Page 65 - EMCAPP-Journal No. 5

Church Traditions for a Christian Psychology

Edward T. Welch (USA)
A Christian Psychologist and Biblical Counselor?

This article is a new genre for our e-journal. It is cational Foundation (CCEF), we referred to
a more personal look at people who have made ourselves as biblical counselors, with a little “b”
contributions to Christian Psychology throug- in order to say that this was not a proprietary
hout a long career. Ed Welch is a representati- label but a group of people who wanted Scriptu-
ve of biblical counseling. He has been teaching, re to shape their counseling theory and method.
writing and counseling for 33 years at the Chri- My colleagues and I think of biblical counseling
stian Counseling and Educational Foundation as an endless Wikipedia article with a long list of
(CCEF), which is in Philadelphia (U.S.A.). He contributors.
has written fourteen books and over seventy ar-
ticles. His short articles and blogs appear week- What were the notable influences from your fa-
ly at CCEF.org. (Werner May) mily of origin? I grew up between two sisters in
a Christian home that was never unkind, always
encouraging. One theme that is etched from
I am tempted to apologize immediately. What those days is that my mother always considered
follows is uncomfortably self-referential. It has the interests of other people. For me, this meant
too much of my own story. In the back of my that she asked me, without fail, about the events
mind is my fourth grade teacher who chal- of my day. As a typical American male I was not
lenged the class to write a letter to someone always forthcoming, but that pattern of having
without using the word “I.” Without doubt, she an interest in others has become part of my own
would assign me a failing grade on this one. life.
But we are participants in a discipline that is
personal. Counseling and therapy involves kno- What is your educational background? I was a
wing and being known. We are not technicians psychology major in college but turned to other
who bring mechanical solutions to broken sy- interests because, during that era, psychology
stems. We are persons who bring our pasts, our neglected the influence of history and culture,
weaknesses, our academic histories, our sins, and it assumed that the latest was the best, yet
our spiritual growth and our accumulating wis- the latest did not make sense of my own story. I
dom to a back-and-forth relationship. So we considered medicine, but it never reached que-
should not be shy about our personal stories. stions of meaning that interested me. One of my
My story spans most of the history of the mo- richer experiences in college was with margi-
dern Christian counseling movement. I com- nalized elementary school students (ages 7-12),
pleted my last degree in 1981, started in my so I applied for a degree that examined the way
present position three days after submitting my children learn. My conversion to Jesus Christ in
dissertation, and have been practicing biblical my last semester of college, however, postponed
counseling, teaching and writing within the that idea and I opted to study Scripture at a se-
same organization since then. This span of hi- minary.
story has given me a first-hand look at the entire My time at seminary felt like a guilty pleasure.
era of modern Christian counseling and Chri- What could be better than learning and studying
stian psychology. the mind of God? As I began wondering about
career options, I took a counseling course with
A Brief History a professor who was godly and kind—the ide-
Since I enjoy reading interviews, here is some al person to introduce me to pastoral care and
background in an interview format. what was to become biblical counseling. The
course aroused those old interests in psycho-
You call yourself a biblical counselor? Soon after logy, which, in retrospect, was an interest in
I came to the Christian Counseling and Edu- wisdom and in questions such as, Who are we?

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