Christianity regards marriages and families as gifts from God. The Bible also regards marriage as a sacred institution and it contains several passages aimed at maintaining peaceful and happy families through counseling (Crabb, 1975). In fact, the Bible has several passages in which it refers Christians as belonging to the family of Christ. The Bible therefore contains family-oriented counseling teachings aimed at helping Christians fit in the will of God as the Father.
Throughout the Old Testament, great men such as Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and others served God and maintained their families under the guidance and wisdom they obtained from God. The overlying marriage and family counseling topic urges wives to respect their wives and requires husbands to love their wives (Carlson, 1976). In Exodus 20, the 5th commandment requires children to honor their parents and in return live a long life. In 1 Corinthians 12: 18-21, Paul wrote, “God put every different part in the body if it were all only one part.” Interpreted, Paul was insinuating at the peace, integration and unity that should exist within the family institution.
In Proverbs 31: 10, the bible describes the “capable wife”. In this passage, Solomon was counseling women on how to they can make good wives. In Romans 7: 1 Paul, counseled couples on marriage values concerning adultery. In the epistles, Paul constantly refers to the churches he addressed as brothers and sisters. The identification of Paul’s teachings with the family institution draws different members of the family to the biblical teachings (Kostenberger & Jones, 2010).
These and other teachings contained in the Bible show value and importance of counseling in marriage and families.
References
Kostenberger, A. & Jones, D. (2010) God, Marriage, and Family: Rebuilding the Biblical
Foundation 2nd Ed. Crossway, 1300 Crescent Street, Wheaton, Illinois.
Carlson, D. (1976) Jesus’ Style of Relating: The Search for a Biblical View of Counseling.
Journal of Psychology and Theology, Vol. 4, No. 3), p. 187
Crabb, L. (1975) Basic Principles of Biblical Counseling. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing
House, p. 12.
