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OHRIT 1
Running head: THE OLD HEART INTERVENTION REPLACEMENT THERAPY
The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy
The New Heart
Delores Lakes
#221967
Liberty University
OHRIT 2
Abstract
This document will explicitly explore the Reality therapy techniques and incorporate it into a new therapeutic technique called The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy (OHRIT) to life’s issues. The goal of this document is to introduce the foundation of The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy. TheOHRIT requires an individual to replace their old heat (mind) with a new mindset. One of the major emphases of the treatment plan is cognitive intervention and problem solving to get his life back on track. The focus of this document is to explain the purpose and intent of OHRIT, which is a combination of changing irrational perspective and soul care.
OHRIT 3
Table of contents
Introduction
PART I: The Old Heart Replacement Therapy
1. We Need a New Heart2. Condition of the Old Heat3. The Mind
PART II: New Heart
4. Steps for Change5. Revisit6. Change is challenging7. A Healthy Sense of Self
PART III: Counselors Responsibility8. Nouethic Touch9. Reality Therapeutic Relationship10. How to Keep the New Heart11. Conclusion
OHRIT 4
The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy
The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy (OHRIT)
is a psychotherapy that focuses on life’s experiences and issues.
Delores Lakes (1969) is recognized as the creator of this
therapeutic technique founded in the 21st Century. Lakes (1969)
was brought up in a warm loving environment, however throughout
her life she encountered many trials, tribulations, crisis and
insurmountable amount of opposition that reshaped her mentality,
transformed her life, and enlightened her spiritually. Lakes
(1969) views life’s trials and tribulations from a Christian’s
perspective, and this is where she gathers her beliefs concerning
the OHRIT which involves issues of life. This therapeutic
foundation is rooted in the Word of God according to Psalm
107:20, “He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them
from their destruction.” The Word of God has power to change the
client’s heart and mind in order to bring them closer to the
Lord. It is essential that clients change and be transformed
OHRIT 5
instead of being reformed temporarly. Romans 12:2a, “And be not
conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing
of your mind.” This Scripture requires that the client first
commit to God, change their lifestyle, behavior, customs that are
usually selfish and often corrupt (Ortberg, 2002). Apostle Paul
understood that our corrupt nature needed more than just a change
in behavior and customs; it also needs to be transformed. The
latter portion of this verse states that our minds must “be
transformed by the renewing of our mind.” It is possible to avoid
most worldly customs and still be proud, covetous, selfish,
stubborn, and arrogant. Only when the Holy Spirit renews,
reeducates, and redirects our minds than our minds are truly
transformed. The Bible tells us in Proverbs 4:23, to keep thy
heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life.
One of Lakes objectives is for patients to overcome symptoms that
hinder them from exploring life freely and receiving the blessing
of God. People have unresolved issues from life crisis that have
caused them to be wounded, bruised, unsatisfied, bound and there
is no sense of fulfillment in life. Lakes (1969) believe that
life crisis affects an individual’s mentality, which causes them
OHRIT 6
to live in bondage. The heart is essential to living both
naturally and spiritually in this world.
We Need a New Heart
Nobody views the heart merely as a blood pumping station,
anymore. We know that the heart is an emotional organ and has a
relationship with the emotional brain (Berger, 2005). The heart
is an organ of intelligence that works in unison with the brain.
When people choose to ignore their heart’s direction, the brain
assumes control. The brain takes over and starts to operate from
a linear to a logical perspective, which in return it is always
ready to defend its own interests (Hart, 1999). The brain is
territorial; nothing foreign (helpful) can enter without a fight.
The brain is always active, even while a person is sleeping. The
brain attempts to pass information to the heart, but the heart
does not accept it especially when a person is trying to change
for the better. The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy
is essential in order for people to be transformed, have a
renewed mind and a new heart. People lives are full of hurts,
wounds, bruises, and unresolved tragedies caused by other hurting
people and just life in general. Life’s crisis has the tendency
OHRIT 7
to impact people at different levels. For instance, two men were
fired from their job. One of the individual viewed it as an
opportunity to pursue another career option. The other gentleman
wanted revenge on the company and stressed about how he was going
to take care of his family. The unexpected in all of our lives
has the ability make the sanest person stumble when they are
impacted by a crisis. It just depends on what an individual
perceive as a crisis and their problem solving skills.
