The couple would plan to go to a Sunday school class party or a family gathering, but Marilyn would beg off at the last minute. She just wasn’t up to socializing. Charles would feel sorry for her, change the evening’s plans and stay home. After several weeks of staying home, he would become blue. Then she would feel guilty for causing him to give up his social life and she would start going out. But he knew she was doing it just for him, so he would feel guilty and stay home more. It was a vicious circle, actually a battle of wills, his versus hers.

At her first appointment, nothing in the world seemed good to Marilyn. I remarked that she was a miserable woman.

“Oh, I’m a Christian,” she replied. “And I’ve got a nice husband, a good home, and a fine church. I suppose I should be happy.”

“No,” I assured her. “It’s your choice to be miserable in spite of all the good things in your life.”

Over a three-month period, Marilyn slowly disclosed how she was gradually withdrawing from life. The home she was raised in had been one of constant distress; she always seemed to be in the middle of combative parents. She learned it was easier to duck than to take the chance of getting hurt. This protective attitude had carried over into her married life. Now it was simpler to stay home rather than risk being hurt.

One day, Marilyn decided to stop ducking. She said she was going to ask God for help to accept her husband’s social life.

For three months, she was a happy Christian. Then she came back, depressed again.

I helped her see that she was depressed because she changed her mind about wanting to venture out. Again, she cast her burden on the Lord and went away rejoicing. But after awhile she returned, defeated as before.

Her moods continually alternate. She knows how to turn her troubles over to the Lord, and she has proved that it works. But I am afraid that she hasn’t yet taken to heart Jesus’ words in John 15:4, “Abide in me.” Hers is not a daily walk with the Lord. Alternately she casts her burdens on the Lord and takes them upon herself. She empties them out and then slowly collects them again.

To “abide” is to enjoy Christ’s victory over self. We must consistently depend on God in order to consistently experience Him. He can and will live in us if we allow His Spirit to work in us.

The names and certain details in this true case history have been changed to protect each person’s identity and privacy.

He had started this flow. It was something he had wanted to do—to end his life. But now the horror of his choice overwhelmed him. What a mistake he had made!

“O God I don’t want to die!” he cried feebly. He knew chances were small that he would survive. An hour might pass before his wife returned—and she would be too late to save him.

He marshaled his wits to give himself an order. Get up and look through the medicine chest for adhesive tape. He tried to bring his legs up under him, but could not. He was too weak. He could only clasp his wrists with opposite hands and press his fingers across the gashes in an attempt to hold back the blood. But the blood was not to be contained. He saw it flow from beneath his weakening fingers.

“I’m a fool. My whole life I’ve been a fool!” he gasped. Then his mind began to fog, and the brightness of the blood seemed to fade. Eric Green slipped into unconsciousness; he lay there alone somewhere in the twilight between life and death …

The day had begun when Eric woke up to the smell of bacon frying. He liked bacon the way Ann, his wife, fixed it. But this morning he had no appetite for any food. He had no “stomach” either for the job that faced him that day as office manager in a large industrial firm.

“I just can’t go to work today,” he said to his wife as he plodded out to the kitchen.

“Have some coffee, and you’ll feel better,” Ann said, holding a steaming cup toward him.

There was little breakfast conversation until Ann reminded Eric he’d be late for work.

Wouldn’t she ever take him at his word? “Ann, I tell you, I’m not going,” he said sharply. “I hate those people. They make me nervous. I can’t face them today.”

“That’s last week’s song, and you played it the week before that,” she said with sarcasm. “Try something else for a change.”

That brought Eric’s temper to a boil. “When we were first married, you understood the difficulties I faced at the plant. At least you said you did,” he shouted. “Maybe you were just as cold-hearted then as you are now—only I couldn’t see through you.”

An hour went by while the quarrel raged on. Eric pushed back his dishes and laid his head in his hands on the table.

“Don’t expect any sympathy from me for the mistakes you make consistently at the office or at church or wherever you go,” she said over the excessive clattering of her dishwashing. “You act like a kid enough without my babying you …”

“What do you mean by that?” he demanded, rising up.

“What do I mean?” she replied. “‘Why, everybody knows if Eric Green doesn’t get his own way he blows his top—and woe to anyone around when the fallout comes.”

