Dale Johnson: Today, on the podcast, I have with me Dr. Ernie Baker. He is a fellow with ACBC, and he is the senior adult pastor at First Baptist Church, in Jacksonville, Florida. He also serves as the Director of training with overseas instruction in counseling, and he’s the chairman of the undergraduate degree program in biblical counseling at the Masters University. He’s married to Rose, and they have six children, five of which are married. They also have 14 grandchildren. He’s the author of a number of books and articles, including being the editor of a new critical issues and biblical counseling series that has been put out by Shepherd’s Press. Ernie, thank you for being with us today. I’m really looking forward to diving into the Scripture on this particular edition.
Ernie Baker: Thank you, Dale. And I’m excited, too. This is a great passage of Scripture.
Dale Johnson: It is a great passage of Scripture, but it’s really interesting to see how the biblical language really comes to life in describing and identifying what we see is normal life, in a fallen human world. And the Bible is unafraid to use this terminology of deep affliction, calamity, suffering, trials, and difficulties of various kinds of the Bible says—and I would argue varying degrees. And this is not a strange or foreign concept in the Scripture, and it’s important that we define it this way. I’m looking forward to the way you’re going to frame this in Isaiah 26. And so, I want to start here: let’s talk about the topic of the passage in question, and then we’ll move into some of the points of application, because I think it’s important that we demonstrate this for people consistently. Not just the understanding of the text, but then how we move to create or describe the location of the texts that are appropriate as we give proper biblical counsel to people. We have a class here actually, at Midwestern Seminary, where we talk about biblical interpretation and counseling methodology, because we want to teach people how to do this. And I think, you know what, it sounds like what we’re going to do today is work through this passage in a way that would be helpful. So, looking forward to you demonstrating this. Let’s start with the passage itself and give you a minute to describe what we’re doing, what we’re talking about here.
Ernie Baker: Well, the reason it’s so appropriate is because the setting is the Assyrian captivity, which is happening or about to happen. And these would have been horrific times. So, our culture’s talking a lot about trauma these days, and these definitely fall into the category of traumatic times. There would have been pillaging, and children possibly being killed, and people being led away in captivity, and harm to your family, your city being razed to the ground—So, just absolutely horrific times. And if you look it up, you can do the background history on the Assyrians—they were notorious for what they did to people.
Dale Johnson: Well, let me just say this is contrary to popular belief, with the VeggieTales depiction of the way Assyria is—it’s not a slapping people with fish, right? We’re talking about, as you articulated, devastating things: the breaking down of families, where some would be carted off to exile, and children being murdered and killed, plundered and pillaged and raped, and all kinds of devastating things. And we have to be careful. I want to make this point, as I rudely interrupted you, that we often read over passages like that, or the context of a passage like that, and we dehumanize people. We act as though they were not real human beings like us, getting to experience the depth of human relationships—that would be so impacted by this level of affliction. And so, we have to take a step back and consider these important factors that you’re describing, because it is similar to the human experience that we’re talking about when we use a language in the modern sense of something like trauma. So, I want you to continue describing what’s going on here in Isaiah 26.
Ernie Baker: Well, there’s horrific suffering going on. And the reason I’m so intrigued by this passage is contextually, in where we find ourselves in the modern biblical counseling movement, it seems like we’re being told, and we definitely would be told in this secular mental health world, that there’s not enough in the Bible to help people with serious, mental health issues. And I believe that in unpacking a passage like this, and then thinking through the practical applications, demonstrates that this is really what people need in the midst of horrific suffering. And I could tell story after story of people who were taught Scripture, learned how to apply Scripture as they’ve gone through PTSD or domestic abuse, and they would say, “That’s what I really needed. What the secular mental health world was giving me is not what I needed. What I really needed was an in-depth application of Scripture.” So, that it’s a wonderful passage of Scripture.
