Apologetics

What is Wrong with the Mentally Ill?

by Jeff Drinnan
09/17/20
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Reading Jay E Adams' "Problems/Solving Them God's Way" brochure I was reminded of the war for people's hearts and minds between the worldly mental health industry and the church. Dr. Adams is the father of the Biblical Counseling movement. He expressed in his seminal book "Comptent to Counsel" that the church should stop palming off people with problems to modern secular psychology.

Mental illness is a misnomer. Although people make themselves sick, the root of the problem is not medical. All you can do is relieve symptoms. Of course, people, including myself, can get cranky when they are not feeling well, but that is not the heart of the matter. It really is a matter of the heart. When my daughter was in preschool, the teachers taught the children about having a "dirty heart" when we do wrong,when we sin.

Doing right or wrong is a choice. We all have to make decisions, some of them moral. In Adams' brochure the pastor argues for equipping Christians to solve problems, with God's intervention, themselves. He wrote that it's impossible to let others make your decision for you and adds "Were you to make the utimate decision to avoid all problems, you might find youself confined to a mental hospital. There, others decide what you will do. Maybe problems are 'solved' for you. But even then, when one attempts to turn over his responsibility for solving problems to others, he still isn't able to avoid them. Those 'others' will restrict him, overmedicate him, destroy his brain cells through shock therapy, or inflict dozens of other insults on his body that cause him all sorts of trouble. By attempting to give up his responsibility to solve problems, not only does he fail to achieve his goal, he sets himself up for innumerable problems. He may even have to face the problem of extricating himself from such an environment."

A few years back, I wrote a parody about the efforts of a local mental health institute to recruit homeless people into their programs:

Can't Think Freely (parody of Buck Owens' "Act Naturally")

They're going to put me in the nuthouse
They want to make a monkey out of me
They're going to put me in the nuthouse
And all they have to do
Is round up me

Well, they are going have to chase me real far
They're going to hunt me and they can't really tell
If I really need to be in the nuthouse
They expect me to play the part for them real well

I hope you'll come and see me in the nuthouse
Maybe you can slip me a file in some cake
I hope you'll come and see me in the nuthouse
Where I'm all doped up and can't think freely

They want to put me in the nuthouse
That's because they don't think I am OK
Well the only reason I am in the nuthouse
Is that I'm homeless in Bucks County PA

I'll be a homeless collection in the nuthouse
From the state they want to collect their precious bounty
I'll be a monkey caged there in the nuthouse
Where I'm all doped up and can't think freely

They're going to put me in the nuthouse
Where I'm all doped up and can't think freely
Dupe-dupe a looney Dupe-dup a looney Dupe-dupe a looney...
They're coming to take me away ewe-who hah-ha-hah ah-hah ah-hah ah-hah...

Not all modern psychology/psychiatry is unbiblical. Swiss psyciatrist Carl Jung related a story of a visit to an insane asylum with "an intelligent layman," who remarked that the inmates are like the rest of us, except that their problems are greatly magnified.

"For God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind." -2 Timothy 1:7

Another brochure, which I am still reading is "Borderline Personality/A Scriptural Perspective", by Christian counselor and Christian college professor Cathy Wiseman. In her brochure, the professor compairs the modern psychological definition of BPD to a Biblical definition:

Psychological definition: "a pervasive pattern of instability of interpersonal relationships, self-image, and affects [emotions], and marked impulsivity texts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following [nine symptoms: indentity disturbance/unstable sense of self; chronic feelings of emptyiness; fear of abandonment; emotional instability; unstable interpersonal relationships; intense rage; paranoia or dissociatives symptoms; impulsivity/self-damaging behaviors; suicidal;self-mutilating behavior]."

Biblical definition: "a pervasive pattern of demanding interpersonal relationships, unstable self-image, volatile emotions, and marked impulsiveness. These individuals demand suffocating intimacy in their relationships and yet their hurtful behavior destroys those same relationships."

The Christian counselor then provides solutions to the problem, with several Bible verses.

People need to stop paying attention to the worldly, mental health hustlers, and seek a Biblical solution to their problems. Ignore the psycho-babble and go to God to give you a clean heart and the right path to follow. "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. " -Proverbs 3: 5-6