Eric pushed back his chair. “Where are those sleeping pills the doctor gave me?”

“In the medicine chest. Why?”

“I need one,” Eric said. “I need a whole bottleful.”

Ann said nothing.

“Did you hear me, Ann? I said I am going to swallow all 20 pills at once.”

Ann turned. Lines of disbelief appeared around her mouth. “I thought you were too sick to make jokes to get my sympathy. But as long as you’re at it, there’s a new package of razor blades next to the sleeping pills in the cabinet. I’m going next door.”

Eric Green had been a sociable fellow, a back-slapper, a joiner. Flattery, manipulation, taking advantage of the situation for his own good—these had been his methods. They had gotten him through college and quite a way up the ladder of success. Who was the best darn fellow in the luncheon club? Eric Green, of course. Who made the biggest impression at church? Eric Green, everyone’s friend.

Inside, however, Eric realized he didn’t have much—except for an image. And lately that image was beginning to tarnish.

His lack of depth had started to show up at the office. And more than one person had recently questioned his sincerity in Christian work. As Ann said, his violent temper was his trademark. But he had always been able to laugh off his angry outbursts, and people seemed to forget. Over the past few months, however, people had stopped laughing with him.

The old techniques of getting by were no longer working, and that bothered him. But he’d find another way. Adjustment was his middle name.

If Eric ever felt guilty, he transferred that guilt to his father; his dad had always been too busy for the family. Or, he blamed his well-meaning, but inept, mother. She had tried to rear her children by high Christian standards, but somehow when Eric or his brother protested such standards, the boys always won out—first by tears and tantrums, later by threats and defiance. His mother’s practice of Christianity never seemed equal to the demands of two wild boys.

Not until he married did anyone really know what Eric was like. In the two years Ann and Eric had been together, she had frequently confronted him. She had made him unsure of himself. Maybe that was why he had been having so much difficulty with the people in his life lately, why failure was piling upon failure. He had to show her …

In the seconds just before Eric lost consciousness, he admitted it wasn’t Ann or his mother or his father who had caused his trouble. It was no one but himself.

Eric woke up in the hospital. He found Ann by his side. She had hardly stirred in the cream and sugar at the neighbor’s when she became convicted about the mean things she had said to her husband. She went back home, called for Eric in a tone of conciliation, and found him when she saw a tiny stream of blood trickle under the bathroom door.

Eric, his old image laid aside, asked his wife for forgiveness. They had a tender reunion, and after his recovery, Eric made an appointment for counseling help.

“Dr. Brandt,” he said, “I’m a Christian, but I haven’t much lived like one.”

There was little of the Christian life I could tell him except to review what he already knew—and had known since the days when his mother had tried to teach him in her inadequate way. We spoke of hate and anger and insincere relations with others as the works of the flesh.

We discussed the spiritual walk of the Christian as outlined in Galatians 5 and Colossians 3, and what Jesus has to say in Matthew 15:8 about mere lip service.

Eric had been deliberately rejecting God’s demands on his life. The severe indictment of Romans 1 against those who do not want to retain God in their knowledge was beginning to apply to him. Seeing this, he earnestly repented and asked God to change him.

Eric came around so fast that people doubted the genuineness of the change. This was another blow to him. But gradually he realized that this was a part of the test he had to go through in order to prove that the Eric Green who came back from near-death was thoroughly renewed by Jesus Christ.

The names and certain details in this true case history have been changed to protect each person’s identity and privacy.

Do you believe that? No, thanks to the law of gravity, I came down so hard the impact broke one of my teeth.

Wouldn’t it be difficult if gravity worked only part of the time? Imagine walking in your neighborhood and never knowing for sure whether you would fly up or come down. Fortunately we can depend on the law of gravity. And though you can’t touch it or see it, if you jump out of a window, you will feel it.

You would not say, “I don’t believe germs exist,” just because you can’t see them. When you are sick, you experience the effects of germs. Even though you can’t see them, you do not deny that they exist.

These invisible powers are explained through science according to predictable laws. There are also biblical laws that affect our interactions.

