Counselling & God’s Faithfulness – 3

We have seen a New Testament pattern of appealing to divine faithfulness as a method of exhortation and encouragement.

For instance: “God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability” (1 Cor 10:13). And, “He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it” (1 Thess 5:24). Again, “If we are faithless, he remains faithful” (2 Tim 2:13). Or, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins” (1 John 1:9).

Implications

From this pattern, we can draw out a few implications for our own caregiving.

1) Some of our weightiest pastoral challenges arise in moments of change. Health that is suddenly crumbling, changing family circumstances, relationships that dramatically collapse—each of these require the spiritual caregiver to respond with a message that is abidingly true. In times of unsettled change and all the anxiety of the unknown, what message is more applicable than that of God’s steadfast faithfulness? He will not waver. He will not fail. In the storm, He is ‘the Rock that is higher than I.’

2) Conversely, some of the most vexing pastoral challenges arise in circumstances when there is no change at all. A person who is enmeshed in sin for two decades or more. Living with a chronic illness. A perpetual conflict between families.

‘The people on the elders’ care list are the same people who were on the list the last time I was in office, and the time before that!’ Seeing long-term patterns of sin and brokenness, spiritual caregivers can all be tempted to grow cynical, to abandon any notion of hope.

But here too, we embrace the gospel of God’s faithfulness: He does not abandon the works of his hands. If He has started a good work in someone by giving them faith in Christ—even if that person has many obvious struggles, and they stagnate, and appear to go backwards—be sure that God will also bring his work to completion in the day of the Lord.

God’s horizon is far longer than ours, and this is an encouragement for caregivers to stay hopeful, to remain patient, not to give up praying and working.

3) One of the questions a spiritual caregiver will want to ask concerns the character of the Lord: “Who is our God?” Posing such a question in a visit is far different than posing it in a Catechism classroom. It’s not question of mere knowledge—if there is such a thing—but it’s a question of truth confirmed by experience. We should talk together: Who have you found God to be? What have you learned of him? Where are the places you seen his faithfulness at work in your life? In what perfections of God have you often found your refuge?

To lead our people to the solid ground of God’s attributes is no abstract exercise. How could anyone understand it to be? The New Testament shows how eminently practical our theology is: “God is faithful. He will establish and guard you.”

So how might this look in the counselling room or the living room when we give spiritual care? The people we’re shepherding can be in very different places in terms of their ability to receive instruction. Over a few visits, one person could be patiently catechized in the perfections of God. Another person’s world might have collapsed so far that referring to Belgic Confession Article 1 does nothing at all.

There are pastoral circumstances when little else can be said but to take Scripture and to affirm God’s goodness, his love, his justice—or his faithfulness. The pastor, the elder, the friend will have moments where the simplest and best answer is to say, “God is faithful.” More must be said, but perhaps not now. For now, this is a heartening and sustaining truth: ‘God is faithful.’ “The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end, but they are new every morning.” (Lam 3:22-23).

4) Scripture teaches us to use the steadfast promises of God as the basis and fuel for our prayers. As we converse together in a pastoral conversation, we turn to the Word of the Lord, and then we turn to the Lord himself. In the words of Psalm 119,

Verse 154, “Plead my cause and redeem me; give me life according to your promise!”

Verse 159, “Give me life, O Lord, according to your steadfast love.”

Verse 170, “Let my plea come before you; deliver me according to your word.”

We pray together with this certainty: God has promised grace, promised strength, promised wisdom, promised preservation, promised a resurrection, He has promised us his very presence, “I will never leave you nor forsake you”—so we know that He will also answer us when we pray, according to his Word, “because He cannot deny himself.” We can ask God to do what He has promised to do, and we teach our people to pray like this too.

5) The faithful God has given his Word, so from him we expect much. We expect much in Jesus’s name, “for all the promises of God find their Yes in him” (2 Cor 1:20). In Christ, the veil is taken away, and we see the true depths and riches of the faithfulness of God. Here is our foundation for giving spiritual care that blesses and helps, “tasting and seeing that in Christ, the Lord is good.”

In all this, it’s still true that when we try to help someone, we can feel sorely inadequate: as friends, as elders, as pastors, as parents. But we hold onto this truth: “He who calls you is faithful; he will surely do it.”