2008 July-- Society for Christian Psychology

Psychology Words: Unconditional Positive Regard

Posted on July 28, 2008

[This is the last post for this month by guest blogger Dr. Bryan Maier (Biblical Seminary). He has been exploring questions stimulated by some of the classic therapeutic theories. In particular, Dr. Maier wishes that readers would be prompted to think how the Scriptures speak to concepts traditionally raised in theories courses. As in past posts, Dr. Maier raises a variety of questions for the reader to consider.]

I hope that my attempt to interact with Scripture and psychological theories has been thought provoking for you. If you want more of these type of discussions, I would encourage you to join us at our annual conference this September in Chicago (see this webpage for details). We will enjoy several keynote speakers and breakout sessions helping us to think through the role of hermeneutics in the building of a Christian Psychology. I will be presenting a paper on the Psalms of Lament.

For my final essay from psychological theories, I would like to look at the concept of unconditional positive regard from person centered therapy. The idea is that if we love (defined according to Rogers and our ethical standards) our clients well, they will in turn learn to love themselves which will embolden them to take healthy risks in their relationships and have less dysfunction. Upon hearing this, many Christian counselors either resonate immediately by attempting to utilize the power of love (especially the love of Christ), OR they reflexively label Rogers theories as narcissistic idolatry that distracts from truly loving God and loving others.

One of the key questions of course, is what does love mean, especially in the clinical setting. Rogers took an optimistic view of humans and assumed that every one of us has within us the desire to change in a more positive direction. The role of the therapist is find that desire and to help release its power. On the other hand, one of my colleagues often says that the task of counseling is convincing someone who wants to buy a car that what they really need is a horse. If this is love, it must be some kind of “tough love”. So we need to reflect on what love means.

Whatever love means, could it be as powerful as Rogers claims? If it is true that Jesus famous words “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 19:19, Mark 12:31, Luke 10:28-29) presuppose a pretty robust love of self (the passages don’t seem to make sense any other way), then it seems that there is a call to love others. But does this love make any difference in the lives of our clients? Can we love someone into changing? Can God? If so, what does this love look like? Is it the unconditional positive regard that Rogers speaks of? 1 John 4:19 claims that our love for others is based on God’s love for us, “We love because he first loved us”. Is our job as counselors to give our clients a taste of that love every time we meet? If so, how do we assess or measure the degree that we love? Is it solely a matter of content (we are telling them the right things) or is there an affective component? Can we love a client but not really like them, or vise versa?

Filed Under Bryan N. Maier, Christian Psychology, Psychology, worldview | 4 Comments

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