I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it. I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong. I love God’s law with all my heart. But there is another power within me that is at war with my mind. This power makes me a slave to the sin that is still within me. Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death? Thank God! The answer is in Jesus Christ our Lord. So you see how it is: In my mind I really want to obey God’s law, but because of my sinful nature I am a slave to sin. (Romans 7:18-25)

There is a tiny word tucked into these verses that you seldom hear these days. The word is … “sin.” These verses define the term “sin” to mean the breaking of God’s law. An equally important concept to understand is the “law of sin.” It is one of the most important of all laws to understand because it will determine your future conduct.

A knowledge of sin and what to do about it is the most important information in the world, and the Bible is the source of that information. Almost all the people who talk to me about themselves have little or no knowledge about the Bible. It follows that they also have little or no knowledge about sin.

I have heard hundreds of stories from people who begin by saying, “I have everything I always wanted and I’m doing everything right!” But the same gnawing emptiness and repetitive questions remain: Why am I restless? Why am I disturbed? Why am I worried? Why am I nervous? Why am I tense? Why am I unhappy? Why do I hurt? Why am I under stress? Why am I uncomfortable?

I am convinced that all of us sincerely want to overlook other people’s faults and be easygoing, loving, generous, cooperative, and sacrificial individuals. But something holds us back. Could it be this law of sin? Paul seems to say yes:  “I want to do what is good, but I don’t. I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. But if I do what I don’t want to do, I am not really the one doing wrong; it is sin living in me that does it” (Romans 7:19-20).

It is usually the unexpected circumstances that give you an unexpected glimpse of yourself. Joe considered himself to be an easygoing, friendly person. He liked his work and got along well with his associates. Then his boss got transferred. The new boss rearranged Joe’s workplace, changed his secretary, and gave him some new duties that he didn’t like. Joe changed from being a cheerful, cooperative person to a disgruntled, rebellious employee. He hated the new boss. His inner response to the new superior resulted in behavior that missed his own personal standard of conduct.

This is the law of sin at work. It suggests a conflict between the desire to do good and the inability to do it. The Bible sums up this condition very simply: “Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin” (James 4:17).

Perhaps you have been present with someone who has eaten too much and is confronted by a luscious dessert. With fork in hand he declares, “I shouldn’t eat this.” Then he deliberately proceeds to do what he just declared he shouldn’t do—eat the dessert.

Another Bible verse describes this type of struggle: “For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish” (Galatians 5:17).

The Bible pinpointed the trouble long ago:  “We have turned, every one, to his own way” (Isaiah 53:6).

Each person likes his own ideas, plans, aspirations, and longings. Thus when you encounter resistance to your wishes, or face demands that are not to your liking, the tendency is to rebel, attack, run, or defend yourself. The natural reaction is to be resentful, bitter, stubborn or full of fight. It is easy for you to think that your desires are the reasonable ones. A person will find a way to make a selfish drive seem selfless, deceiving even himself.

Furthermore, it is natural to shrink away from an honest glimpse of yourself. To back off from reproof is as human as shielding the eyes from a burst of light in a dark room. The Bible’s assessment that the heart is deceitful above all things (Jeremiah 17:9) and that men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil (John 3:19) is as up-to-date as the literature on psychology that describes the mental mechanisms for evading the truth.

The patterns of deceit and self-defense are so systematized that their names are common dictionary words: rationalization, regression, suppression, repression, extroversion, introversion, compartmental thinking, and projection. To peer further into the darkness, such avenues can lead to psychoses requiring hospitalization—or to broken homes, crime, vice, or even murder or suicide.

But as already mentioned, there is hope! Since we are looking to the Bible as our guide, we can turn to it not only for a description of man as he naturally is, but for the path to peace from our disturbances, neuroses, and psychoses. Psalm 119:165 says, “Great peace have those who love Your law, And nothing causes them to stumble.”

Many people turn to a counselor for help because they are in circumstances that offend them or have caused them to stumble. They are dissatisfied, irritated and unhappy. Either they flee from the vexing situation or attack it. One would think that people would rush to buy a book that pointed out the path to peace and the way from offense to freedom. People do buy it—millions of copies every year. The Bible continues to be the all-time bestseller. But it is a book that most people quickly lay aside because it reproves and corrects. Man simply does not like the truth that he discovers about himself in the Bible.

