What Is Christian Counseling and How Can it Help Troubled Teenage Girls From Okeechobee, FL?

As its classification implies, Christian counseling is a Jesus-centered method that combines the word of God and contemporary psychiatry to treat those with mental health-related problems. Christian counseling requires formal one-on-one therapy concourses and faith-based communications when treating an individual, unlike conventional psychiatry and therapeutics.

That said, Christian therapists, or psychiatrists, are also comparable to regular counselors in many ways. For instance, an accredited Christian counselor diagnose and manage mental illnesses with the same accreditation as a worldly mental health advocate. The only difference between the two mental health services is that Christian counselors also address their patient's spiritual needs. 

According to the International Association of Biblical Counselors  

(AIABC), Christian therapists "seek to thoughtfully identify those areas in which a Christian may be challenging to the principles and commands of Scripture and to help him learn how to submit to Jesus' will. Christian counselors, therefore, do approach psychiatric science, albeit through a biblical lens." The authority of AIABC also asserts that the only differentiation between secular and Christian therapy is that Christian counselors, while competent in modern psychiatry and psychotherapy, are driven by the Bible as their therapeutic incentive. 

As it correlates to troubled teenage girls, Christian counseling is verifiably demonstrated to be effective in restoring mental and behavioral health in their patients -- even more so than secular psychology.  

Why Many of Today's Parents Choose Christian Counseling over Secular Treatment

As we've already related, Christian counseling is comparable and divergent to secular medicine, both in its treatment composition and ideological framework. Proponents of Christian-based medicine contest that Christ-based therapy is preferred to material treatment because temporal counseling bases its applications on the latest psychological constructions and societal models. Proponents of biblical therapy claim that psychological trends are invariably changing, making it immensely challenging to adequately treat the root condition of any mental health-related issue. However, this is not the case for Christian counseling. 

Whereas secular counseling is based on the stereotypically marking of an individual into a cookie-cutter gauge, biblical therapy is based on steadfast faith in the word of God, whose message, by nature, is invariably constant. Advocates for Christ-centered medicine also point out that where materialistic treatment fundamentally fails is that, without the direction of Christ, it cannot identify, and therefore treat, the motives behind a troubled teen's self-destructive responses.