Page 3 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 4

Editorial

I was just sitting over my lecture outline for this year’s EMCAPP Sym-
posium L`Viv (Ukraine) on the subject of “Therapeutic factors in Chris-
tian psychology.”
Act as if everything
I was involved once again with the great question of how God’s working depended on you, but trust
and human action come together. as if everything depended
on God?
Initially, I sympathised with a classical position: “Act as if everything de-
pended on you, but trust as if everything depended on God.” But there I
see the danger of falling on both sides of the horse: either forgetting God
entirely, or pushing God forward as an excuse for one’s own deficits or
lack of effort.

Yes, without doubt, the greater proportion is due to God, but he sel-
dom acts without our contributory action. And our contributory ac-
tion – seen from our little human perspective – means, in turn, giving
everything we have: training, trust in God, supervision, prayer, further
training, spiritual development, …

At our IGNIS Institute, we very much appreciate the multiplication of
the loaves in the Gospels. Jesus accepted everything that was available
– it was not very much, only a few loaves and fishes – and with it fed
Jesus takes
thousands.
what we have
and multiplies it.
My wish is that the reader of this Journal should find a few such loaves
and fishes, perhaps only “bread crumbs” and “fish bones”, which the
Holy Spirit converts into a sustained and comprehensive blessing.

Christian psychology is a psychology on the basis of a Christian world-
view and a cooperation with the Holy Spirit, and it is a psychology
which names a person, Jesus Christ. It will, and must, be about him that
a Christian psychology speaks. He should be glorified.

Once again, I invite you, with this 4th edition of Christian Psychology
Around The World, to a study journey around the world, with the focus Invitation to a journey
resting on Switzerland and with comments and further contributions around the world
worldwide. Let us once again receive a sense of the greatness of God,
who is Lord of this world!

Yours
Werner May
Germany, werner.may@ignis.de

This edition is accompa-
nied by the artwork of
Anita Sieber Hagenbach,
Switzerland, who is both a
social worker and an artist.
„With my works, I try to
create an image of words
of life, as a picture, a text
image, an object, an ins-
tallation. I understand this
as a way of making God‘s
speaking visible. It is in-
tended to give access to
the treasures, encourage-
ments, challenges, provo-
cations of biblical texts and
to take these as a theme.“

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