The “law” of sin exposes our inability to do right. As we study the Bible we can be assured that God will help us to confess our sin, will forgive us of it, and will help us to live a new life of freedom in Him.

This town was surrounded by beautiful, rolling hills and lush, productive farmland. The air was fresh and clean. There was lots of sky, and we enjoyed glowing sunrises, spectacular sunsets, and beautiful moonlit nights. There were prosperous farmers who lived in large, lovely homes with all the conveniences anyone could ask for. They looked out of their picture windows at their oil wells pumping black gold 24 hours a day. Everyone had several big cars in their driveways and we ate sumptuous meals. The people were elegantly dressed. The church was beautifully furnished.

You would think if there were any place in the world where people would be content and satisfied, it would be in this town. No doubt these people could teach me a thing or two about mental health.

To my surprise, I was swamped by people who requested counseling. There were many troubled hearts in those beautiful homes. People were lonely, worried, disillusioned, and fearful. Many of them tossed and turned in their comfortable beds and often wet their soft pillows with bitter tears. Human nature is the same wherever you go, and sad to say, luxury and plenty do not quiet the human heart. These people pleaded for me to tell them what to buy, or eat, or drink, or where to go, or what to do to find some relief for their tense, anxious bodies.

Christina was from one of those lovely homes. She drove to my office in a fine luxury car. She was beautiful. The skillful use of cosmetics gave just the right touch to her complexion and eyes. Every hair was in place. A carefully chosen dress complemented her body. She was married to a handsome, hard-working husband. They lived in a roomy, nicely furnished house. They had one child and planned to have at least two more.

She had the same questions that I have heard repeated hundreds of times since. Christina wondered, “I have everything I ever wanted. Why do I hurt? Why can’t I relax?”

She had consulted a physician because she was experiencing occasional pain in the chest area and she struggled with a shortness of breath. After looking at the test results, her physician gingerly asked if she might be having any personal or family problems. He suggested that she consult a psychiatrist. She felt insulted, so she indignantly proceeded to get a second opinion. It was the same as the first.

As this story tumbled out, it was easy to see that she was a tense, stressful young lady. She couldn’t imagine why she needed a counselor. She had a good life and a good marriage. Why, then, did she have chest pains and shortness of breath?

I urged her to go home and think about the possible causes of her symptoms. Was there anything in her life that made her feel angry, resentful, bitter, or rebellious? She told me immediately that she had no such problems and promptly left.

Christina called me the next morning. “Could I come in?” she asked. “The sooner the better.” She was ready for some help.

Apparently that night, after she had talked with me, she and her husband watched a football game with another couple. During the game, her husband yelled at the referee and argued loudly with his friend several times. Christina didn’t say anything, but by the time the game was over she was disgusted and embarrassed. Her husband sensed something was wrong, but she simply told him she was tired.

Christina told me that she discovered soon after her marriage that her handsome, hard-working, fun-loving husband was also gruff, rude, and demanding. When he wanted to speak to her he would do so from wherever he was–even if he was upstairs in the bathroom and she was downstairs in the kitchen. He would shout loudly enough to be heard and expected her to reply immediately. If she didn’t, he would come storming to her and give her an angry tongue-lashing for not listening to him. If he was watching a ball game on TV, he would cheer or boo or yell at the umpire as loudly as the people in the crowd at the stadium. During the evening news, he would react loudly and give his opinions as though he were addressing an audience. Yet when there were guests in the house he would speak in a conversational tone, so Christina’s friends had no idea what she endured.

She discovered that this was a family pattern. They were a loud bunch who turned down the volume when company came. While Christina and her husband were courting, she was company. Now that they were married, she was family.

Christina was a soft-spoken person. She was accustomed to conversational-level talk. No one ever shouted in her family, especially from one room to another. Any effort on her part to get him to see her side of the issue was just brushed aside. After several tries failed to get him to at least discuss the problem, she gave up and never brought it up again.

I reminded Christina about the words I asked her to think about the day before. We ended up agreeing that she deeply resented her husband’s behavior and his total disregard for her style of communicating. Outwardly she was friendly, but last night she almost lost control. “He has no idea how I feel and couldn’t care less,” she said bitterly and burst into uncontrollable weeping. After she quieted down she said she felt as if a heavy load had been removed from her shoulders.

