Conflict Within the Person

Person-centered therapy has a trivial view of conflict within the person. That is why it has been described as instinctual utopianism; it suggests perfect inner congruence at the deepest levels for the healthy person. Christianity suggests that our good impulses and our bad impulses, our love for and rebellion against God, are both representative of our true selves. Conflict is real, and goes on in the deepest dimensions of the person. Christianity views conflict as both internal and external, and evident at both the individual and corporate levels.

In person-centered therapy the true self is aware, through the organismic valuing process, of internal needs, but can be totally unaware of anything external like the needs and wants of others. In Christian beliefs, the true self is the person who loves God with all his heart, but still loves others as himself. A more complete understanding of the true self goes beyond self-awareness and subjective experience to a keen awareness and knowledge of others. In a very real sense, we find our identity in being and doing.

The person-centered therapy ideal of health is the person without a past (we are always to live in the now), a person without any need to submit to authority (we are our own ultimate truth), a person without real dependence on anyone else (we contain all our resources within ourselves) and a person with no firm commitment to truth (all meanings are held tentatively and revised according to changing experiences). This sounds a lot like the New Age teaching.

In contrast, Christianity presents humans as having pasts, presents and futures. We are part of a community of faith that has a stable identity. We are not our own gods, rather we submit to the rightful Lord of the universe.

There are absolutes in the Christian faith, but few if any in person-centered therapy, where external authority is seen as obtrusive. Yet we as Christians are profoundly dependent on God: “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gen. 2:18). We also believe in a truth that is constant because it ultimately depends on a truth-speaking God who is “. . . the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). When anyone says, “There are no absolutes!” and that is their teaching, are they not proclaiming an absolute? Isn’t that as much of an absolute as “God is love.”?

Person-centered therapy runs the risk of indifference to or ignorance about the full range of human misery and suffering. Since careful assessment is seen as futile according to this model (because of the emphasis on experiencing), important clinical symptoms can be missed or minimized.

A fundamental flaw in the humanistic and relativistic philosophy behind person-centered therapy is what appears to be a lack of willingness to seriously confront the depravity of persons and the reality of evil (Peck, 1983. People of the Lie.). There is so much focus on affirmation of the person that it seriously neglects those matters for which we are to be held accountable. There is a danger that the person-centered therapist can begin “to view evil as innocuous, worn out, and generally to be dealt with by a wave of the finger and a genteel ‘tsk . . . tsk.’” [C. McLemore, The Scandal of Psychotherapy.] Using explicitly theological terms, the therapist’s approach is a one-sided emphasis on “grace” and how we “image God,” to the neglect of the Law and human sin [J. Ortberg, “Accepting our acceptance: some limitations of a Rogerian approach to the nature of grace,” Journal of Psychology and Christianity, 1, 1981].

Again, the tradition is so hung up on the affirmation of the client that it overlooks self-hate as a source of human suffering. After all, the root of self-hate is the tendency to make more of self than is healthy. We set ourselves up as something to be esteemed or worshipped, as a god, and then we despise ourselves for not meeting up to our own standards. Surely self-love is as much a cause of problems in living as is self-hate [D. Browning, Religious Thought and the Modern Psychologies.]

The similarities between the new psychology and mysticism did not go unnoticed, even by its founding fathers. Maslow placed the transcendent at the top of his list of hierarchical needs. To him, self-actualization could not be complete until his transcendent dimension was satisfied. Neither God nor biblical revelation could satisfy that longing. Maslow was talking about that dimension of an individual that intersected with other spiritual realities of the cosmos. His self-actualized man was truly a man who was full of himself.

Maslow’s influence didn’t stop with his pyramid of hierarchical needs. His notion that human consciousness linked humanity with the fundamental realities of the universe became the basic premise of transpersonal psychology, the newest kid on the humanistic psychology team.

This is not the conclusion of this section, but it is as far as I have gone. I will share next some of the research I have done on the New Age in our schools.

The Four Stages of Church Decline

It's estimated that between 60 and 80 percent of American churches have either plateaued or are in decline. In his new book, Confessions of a Reformission Rev., Mark Driscoll has a section where he talks about the four stages of church decline. It's Monday morning, and a great time to sit back and really consider where your church is at. Read the following stages that Mark discusses and honestly ask yourself, "Which phase are we in?"

