If Doctors Can Treat the Body, Why Not the Mind?

In this regular feature, Dave and Tom respond to questions from listeners and readers of The Berean Call. Here is this week’s question: Dear Dave and TA: Regarding psychology, every disease of man stems from the fall, that is, sin, so why is it biblical to see a doctor for a physical problem, but not for a mental problem? Or, if Bible solutions are all that is necessary for mental health, why not physical health as well?

Tom:

Dave, it’s an interesting question, but I think this person is a little bit confused, and maybe that confusion doesn’t just hold with this individual--a lot of people think that mental health, that somehow our mind, our spirits, can be physically healthful.

Dave:

I guess we’ve dealt with this a number of times in the Newsletter, and Q & A’s and so forth, it’s pretty simple. I like the way the Bobgans put it: tissues know nothing of issues. There’s a difference between tissues and issues. The mind deals with issues, the body is made up of tissues.

Tom:

Right, nerves, muscles, bones.

Dave:

Right, so when we talk of the brain, it’s physical. You talk of the mind, it’s nonphysical, and we have proved that many times, can prove it very easily. We have nonphysical ideas, all ideas in fact are non physical. When I say justice, you know what I am talking about. What does it weigh, what does it smell like, what’s its texture, and what does it look like, and so forth. It has nothing to do with the physical world, it’s held in the mind. Now, all concepts are non physical. We are non physical beings living in a physical body. We’re spirit, soul and body. So of course the doctor deals with physical problems, but he cannot deal with emotional or mental or moral problems. As I have often said, Tom, in the past when we talked about this sort of thing, I haven’t talked about it in a long time, but holistic medicine, for example. You see a triangle, mind, body, spirit. Well, just a couple of little questions, ask your doctor. Doctor, you’re into holistic medicine, mind, body, spirit, tell me, did you study spirit, how to diagnose spirits in medical school? Isn’t spirit a religious term? Well, what religion is this that you’re passing off on your patients in the name of holistic medicine? Unless we make that distinction we get into all kinds of problems.

Tom:

Sure Dave, can we put your mind and your spirit under a microscope? Is there some kind of a physiological test that identifies these areas?It doesn’t.

Dave:

But Tom, we have, as you know, we have Christian psychologists by the zillions almost, and they do not make that distinction, and they have written some pretty angry stuff about me, and then they have used that very illustration: Well, does the hunt go to an auto mechanic when he’s got a problem with his automobile. They can’t even distinguish. The Bible never suggests I go to a medical doctor in order to get in a right relationship with God. This is a spiritual matter, it’s a moral matter. Morals have nothing to do---you don’t have an immoral kidney or an unrighteous gland somewhere in your body. You can’t mix those two, but tragically, this is what Christian psychology has done, and it tries to deal from a supposed scientific, and Psychology is not scientific, tries to deal from this type of an analysis in treatment mode with the mind, the soul the spirit. I remember I was listening to Martin Bobgan one time when he was invited to go to Fuller Graduate School of Psychology. They didn’t give him a very big audience, they just gave him a class. He said, look, here’s what we have to deal with, what is the model of man and what is the method of change. Now, if a man just has diphtheria or cancer, or whatever it is, how are you going to work with this?You need a medical doctor, you need physical science, but if the man is an adulterer, he’s a thief, he’s a liar, how are you going to deal with that?You’re going to adjust something in his brain? But now this is what drugs are given for, to adjust the brain, and you cannot adjust the brain with drugs.So Tom, sadly, the Christian psychologist, they deal with everything from that mode. They go to the atheistic humanists who know nothing of the soul and the spirit, whose lives themselves are messed up, practically every one of them, and they’re going to try, somehow we’re going to deal with this from a scientific, physical standpoint and they are ignoring the relationship with God which we must have through Jesus Christ. And the Bible promises all things that pertain to life and godliness. How do I get right with God?I’m crucified with Christ, Jesus has become my life. I don’t think that Jesus Christ, who has become my life needs any help from a Freudian or Jungian or any other kind of psychiatrist.

Tom:

Yeah. Dave, one of the problems with this question is that it assumes that mental health, that its a realm of science, and it’s totally not. We have, not only our video, Psychology and the Church, Critical Questions, Crucial Answers, we have a series that we did on the radio program. Somebody that’s interested in this, I really recommend that you contact us and we can get some information, documentation, all that you would need to show how bogus this whole so-called approach, psychotherapy, so-called Christian psychology, it’s just dead wrong!

Dave:

Tom, let’s just put it bluntly, we have very little time left I’m sure. The Bible promises everything we need. You read Hebrews 11, these are the men and women of faith who triumphed over trials and difficulties like people today don’t even know anything about. Why would I then turn from what thousands, millions of Godly men and women down through history have found more than sufficient, why would I turn from Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit and the Word of God to the counsel of the ungodly? It makes no sense at all!