Dale Johnson: Now, I want to get back to the passage, but I want to give the emphasis that I think is really important here. The reason I think we can freely turn to somewhere like Isaiah 26 and consider the depth of truths that are described here in the horrific human experiences that are happening here is because of something that we’ve taught in ACBC for a long time. It is the idea of the sufficiency of Scripture. And yes, sufficient for everything that we would deal with in life—That God has given help and hope for us to pursue life and godliness in a way that’s pleasing to Him. And we believe that’s found in the Scripture, and we’ve articulated that in lots of documents in our history. We have statements now in our doctrinal standards that provide clarity on our view of sufficiency. You know, there was a time during my tenure as an executive director, where I was going back and looking through different documents where we articulated our doctrinal positions in times past. And one of the conversations that I’ve gotten into with different people back between 2006-2008—It took the board a while to create some of these documentation, but they wrote out seven particular doctrinal statements. You know, I’ve read through all of those and as I consider some of those statements, some intriguing thoughts come. And Lance Quinn, who’s still on the board and was the chairman at the time, he was writing some of these very articulately. David Powlison helped him to write this particular one. I want to read a statement and get your thoughts as we move into thinking about Isaiah. This is what one of those doctrinal statements describes: “The counselor must build his counseling system, including its presuppositions, principles, and methodologies, solely from Scripture. His counseling must demonstrate that Scriptural truth ministered in the power of the Holy Spirit is sufficient to enable counselees to love God and their neighbors.” Now, this statement, as I mentioned, was written by David Powlison and Lance Quinn, and it was a part of NANC membership covenant—what, you know, people had to ascribe to before ACBC did a more full orbed Standard of Doctrine and Standard of Conduct. Describe a little bit about that statement and what it means. That will be helpful context as we move to passages like Isaiah 26.
Ernie Baker: Well, that statement, as you said, by David and Lance, and then approved by the NANC board, and then others gave their input. I talked to Lance recently about this, and he was giving me some of the background of the statement. And it’s exactly what I was taught by David Powlison, when I was studying under him. It is that we have a complete counseling system, and we build that right out of Scripture, including our methodology. We want to let the text speak, and that’s what I’m hoping to demonstrate today through Isaiah 26 before we’re done. What are the things that come right out of the text? Even with horrific suffering, or deep affliction, or to use the cultural term trauma—how do we minister this passage of Scripture? So, Scripture gives us a complete counseling system, including our methodology. Our job is to do the deep thinking, and to know people so well, having worked with people, David would call that “case wisdom.” So, having case wisdom, and then, how do I take the sufficient Scripture and just unpack the theology there, and apply it to people who are going through horrific circumstances in their lives?
Dale Johnson: Let’s do that now, because I think it’s important. This is something that Jay Adams encouraged us with. I think David Powlison did the same thing. They would use the idea of provocation. They would say, “okay we see issues of trauma,” nobody’s denying that that traumatic events happen. We’ve seen this since Genesis 3, and certainly in human experience, so nobody’s denying that. But we are seeing a flood of information and philosophies on how to think about these events, or how to interpret these events. So, we don’t have to run from how people are trying to frame these ideas, but it should provoke us to go in one direction, which is back to Scripture. And I think that’s what you see consistently with guys like Jay and David, and how they articulated things. It wasn’t trying to be ignorant of research that was going on out there; It was intended to be provocative, to send us back to the Scripture as a primary place, where we know God has given answers to the things that we experience in life. Let’s see how the Scripture frames it—that was the posture. And that’s what we’re seeing, I think now, that might be a little bit different: that it is being enthralled with the information that we see out there, rather than it provoking us to be enthralled with the treasures of wisdom that are found in the Scriptures. And so, I want you to start by helping to demonstrate how we would use a passage like this—how the provocation of modern trauma language would push us back to the Scripture to say, “Okay, what does the Scripture describe in these elements of what we could say, from Isaiah 26, is traumatic events?” So, talk about the relevancy of this passage here.