Finally she was able to admit to herself that her response to her husband was a miserable concoction of resentment, anger, hatred, and rebellion. She was simply covering it all over with behavior that made her look perfectly happy.

Here was a beautiful, perfectly groomed lady. She drove one of the finest luxury cars on the market. She lived in a spacious home that she helped to design and furnish. Her husband was a leader in the church. But she was hurting with chest pains and had trouble breathing. She did not want to acknowledge her own feelings of resentment and rebellion. She could not enjoy life because of a tiny word that has been banished from most people’s vocabulary: “sin.”

Let’s take a look at two Bible verses that give us instruction on how to deal with our anger:

“Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.” (Ephesians 4:26-27)

“Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice.” (Ephesians 4:31)

To come to the decision that will lead you into the pleasant valley of peace is to struggle with your own will. Let me illustrate this by noting the experience of Jerry.

Jerry was a department foreman at a manufacturing firm. One day his boss called him into the office and said, “Jerry, as you know, things are a bit slow around here these days. I realize you have worked hard and run one of the best departments in the company. But my orders are to cut one supervisor, so I am letting you go.”

Jerry was stunned. He was the only Christian among the foremen. The other supervisory personnel, including his boss, liked to go out drinking and had some wild parties together. As a result, their work sometimes suffered and Jerry had to step in to rescue them. He had worked hard and now this was his reward.

Jerry soon faced a financial slump. He had been making payments on a new home and a car but when his salary was suddenly cut off, he was in trouble. He lost both the house and the car and had to move in with his parents. While with them, he had nothing to do but sit in a comfortable chair and mull over his experience.

“So this is the reward for hard work and clean living,” he said to himself over and over. The more he thought, the more bitter he became. He found it hard to eat and harder to digest what little he did eat. He suffered from painful cramps. His physician told him that his condition stemmed from his emotions. But most of his friends reassured him that he had a right to have some emotional problems.

Twelve years later, time seemed to have healed the wound. Jerry found another job and was quite successful in it. He was, in fact, the general manager of a manufacturing outfit with eight plants. One day, while he was inspecting one of the plants, the personnel director asked him if he would like to meet the plant’s new chief engineer. Of course he would, and did. Jerry found himself face-to-face with the man who fired him 12 years before. Here working for him was the person who had caused him so much grief, pain, and embarrassment.

“I sure made a terrible mistake back then,” the engineer said to Jerry when they were alone. “Will you forgive me?”

“Oh, certainly. Forget it,” Jerry replied.

Jerry told the man that he would forgive, but within himself he nursed a gnawing bitterness. His stomach problem returned and he began reliving those confusing, painful days of long ago. He had thought this period of his life was long forgotten, but now he found himself fuming in his plush office, wanting only to get even.

One day, he related the experience to me, then asked how one could work with a person who had treated him as this man had.

What would have been your reply?

I pointed out several Scripture passages to Jerry. One describes the work of the Holy Spirit:

“But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.” (2 Corinthians 4:7-11)

The apostle Paul spoke here of trouble, perplexity, persecution, and rejection. All these had happened to him. But Paul also said there is a power that will enable a man to face such treatment without distress, despair, self-pity, or ruin. It is the power of God. I discussed this with Jerry, but at the time it seemed to mean little to him. I then spoke of the end products of distress, pointing out that definite bodily changes are involved. “Your blood pressure, respiration, and digestion can be affected,” I said.

“Are you suggesting that I am my own problem? Would you have acted differently had you taken what I took?” he asked.

I reminded Jerry of one of Jesus’ statements:

“But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” (Luke 6:27-28)

Jerry became furious with me. How could I be so lacking in sympathy and understanding? Now he was upset not only at the engineer, but at me as well.

Who was Jerry hurting when he carried his grudge around within himself? Who was affected when he sat in his chair and seethed over a man who wasn’t even in his presence? Himself, of course. Jerry argued that he had a right to be bitter. I agreed he did and I would agree with anyone who stands on his right to be angry and unforgiving over a wrong done to him. It is your privilege to be upset and miserable. But as long as you remain angry, you will be miserable.

