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Lesson OneHoly Tension: Leading People Toward the Cycle of Spiritual Movement3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson TwoFour Kinds of Conversations: Provoking the Right Kind of Tension3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson ThreeThe Rhythm of SoulCare: Four Movements3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson FourThe Doctrine of First and Second Things: Beginning to Understand Radical Dependence on Supernatural Resources for Supernatural Living3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson FiveNew Covenant Provisions: Entering Tension that the Spirit Creates and Resolves3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson SixNew Covenant Community: What the Spirit Makes Possible3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson SevenSafety and Excitement: What Makes Someone Willing to be Known and Explored3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson EightThe Purity of Self-Awareness: Encouraging Trust in Another3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson NineDiscernment: Building Confidence in the Process of Discovery3 Activities1 Assessment
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Lesson TenReleasing What Is Alive: Touching the Soul with Power3 Activities1 Assessment
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Course Wrap-UpCourse Completion1 Activity1 Assessment
Participants 184
Discussion Questions
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Briefly review what role each of the following topics plays in SoulCare: passion, wisdom, journeying reality, vision, reframing, and categories of understanding.
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Passion is understanding the ruling passion that is going on inside of me (my interior) as I turn my chair toward someone else, what are my interior motives. Am I looking at, depending on my own expertise? Am I looking to impress someone else. Am I really wanting to represent Jesus?
Wisdom is relying on the Spirit of God to guide us, knowing that on our own, we can do nothing that is truly effective SoulCare.
Journey Reality is the story of the person who is sharing their current situation/problem.
Vision is the compelling vision for someone that opens their appetitive for God so that I’d becomes stronger than any other appetite.
Reframing is moving from the journeying reality into the deeper story of the soul. How are they relating to family, friends, past history. How are they relating to God. Shifting to the power of God rather than the reality of the journey.
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passion- what’s going on inside of me; wisdom – what’s going on in them that the Spirit wants to touch through the Soulcarer; journeying reality – what’s the flesh dynamics (soul without t/Spirit) and how to go beyond/deeper in to the Spirit dynamics (soul with the Spirit and appetite for God is stirred/greater); vision – what’s the Spirit revealing as a greater hope that only God can fill and wants to fill; reframing – asking relationship questions of past, present, & w/God; categories of understanding – do I have a roadmap for how to understand what’s happening as I listen to their story
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Passion: What is in my heart and what is happening in the other, longing for the Spirit of God to stir their appetite for God becomes stronger than anything else. Wisdom: Holy Spirit guidance that comes out of you and touches them.
Journeying reality: The issue at hand, what the person is experiencing right now.
Vision: What and where is the spirit of God moving in this person’s life?
Reframing: Move specifics to reframe to the larger story of their story in Him in relation to past and present relationships with others.
Categories of Understanding: What helps us to make sense out of this story – they want God, they are an image bearer, they feel, think, choose. And when things hurt they may run away or handle it in a fleshly way.
Do we see that we need Him more than anything else? -
Passion – what is going on in my interior world as I listen to the person seeking soulcare, my ruling passion. That helps highlight my inadequacy in providing soulcare as I realised how self-centred I am inclined, even in seeking to help others.
Wisdom – it is seeking to understand the other person, to understand where they are at and how we can enter into that person’s life with the right words and questions.
Journeying reality – it is understanding the problem the other is currently facing
Vision – It is the eventual reality of how this person’s appetite for God is stirred in such a way that he becomes aware of it and becomes his primary appetite above all other appetites including a better life
Reframing – to move the conversation from his journey reality to the bigger story of the soul of the other person, his relationships beyond the current one etc.
Categories of understanding – I think it is the process of walking through all the possibilities that is contributing to the problem, for eg, how his corrupt capacity to desire, perceive, choose or feel contribute to the situation, the focus on desires of convenience and importance instead of necessity, the foolishness that impairs his preception resulting in his choices etc. -
Basically, all of these boil down to being centered on God, directing our greatest passion toward him, drawing on his wisdom, journeying toward him, envisioning the counseled as his child,reframing away from our own tendencies and seeking deeper understanding of the person we’re trying to help
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How might your experiences in the cycle of spiritual growth help you provide more effective SoulCare?
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Having been in spiritually forming conversations, having seen the flesh dynamics at work in my own processing of my life, having been called to see what the Spirit is doing beneath the surface, and having to wait for any small sign of change in myth own life, I am more in touch with what the one I am talking with will experience.
My own brokenness, my own need, my inadequacy puts me in the spot of needing to depend.
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My experiences in the cycle of spiritual growth help me move through the process of providing soul care more effectively starting with brokenness and the acceptance of my own inadequacy, leading to abandonment. Actually going through this cycle has informed me as I seek to understand and interpret what God tells me about myself as well as this person and how to help create a hunger and thirst for Him in them.
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Understanding that life isn’t all about me, self, but about others is the first step in growing closer to God. I’m guided in the Word to think of others as more important than ourself (Philippians 2:3-4). Once I come to terms with this, I can turn from selfish ways and strive for Christ-like behavior, which is the point of abandonment to God. Putting full trust in Him will in time create a confidence so I can talk with people being led by the spirit to move them closer to God. This release will complete the passion to see what’s happening in me and others.
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Practicing abandonment daily, as a SoulCare giver, helps us to grow in our reliance on God. We are then able to model it to other people in order to encourage them to abandon purposeless “fighting with the windmills” (looking how to fix their problems, finding temporary soltuons, but ultimately still feeling restless, empty and deepy unhappy). If we can show them the great wisdom of “I can’t do this. God can” in our own practice, then they may be drawn to adopt this way of thiking, feeling and living for themselves – acknowledge that things are not working and invite God to intervene and lead one to the bigger vision.
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The cycle of spiritual growth brings me to a place of dependence on God. I will be far more effective as God’s agent than in my own strengths and ideas.
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Why is it a mistake to focus on retreating, advising, or empathizing while attempting to provide SoulCare? Which of these three mistakes are you personally more likely to make as you attempt to engage in SoulCare? What do you think predisposes you to make that mistake?
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None of these three movements get to the depth of the soul. I must be willing to move deeper to encourage my friend to recognize there is more. That means that I must stay with them in nasty circumstances, wait for the Spirit to raise up life in their soul.
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Focusing on these three actions is a mistake because this focus indicates my self reliance. My ruling passion is exposed as not being the will of God and not relying on God through His Holy Spirit. I have been a solutions focused person all my life and especially since my educational focus as I pursued degrees in social work was always on solutions. My own back story, foolishness and education predisposed me to make this mistake.
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When we back away, offer solutions or try to feel what the person feels the thing that can be accomplished is rearranged behavior. This doesn’t get to the interior world or move someone closer to God.
I’m more likely to retreat. The reason is two-fold. Learning to keep peace, leave a difficult or uncomfortable situation as a child is still a battle I fight as an adult. As a result, when I feel confused or like I may not be able to contribute in a positive way I back away. So this has become a habit that I need to break. -
All three of these things, retreating, advising, and empathizing are attempts to stay comfortable. True soul care is often uncomfortable. There is tremendous power in having someone stay instead of retreating when I share a painful and shameful experience.
My tendency is to give advice, because that’s often what people ask for with their words. I want to learn to hear what their hearts are asking for- God! -
Self centered
No dependence on the spirit