Check out our online courses, including, Introduction to Nouthetic Counseling and  The Use of Scripture in Counseling, taught by Jay Adams!

Books related to counseling others:

1. Competent to Counsel by Jay Adams
2. The Christian Counselor’s Manual by Jay Adams
3. How to Help People Change by Jay Adams
4. The Use of Scripture in Counseling by Jay Adams
5. Sanctification and Counseling by Jay Adams
6. Critical Stages in Biblical Counseling by Jay Adams
7. Check out our Bookstore for all the best counseling books!

The Christian Counselor’s New Testament and Proverbs, translated by Jay Adams

Visit our online bookstore for all your biblical counseling resource needs.
For more biblical counseling training, check out our list of INS Online Courses.

Follow INS on Social Media:
– Facebook: noutheticstudies
– Twitter: @noutheticstud
– Instagram: @noutheticstudies

The post Marriage is Made in Heaven appeared first on Institute for Nouthetic Studies | Biblical Counseling.

You guide me with Your counsel, And afterwards, you will take me up in glory.   Psalm 72:10

What a way to live life! Here and hereafter to live with God’s counsel and His Person.

Do you know Christ as your Savior? If not, whose counsel do you follow here; where will you go hereafter?

I urge you to think about that counsel now—it is found only in the Scriptures. But it leads to eternal life hereafter with God in glory. Glory is the splendor that surrounds Him and all that belongs to Him. Don’t you want to be a part of that glorious place where there is no sin or its ill effects? Where there is no sickness, misery of any kind or death?

If you don’t know how to be saved, check out some of our earlier blogs that explain the way of salvation and believe!

Check out our online course, The Use of Scripture in Counseling, taught by Jay Adams!

1. What to do on Thursday
2. The Christian’s Guide to Guidance 
3. A Call for Discernment

The Christian Counselor’s New Testament and Proverbs, translated by Jay Adams

Visit our online bookstore for all your biblical counseling resource needs.
For biblical counseling training, check out our list of INS Online Courses.

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The post Here and There appeared first on Institute for Nouthetic Studies | Biblical Counseling.

No, we “eagerly wait for a Savior the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform the body of our humble condition into the likeness of His glorious body . . .” (Philippians 3: 20, 21: HBSC). That is more than heaven—indeed, we will live in a new body in a new heavens and new earth (2 Peter 3:13) in which righteousness is at home. Think of it—believer, some day, you will have a new body like His!

It was a body that rose from the dead, walked through doors, ascended into heaven and sat on the right hand of God (where it is today).

On that resurrection day, your body will rise to meet Him in the air, in order to escort Him to earth.  You will then enjoy all the privileges of living in a perfect body in a perfect world! That is heaven, all right: heaven on earth!

Check out our online courses, including, Introduction to Nouthetic Counseling and  The Use of Scripture in Counseling, taught by Jay Adams!

Books related to end times:

1. The Time Is At Hand by Jay Adams
2. Check out our Bookstore for all the best counseling books!

The Christian Counselor’s New Testament and Proverbs, translated by Jay Adams

Visit our online bookstore for all your biblical counseling resource needs.
For more biblical counseling training, check out our list of INS Online Courses.

Follow INS on Social Media:
– Facebook: noutheticstudies
– Twitter: @noutheticstud
– Instagram: @noutheticstudies

The post What We Look Forward To . . . appeared first on Institute for Nouthetic Studies | Biblical Counseling.

“That for sure! Unless, of course, Jesus returns beforehand, and changes us so that it isn’t necessary to die.”

Are you expecting that to happen in your case?

“Well, it could. I’m younger than you (sorry to have to bring up the point).”

No problem. I know how old I am; my body won’t let me forget it. But back to the subject—are you looking forward to the second coming as a way of escaping death?

“Well . . . sorta’”

Hmmmm. Are you looking forward to death if that’s what will happen instead?

“That’s a bit different.”

How come?

“Well . . . I’m not sure.”

Will the transition from life to larger life by death be any different?

“Dunno.”

In either case, you will be with the Lord. which Paul says is “far better. And Jesus told the thief that when they died they’d be together that very day in Paradise.

“Yea. You’re right. But I wouldn’t yet have my glorified body.”

Correct. But with or without a body, Paul said that in Paradise, which he equated with the third heaven, he heard all sorts of good stuff he couldn’t reveal (II Corinthians 12:4). Sounds like a great place to be while awaiting the resurrection of the body.

“Yeah. Suppose you’re right.”

Sure I am. Paul couldn’t wait to die, which he called “gain” (Philippians 1:21). Anyone you know who doesn’t like to gain something?

“Don’t think so. But what sort of gain will I get?”

We know very little about the intermediate state between death and the resurrection. We do know that it is called “heaven” and “paradise,” however, and that’s a pretty good indication that the gain will be pleasant. We know that we’ll be with Christ, which is wonderful. We know that we will leave the sorrows of sin behind. Sounds like we know all we need to know to strongly anticipate it.

