A proposed will-centered pastoral counseling approach for Seventh-day Adventists and its application in group counseling

This study sought to accomplish two things. The first part was a proposal for will-centered pastoral counseling approach. This counseling approach was a reflection of the Biblical and White\u27s writings and the related counseling theories, such as: client-centered, rational-emotive, reality, and logo therapy. The counseling process undergoes six steps or stages. They are : 1) expressing the problem, 2) examining self, 3) defining the problem and felt needs, 4) perceiving Gods revealed will, 5) redirecting the will, and 6) translating God’s will into specific goals in life and plan of action. On the other hand, the second part of the problem dealt with an investigation into the feasibility of the will-centered approach for Seventh-day Adventist population through actual group pastoral counseling. The experiment was meant to be a preliminary try-out or an exercise from which the researcher can further develop and refine the approach that he has proposed. Subjects of this study were selected based on five criteria. Using random sampling, thirty-five students from whom the control and experimental groups were formed. Specifically, it determines whether the approach will have an effect in the level of satisfaction and/or functioning of the selected Seventh-day Adventists in the following variables : a) self-actualization, as measured by the Personal Orientation Inventory b) self-defined behavioral characteristics, as measured by the Counseling Outcome Inventory and c) religiosity, as measured by the Religiosity Scale. For the statistical treatment, two types of t-test were used, namely : 1) for correlated data, to get the significant difference of the counselees mean scores in the pretest and posttest conditions in the POI, COI, and RS and 2) for uncorrelated data, to get the significant difference between the experimental and control groups in their pretest and posttest mean scores as well as in their mean gain scores