Page 17 - Biblical Counseling II-Textbook

To use my children as an example again, Cailey and Nate are very smart and are excellent students. I
believe nature gave them their intelligence abilities. However, nurture helped them develop to be good
students. If they were born naturally smart but were never able to go to school, would they have
developed intelligence on their own? What about athletic abilities? If someone is a good athlete, how
much is nature and how much is nurture? Can someone without natural athletic abilities (maybe they
are even clumsy!) work hard to become excellent? These are nature-nurture questions.

To use my siblings as another
example, I have an older sister, Amy,
a younger brother, Tim, and a
younger sister, Xandi. My sister,
Xandi, was adopted at the age of six.
She has different parents and a
different set of genetics compared to
Amy, Tim and me. The three of us are
tall, have brown hair, and look alike.
Xandi is short, has blond hair and
does not physically share similar
traits with us. In addition, she spent
six years with other families before
she came to live with us. Her parents
were unable to care for her, so she
lived with different relatives and
foster families until my parents
adopted her. This meant while the
three of us grew up in the same house, same parents, same structure and in the same community, she
had very different early life experiences. The nurture part of her early life has influenced who she is
even though she has been in my family for almost 30 years.

Think about your siblings or other relatives you grew up with. What do you have in common? What is
different? What parts of you come from nature and what is nurture?

The following picture is one I would usually draw in class. You can see a nature side and a nurture side.
As Christians, we believe and know that God is in both nature and nurture as He is our creator and
present throughout every aspect of our lives.

What does the Bible say about nature/nurture?

Take a few minutes to think of how you would answer this question. Can you think of verses in the Bible
that apply to the nature/nurture debate? It would be interesting to hear your thoughts on this during a
class discussion. While the Bible doesn’t directly deal with nature/nurture, there are many verses that
address our nature (born with/genetic) as well as our nurture (learned behavior/life experiences). Look
at the following (summarized) verses from author John Blythe:

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