The heart has a special place in our collective psyche as
well. The heart is synonymous with love (Smalley, 1987). It has
many other associations, too. Here are just a few examples:
If you have a heart be merciful. Change of a person’s heart,
changes their mind. To know something by heart it is memorized.
A broken heart is wounded and loses love. Heartfelt is deeply
felt. To have our heart in the right place is a new heart and it
signifies our nature as
kind. To have a heart cry is a grieved heart. A heavy heart is a
sad heart. There is no other bodily organ that elicits these
types of feelings and responses (Alderman, 1997).
Condition of the Old Heart
OHRIT 8
Every living human being will either be hurt or they have
been hurt during the course of their life. By “hurt” I mean
actions, words, tragedies, divorce, death, and attitudes that are
intentional or unintentional, visible or invisible, hands-on or
hands-off, other-perpetrated or self-inflicted, and barely
survivable to hardly noticeable (Wilson, 2001). When a person is
hurt it is difficult for that him or her to think clearly, to
acknowledge the positive, or simply want to live another day.
When a person encounters a crisis more than likely they are not
prepared to handle the situation rationally or productively
(Mabray, Bell, & Bray, 2009). Too often, the situation is
suppressed or ignored. Most of these wounds are from the people
we love, trust or unforeseen crises that land at one our
doorsteps (p. 10). When these wounds are left unattended they
only scab up and are forgotten about until something triggers
them again. People hold grudges vowing never to forgive and they
remain bitter, wounded, and unforgiveness flows in and from their
heart (Harburg, Kaciroti, & Gleiberman, 2008). Our hurts must be
deal with not ignored.
OHRIT 9
What condition is the old heart in? It is simply a “poor,
little, confused, messed up heart” (McMinn, 1996). We can begin
to understand the condition of our old heart by taking a closer
look at Jeremiah 17:9-10.
The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is
exceedingly perverse and corrupt and
Severely, mortally sick! Who can know it [perceive,
understand, be acquainted with his own
heart and mind]? I, the Lord, search the heart; I test the
mind, even to every man according to
his ways. According to the fruit of his doings.
The Old Heart Replacement Intervention Therapy requires for
people to be honest with themselves, and to acknowledge that
their old heart is not right with God, self, and others. We have
to face our issues as real problems and own up to them (Cloud &
Townsend, 1999). When a person does not acknowledge the pain they
feel from being hurt the following happens: 1. Resentment, 2.
Lack of communication, 3. Feel alienated, 4. Get Defensive, 5.
Revenge and 6. The problem is never solved (pp. 178-181). The
problem is this, people stayed wounded in their hearts for a
OHRIT 10
prolonged length of time and for unnecessary reasons. Jesus is
willing to make a trade with our old heart perspective for a new
heart just by asking Him.
Jesus has instructed us in Matthew 11:28-29 to “Come to Me,
all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and
lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” A person
may be carrying burdens of sin, life’s tragedies, excessive
demands, oppression and persecution, or weariness. Jesus frees
people from all burdens. The rest that Jesus promises is love,
healing, and peace with God. A relationship with God changes
meaningless, hurt, wearisome toil into spiritual productivity and
renewing of the heart.
The Mind
It is a person’s old mind or ways of thinking that causes them
to be stagnated in life. The mind must be transformed in order
for it to be renewed and to function productively. If a person
wants to know what they are full of, and what their heart if full
of, then they must listen to their conversation. When a person
operates from an old heart the words from his or her mouth are a
OHRIT 11
representation of what is in their heart. Proverb 18:21 declare
that death and life are n the power of the tongue. For instance,
there is a relative of mine who encountered an unfortunate
tragedy fifteen years ago, and it seems as if the incident just
happens today. He is in a paralyzed state mentally, which has
caused him to be bitter, bound, and absolutely nothing satisfies
him (Anderson, 2000). When words of encouragement are spoken to
him they are rejected with negative comments and gestures. He
cannot see that his future is brighter than his past. No matter
how often he is encouraged his brain constantly reminds him of
the pain and lost from the tragedy. It is hard for his old heart
to override the pain from his past. OHRIT is designed to change a
person’s old heart thinking process, by replacing it with a new
optimistic heart. This therapy technique believes that change has
to take place in the mind, which is the seat of the heart into
order to gain a new perspective about life and the issues
experienced. A person has to changes his or her thoughts,
feelings, behavior, and actions. Kanel (2007) drew the conclusion
that a crisis is based upon a person’s perception, the abrupt or
unexpected dimension of the event, and the person’s inability to
OHRIT 12
resolve the problem. Another reason an individual’s view crisis
in a differently fashion is due to the temporary state of mind
which is accompanied by confusion and disorganization at the time
of the event. This theory has the power to change a person’s old
nature back to the nature that God intended from the foundation
of the earth.
