Four Models of Counseling
Col. 1:27,28
Case Study - Pastor Baro is fresh out of seminary. He realizes that several Pastors in his district use different styles of counseling. He sees strength in the prophetic type of counseling approach as he likes to challenge people with the commands of Christ. He admires a strong counselor’s ability to go straight to the point with counselee’ problems. However, he is afraid that the prophetic counselor model is a bit too confrontational for some of his people. He has heard of several instances where a Pastor-counselor set out to command the counselee to change or risk excommunication. In fact, many church members have left the church where one Pastor uses the prophetic style of counseling because they insist that this Pastor shows little love for them.
Pastor Yusufu has considered adopting the priestly style of merciful counseling model. He likes the fact that many church members are fond of Pastors who comfort their members during times of heartaches, loss, or sickness. He sees the merciful counselor role as very much like Jesus Christ’s counseling - understanding, empathetic, and consoling. However, he is afraid that the merciful Pastor is too sensitive to the needs of the people. He has often heard that one of the Pastor’s from his village area was too quick to side with the people’s experiential views and was discipline by his district headquarters. Pastor Yusufu wants to be merciful but is afraid of compromising any of the truths of the scripture. He thinks that too much of an indirect approach to counseling in his culture will be construed as weak, innocuous, and unclear leadership.
Pastor John feels that it is important to exhort people to love and good works, so he takes a practical approach to counseling. Pastor John believes that this interactive style of counseling offers people down to earth practical solutions to their problems. As he has observed practical counselors are often the most effective since they know how to use their cultural insights in Christian counseling. However, Pastor John is afraid that the practical approach to counseling may be a bit too positive and optimistic. Furthermore, he is leery of being so practical that he offers nothing more than just common sense advice. Pastor John has a keen desire to see that a balanced point is presented to his counselee. He does not want to offer practical wisdom to people who are not fully clear about their entire responsibilities before God. He wants to see a strong follow-up ministry through his counseling, but he knows that certain people will respond better to a teaching style of counseling.
Finally, Pastor Adamu likes be very accurate in teaching his counselee from the scripture. He likes to take groups of people to the scriptures allowing the counselee to see how the scriptures can provide needed answers to every problem in life. Pastor Adamu would rather teach principles of the scripture than offer specific advice about personal problems. Pastor Adamu believes that the Holy Spirit is the best counselor whose role should not be usurped. He wholeheartedly subscribes to 2 Tim. 3:16,17 which puts much emphasis on the scriptures capacities to teach, correct, reprove, and train for righteousness. However, since he was not a great student in seminary, he realizes that many of his people struggle to read, interpret, and analyze the deeper truths of the Bible. He also has seen that too much attention to details in the scripture will disallow him from understanding how he can integrate his knowledge of other disciplines into his counseling.
Overall, each of the four Pastors have discovered that they struggle to learn how to balance the four models of counseling:
1). Prophetic - Confrontational 12:00 P.M.
2). Priestly - Compassionate 9:00 P.M.
3). Practical - Interactive 6:00 P.M.
4). Teaching - Educative 9:00 A.M.
Each of the four models of counseling have their strengths and weaknesses, but we need to see how we can use the roles, responsibilities, and identities to maximize our counseling ministry. Since counseling requires different roles and responsibilities for different people and situations, the four models of counseling provide us with four corners of a square to build our foundations for an effective ministry.
As each family, organization, and institution will tend to take on the characteristics of its leader, the balance of the four models provides the broadest kind of identifications as possible for various needs. The four poles of the counseling model can be seen as a clock or cycle that is necessary at different times and circumstances. Whenever we are stuck on one point on the clock we will quickly get out of touch with our people. But as long as we allow our counseling to cycle through the various roles we will keep in step with the changing needs of people, their problems, and their cultural changes.
The following scale is used to help you determine your strengths and weaknesses in your counseling style. Answer the following questions as true or false as honesty as you can.
