A desire for increased Christian influence in the counseling community led me to help open Bell Tower Counseling in 2021 as a non-profit counseling center housed at Trinity Church Seattle.[1] We have a staff of licensed mental health counselors who are committed to two main things: the gospel of Jesus Christ and evidence-based counseling care. We raise money so that we can provide generous scholarships to make counseling affordable to people who cannot access it otherwise. We serve about 100 clients a month and nearly half of them are not affiliated with any church or faith community.
We believe in this work because Christians’ attention to mental and emotional health creates common ground with our neighbors – a way to build a bridge for redemptive relationships between people of faith and those without. Mental and emotional suffering is an aspect of our common humanity that is shared by people both inside and outside of the church. Our congregants are going to seek out support for their mental health conditions and we should be prepared to support them and direct them towards wise counsel and appropriate care. Likewise, our non-Christian neighbors are also searching for healing for their minds and hearts. While they will not necessarily go looking for healing in a church, they may very well seek out care from a counseling professional. Wouldn’t it be incredible if that professional was also a Christian believer?
The counselor has the sacred task of entering into a person’s story and helping them sort through both the dignity and the depravity which they discover there. The counseling relationship can become the training ground where a person learns how to trust, to repent, to forgive, and to heal. This healing process begins with naming the evils we have committed and those that have been committed against us, and lamenting the impacts of sin on our lives and in our world. We acknowledge with our clients that the pain they are feeling is real and deserves lament. There is hope hidden within lament, because acknowledging our pain points us to hope in “the ultimate justice of things”[2] as God has promised.
As a Christian who believes in common grace and believes that God has provided many means for us to participate in the battle against sin, suffering, and death in our broken world, I can engage with my non-Christian clients on this point – we can agree in our acknowledgement of present pain and in our longing for ultimate justice. We can wrestle through life’s tough questions and seek the truth together, as all truth belongs to God. Our God-given dignity means that there is enough of God’s glory in all people that they are able to see and discover truth.
According to research conducted by SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration), 1 in 5 American adults and 1 in 3 young adults (ages 18-25) has experienced a diagnosable mental health condition in the past year.[3] This kind of statistic indicates that not only are there Christians in our church pews each week who are suffering through various mental health struggles, but there are countless children, teens, and adults right outside the doors of our church buildings who are likewise in desperate need of healing and of hope.
We have been given agency by God to choose and change our behaviors, learn new tools and skills to practice with the help of our community, and experience healing as profound and redemptive as earned secure attachment (seriously – Google it!).[4] Even when my words fail or my strategies and techniques fall short, I believe that the Holy Spirit is present in me and at work through me in the counseling room with my non-Christian clients. If the Holy Spirit lives inside of me, then my non-believing clients are spending at least an hour a week in his presence, even when I’m not explicitly sharing the gospel with them. That’s a pretty powerful missional reality.
At Bell Tower, we believe that we are truly God’s co-laborers. Even as we “plant” and “water,” it is God alone who gives growth.[5] This is a call to labor in this work with faith and hope, while also acknowledging that it is God who will make change happen by his own will and in his own timing. A counseling relationship shines light into the dark places of someone’s life and story in such a way that they might glorify God for the work he has done.[6] We hope that by engaging and investing in mental health for our communities, churches in our region will become known among both believers and unbelievers as a place and a people who show our commitment to Jesus by investing in the health and flourishing of our neighbors.
[1] For more info visit www.belltowercounseling.org.
[2] Allender, D. (1995). The wounded heart: Hope for adult victims of childhood sexual abuse. Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress.
[3] Key Substance Use and Mental Health Indicators in the United States: Results from the 2020 National Survey on Drug Use and Health, accessed 06/08/2022. https://www.samhsa.gov/. (For full url, please contact Urbangelical. Short url: https://bit.ly/3Qkgd1s.)
[4] https://www.parentingforbrain.com/earned-secure-attachment/
[5] 1 Corinthians 3:6-9
[6] Matthew 5:16