In Dr. Wilson’s (2001) view, hope and healing as the two
therapeutic doses needed when hurt people hurt others because
they have been hurt. Wilson acknowledges that majority of life’s
scars come from other hurting people, however, there is a healing
prescription for our souls, which is only found in Jesus Christ
the all-sufficient healer (p. 220). No matter how devastating the
wounded or scar maybe from being hurt, Dr. Wilson advices us to
review, revisit, and start making consistent life changing
patterns (p. 87).
Steps for Change
The first step in receiving a new heart is
acknowledging that our old heart is not pumping properly because
it is clogged, broke down and need repairing. Heart disease is
the number one killer among Americans in 2006 (DHHS, 2006). Heart
OHRIT 13
disease itself is caused by the accumulation of athermanous
plaques within the walls of the arteries that supply the
myocardium. This means our eating habits are unhealthy which
causes our arteries from pumping blood properly to our hearts.
Unfortunately, heart disease cause sudden death and many people
die before every receiving treatment. When our lives are filled
with the works of the flesh according to Galatains 5:19-21, it is
evident that our hearts are full of evil desires. These desires
inlcude obvious sins such as sexual immorality and sorcery. They
also include less obvious sins such as hartred, selfish,
ambiiton, envy, bitterness, strife, malice which equate to hurts
and wounds intentional and unintetional.
Revisit
Dr. Wilson (2001) instructed the wounded to review where the
pain originated. Wilson focused on getting to the root of the
problem in order to stop the vicious cycle. Hurt has no
limitation whether it stems from a parent, friend, significant
other, co-worker, uncle molester, rejection, or church folks
being hurt can cause a lifetime of pain if left unattended. We
often think people our love ones are just being mean, when in
OHRIT 14
reality they are hurt, so they attack others verbally,
emotionally, or physically. The negative tension that hurt people
have going on in the inside must be dealt with properly. Hurting
people have been using remedies to sooth their problems, only for
the problem to resurface its ugly head. Wilson, stated that, “A
long time ago we had a scary and painful problem; we chose the
best solution we could at the time but it isn’t working any more
and our solution have become our problems (p. 86).” Wilson puts
emphasis that a change is needed.
Change is challenging
Many people look upon change and frown because it challenges
them to do something new in order to get something they never
had. People are accustomed to running around grumbling and
complaining about their situation instead of being responsible.
It is time to find a new way of dealing with the same old
problems (Adams, 1986). If change does not take place than the
old heart problems will continue to affect our lives. If we want
change in our lives we must first clear out the old victimize
mentality of deception, cultivate a new ground with honesty, and
sow seeds of truth. That’s right our lives need to be cultivated
OHRIT 15
with new ways of thinking and handling the situation. The main
components to cognitive therapy are education, identification of
negative automatic thoughts and challenging dysfunctional
schemata, which is compatible to my faith. Cognitive Behavior
Therapy (CBT) is also intertwined into the OHRIT. CBT correlates
with the steps the Lord require in order for His children to be
healed. An individual is responsible for working out his own soul
and salvation through understanding the commandments of the Lord.
In biblical terminology CBT would described as transformation (.
Transformation does not take place in the heart only, but in the
mind and soul of man.
Choosing a new direction, new way of thinking, making new
choices, new practices contribute to one’s journey for change.