There is a power that will enable you to face your circumstances without distress. It is the power of God, made available to you through the dying of the Lord Jesus. God’s power and His alone can make you want to forgive a person who has misused you. But Jerry did not want to forgive that engineer; he wanted to get even.

For many people, yielding bitterness and hatred in exchange for a tender heart toward someone who doesn’t deserve it would not be a blessed relief but rather a great sacrifice. Like Jerry, untold numbers of people would like to be free from their aches and pains. But if you say that means they must relinquish a long-standing grudge, they say they would rather ache.

There in Jerry’s nice walnut-paneled, softly lit office we were locked in a struggle. If I had told him that his grudge was normal and that I probably would have acted the same way, he might have enjoyed some relief, but the inner sore would have continued to fester and spread its poison.

The only solution is for a person to quit fighting and turn to God for a spirit of love toward someone who does not deserve it. And when you yield, the problem is nearly over. The Bible says it is your move: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

One day, Jerry finally did turn to God for help with his bitterness and hatred. His digestive disorder disappeared and his aches and pains went away. He was at peace with himself and with the man he felt had treated him unfairly. Jerry was able to enjoy God’s peace in his life.

How did this change come about? By confessing or acknowledging that he had done wrong–that he had sinned. David wrote this about his sin: “Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,’ and you forgave the guilt of my sin” (Psalm 32:5).

When Jerry paid attention to and took care of his own reaction to the other man’s sins instead of concerning himself with what the other man had done, he found himself on the road to peace.

To acknowledge your own sin is disturbing only if you fight what you discover. If, instead, you admit it and seek help from God, the result is not guilt but an overwhelming sense of forgiveness, cleansing, renewal, and peace.

Unfortunately, the word “sin” has almost completely disappeared from our vocabulary. One of the reasons is that we rely on the medical profession to prescribe mood-altering drugs that provide patients with a temporary escape from pain, anxiety, boredom, and remorse. While these can often be helpful, they can also enable us to put off dealing with the real issues in our lives.

People steadfastly resist the diagnosis of personal sin. It is much easier to accept that our symptoms have some underlying pathology. There is no reason to turn to God; what we are experiencing is a human problem caused by social interaction and it must be solved on a human level with the help of trained human beings. This is the approach taken by most government, education, medical, and psychological professionals, and by a rapidly growing number of church-related personnel.

The pathway to spiritual peace is a struggle. Discover the truth about yourself and you will naturally shrink from it; become offended and defensive and you will be bound in the strong fetters of your sin. What a difference you will find if you just heed the promise of Jesus: “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free” (John 8:31-32).

Why did Jesus come to live among the people, die on a cross, and rise again? Matthew 1:21 gives us the answer: “… because he will save his people from their sins.”

Identify the sin in your life, ask God to forgive you of it, and experience His peace!

I shared this information with the restless, nervous people who crossed my path. As we talked, many of these people could see that some of these sins were present in their lives. They repented of their sins and their restless, nervous symptoms disappeared.

This happened often enough that I decided to focus my college and graduate studies on a Biblical approach to human behavior.

In my sociology and psychology classes, I learned that the same words the Bible uses to describe sin were used to describe personality or emotional disorders. In those days we frequently heard the term “nervous breakdown.” People who had nervous breakdowns would be quickly hospitalized. The patient was “sick” and required a psychiatrist who could prescribe medication and use a specialized form of treatment called therapy. The patient was struggling with what was called a “neurosis” (an emotional disorder with physical complaints without objective evidence of disease).

Ten years later, I hung out my first Christian counseling sign. A letter sent to a group of pastors announcing my availability resulted in a full schedule within a few months and a pattern emerged rather quickly. Many people were coming to find a cure for an anxiety state that was intolerable.

In the background these people would be struggling with a marriage problem, parent/child relations, difficulty socializing, or conflict at work. The responses to these problems were predictable: anger, resentment, fear, bitterness, rebellion, griping, yelling, dishonesty, lust, jealousy, sex, or stealing. The attempt to contain such emotions and desires caused these people to become highly excitable, unnaturally apprehensive, and/or very restless.