1. Prophetic - Confrontational
a). Do you tend to exhibit authority in counseling? True or False
b). Do you tend to place strong demands on your counselee? True or False
c). Do you tend to stress the importance of holiness? True or False
d). Do you tend to insist on the importance of prayer? True or False
e). Do you tend to emphasize accountability in your counseling? True or False
f). Do you tend to urge people to have a low tolerance for carnality or world living? True or False
g). Do you tend to be black and white in your approach to counseling? True or False
h). Do you tend to avoid people of the consequences of wrong decisions? True or False
i). Do you tend to ignore people’s criticism of your confrontational style of counseling? True or False
j). Do you tend to see your counseling as a way of sounding forth the word of truth from God? True or False
2. Priestly - Compassionate
a). Do you tend to exhibit a compassionate approach when counseling? True or False
b). Do you tend to feel great sympathy for the problems of your counselee? True or False
c). Do you tend to feel a super sensitivity to the hurts, heartaches, and problems of your counselee? True or False
d). Do you tend to identify closely with the pains felt by your counselee? True or False
e). Do you tend to be too sensitive at times allowing your emotions to get the better of you occasionally? True or False
f). Do you tend to avoid heavy confrontations? True or False
g). Do you find that gray areas or unclear issues do not bother you like they do others? True or False
h). Do you delight in God’s promises of forgiveness and comfort for the afflicted? True or False
i). Do you find yourself inspiring your counselee with the great love, hope, and mercy found in Jesus Christ? True or False
j). Do you feel that preachers can often times be too dogmatic and insistent on certain points of scripture at the expense of others? True or False
3. Practical - Interactive
a). Do you tend to emphasize practical solutions to the problems of your counselee? True or False
b). Do you tend to get bored with lengthy explanations of your counselee? True or False
c). Do you prefer that your counselee go straight to the point on the most essential root causes of their problems? True or False
d). Do you like to relate truth through stories and illustrations that are practical? True or False
e). Do you like to see practical assignments accomplished by your counselee? True or False
f). Do you find being liked and accepted by your counselee is very important to you? True or False
g). Do you tend to emphasize common sense and practical uses of wisdom in your counseling? True or False
h). Do you like to exhort your counselee to love and good works? True or False
i). Do you see your counselee problems in practical terms that can be dealt best with practical solutions? True or False
j). Do you have a hard time listening to detailed explanations and giving detailed advice to your counselee, preferring the straight forward approach? True or False
4. Teaching - Educational
a). Do you like to investigate all the details on your counselee’ case studies? True or False
b). Do you find yourself absorbed in the search for just the right kind of scriptural approach to present to your counselee? True or False
c). Do you enjoy spending time teaching your counselee truth accurately? True or False
d). Do you tend to spend a lot of time explaining each angle of the interpretations of different passage of scripture? True or False
e). Do you find you are gifted in clear thought and communication of the truth? True or False
f). Do you want to present the whole counsel of God with clarity, accuracy, and in detail so that the counselee really understand everything? True or False
g). Do you tend to be theoretical more than practical in your approach to counseling:? True or False
h). Do you pull away from over simplifying the truth of scripture? True or False
i). Do you love to see your counselee teach others the scripture in the same detail, attention to principles, and careful with every word? True or False
j). Do you find yourself spending lots of time reading and researching the best way to clarify your counselee’ problems? True or False
Now total up the number of true statements from each of the four groups. Then circle the number on the following graph and make a square box out of the four points. A small example is given to show you how one man scored himself on the above counselor’s inventory:
A Holistic Approach To Counseling
12:00 0’Clock Priestly-Compassionate
Enabler Nurturer
9:00 O’Clock Teacher
3:00 O’ClockPractical - Interacter
Expressor Stimulator
6:00 O’Clock
Prophetic-Confrontationist
Now that you have drawn your evaluations of your strengths and weakness as a counselor, let’s analyze the results. First, if you find that you are strong in the prophetic-confrontational model you are probably needing help in becoming more merciful and compassionate. If you are, however, strong in teaching you may find you need to balance more of your style with more listening and personal interactions. If we would consider Jesus Christ, we would have to put Him as a 10 on all four scales producing the largest and perfectly balanced counselor. However, since we are not gifted and complete like Christ we will continue to look to Him for our strength, guidance, and enablement in becoming more mature in all aspects.
Secondly, some of you may have noticed that you are strong in two areas like prophetic and teaching but weak in two other areas like priestly and interactive. This may indicate a lot about who you are regarding as your role models for an effective counselor. The role model for the teacher and the prophetic counselor is an EXPRESSOR. This will help you to see how to balance out your natural tendencies to preach and teach with more a nurturing style. A nurturer tends to be more compassionate as he provides the social, spiritual, and mentoring nourishment needed for the counselee’s growth.
Thirdly, if you tend to combine the interactive and prophetic styles of counseling this would indicate that you generally like to stimulate your counselee to action. As a motivator you are very concerned with practical applications. Wise counsel offered in the form of common sense expressions is your favorite way of helping to solve counselee problems.
Finally, if you combine compassionate and teaching roles of a counselor you are known as an enabler. By trying to facilitate your counselee success, you looks for ways and the authority to help your counselee solve their problems. Your enabling style is very popular since you are willing to go the extra mile to assist, comfort, and work allow side of your counselors.
The best counselors are able to combine the best of all four styles of counseling in a way that facilitates the person’s growth through the will of God. By challenging people to learn how to teach, preach, comfort, and exhort others through counseling ministries, one finds the highest level of satisfaction!