Ernie Baker: The core of the passage is the beautiful versus you keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on you, because He trusts in you. Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord God is an everlasting rock, and those are beautiful. I’ve heard songs that are written about that passage. But how do you help somebody that’s having intrusive thoughts? How do you help somebody who’s having flashbacks about the horrible experience that they’ve been through? This passage is so rich. I’ve spent literally decades thinking about the passage. And just even in recent weeks, I’ve had some new applications come out of it, as I’ve thought more about it. So, for example, just a little bit of the content, you will keep Him in perfect peace. So, the Hebrew says, “shalom, shalom” and it’s astounding what is promising—You can stay at a place of perfect, peace, peace, peace, perfect peace, but you’re going to have to work on your mind. Your mind is stayed on whom? You’re going to have to work on trusting in the one who is the Everlasting Rock. The word trust there, to get a little geeky, batach is my favorite Hebrew word. I know that sounds very geeky, but batach means to put your reliance on something so much, so that you’re at a place of rest. So, he’s saying in the midst of the Assyrian captivity, you can get to a place, if you were lying on the one who’s the Everlasting Rock, of perfect peace. Now, that sounds crazy to someone who’s having intrusive thoughts, flashbacks, etc. Well, how do you help them apply the passage? Well, number one: You’re going to have to work with them, as a counselor, on a really big view of God. Who is this God? And I just recently had a student at Masters University who was a combat veteran. I don’t have time to tell you the whole story, but he’s been through all kinds of therapies. He has been in 3 residential treatment programs, and he actually said, “it has taken me seven years to deprogram myself of everything I was told was wrong with me in the secular therapeutic world.” And he went to a residential biblical discipleship program, and they taught him good theology. They taught him who he was in Christ. They taught him about disciplining his thinking with God’s word. And he said, “what I needed all along was just good theology. I needed the right thoughts about God, and how to frame the horrible experiences I went through in combat.” And that’s what I see Isaiah doing—he’s giving us a very big view of God. down in verse 8, he says “In the path of your judgments, O Lord, we wait for you. Your name and remembrance.” Or it could be translated, “Your renown are the desire of our soul.” What are they doing? In the midst of this horrible affliction is they’re working in a very disciplined way on having big substantial meaningful thoughts about who God is and they’re disciplining their mind to do that.
One other application in verse 1 is that in that day, this song would have been sung in the land of Judah. It’s a song. And Scripture is full of music, but this is music in the context of horrible suffering. And one of the things I teach counselees to do that have been through domestic abuse or combat and they’re having horrible times with their memories, is sing. Sing out loud. Sing hymns. Just think of the beauty of singing and what singing does with the mind, as you’re turning up the volume. So, your brain is trying to control you. Your flesh is trying to control you. And there’s a lot going on in the brain—you have a busy mind. You’re very anxious. And I call it turning up the volume. So, I want to turn up the volume by singing out loud. And I’m hearing my voice and what am I singing? I’m singing truth. So, it accomplishes three things. First, I’m drowning out the voices in my head. Number two, I’m meditating on truth. I’m singing substantial things. And number three, I’m worshiping, and we’re made to be worshippers. They’re singing a song in the midst of the suffering. Another thing that I see in the passage is down in verse 1: “Oh, Lord, in distress, they sought you. They poured out a whispered prayer.” I want to teach my counselee how to supplicate the Lord, not weak prayers. How do you pray passionate prayers to pour out your heart to the Lord? And then that falls into the realm of lamenting. How do I teach my counselee that’s been through horrible suffering, how to write prayers of lament to the Lord? There’s even more here. I mean, we could just keep unpacking the practical applications of: What do you do when you have intrusive thoughts? What do you do when you’re having flashbacks? Well, I want to teach them with a disciplined mind, how to practice good theology. I want to teach them how to worship. I want to teach them how to sing. I want to teach them how to lament properly to the Lord. If we had more time, I could just keep unpacking applications, but I believe that’s what David and Lance mean when they wrote that statement, that our presuppositions and our methodology must flow out of the text of Scripture.
Dale Johnson: I want to continue to unpack those applications, and I want to get, you know, real as we move into the counseling room. As you were describing that, Ernie, I couldn’t help but think of a contrast that we see in Scripture here. Isaiah is saying that this is a positive means to peace peace. But there’s a fault way of fault crying. In Jeremiah, for example, where the shepherds of Israel were not being faithful. Jeremiah was calling out with the word of the Lord. He had called them to repent, to turn before judgment was to befall them—which we see both in Jeremiah and Ezekiel. And in 6:10 he says that, “the word of the Lord, their ears were uncircumcised in the word of the Lord was a scorned to them.” And what was the byproduct of it? That everyone was “greedy for gain.” From prophet to preacher, everyone deals falsely. He says, “they have healed the wound of my people lightly,” saying what? Peace, peace, but when the Word of the Lord was an object of scorn, seeking peace in something else actually didn’t lead to peace—what did it lead to? Were they ashamed when they committed an abomination before the Lord? No, they were not ashamed at all, nor did they even blush. So, it’s not truly peace found in a different direction. And I think in the positive sense, this is exactly what Isaiah is calling people to, that when our mind is stayed on that which is trustworthy. The result can be peace peace, no matter how deep the devastation. Jeremiah is warning us here, when we abandon the Word and our ears become scorned against or uncircumcised against the Word, that leads to us committing things against the Lord. And we’re not even ashamed of those things. We don’t even blush at those particular things. So, I want us to continue to think about those applications that you described, because we see it in Scripture in both the positive and a negative way—where certain things are promised of peace, but it’s not, the means of peace, because it’s the wrong thing we’re trusting in.