Wilson’s Theory of Change is best put in the form of an equation,
New Choices + Consistent Practice = Change (p. 87). Paul said we
must put away childish ways in 1 Corinthians 13:11 in order to
mature. Change occurs by accepting Jesus Christ into our hearts,
minds renewed; forgive our debtor, changed actions, and old
relationships restored if possible. In Wilson’s view, change can
only occur when hurt people realize that they cannot change the
OHRIT 16
person who hurt them, but they do have the power to change
themselves.
There is a price for change. Change produces more pain
since many of us fear the light of truth that reveals them. Jesus
tells us, “And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make
you free (John 8:32).” The Healer of our souls has a set of rules
that we must follow in order to receive our healing. The first
rule requires us not to live our lives in concert with the person
who inflicted the pain. Secondly, we must seek and walk in truth
even though it may seem weird at first. We must call the hurt or
pain by the correct name this is the beginning of change. We must
stop playing the blaming game it robs us of our responsibility
and becomes a stumbling block in our lives. Change does not
happen over night, so we must remember through the tears and
painful memories, it takes time. Dr. Wilson said, “Change is a
terror and it is scary”(p. 101). Hurt is rooted deeper than our
childhood experiences; sin is the deadly poison to why hurt
people hurt people. Change can only occur with All-Sufficient
Healer, not by power, nor by might, but by my Spirit, says the
OHRIT 17
Lord (Zechariah 4:6). The heart must be new and converted before
a person can have a changed of mind and a new perspective.
The New Heart
The new converted heart desires to walk in the way of God,
which means that it declares war on the old mind. The new
information that the brain receives tells us that we can change
our heart and change our life if we change our mind. The mind
does not change; it fights to keep things the way it has always
been. We have to confront our distorted views with a gentle
spirit of empathy and compassion while encouraging spiritual
growth. Confronting an individual’s distorted view allows the
client to confess their feelings, frustrations, and hurts and
recognize that they need help. Confession is the nature of
counseling, and it produces freedom for the client. It draws the
client out of darkness and sheds light on their situation. When
sin is addressed, confronted and confessed properly it humbles,
gives hope to the client, not despair and shame. In return it
produces psychological growth and spiritual renewal for the
client. The mind needs to be retrained with the understanding
that it is built into the new heart, which is the heart of God.
OHRIT 18
Secondly, the mind must be retrained through the Word of God.
Then our emotions and rational memory banks will be refilled with
godly information from the Bible.
The new heart and the renewed mind connect they are a
powerful combination. When the mind identifies with the heart it
causes the body to receive the blessings of God. Healing and
peace are only moments away when our minds are renewed. Apostle
Paul describes this existence and instructs us to seek the mind
of Christ continually. Philippians 2:5-7, “Let this mind be in
you which was also in Christ Jesus, who, being in the form of
God, did no consider it robbery to be equal with God.” Jesus was
humble, willing to give up his rights in order to obey God and
serve people. Like Christ, we should have a servant’s attitude,
serving out of love for God and for others, not out of fear or
guilt. The new heart allows us to choose what state (wounded or
healed) we want to be in. At this point the client understands
that God is concerned with their physical, mental and spiritual
well being. This begins to build a healthy sense of ourselves.
A Healthy Sense of Self
OHRIT 19
A healthy sense of self relies on us doing an assessment of
our lives holistically, which include our spiritual and
psychological state. An accurate “healthy sense of self” allow us
to recognize our responsibility to God, others, and ourselves.
One of the steps to necessary for a healthy sense of self is
first to clear out the weeds of deception, loosen the soil with
honesty, and sow seeds of truth. The individual life must be
cultivated with new ways of thinking and handling the situation
(Chase, 2007). CBT and my Christian faith therapeutically
concerned with changing the faulty thinking pattern in order for
the individual to live positive and productive life (Eng &
Heimberg, 2006).
The next step to a “healthy sense of self” is recognizing
that we cannot live apart from the Lord. II Corinthians 3:5 it
states, not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any
thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God. Thirdly,
being aware of our strengths, weakness, brokenness, voids,
fantasies, idolatries dreams, relationships and aspirations
contributes to our self-awareness, which guides us to a healthy
lifestyle (Brunk, 2005). Merely recognizing our inadequacies and
OHRIT 20
need for help is good, but we must do something about our
condition in order for it to be considered healthy. King David
examined himself, acknowledged his transgression, and repented
before the Lord. In order for us to develop a “healthy sense of
self” we must continue in the things of God, forgive, move
forward at all cost, and enjoy life. McMinn (1996) says: “to be
healthy, we need to move beyond a preoccupation with self” (p.
