Creating a Culture of Understanding of Mental Illness Within the Context of the Church
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The mission of the Christian within the context of the local church is to serve others as Christ served the body. In this time of rapid mental health concerns, the church should be concerned and equipped to care and support those who are in need. In the equipping of the body with such concerns of mental illness, the church should seek to learn how to create a culture of understanding, which demonstrates grace. This culture of understanding by the church should consist of identifying people who are in need and treating them with the same love and kindness that has been granted to them through Christ. The act of grace in the Greek is defined as showing favor; this is how the church should present themselves to those with mental illness. For example, in Romans 3:23-24, it reads, “ for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” Here, it shows that God granted grace to those who sinned and fell short of His glory. His grace was a gift to them, an act of favor. As God’s people, we are to imitate Him in this way of showing favor to those with mental illness. In this culture of grace, there will be an active participation and learning of what it means to be gracious. Although the act of empathy should be included in such a culture, it will not be enough to demonstrate such favor. With those experiencing mental illnesses, it is helpful to feel and to understand what they are going through but until that empathy is God oriented it will be lacking.
The church should also be discerning in this time of rapid mental health concerns. Many people are seeking out answers for this issue of mental illness and do not exactly know where to turn to get them. With the many resources out there which are addressing the concerns of mental illness, the church must be careful to distinguish that which is true from that which false. When speaking about discernment, the church should seek to discern by regarding God’s mind on the specific topic. The only way of truly discerning something from truth and error is by having the Word of God as the means of discernment. In Philippians 1:9-11, Paul desired for the Philippian church’s love to abound with all discernment writing,
“And it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more, with knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.”
This prayer from Paul was in hopes for the Philippians to be able to approve what is excellent, and so be pure and blameless for the day of Christ. In this same way, the church should be discerning with the issue of mental illness.
As believers, we should come to acknowledge that in the psychological diagnosing of someone with a mental illness, majority of the time, physical evidence are not shown in the diagnoses and the concept itself is abstract. This means that majority of the time psychologist diagnose their patients with illnesses that are selected through mere objective observation. The latest guide used by these psychologists is known to be the DSM V-TR. As psychologist diagnose their patients using the criteria found in the DSM V-TR, they can fail to acknowledge that there is a spiritual aspect that should be considered. As Biblical Counselors seek to care for those with mental illnesses, they consider the person as a whole person; they, recognizing that there are both physical and spiritual aspects to the person that they are helping. With this in mind, Biblical Counselors do not disregard the physical nature of a person, so if there is suspicion of a true physiological problem from the person, the Biblical Counselor should refer them to see a Medical Doctor. The church should do the same in recognizing that there are both physical and spiritual aspects in those that are dealing with mental illnesses.
When looking at a person, that person consists of mental, emotional, and behavioral influences. All these influences are spiritual in nature. A person with a mental illness experiences all these faculties and can receive spiritual guidance regarding them. The church should be aware of these influences that reside in every human being and should recognize that regardless of what is occurring in a person dealing with mental illness, that person must still respond to God. In order to communicate this information to the person dealing with mental illness, the church must communicate this to them graciously. In graciously communicating to them graciously, we are calling them to respond in faith to God, we are telling them that God has provided everything in His Word for them that they need even in their struggles. The Scripture says that God’s power is made perfect in our weaknesses. In 2 Corinthians 12:9a, God speaks to Paul saying, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Here scripture tells us that our human weaknesses are not a deterrent to God’s power but instead, they promote it. As a follow-up to this, Paul in that same chapter responded by saying, “Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Cor. 12:9b). We are beset with weaknesses as human beings, with this there are plenty of opportunities for God to show His power through us. When we see our need for Him through our weakness, we can then rest in His gospel. This shows us that it is not all weaknesses that God will remove from us; He may plan to use some for our benefit and for His glory (ex. 2 Cor. 12:7).
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