Zondervan - Counseling in African-American Communities

OTHER BOOKS BY THE EDITORS

By Dr. Lee N. June

The Black Family (with Matthew Parker)

Evangelism and Discipleship in African-American Churches (with Matthew Parker)

Men to Men (with Matthew Parker)

By Sabrina D. Black

Can Two Walk Together? Encouragement for Spiritually Unbalanced Marriages (Moody Press)

Prone to Wander (with LaVern A. Harlin) (Church Initiative)

By Dr. Willie Richardson

Reclaiming the Urban Family

Sharing Christ as You Go (Christian Research and Development)

ZONDERVAN

Counseling in African-American Communities
Copyright 2002 by Christian Research & Development

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of Zondervan.

epub Edition June 2009 ISBN: 0-310-86152-7

Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Counseling in African American communities : biblical perspectives on tough issues /
Lee N. June and Sabrina D. Black, editors ; Willie Richardson, consulting editor.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-310-24025-5
1. African AmericansPastoral counseling of. I. June, Lee N.
II. Black, Sabrina D. III. Richardson, Willie, 1939
BV4468.2.A34 .C68 2002
259'.089'96073dc21

2002004147

Names and details have sometimes been changed in stories and case studies.

All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated and with the exceptions noted below, are taken from the Holy Bible: New International Version. NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.

Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations in chapter 3 are from the New AmericanStandard Bible (NASB); in chapter 15, the King James Version (KJV); in chapter 16, the NewKing James Version (NKJV). Other versions of Scripture used in this book are the New CenturyVersion (NCV), the New Living Translation (NLT), the Amplified Bible, and the Scofield Reference Bible.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any otherexcept for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

02 03 04 05 06 07 08 /DC/ 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Contents

Willie Richardson

Lee N. June and Sabrina D. Black

Sabrina D. Black

Sabrina D. Black and LaVern A. Harlin

3. Dealing with Addictions through
the Twelve Steps with Godly Principles
Annette V. Hampton

Alfred Young Jr.

Kenneth Staley and Sheila Staley

Deborah G. Haskins

Paris M. Finner-Williams

Willie Richardson

Julius Brooks

Michael R. Lyles

11. Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder:
The Disease of the Shadows
Michael R. Lyles

Cupid R. Poe

Patricia Richardson

14. Suffering for a Season: A Physicians Perspective
on Grief and Loss
Pamela Turnbo

Willie L. Davis Jr.

Joan A. Watson Ganns

Darrell V. Freeman Sr.

Artis Fletcher and Blanche Womack-Ross

Lee N. June and Christopher C. Mathis Jr.

For many years, I have been an advocate, along with others, for the Bible as a power and a force in solving problems in counseling. I believe that our Creator, the author of the Bible, perfectly understands human nature, sociology, and psychology. He has given us the Scriptures, which contain principles to live by to help us avoid problems, and has given us the solutions for solving problems. I am not against behavioral or medical science; we need these disciplines. But I believe the Bible, being holistic in its approach, goes much deeper in discovering the root of problems rather than simply treating symptoms.

Christian Research and Development has been training churches and individuals in biblical counseling for the last twenty years, and we have recently joined together in establishing the National Biblical Counselors Association. Our mission is to advance the use of Gods Word in counseling and mobilizing lay counselors for the body of Christ, partnering with professional and pastoral counselors.

The association is purposely made up of biblical counselors, therapists, social workers, physicians, psychologists, psychiatrists, pastors, and lay people. What we all have in common is that we are Christians and believe in the power and the authority of the Bible.

Most of our practitioners are in urban centers, facing some of the most complex and challenging counselees and employing cutting-edge techniques. We work together and cooperate as a caregiving team. For example, there may be a pastor, a lay counselor, a social worker, and a physician working together to care for a person with Bipolar Disorder. The team is guided by the biblical principles that teach that people can be changed, restored, and healed or can learn to live productive and fruitful lives with an incurable disadvantage.

The contributors to this book are representatives of the national team of Christian caregivers. We have chosen some of the most difficult subjects to present in this book as an effort to advance the use of the Bible in problem solving and to demonstrate how professionals and lay caregivers can work together to generate a better quality of life for so many who are in need of help in our community.

Dr. Willie Richardson, President
Christian Research and Development

Lee N. June and Sabrina D. Black

The purpose of this book is to assist helping professionals who are Christians or who are sympathetic to the Christian faith and are seeking to employ the best of psychological, psychiatric, and medical principles while staying true to biblical precepts. It is also intended for persons who are facing the issues that are discussed and seeking ways to effectively deal with them.

The topics discussed in this book represent some of the most perplexing issues of our time and may be appropriately called tough issues. In order to grapple with these issues, we have asked persons in the field who are confronting them and are effectively dealing with them on a regular basis to offer practical suggestions/advice/tips to the practitioner as well as the person suffering from the problem at issue.

The book is divided into four sections. Part 1 deals with addictions. As the world and society become more complex, old addictions remain and new ones come on the scene. Hence, we have chosen to present in this section the old prevailing issues of alcohol and drug addictions along with ones that have only recently gained national attentiongambling addiction, sexual addiction, and the Internet.