46). Oddly enough our culture has put such a premium on “self”
that self-centered thinking has become pervasive.
More importantly we need to find answers, by looking at
ourselves and seeing if we are who God wants us to be. OHRIT
believes the more accurately we understand ourselves, the more
freedom we have in regards to our emotional and spiritual health.
Lakes (1969) believes an accurate understanding of self comes
from an understanding who we are in Christ. "Before I formed you
in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I
appointed you as a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5, NIV).
God has known us from the beginning, and has set a plan for us.
His work and design for us is as much a part of who we are as our
OHRIT 21
histories, genetics, pains, joys, and desires. Pursuing the
Lord’s will for our lives keeps our mind and heart focus on Him.
OHRIT Intergrates Cognitive Behavior Therapy
The OHRIT integrate the Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) of Aaron
Beck (1985) and Albert Ellis (1961). Cognitive Behavioral
Therapy is basically intended as a synergy of the cognitive and
behavioral perspectives in psychotherapy and normally includes
the modification of cognitions, beliefs and assumptions, which is
to be followed by the behavior change or alteration in emotion
expression (Corey, 2005, p.297). In fact, this modality is an
umbrella terms gathering various sub-modalities, but its general
concept is the interdependence between thoughts, emotions and
overall social and psychological functioning, which implies the
negative impact of certain beliefs on the performance in the
specific context (career, education, interpersonal relationships
and so forth) (Corey, 2005, p. 301). Due to the fact that the
given modality needs a specific algorithm reflecting the
relationship between human mental events and the subsequent
behaviors, it includes Albert Ellis’s ABC Technique of Irrational
OHRIT 22
Beliefs (Kendall, Suveg, & Kingery, 2005), which requires that
the counselor analyze the three aspects of the disturbing belief
in a three-column table. The first column contains an activating
event or “the objective situation, that is, even an event that
ultimately leads to some type of high emotional response or
negative dysfunctional thinking” (Borkovec, Newman, & Castonguay,
2004). The second column contains the precise belief that derives
from the objective situation as well as the parallel negative
thoughts (Goldfried & Davison, 2003). The third column includes
the consequences of thinking in the specific direction, including
negative emotions, dysfunctions and decrease in human
productivity (Smith, 2005). Furthermore, the Cognitive Behavioral
Counseling necessarily involves self-observation and self-
reflection, i.e. writing diaries of emotions, counting the
intensity of obsessive thoughts, evaluating behaviors or feelings
during the periods of abstinence, which are carefully discussed
with the counselor and gradually transmitted into the real-life
matrix, i.e. turned into helpful styles of self-perception,
skills and more neutral emotions (Reynolds, 1999; Jacobson et al,
2003; Smith, 1985). As one can understand, the Cognitive
OHRIT 23
Behavioral Therapy is a collaborative effort, involving the
participation of both patient and counselor; the ideal counseling
should include minimal pressure (e.g. advice) from the latter’s
side, as the growth of awareness, realization and understanding
are the major prerequisites for its success (Reynolds, 1999, p.
166; Young et al, 2003, p. 118).
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is also greatly based upon
Aaron Beck’s model of Cognitive therapy (Beck & Emery, 1985).
This approach is aimed at helping the client manage with
difficulties by identifying and altering dysfunctional patterns
of reasoning, beliefs, stereotypes and emotional responses.
According to Jacobson and colleagues, “This involves helping
clients develop skills for modifying beliefs, identifying
distorted thinking, relating to others in different ways, and
changing behaviors” (Young, Klosko, & Weishaar, 2003). The
therapy itself consists of step-to-step assumption testing, i.e.
each important statement the patient makes is discussed in terms
of its plausibility and realism. In certain cases, it is quite
difficult to change beliefs, due to the fact that they are
“protected” by a number of cognitive justifications, which
OHRIT 24
developed in the course of patient’s adaptation to the social
environment. Therefore, the process of removing destructive
cognitive patterns involves a number of techniques including
positive self-talk, Socratic questioning, self-evaluation and
comparison of external situations and the patient’s responses.
