Individual Biblical Counseling

Romania is now going through a major crisis both in terms of increasing numbers of people suffering from various addictions, but also because there is a lot of suffering in general, in families, in churches, a lot of insecurity, depression, anxiety, anger, and conflict. That is why a ministry of biblical counseling, where both Christians and non-Christians can receive help from God through His Word, is extremely important and necessary. We want Deo Gloria Church Sibiu to be such a church, with a Biblical Counseling Center that will bring the hope of the gospel to suffering hearts that seek real help.

The biblical counseling movement is just starting in Romania, and it is in its embryonic form, and this can be seen by the fact that at present there is no national association to accredit biblical counselors and there are only a few brothers who hold biblical counseling training courses. There is still no biblical counseling center and we really want to be part of this pioneering work and to contribute to the expansion of the counseling movement, both in our city and in the central part of the country and nationally.

We receive a lot of requests for counseling, almost every week, to help people suffering from addictions, either directly or indirectly – having addicts in the family. And it requires a lot of energy and time, especially when I have to talk to them – as I did so far during the evenings, after 19:00 – and take that time from my family. That is why we want to have a specific meeting place with a clear program where we can do professional biblical counseling with all these people at least 2 or 3 times a week, having between 4 and 6 people per week in counseling.

In addition to what we have done so far in the biblical counseling ministry, we want to make the following changes:

• I want to do this activity not only on the phone or at my home, but in a suitable environment, more precisely at the MAMA Pro-Life Center in a counseling room, as can be seen in the video and photo.
• I want to have the time to develop a detailed, visual biblical counseling plan that I can go through with functionally illiterate people. I’ve noticed lately that more people with addictions no longer have the ability to understand what they read and can’t concentrate for too long.
• I wish I could do some mentoring in counseling with other counselors who want to learn how to do biblical counseling and I have already started counseling in teams of two. In this way, together with a sister who is also a counselor, we started to be able to counsel women, which until now we could not do, and we had many requests from women.
• We also recognize that we have only a few resources translated into Romanian or produced by Romanian counselors that are from the perspective of biblical counseling and that are so necessary, that’s why we want to invest time, resources, and energy every month in producing or translating such resources that are helpful to other counselors on the long-term.
• On the long run, together with Deo Gloria Church, we want to open a Biblical Counseling Center within the church, and I will be actively involved in developing and organizing this Biblical Counseling Center together with pastor Betuel Vararu.

Time invested per week: 6 hours of counseling, 2 hours of training.

Partners: MAMA Center, Deo Gloria Church, Doug Marksbery, Nicu Sotir.