Depressed? Here's a job

I do not think I would like to be a professional counselor. There are a thousand ways you can go when counseling a person. I always thought being a Bible expositor would be an easier profession: You stick to the text and you're alright. Counseling, by contrast, is an art form---a Holy Spirit art form, to be sure. This, I suppose, is partly because the Word is infinitely deep and so the possible connections are inexhaustible. Moreover, as a medical doctor is only as good as his intuition, so an adroit counselor will know which presenting problems are a red herring, and where the promising fishing is in the "deep waters" of a man's words (Proverbs 18:4).

A history professor once told me that a student kept coming to him about trouble he was having with his thesis paper. The professor worked patiently with the young man on his outline, but they weren't getting anywhere. It so happened that this professor shared a carrel with a counseling professor named Jay Adams. One day, the beleaguered church history expert got the notion to send his student to the other side of the partition. An hour or two later, the student walked away with a new plan for his life. Turns out he was struggling with homosexuality. Years later the history prof told me, shaking his head, "It's a good thing I sent him to Adams. We would still be tinkering with his outline!"

The prophet Elijah had had it. Faithful, tireless, persecuted, and now with a contract on his head from Queen Jezebel, he did what I would have done---threw himself on the ground and cried, "Kill me, God, I'm done." How would you counsel Elijah? Here are a few ideas: (A) Remind him that he is a saved man and doesn't deserve it and should be grateful; (B) cheer him up; (C) send him on vacation.

But no, you know what God did? He gave him three new assignments to get started on immediately (1 Kings 19:11-21).

To hear commentaries by Andrée Seu, click here.