Curiously, these people had also acquired a new vocabulary. Ten years earlier it was not difficult for them to talk about sin and see their problems as such. Now my counselees would leave my office greatly relieved only as long as we focused on their circumstances past and present. They wanted to focus on what caused their emotional reactions, and not deal with the emotional reactions themselves.

My teachers in graduate school taught that a personality disorder is not a person’s own fault. The Freudian hypothesis is that neurosis stems from a too-severe handling at the hands of harsh, unloving parents and an irrational society. The individual has done nothing “sinful,” but rather is forced to repress what he wants to do. Thus he is sick, not sinful–the innocent victim of “the demands of the fathers.” Rogers, another leading psychologist, insists that we are inherently good and yet are corrupted by our experiences with the external everyday world.

Already years ago, these psychological explanations for personal unrest filtered down to the churches, and when I started professionally counseling, I was faced with the incredible fact that dealing with sin was totally ruled out in the psychological world and was rapidly disappearing in the church as well.

The emphasis among Christians was slowly changing from dealing with sins to coming to terms with past experiences. These people expected sympathy and acceptance while others around them lovingly helped them to recover from their sicknesses.

Many of these counselees required many months of “therapy” in order to get control of themselves. They would be taught to become aware of the people or circumstances that triggered their negative emotions or behavior patterns. They learned to interrupt a line of conversation when they sensed they were becoming “disturbed” and to avoid certain people or circumstances. One man was told that when he felt his jaws tighten he must interrupt whomever he was talking to. He would change the subject, leave the room, walk around the block, or go for a ride.

I became a partner with these counselees. They could share their failures with me and I was there to give them a warm, sympathetic welcome. After months of therapy we were not far from where we started. I guess therapy simply takes a long time, I told myself. All went well as long as the counselee could set the pace and determine the content of our conversations.

All too frequently, I encountered stiff resistance when I proposed that we take a look into the Bible to see what it had to say about emotions and behavior patterns. My dilemma was that my clients’ emotional problems were often coupled with a headache or abdominal pain. I felt the pressure of trying to decide if they should be sent to see a physician. On the other hand, some contacted me at the recommendation of a physician.

The prevailing psychological opinion these days is that we can get the sinner to love himself by loving him and accepting him. This flows from the Freudian assumption that the patient is not really guilty or sinful but only fancies himself so, and from Rogers’ view, that we are inherently good and are corrupted by our experiences with the external, everyday world.

I became a Christian because I understood that Jesus died to save us from our sins (Matthew 1:21) and I unquestionably needed to be saved from my sins. Isn’t this the issue that separates Christianity from secular humanism? The Person of Christ died for our sins and was raised to life again so that we could be victorious over sin!

I found that as long as someone remained, in old-fashioned religious phraseology, “hard-of-heart and unrepentant,” that person’s conscience would hold him in the viselike grip of “neurotic” rigidity and suffering. But the moment he (with or without assistance) began to accept his guilt and his sinfulness, the possibility of radical reformation opened up, and with this, the individual would begin the journey, though not without pain and effort, from deep, pervasive self-rejection and self-torture to a new freedom of self-respect and peace.

Tragically, many Christians turn to therapy (humanism) for relief from a sinful heart instead of turning to God for a cure. I listened to many counselees tell me their troubles. Most of them chose not to acknowledge, let alone seek, forgiveness of their sins. They chose to simply live with their sins.

I had to make a choice. Go with the flow, or go with the few who would seek repentance and forgiveness of their sins. After a little reflection, I made the decision that I would make the diagnosis of sin my primary goal in helping people. Sin (resentment, anger, hatred, rebellion) had nearly destroyed my own life and marriage. If I understood the Bible correctly, the “emotional problems” that plagued my counselees were sin.

Here are some of the Bible verses that guided me in those early days:

He who covers his sins will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy. (Proverbs 28:13)

But your iniquities have separated you from your God; and your sins have hidden His face from you, so that He will not hear. (Isaiah 59:2)

John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world! (John 1:29)

Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. (Psalm 32:1)

The bad news is, there is no human remedy for sin.

The good news is, repentance for sin before God brings instant cleansing.

