Jeremy Pierre and Deepak Reju in their book The Pastor and Counseling posed this counseling scenario: Let’s say a professional Christian counselor and a professional secular counselor advise your member to go into his bedroom and punch a pillow when his wife angers him. This seems reasonable. It’s certainly better than punching his wife, and the pillow is replaceable. If the professional Christian counselor has advised this, your member might assume that this is biblically-based advice. After all, it doesn’t seem unloving to others or dishonoring to God to treat a pillow viciously. A professional Christian counselor giving such pillow advice would likely cite Scripture to make his point, maybe showing how Jesus directed his anger appropriately by overturning the money changers’ tables and not striking the money-changers themselves. And this would seem reasonably biblical to your member (Jeremy Pierre, Jeremy, and Deepak Reju. The Pastor and Counseling (9Marks, pp. 123-124. Crossway. Kindle Edition).
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