The therapy world has exploded in recent years. Not only has going to therapy been totally destigmatized and is even seen as a status symbol, but the research and clinical sides of the industry have developed an enormous range of different types of treatment.
But how are Christians supposed to view the therapy world? Just because a particular treatment has been touted as effective, does that mean a believer can give it a stamp of approval?
On a recent episode of “Relatable,” BlazeTV host Allie Beth Stuckey dove into the secular therapy world and exposed several popular practices as unbiblical — one of which is the concept of the “inner child.”
The “biggest threat” to Christian women in particular, says Allie, is “not progressivism,” “not feminism,” “not the New Age,” and “not toxic empathy.”
“It’s therapy culture,” she says bluntly.
“I actually believe that the progressivism, feminism, toxic empathy, emotionalism, me-centeredness, New Age-ish stuff that unfortunately infects so many women’s Bible studies … and conferences are all downstream from the secular therapy, pop psychology, pseudo-spiritualism that we find on social media that is dedicated to women’s therapy and therapy concepts.”
For Allie, a lot of “therapeutic language” is just “an excuse for complaining and self-centeredness” and “a replacement for sanctification, for self-denial, for generosity, and the hard work of Holy Spirit-empowered holiness.”
She says that nowhere is this more evident than in the concept of the “inner child.”
In the therapy world, the “inner child” refers to the part of your adult self that still carries the emotions, needs, wounds, and beliefs formed during childhood. Therapeutic treatments often include patients learning to identify, reconnect with, and heal their childhood wounds, unmet needs, and emotions through techniques like visualization, reparenting exercises, emotional processing, and inner dialogue work.
But Allie says that “there’s no such thing as an inner child in the Christian worldview.”
While she validates the existence of “childhood memories,” “childhood experiences that shaped us,” and “childhood pain,” she argues that “the concept of an emotional or spiritual existence of an internal version of ourselves at 6 or 8 or 12 years old does not exist.”
Further, the concept of an inner child has problematic origins for the Christian, she says.
Sigmund Freud “popularized the idea that repressed childhood trauma is what drives much of our adult behavior,” but this perspective, Allie argues, denies our “sin nature that we inherited from Adam.”
One of Freud’s protégés, Carl Jung, then expanded on the idea of an internal child, which he called “the divine child” — a symbol for the pure, whole, innocent, and miraculous potential inside each person.
But Allie condemns this concept, as it also denies the biblical reality of sin nature. It has also, however, birthed and fed the New Age notion of the “inner goddess” — a divine or sacred internal energy or essence in each person that, if awakened, allows one to reclaim personal wholeness and embody her highest self.
“This underlying assumption that if it weren’t for all of these other factors, my inner self would be perfect and perfectly loved and if I can find her and find a way to perfectly love her and heal her, then I’ll just be okay — that is a secular New Age idea. It’s not a biblical idea,” says Allie, citing Jeremiah 17:9, which warns that “the heart is deceitful above all things.”
Ultimately, the inner child and other concepts that turn our gaze inward put the focus on us instead of God — the true healer, says Allie.
“This journey to finding the untainted, perfect, divine self inside of us is a losing battle that actually will just encourage more self-focus, which is the thing that is oppressing and trapping us, not the thing that’s going to liberate us.”
To hear Allie’s full biblical breakdown of the inner child — as well as more therapy treatments that she argues are unbiblical — watch the episode above.
Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?
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