To declare that man has sinned–that is, to say he is out of line with God’s standard–is not to condemn him. The Bible gives us the key to freedom from the severe ego insult (condemnation) that is the result of seeing one’s sinfulness. Sin is the simplest problem in the world to solve! The resources of God, the Creator of the universe, are available to anyone who asks–on God’s terms. A variety of Bible verses give some guidance:

For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. (John 3:17-18)

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me. (John 14:5)

Nor is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12)

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)

I spoke with a man who wished that he had love, joy, and peace in his home. While the man had great wealth, he realized that he could not find a doctor, counselor, or a retail store where he could buy love, joy, and peace. He admitted that everything he had tried in this world–money, fame, and power–had not brought happiness. These virtues are not available “over the counter.” Qualities such as love, joy, and peace are only available as a result of a relationship with Jesus Christ. It is a shame that many people in our world today will not accept this fact.

The Bible says these virtues are from a source out of this world. God controls an infinite supply. They will flow through the person who is cleansed from sin as his body is yielded to the Spirit of God. The result is access to a supernatural resource that a person can draw upon.

Drawing upon God can be compared to drawing water. When you open a faucet, water flows out. Water is made up of two parts: hydrogen, a gas; and oxygen, also a gas. These invisible units combine miraculously into a product called water. A glassful will quench your thirst. You can fill a tub and take a bath in it. You can irrigate a thousand-acre farm with it.

You can use all you want because you are drawing from a reservoir of water. All you need to do is to keep the pipes in good repair, and open the faucet. The water will flow. Amazingly, you can stop the flow of a massive reservoir of water by simply closing the faucet.

In similar fashion, when you allow Jesus to come into your body as your Savior, not only are you cleansed from your sin, but you also have access to the Spirit of God. Here is an invisible, unexplainable presence that produces visible, measurable changes in the way your body works. Your body is transformed.

Nothing in this world can cause a person to change so radically. No longer do circumstances or people determine the condition under your skin. You can now respond to the troublesome people in your life with unconditional love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Humanly speaking, this is an impossibility. But, by yielding yourself to the Spirit of God, an infinite, endless supply flows through you. There is enough for a minor irritation or a major tragedy.

Medical researchers have expressed the opinion that destructive emotions are caused by a chemical imbalance in the body. But I ask the question, is it possible that a chemical imbalance in the body can be caused by destructive emotions? It seems obvious to me that since sin is so easily cleansed, the presence of sin should be explored first.

A pastor questioned me about this issue. Someone in his congregation had suffered from severe anxiety attacks. His physician prescribed a drug that corrected the problem. After three years of treatment, it was clear that the patient was fine as long as he took his pills. Was I implying that the cause of these attacks was sin? I asked him, “Shouldn’t everyone be open to the possibility of sin in their lives?”

Later that day I was chatting with several people. A man interrupted our conversation. He wanted to talk to me immediately. He seemed disturbed, and paced the floor while he waited.

When we were finally able to talk, he wanted to know if I thought that anxiety was caused by sin. I replied that we can be both sick and sinful at the same time. I told him that if he cared to make an appointment, I would be pleased to talk with him more. We set a time and he left in a huff. When we met again I reviewed his reason for wanting to see me. He said he was on medication for stress and that it solved his problem. I then asked why he wanted to see me. He seemed abrupt and annoyed, and then it dawned on me. This was the man that the pastor asked about–the one who had been under treatment for three years.

I asked if he wanted to explore his spiritual life. Yes, he did.

I asked if there were any tensions in his marriage, family, church, or at his children’s school. His answer each time was a testy “no” almost before I finished the question. I remarked that he couldn’t possibly have given any thought to my questions. He admitted that was true, so I chided him for brushing off my questions. He left, again in a huff.

The next time we met, he seemed lighthearted and radiant. He decided I had been right. He had been nursing some nasty grudges in his heart, but now he had given them up. His wife wondered what happened; she hadn’t seen him so cheerful in a longtime. Clearly, his response to the people he held grudges against–bitterness, resentfulness, anger–was sinful, and repentance brought immediate relief. Whether or not he was also sick was a matter for his physician to determine.

Repentant people are free–cleansed, renewed, restored. Repentance restores your reason (conscience) and fellowship (with the Lord). Restoration brings wholeness to your being and to your relationships with others. Take time to evaluate your life. Is there a sin you need to confess to God and be free of? God is waiting to help you experience His freedom!