“You’re right. The only difference then, between transformation at Christ’s coming and transformation at death has to do with the body, and with how we leave this present world. It’s not death I fear, but the deterioration of the body that often leads so it. If I go at the second coming, I might avoid some of that.”

That’s about all the difference.

“But I guess that too is one more opportunity to lay up treasures in heaven—if I handle suffering leading to death Christ’s way.”

Right you are. So if one is a Christian, one way or another, he has nothing to lose and everything to gain.

“Sounds great, either way!”

Check out our online courses, including, Introduction to Nouthetic Counseling and  The Use of Scripture in Counseling, taught by Jay Adams!

Books related to counseling others:

1. Competent to Counsel by Jay Adams
2. The Christian Counselor’s Manual by Jay Adams
3. How to Help People Change by Jay Adams
4. Check out our Bookstore for all the best counseling books!

The Christian Counselor’s New Testament and Proverbs, translated by Jay Adams

Visit our online bookstore for all your biblical counseling resource needs.
For more biblical counseling training, check out our list of INS Online Courses.

Follow INS on Social Media:
– Facebook: noutheticstudies
– Twitter: @noutheticstud
– Instagram: @noutheticstudies

The post Transformation—How? appeared first on Institute for Nouthetic Studies | Biblical Counseling.

All we should expect is His vengeance for our ingratitude.

And if you think about it what does a country like ours, that has been blessed so greatly, really deserve? Surely, a lot worse than we have yet seen. We have been a rebellious nation, bent on pleasure and willing to do most anything in order to “get ahead” in life. We have been a country of people who spend more on entertainment and sports in a month than they give to the cause of the Lord in a year. We don’t deserve God’s favor. We deserve his punishment. And, if the way that God dealt with people and nations in the Scripture is any indication of how He will deal with us today, we can expect His patience to run out sometime in the future. Eventually, the iniquity of the Amorites was full! Eventually, after a long time, God destroyed Jerusalem and sent the people off into captivity. He is slow to anger—but when His anger burns and boils over, God can sweep nations and peoples aside like so much dust. We dare not treat His longsuffering as if it were indifference. To do so has been the tragic story of many a nation in history.

Not only ought we not to presume upon God’s patience, we ought to implore Him to be merciful to us. Before things go too far, it’s time for Christians to rise up and seek His forgiveness and beg His favor. It isn’t time to bewail situations that we don’t like. Rather, we ought to bewail our sin and seek God’s pardon. Rather, we ought to warn others of the wrath to come and seek to win the lost.  Rather, we ought to ask God once again to awaken our country to the faith that so many once had.  Rather, we ought to live as we ought before Him and our neighbors as Christians should rather than living like the world.

In short, it is time to repent as a nation, as a church, as individuals, and call upon God to pour out His grace upon us once more. Will you be one who does, Christian?  Or will you just go about complaining how bad things have become?

Check out our online courses, including, Introduction to Nouthetic Counseling and  The Use of Scripture in Counseling, taught by Jay Adams!

Books related to counseling others:

1. Competent to Counsel by Jay Adams
2. The Christian Counselor’s Manual by Jay Adams
3. How to Help People Change by Jay Adams
4. Check out our Bookstore for all the best counseling books!

The Christian Counselor’s New Testament and Proverbs, translated by Jay Adams

Visit our online bookstore for all your biblical counseling resource needs.
For more biblical counseling training, check out our list of INS Online Courses.

Follow INS on Social Media:
– Facebook: noutheticstudies
– Twitter: @noutheticstud
– Instagram: @noutheticstudies

The post God’s Still in Heaven appeared first on Institute for Nouthetic Studies | Biblical Counseling.

This means that spring is here. Of course, it is so officially, but the flowers and the blossoming trees are what so clearly give evidence of the fact.

What will you do this spring to take advantage of God’s beautiful world? (I know, man has messed things up) But in spite of man—though marred—there is much that is lovely, exciting, interesting, pleasant, etc., etc.

Now, my friend—how are you going to spend whatever discretionary time you have? Are picnics too old-fashioned for you? Is it too much trouble to set up the badminton court? [I had to look up the spelling of that word—didn’t realize it had an ‘n’ in it]. Will you go swimming at the beach in a few weeks when it warms up a bit more? How about fishing? What will you do to enjoy this wonderful world that God has provided for you to enjoy?

When you do—don’t forget to thank Him for it.

And—beyond that—use it as a reminder that (if you are a Christian) there awaits you a world that is far better. If this one is so wonderful in spite of the scars and pollution brought about by man, think how much better the new world will be–the one in which righteousness is at home!

Think what it will be like never to feel pain again, never to cry over anything, since there won’t be anything to cry about. Never to sin or be sinned against!! But, most of all, think of it—you’ll finally see the Lord Jesus Himself—you’ll know the glory of His presence. And you’ll be able to appreciate things the way a perfect person will!

Are you looking forward to a city whose Builder and Maker is God? If you forget from time to time, why not use the beauties of spring to remind you?

The post Spring Has Sprung appeared first on Institute for Nouthetic Studies | Biblical Counseling.