Phase 1 - Creative, the dream stageThe creative phase is the beginning of a new church or a new project within the church. This phase is marked by enthusiasm, hope, and numerous ideas that are considered for implementation, which causes momentum. The early days of our church plant were filled with this kind of creative energy, and the young and motivated people in our church were filled with ideas for all that we could do. Once we lost our building, we were thrust into another creative phase as we struggled to survive. And we returned to a creative phase when we acquired the two buildings and were able to again dream of ways to grow our ministry. I noticed that each time we were in a creative phase, our church attracted more entrepreneurial types of skilled leaders who were excited about the opportunity to try something new and make a difference in our city. This indicates that chaos and crisis can be leveraged to a church's benefit.

Phase 2 - Management, the reality stageIn the management phase, the ministry project becomes a reality and requires a great deal of organization, management, and problem solving to make it successful. This phase can be a lot of hard work and is not as enthusiastically pursued because it is tedious and difficult. But without managing the creative ideas, success is not possible. We spent a few years working through very difficult management issues, such as obtaining and renovating facilities, opening a concert venue, maintaining ministry homes, and starting new services. Each of these ministries succeeded, which required increasing management, such as funding, facilities, systems, leaders, theology, and technology. The hope for every church is that they work through their management issues, thereby enabling them to return to the creative phase, where they dream up a new project and enthusiastically undertake it and raise a whole new set of management issues to overcome. Therefore, the goal of the management phase is not to get the church organized or under control. Rather, the management phase is needed to eliminate the inefficiencies and barriers that are keeping the church from refocusing back on the creative phase and creating a whole new set of problems to manage.

Phase 3 - Defensive justification, the failure stageIn the defensive justification phase, something has gone terribly wrong and has failed at the management stage. Or the church succeeded at the management stage but never returned to the creative phase and got stuck with a bunch of well-organized managers running the church but no creative and visionary new ideas to move the church forward. When this phase sets in, the church begins to stall, plateau, and slowly decline. People are less motivated to serve, money is less generously given, and a cloud of lethargy and complaint begins to settle in. This is because some leaders in the church start to act defensively and justify their failures rather than finding creative or management ways to overcome them. In this phase, time, money, and energy are used to explain problems rather than to fix them, which is the primary clue that organizational death is on the horizon unless changes are made. Because the church is in a defensive posture, people start to leave the church, and the best and brightest people are no longer attracted to the church because it has lost sight of any risky mission that calls people to rise up in faith. The peculiar truth of the defensive justification phase is that many of the excuses provided in this season are in fact valid. But whether or not they are valid, the fact remains that they need to be overcome.

Phase 4 - Blaming, the death stageAn organization that remains stuck in the defensive justification phase for too long inevitably then declines to the blaming phase. In the blaming phase, it is obvious that the church or ministry is going to die, and excuses and explanations for the death have been devised. This does not necessarily mean that the church will be closing its doors; effectively dead churches have been known to keep the doors open on Sundays for many years to welcome a handful of people who have no mission. In this phase, the focus of the church is determining who will be blamed for the failure so that another group of people can escape responsibility for the failure. Some churches blame the pastor and fire him, others blame Satan and spiritualize everything, and still others blame the outside culture as being too hard for a church to thrive. Rarely does the leadership of a church in this phase rise up to repent of the things that are preventing the church from returning to the life-giving creative phase, and eventually the church dies. It was precisely this kind of church that gave us the free building after they died.

Mark shares a lot more details and gives some practical ways that his church (Mars Hills Bible Church in Seattle) has continually returned to phase 1; and how they have dealt over the years as they have moved from phase to phase. Mark's new book is a great read; and I would encourage you to get a copy for yourself. You can order a copy here and help support MMI at the same time!

So... where is your church? Phase 1, 2, 3 or 4? If you're in phase 2, what needs to be done for you to re-enter into a creative phase? If you're in phase 3, what excuses need to be overcome? And if you're in phase 4, how can you stop the blame game and begin to get back to a place of health rather than death?
These are important questions to answer... where did you find yourself? Please take a few moments to share your thoughts in our comments section.

Have a great week in ministry!
Todd