Here in Isaiah, you’ve developed these applications. Help some of our counselors to know, “Okay, we’ve done our Bible study. We’ve understood the context of what’s happening. We have grasped the meaning of the passage. Now, we’ve talked through some potential applications.” Bring this into the counseling room. So, how would you apply this in counseling? Give us some practical ideas that come out of the text, that you would start to implement with your counselees.
Ernie Baker: Just to piggyback on what you’re saying—Isaiah in the same book has the same type of warnings. Isaiah 55 is one of them: “Why do you keep spending your money for that which does not satisfy.” And then later on in the same chapter: “But my word will not return void.” And part of the problem in Isaiah is that they were rejecting the Lord’s way of doing things, and living idolatrous lives. So, I’ve worked with people, worked with women, who have been through domestic abuse to help them work on their mind. There is one lady, I’m thinking of in particular, who I actually talked about in my plenary session at our conference in the fall of 2023. She is a woman that has just been through horrific suffering. And what she has done in her home is she created a worship atmosphere. One of the things is, she’s found an app that just keeps playing worship music during the day, so that she and her girls are just in this continual atmosphere of trying to think about worship music. She sent me pictures of what her bathroom looks like, and notes that her daughters have written to her about truths to believe and truths that she claims, and they’re just in front of her all the time. These Post-it notes are all over the mirror and all over the wall. And that’s what the passage is saying, you’re going to have to have a steadfast mind. When her mind starts drifting toward, “I brought this on myself, I put myself in this predicament by fleeing from my abusive husband,” She looks at those truths and says, “no, this is what the Bible says is true.” She has learned in the midst of having intrusive thoughts, “I’m going to sing, and I’m going to sing out loud, and I’m going to sing these songs.” So, we picked worship songs for her to sing, so that she’s thinking about truth. She has memorized passages of Scripture, even though she’s not carrying her Bible with her all the time.
So, I would be having my counselee study the passage, but let’s memorize these verses, and you can call them fighter verses. What are the fighter verses you’re going to use when you are having intrusive thoughts? When you’re having a nightmare? What are you going to do when the nightmare wakes you up in the middle of the night? Not only that: How do you work on your thought life during the day to get yourself ready for bed, because you’re more vulnerable at night when you have nightmares? So, I’ve got to be working on this during the day in my thought life, so that I’m more at a place of peace when I go to bed at night. But then, when I do wake up with a nightmare, what am I going to do to battle that nightmare? And again, I would be teaching them to sing, and teaching themselves how to lament to the Lord. So, I would have them write out a prayer of lament. I’ve often used Psalm 42 as a model of lament, and then I just tell them, “Write your own lament, following the flow of thought of Psalm 42, and express your grief to the Lord.” So, that would be some of the practical methodology that I use.
Dale Johnson: Ernie, already as you’re talking, and I’m contemplating that the applications that you’re giving—we’re not saying that peace is achievable by us. That’s even a part of the text here in Isaiah 26. It’s “you keep Him in perfect peace.” So, this is the work that the Lord does as a product. We see it fleshed out in the New Testament: that love, joy, peace, patience, and so on, are a product of the Holy Spirit, the work that the Spirit does in us. Our part, as you mentioned, in Isaiah 26:3, is for us to keep our minds fixed on Him, to truly trust or rest (as you describe that word) in Him. And then, we trust Him to do that work of producing legitimate peace. That we rest in the truths that He’s made so evident to us, to settle hearts that are deeply, deeply afflicted. You’ve talked about the young lady who went through an abusive situation with her children and some of the practicalities that you gave to her. Earlier, you mentioned in our podcast a gentleman who went through the military that was diagnosed with PTSD. Give some specifics on how you might address someone like him using some of these applications that you see in Isaiah 26.
