The Ambiguously Cured Soul

In this editorial, David Powlison argues that many people receive counseling that mixes true, half-true, and false. He presents a case study of a woman with a history of lesbian fantasy, and offers commentary on the counsel she received. Powlison maintains that counsel misled her in two ways, saying that her problems were caused by childhood experiences and that the human heart is an empty receptacle of needs. Her counsel also ignored two problems that lie on the surface of the case study: a shallow view of human nature, and the dominance of “fear of man” in the woman’s life. Powlison concludes, she is an ambiguously cured soul. The therapeutic mingles with Christianity into a syncretistic psychotherapy. Powlison argues that she is one of God’s sheep who needs better and more wholesome nourishment than psychotherapy can provide.