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Summary
The article I chose to review is, Use of prayer and scripture in Cognitive-Behavior
Therapy written by Siang-Yang Tan. In this article he describes how he uses prayer and scripture
in a therapy session. Tan makes it very clear that the first step in using this form of therapy is
informed consent from the client. In his initial two-hour long intake interview, he assesses what
is going on with the client. In this time, he can determine whether or not cognitive based therapy
is appropriate at the current stage for the client or not. Some clients may need initial medications
and or additional, more intensive therapies to help them get to a more stable position where this
type of therapy would be useful. Once it is determined that cognitive based therapy is the
appropriate option for the client, Tan then determines what spiritual stage or level the client is at.
He states that if the client is in open defiance with God or struggling with their relationship with
God, they are not ready to effectively use scripture and prayer in their therapeutic approach.
More sessions would be needed to get them to this point. If Tan sees that it would benefit the
client, he discusses the approach with them and gets their explicit permission before continuing.
Once the client agrees to this approach to therapy the session will continue weekly and
phase out into biweekly, monthly, seasonally, and finally yearly until the client no longer
requires the sessions. The speed of this progression is based on the clients needs. Even though
the client agrees to this form of therapy, it doesn’t automatically mean that scripture is going to
be used in every session. Tan uses the example of a Christian who is experiencing spiritual
dryness and/ emptiness, these clients may find comfort in scripture about wilderness experiences
and solitude. However, clients who are experiencing perfectionism, stress, anxiety, addictions,
compulsions, and burnout may be better off being helped by going on private retreats and/or
learning about solitude and silence and prayer. It is up to the counselor to allow the Holy Spirit
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to guide them as to when scripture and/or prayer is best for the individual they are helping. In the
article, Tan uses the example of healing prayer to heal memories. The client is led to a relaxed
and calm state, once there, they relive a bad or painful memory. The counselor can then lead
them in prayer, asking God to come them in that moment and heal that pain. In the same
situation, instead of using this technique, the client can be led to talk about their feeling about a
situation or memory. When they describe that memory as causing an emotion such as anger, the
counselor can dive deeper into why or if they believe that feeling to be sinful. Exploring
scripture to help make sure that that belief is accurate. Guiding the client to the appropriate
scriptures and allowing the Holy Spirit to speak into the situation through the scriptures can help
the client start to clear away false beliefs and the true word or God. This then allows the client to
heal through the use of scripture.
Reflect
I am a survivor of domestic violence. When I first began induvial counseling at a church I
had just started attending, one of the pastors who acted the church’s pastoral counselor sat and
listened to me for over an hour. At which point. I had expected him to tell me to pray harder or
be a better wife to my then husband. To my surprise, he told me of the dangerous situation that I
and my children were in and needed out as soon as possible. I then defended my husband and my
marriage. I had developed a false perception of what the bible said about marriage and my
husband’s role as a husband. Only focusing on my role as a wife. When pushed, I had no real
scriptural evidence to back it up. Yes, there was a lot of truth to what I believed, but I left out a
lot, particularly what was expected of my then husband. The pastor patiently and
compassionately led me through scripture after scripture, showing me how God would not want
me in my present circumstance. That my husband did not have the right to treat me the way he
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had. That there was a safer and healthier path that he could help me find through the guidance of
Christ. It took a lot of scripture to help sort through the misconceptions that I had previously
been taught. I choose this article because since my experience of this form of therapy, I have not
studied it. It is not the only approach that I did nor the only counselor since, so I was curious to
look at it from the counselor’s perspective and not just the client. It also being interesting to
understand and see how it works no longer being in that stage and level of distress.
I particularly liked and respected Tan’s insistence of informed consent, understanding
that this form of counseling would not work with everyone because not everyone would be
receptive. But then to take that further and make sure that the client fully understood the level of
use of scripture and prayer in their counseling sessions and getting their consent to continue. I
believe that’s the best way to ensure that a client is most receptive to the care plan. I also found it
interesting that Tan put great importance into taking the time to determine what would be the
best course of action during each session. Making sure that as a counselor, you are flexible to the
needs of the client on that particular day and time. Prayer may be best, or scripture needed,
silence or guided meditation. It’s important to evaluate the client and allow the Holy Spirit to
guide you as the practitioner in order to help the client appropriately. I do plan on taking these
readings further and learning more about Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy which the
author mentions early in the article as a further option with assisting in Cognitive Behavior
Therapy.
Apply
As a counselor working with patients suffering from trauma, I believe I will find this
form of therapy very helpful with my Christian clientele. Let’s take Sarah for example. Sarah is a
27-year-old Caucasian female who engaged to be married. She comes in seeking help with her
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anxiety and fears about being married. During the initial intake interview, Sarah expresses her
love for her fiancé and her desire to spend her life with him. However, since he proposed she has
been plagued with nightmares from childhood memories. Her nights are restless, and she is
irritable with friends and family when they try to discuss wedding plans. When her fiancé
discusses future plans with her, she feels the desire to run. Now she fantasizes about traveling
solo and being on her own. Though her love for her fiancé is strong, she feels her fear is making
her self-sabotage her relationship and she doesn’t know what to do. After determining that she
does not need further psychiatric help and is in a distressed, but stable position, I decide we can
continue with cognitive behavior therapy (CBT). After further discussion, she has gone in great
detail able her closeness and importance to her relationship with Christ and I explain to her how
we can use scripture and prayer in her sessions to help her. I ask her if she is okay with this and
get explicit consent to continue.
In future sessions, we begin with prayer and ask God to intervene and help Sarah during
this time, giving her peace and guidance. Sarah soon starts to describe the examples of marriage
from her childhood. At first, she proudly states that her parents were married for 32 years before
her father died from heart failure. She goes into details about arguments that her parents had
when she was a child. Fighting constantly. I have her close her eyes and guide her through a
breathing exercise, getting her to a calm state. Then I ask her to remember a particular difficult
time when her parents were fighting. She remembers and walks me through it, she was sitting on
the floor in the corner of her room listening to the shouting and yelling coming from her parents
in the living room. She remembers praying for it to stop and it only getting louder. She starts to
cry at reliving them memory. She explains how her father continued to yell at her mother until
her mother was silent. That he continued to yell until her mother apologized and promised to do
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better. This particular memory, this had gone on for hours. She remembers being scared for her
mother, wishing she would give in sooner. I then lead her into a healing prayer and ask her to ask
God to come into this memory and help her. She prays and is silent for some time. I ask her to
describe what she is feeling. She says she is still in the corner, but with an angel’s arms wrapped
around her. She’s no longer scared for her mother because the angel told her that her mother’s
silence means that Christ is by her side, comforting her and protecting her. Tears are still
streaming down her face, but Sarah is now smiling. We end in prayer and Sarah explains how
helpful the exercise was for her. In future sessions we use scripture to help Sarah know how to
open up communication with her fiancé about her past experience with witnessing the traumatic
fight with her parents. She begins to heal and disassociate her relationship with that of her
parents.