Another influential framework to be taken in consideration
in the Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is attribution theory,
designed specifically to conceptualize the development of mood
problems: “First advanced by Lyn Abramson and her colleagues in
1978, this approach argues that depressives have a typical
attributional style – they tend to attribute negative events in
their lives to stable and global characteristics of themselves”
(Hoyer, Beesdo, Gloster, Hofler, & Becker, 2009). Therefore, the
Cognitive Behavioral modality necessarily focuses on attribution
as a key of breaking the problem circle and constructing less
biased causal relationships between external and internal events.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, however, involves a broader
range of techniques, which focus on changing both beliefs and
habits. For instance, cognitive rehearsal involves recollecting a
situation from the client’s life and discussing the specific
OHRIT 25
behaviors, which allow managing this situation. When the patient
faces a similar situation again, they are likely to be better
prepared and use those patterns, which were created during the
session (Clarke et al, 1999; Jacobson et al, 1996). The technique
of journal writing allows the patient to document all feelings,
sensations and thoughts they had in different life situations –
from daily routines to the episodes of being confronted by major
stressors. The therapist and service user review the records
together in order to detect maladaptive thoughts and how these
thought influence behavior. Psychotherapy specialists may also
give their client home assignments: “These may include note-
taking during the session, journaling, review of an audiotape of
the patient session, or reading books or articles appropriate to
the therapy. They may also be behaviorally focused, applying a
newly learned strategy or coping mechanism to a situation and
then recording the result for the next therapy session”
(Arredondo, 1996, p.48). Role-playing exercises are helpful in
training appropriate responses to different stressors or
situations; however, it needs to be noted that this technique
requires creating conditions which are close to those which
OHRIT 26
characterize the situation, so the therapist should be able to
play different roles.
Reinforcement, a purely behaviorist concept and set of
practices, is also widely used in CBT. Human behavior is actually
motivated by positive reinforcement and reduced by the negative
or absence of reinforcement at all. In order to create a clear
system of reinforcement, it is highly important to establish
rules and a reward system. It needs to be noted that this
technique is most workable with children, who receive certain
reinforcing tokens, whereas adult patients might need much more
elaborated rules (Clarke et al, 1999).
OHRIT Therapeutic Relationship
It is imperative that a patient client relationship develop
early in counseling.
The therapist is open and honest with the client, sends clear
and explicit messages to the client, and gives honest feedback by
working with schemas to which the primary goal of cognitive-
behavioral treatment is the change/reorganization of the old
schemas and creating new ones. Since change is such a frightening
thing to the patients, cognitive-behavioral therapist effects
OHRIT 27
change primarily through therapeutic techniques, such as guided
discovery of schema beliefs, relaxation training, and graded
anxiety hierarchies.
Another key concept of OHRIT therapy is that patient’s must
be willing to be transparent with the therapist and likewise with
the therapist. The client must be willing to explore the cause of
the heartache and work toward healing with the therapist (Brunk,
2005). The therapist is open and honest with the client, sends
clear and explicit messages to the client, and gives honest
feedback by working with schemas to which the primary goal of
cognitive-behavioral treatment is the change/reorganization of
the old schemas and creating new ones (Jacobson, Martell, &
Dimidjian, 2003). The OHRIT calls the old issues the client is
dealing with an inside-out problem. It is the outside
experiences and issues that cause the inside to be affected. The
new heart is empowered to conquer life’s issues and problems
(Berger, 2005). The new heart realizes that the issues of life
are may be unfortunate, but the new heart finds a way to cope and
deal with what life throws at them. OHRIT explains life as a
deck of playing cards; a player is dealt a hand and has no
OHRIT 28
foreknowledge or control of what is dealt. The power that the
player has lies in his or her plan of action. The player has to
play the hand dealt to him or her. Life deals us various hands,
some favorable while others are not as favorable, however, a
player is expected to play regardless of the opposition. This
method requires for the patient to push pass what he or she is
feeling and conquer what the mind is experiencing in reality.
OHRIT creates freedom and inner exploration of the client’s world
in order to allow change and growth to take place.
