In all my years of writing, I’ve never received as many significant responses to anything as last December’s article “What My Psychiatrist Never Told Me” (available at www.ministerialassociation.com).
Most of these interactions have come “below the radar” in the form of affirmation, comments, questions, dialogue, and a couple severe criticisms that I would admit to seeing a therapist or that the denomination would permit me to reveal such a horrible and secret shame.
However, behind most of the feedback and questions that have come over the past few months has been the recurring query, How would someone know if they needed to see a professional therapist? Typically this question has been preceded by, “Of course, I haven’t experienced a tragedy like your sudden loss of your brother and friends in a plane crash, but . . .”
I have decided to return to this subject for precisely the reasons that seem to lie behind these questions. How does someone know when they need help beyond their spouse, their friends, their church family, and their personal prayer and devotional life?
Have we attached so much shame and prohibition to the process of seeking counsel that real needs are not being addressed and pastoral caregivers are attempting to help individuals even as they remain deeply wounded and untreated themselves?
In “Pastor, Deal With Your ‘Soul Holes,’ ”1 a recent anonymously written article, a minister of more than two decades describes confronting his own traumas while serving as a pastoral counselor during the aftermath of the Oklahoma City bombings. “After each meeting, the care teams were required to debrief with a psychologist. I remember thinking, What a waste of time to debrief with this shrink. I’m around death and dying frequently as a pastor. I don’t need debriefing.”
He continues, “After all, we pastors have to be tough. Pain, sorrow, trauma, and conflict are commonplace in our lives. Nothing sticks to our Teflon hearts. I’d referred a boatload of neurotic parishioners to psychologists over the years, but I didn’t need one. I was a counselor . . . But after nearly a quarter century of church work, I began to see my own need for therapy. For years I’d wrestled with free-floating anger, which would pop up as irritability, defensiveness, a need ‘to win,’ sarcasm, condescending speech, restlessness, and other symptoms.”
A sidebar to this penetrating article lists seven signs, any one of which may indicate the need to talk to a reputable, professional counselor to discover if inner issues might be holding you back in your ministry’s effectiveness:
1. You have frequent, low-grade anger and/or feel defensive and irritable.
2. You feel depressed about ministry and life and/or experience mood swings.
3. You wrestle with addictive behaviors: alcohol, drugs, sex, or others.
4. You pursue workaholism, justifying it out of need or ambition.
5. You recognize traumatic events in your past, but you’ve never discussed them openly with a counselor.
6. You’re in frequent conflict with others at home and at work.
7. You have marital or parenting problems that don’t go away. When others mention them, you dismiss the topic or the person.
Noting the intimate connection between our mental and physical health, Ellen White stated, “The relation that exists between the mind and the body is very intimate. When one is affected, the other sympathizes. The condition of the mind affects the health to a far greater degree than many realize. Many of the diseases from which men suffer are the result of mental depression. Grief, anxiety, discontent, remorse, guilt, distrust, all tend to break down the life forces and to invite decay and death.”2
Our anonymous pastoral writer continues (and perhaps his choice to remain anonymous says something significant about the scope of this challenge), “Pride kept me from seeking help in those times when I wondered if I might benefit from the perspectives of a trained professional. My roles as a ‘tough’ pastor and a Bible know-it-all made it even more difficult for me to admit my need for help.”
In his conclusion, “Embracing My Weaknesses,” he says, “Paul’s writing to the Corinthians has come to make more sense than ever: So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong (2 Cor. 12:9, 10). I used to think that health was a matter of embracing my strengths and pretending I had no significant soul holes. I’ve come to realize that only when I’m willing and able to embrace my weaknesses as well as strengths can I ever hope to become healthy.”
I’ve concluded that the strongest thing we can do is to get the help we need.
1 “Pastor, Deal With Your ‘Soul Holes,’ ” Rev! Magazine (January/February 2006), 134.
2 Ellen G. White, The Ministry of Healing (Mountainview, CA: Pacifi c Press Publishing Association, 1942), 241.
