, long before man. In fact, it was the death of the "unfit" which was paralleled by "survival of the fittest" and allowed man to evolve from the animals. In evolution, our ancestors possessed animal desires fueled by animal instincts; thus, evolution is specifically used to justify sinful behavior. How do Christian counselors who believe in any form of evolution or old-earth concepts deal with these issues?

The Bible explicitly says that in the beginning all things were "very good" (Genesis 1:31), with no death, no carnivorous activity. Sin entered, and now all is dying (Romans 8:20-22). From Genesis we learn who God is, who man is, where death, disease, and our sin nature come from, and God's standards for the way we should live.

Today we live in a cursed world, dominated by sin, sinful people, and sinful choices. Disease, pain, and death are not natural; they result from man's rejection of God's plan. God is not responsible. In fact, He even died to pay sin's penalty and remove the curse (Revelation 21:4; 22:3). Creation will one day be restored to the way God intended.

This is the message of hope and purity made possible for those who go "Back to Genesis" and build their counseling methods on God's truth, not evolution.

*Dr. John Morris is the President of ICR.

Cite this article: John D. Morris, Ph.D. 1996. Is There Such A Thing As Creationist Counseling?. Acts & Facts. 25 (1).

The Latest
NEWS
Did Teeth First Evolve as Sensory Tissue?
One of the mysteries of evolution (there are so many) is the origin of teeth. The past few years have witnessed a remarkable flurry of research...

NEWS
''The Flood of Death'': A Mass Dino Grave in Canada
Paleontologists in Alberta, Canada, have recently unearthed “a mass grave on a monumental scale.”1 The BBC story speaks of Thousands...

CREATION PODCAST
The 100th Episode of The Creation Podcast! | Let's Talk About...
What role do in-person events play for a creation science ministry? How can you host an event through ICR? Are these events still important...

NEWS
Bone, Skin, Claw Lasted…150 Million Years?
Experts and educators have long assumed Archaeopteryx represents a transition from theropod dinosaurs to modern birds. All of this speculation depends...

NEWS
How Did Earth Get Its Water?
Earth’s oceans contain 321 million cubic miles (1.335 billion cubic kilometers) of water. The moon causes ebb and flow of tides twice in a 24-hour...

NEWS
New Fossil Discovery Upends Animal Evolution...Again
Reptiles belong to a group of animals called amniotes that also include birds and mammals. A new Australian fossil discovery of a clawed amniote demonstrates...

NEWS
100% Cicada Fossil
Cicadas are an unusual-looking insect belonging to the order Hemiptera (the true bugs, including bed bugs and aphids). If you live in the eastern United...

CREATION PODCAST
Earth’s Origins: Science, Theology, and a New Geology Textbook...
Since the late eighteenth century, most scientists have argued for a uniformitarian view of Earth’s history. They claim the world...

NEWS
June 2025 ICR Wallpaper
"He has made everything beautiful in its time. Also He put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from...

CREATION.LIVE PODCAST
Getting the Gospel into People's Hands | Creation.Live Podcast:...
Can God use an atheist airline pilot to reach other nations with the truth of the Gospel? The answer, obviously, is yes.   Host...