Dr. Stanton Jones is a Christian Integrationist Counselor currently serving as Professor of Psychology and Core Studies Emeritus and Provost Emeritus at Wheaton College.[1] After receiving his B.S. summa cum laude from Texas A&M University, Dr. Jones went on to obtain his M.A. and Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Arizona State University. He has held many offices including Rech Professor of Psychology and Christianity and Chairperson of the Wheaton College Psychology Department, Psychology Department Chair, Research Fellow of the Pew Evangelical Scholars Program, Visiting Scholar at the University of Chicago and the University of Cambridge, and Provost at Wheaton College. Dr. Stanton has published books about Christian counseling including Psychology: A Student’s Guide, Modern Psychotherapies: A Comprehensive Christian Appraisal, and a contribution to Psychology & Christianity: Five Views. Dr. Stanton has also written extensively on the issue of homosexuality and Christianity, having published three books on the topic including Homosexuality: The Use of Scientific Research in the Church’s Moral Debate, God’s Design for Sex, and Ex-Gays?: A Longitudinal Study of Religiously Mediated Change in Sexual Orientation.
This understanding of integration does not require one to be in tension with all aspects of secular psychology. There are many topics to which Scripture does not speak—how neurons work, how the brain synthesizes mathematical or emotional information, the types of memory, or the best way to conceptualize personality traits. There are also many areas of psychological study where the most basic construals that nonbelieving scientists make about their subject matter are roughly in accord with how Christians might view the same subject, and so there is generous overlap in the basic understandings that all bring to the subject. There are many areas of psychology where Christians can explore and celebrate the fascinating fruits of psychological exploration and encounter no apparent tension between Christian and “secular” belief. I share in my friend David Myers’s enthusiasm for the fruits of psychological science that can inform and challenge my understandings of persons.[2]
In the quote above, Stanton Jones mounts two attacks on the sufficiency of Scripture in defense of Christian Integrationist Counseling. First, Jones advances a low view of God’s Word. This attack is not blatant, and Jones himself would deny that he has a low view of Scripture, but simply that his view of Scripture is appropriate.[3] Like most Christian Integrationists, Jones believes that Scripture is sufficient to bring us to faith in Christ and to orient our perspective of reality.[4] He makes sure to affirm that God’s Word is not simply constructed of “value perspectives,” but that it is “completely trustworthy” and “stable and enduring.”[5] However, Jones also denies that Scripture is materially sufficient for counseling. Material sufficiency means that the Bible “tells us everything we need to know from God about any topic.”[6] While Jones affirms the Bible’s trustworthiness in what it does say, he also says that there are “many topics to which Scripture does not speak.”[7] Some of the examples that he gives are “how neurons work, how the brain synthesizes mathematical or emotional information, the types of memory, or the best way to conceptualize personality traits.”[8] This statement may not seem to be an attack on the material sufficiency of Scripture at first glance, but Jones is here claiming that these topics are vital to an understanding of counseling. Christian Integrationist Counselors advance a low view of Scripture by claiming that the material found in Scripture is not complete enough to give believers all that they need to know about counseling.
Second, Jones initiates what Newcomer describes as “a silent baptism of worldly philosophy.”[9] Not only does Jones advance a low view of Scripture his solution to the supposed lack of information in Scripture about counseling is to advance secular psychologists and psychotherapies. Jones does this in a way that seems to align with Scripture, but he elevates secular philosophies to the level of Scripture. He does this by stating that Christians and “nonbelieving scientists” are in accord about many of the “most basic construals” of various areas of psychology.[10] Jones believes that integrating many elements of the models of secular therapists is acceptable because we can use their theories in conjunction with Scripture to better understand those whom we are counseling.[11]
Therefore, Jones attacks the sufficiency of Scripture by first advancing a low view of Scripture through the creation of a false equivalency between areas of scientific inquiries such as neural connections or types of memory and the knowledge necessary to counsel believers in trials and temptations. In contrast, Paul tells us in Romans 15:14 that we are “full of goodness, filled with all knowledge and able to instruct one another.”[12] Jones also attacks the sufficiency of Scripture by asserting that what believers need to properly counsel people in the face of this supposed gap in understanding is the worldly philosophies of secular psychotherapists. God has given us all that we need to counsel one another, so we must stand firm on the sufficiency of His Word.
[1] “Stanton Jones,” Wheaton College, accessed May 26, 2024, https://www.wheaton.edu/academics/departments/psychology/all-department-faculty/faculty-emeriti/stanton-jones/.
[2] Stanton L. Jones et al., “An Integration View,” in Psychology & Christianity: Five Views, ed. Eric L. Johnson, Second Edition., Spectrum Multiview Books (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2010), 115–116.
[3] Jones, 115.
[4] Ibid., 108, 110
[5] Ibid., 108
[6] Heath Lambert, A Theology of Biblical Counseling (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Academic, 2016), 48.
[7] Jons, 115.
[8] Ibid.
[9] Jim Newcomer, “Attacks, Part 2,” OL SCM 632 Foundations of Biblical Counseling, (lecture, May 26, 2024).
[10] Jones, 115.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible: English Standard Version
(Wheaton: Crossway, 2011).
