I've been thinking about an approach to pastoral encouragement/exhortation I've seen over the past couple of months. It's especially prominent across various social media platforms among a certain "Reformedish" type (though it's not an exhibition of truly Reformed pastoral care).
It always involves some kind of biblical exhortation, offered as a way of addressing specific forms of misery (physical, economic, etc.) that accompany the pandemic: "fear not," "be not anxious," etc., etc. Such encouragements, moreover, are often offered with great bravado.
Because it is the divine Word of the "God of all comfort" (2 Cor 1:3), the Bible is certainly the supreme source of encouragement and exhortation in times like these.
However, there is an *unbiblical* way of using the Bible to encourage and exhort. (In fact, there are *many*.)
However, there is an *unbiblical* way of using the Bible to encourage and exhort. (In fact, there are *many*.)
The one I have in mind has something to do with how we think about the heart, the center of cognition, evaluation, and movement in human beings. My sense is that there's an unbiblical view of the heart that underlies certain ways of using Bible verses to exhort and encourage.
Perhaps the best way to see it is to consider two competing metaphors for the heart. According to one metaphor, the heart is a cup. It may be full of coffee or it may be full of tea but, under normal circumstances, one would not want to fill his cup with both.
It seems that folks sometimes offer biblical encouragements "do not be afraid," "do not be anxious" as if the heart is a cup full of fear or anxiety that needs to be *emptied* of those emotions so that it can be *filled* with alternative emotions. But this is wrongheaded.
The metaphor errs in at least two ways. First, it fails to understand that sorrow, fear, and anxiety are not always sinful emotions; in fact, such emotions may constitute *appropriate* emotional responses to the loss (actual or threatened) of *real* goods.
Second, this metaphor seems to be guilty of an over-realized eschatology. That is to say, it fails to appreciate that, from a redemptive-historical perspective, these are days of sorrow, not yet the day of the wiping away of all tears once and for all.
However, the heart is not a cup.
The heart is more like a scale, specifically, it is more like a "balance scale," the kind often used as a symbol for justice because its two sides weigh different arguments and positions in the process of reaching a true and proper judgment.
The heart is more like a scale, specifically, it is more like a "balance scale," the kind often used as a symbol for justice because its two sides weigh different arguments and positions in the process of reaching a true and proper judgment.
The heart is a balance scale. To borrow Basil of Caesarea's analogy, it is the "internal" court of the soul that weighs differing realities, differing courses of action, etc.
A proper use of biblical encouragements and exhortations will take this into account.
A proper use of biblical encouragements and exhortations will take this into account.
The encouragements "do not be afraid," "do not be anxious" should not be offered (in every case at least) as a *rebuke*. As in: "pour out the contents of your heart, fill them with something else." Such rebukes can be the cause of *a lot* of false guilt among sincere believers.
These encouragements instead should be offered as *counter weights*.
As in: "I know your heart is (rightly) heavy with sorrow due to the loss of some good thing(s), that it is overwhelmed by threatening circumstances, that it is uncertain of what tomorrow may bring...
As in: "I know your heart is (rightly) heavy with sorrow due to the loss of some good thing(s), that it is overwhelmed by threatening circumstances, that it is uncertain of what tomorrow may bring...
... However, let me offer you a counter weight, not to *remove* these emotions (the cup metaphor), but to place them in relation to a larger reality: the reality of God's sovereign goodness, attention, and purpose, which offer solid reasons for hope, encouragement, and so forth."
These "counter weights" do not *remove* the other "weights." Instead they provide precious consolations that enable us to *bear* the other weights of sorrow, anxiety, and fear in a godly manner in this vale of tears.
One more thing: Much pastoral wisdom consists in knowing *when* to offer such biblical encouragements and exhortations and when to shut your mouth. There is "a time for every matter under heaven" (Eccl 3:1), including "a time to keep silence" (Eccl 3:7).