Ernie Baker: I’m going to call him George. This is a testimony I just got recently. He’s currently one of my students at Masters University, and it just an astounding testimony. He is an Army Ranger, combat veteran with multiple tours of duty. He wasn’t satisfied with being in ground troops, so he became a combat helicopter pilot. And he flew multiple combat missions because he just wanted to kill people. He was trying to get vengeance for a friend that was killed and died. He saw him die, and so he wanted to get vengeance. He graduated at the top of his helicopter fighter pilot class, and again he did multiple tours of duty, but it was personally devastating because he was so angry. He’s actually on his fourth marriage. And so, he went through three marriages, pornography, illegal and legal substance abuse, and all kinds of legal psychotropic medicines. In his testimony, he told me that he had been in three residential treatment programs, with all kinds of different therapies, and finally he was medically discharged by the military because he just couldn’t handle all the anger. One of his wives, his third wife, tried to kill herself right in front of him, she slit her wrists right in front of him. And that’s when he said, “I’m ruining people’s lives. I need to get help,” and he went away to a biblical PTSD place. And I’m thankful for the ones that do that ministry.
He was also discipled. Some people might know Brian Sayers, who is one of our leaders in ACBC. Brian Sayers was involved with helping him, and the counseling ministry there at their church in Spokane, Washington. So, shoutout to my friend Brian, and I’m very thankful for his involvement in George’s life. And George went through all kinds of therapy, but in the end, He said, “what they taught me at this biblical discipleship model is that I needed to have a big view of suffering. I needed to understand God’s Providence. I needed to learn how to deal with my anger and bitterness biblically. I needed to be discipled in what it really means to be a follower of Christ. I needed to learn how to forgive. And as I was discipled intensely.” And as I’ve read his testimony, I praise God for the people who were so patient with him. They were very loving. They were very patient because this is a very angry guy, who now has all kinds of baggage of illegal, drugs, legal drugs, all kinds of psychological theories in his brain, and he’s learning to think biblically about life and problems. He told me, “I had to work really hard at deprogramming myself of everything that psychology told me was wrong with me, and I had to start thinking what the Bible says is true about me, and who God is and truth. And as he disciplined himself, he now has a stable marriage. He is studying biblical counseling. He wants to be used by the Lord. He’s free of the drugs, and of the pornography, obviously. And he wants to be used of the Lord to be a discipler of other people. So, I don’t buy into the thinking that there’s not enough in the Bible. I believe we have a very robust model. Scripture is inexhaustible. My job is to do the hard work of unpacking Scripture. I’ve spent the last probably four years of my life studying secular trauma theory and trying to understand it. And it has done for me exactly what you explained earlier—It has provoked me to get into God’s word in a deeper way to tell myself, “I just haven’t thought deeply enough about the application of Scripture.” And one last thing I would say to our listeners is, understanding the context of passages really brings them alive. So, when you understand that this was the Assyrian captivity, it brings Isaiah 26 alive. When you understand Romans 8, which talks so much about suffering was written during the time of Nero, that just brings that whole passage alive. So, don’t underestimate by the power of the Holy Spirit and the Living Word of God, through a faithful loving patient discipler. Don’t underestimate what can happen if a person will just yield themselves to the Lord and say, “I want to have a steadfast mind. I want to think God’s thoughts. I want to glorify Him.” The Lord can do exactly what he promised in John 8:32. You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.
Dale Johnson: Amen, brother. Well said. Thank you for summarizing those details and helping us to see the beauty of the riches of the Scripture. And that we can truly trust, and we can place our self with the mercy of a good God, who has given us His word. And that that’s a very comfortable place for us to rest ourselves. Brother, thank you for the encouragement. Thank you for the demonstration of using the Scripture in counseling methodology, and how we can understand deeply things about God and things about ourselves, and then how we can apply those to those who are hurting, and if it lifts some difficult situations in their life. So thank you, brother, for encouraging us in this way.
Ernie Baker: Very thankful to be with you, Dale.
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