Another area of great importance for the OHRIT counselor is
ethics. Ethics are recognized as rules, regulations and laws that
govern therapist in their profession (Clinton & Ohlschlager,
2002). By using Scriptures as the premise for therapy the
counselor could encounter some ethical concerns. The client has a
right to choose and OHRIT Counselor should not impose his or her
beliefs on the client. The clients’ well being for the OHRIT
counselor is the first priority.
Confidentiality is another area that must be taken seriously
(Corey, 2005). Confidentiality in the OHRIT counselor’s is his or
her character, lifestyle, and integrity as a counselor
OHRIT 29
(Entwistle, 2004). Confidentiality is embedded in the Christians
counselor’s relationship with his or her client and is Christ
centered.
How to Keep the New Heart
The only way to keep the new heart is through meditating
on the Word day and night (Psalms 1:2). Counselees must digest
the Word over and over again until it gets through their cerebral
cortex where they think, strategize, plan, reflect, and become
inspired as God takes their destructive past and uses it for His
glory. At this stage their imagination takes over, and they start
seeing their selves healed, prosperous, delivered and as an
overcomer. As they become more aware they will declare the works
of the Lord. King David knew the power of meditating on God’s
Word. He said, Your word have I hid in my heart, that I might not
sin against You (Psalm 119:11). In Romans 12:2, Apostle Paul
added, “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by
the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what is the good
and acceptable and perfect will of God.” When the counselee’s
mind is transformed he or she will have the same desire as David,
which was to live in accordance to God’s Word and standards.
OHRIT 30
Another key concept of OHRIT is prayer. Counselee must
understand God wants to heal their land (2 Chronicles 7:14). In
order to keep the new heart with all diligence, the counselee
must seek God while he may be found. Prayer is praise and
petition to the Lord. The counselee will enter God’s presence
through their praise, but thanksgiving proves the clients faith
in the Lord that he will perform His Word. The counselee must go
to God in faith whatsoever you ask when you pray believe and it
shall be yours. The intensified prayer of consecration is where
the counselees can press into God seeking answers or to do His
will (Matthew 26:39). Then there is intercession is where the
counselee prayer for someone else (Isaiah 59:16). The clients’
heart is restored over and over again when he or she is
persistent in prayer; simply because they are obey their new
heart.
Prayer is vital to the client’s heart and well being it is
the connection to God. The client must practice prayer until it
becomes permanent and heartfelt. Here are a few steps for
incorporating prayer daily: 1. Start and end the day with
prayer, 2. Read the Word of God, 3. Surrender your will for the
OHRIT 31
help of the Holy Spirit, 3. Obey, 4. Take authority, 5. Avoid
Egypt, 6. Ask God to create a clean heart in you, and 7. Repeat
the steps as much as possible. It is time for the counselee to
return to the Creator, because nothing is more important than the
transforming our hearts to God’s desires.
Conclusion
What is the purpose of The Old Heart Replacement
Intervention Therapy? As an OHRIT Christian counselor, we
recognize the fallen nature of man as inevitable and therefore
healing is needed (Gladding, 2004). An OHRIT Counselor a
multitasked professional who are concerned with the following
three areas: Psychology, Theology, and Christianity (Entwistle,
2004). Multitasking requires an OHRIT counselor to balance these
three areas. They do not solely rely on their professional
techniques and theories but their personal lives are just as
important. Ideally an OHRIT Christian counselor is a healing
Agent for Christ whose spiritual life spills over through
interactions into their client’s life. There are a number of
OHRIT 32
other contributing non-specific factors, which are: 1. Counseling
relationship (invest energy and emotion), 2. Christian character
outside the office (prayer, studying, fasting, Scripture,
worship, and so on), and 3. Christian counselor’s spiritual well
being (McMinn, 1996). Spirituality comes from within and it
manifests a caring heart, worthiness, empathy, wisdom, and
insight (p. 15). These three disciplines provide a clearer
picture of what our clients need: 1. Psychological provides the
right treatment plan, 2. Theological provides the basic working
knowledge of the Bible, and 3. Spiritual allow us to understand
God’s grace and our own fallenness (p. 270).
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OHRIT 33
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OHRIT 36
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