A searchable, downloadable PDF of the original article appears below. Norm and Kathy Baugh attend Fairview Church, Vancouver.
Loving Enough to Care. Earl D. Wilson, Portland: Multnomah, 1984.
Loving Enough to Care, by Earl D. Wilson, provides valuable instruction on developing caring relationships with the people around us. It is a book of practical advice on the exercise of “love in action”. The author is a professor of psychology, but his presentation is free from jargon and from overtones of an academic or clinical understanding of people.
Dr. Wilson understands caring in an active sense, as trying to meet some of the needs of the people around us. His book begins by setting forth the basis for becoming a caring person. In the life of Christ are a number of situations which together model the essential characteristics of a caring attitude. Placing complete trust in God allows us to make the needs of others as important as our own. This attitude puts faith to work, and develops selflessness, obedience and openness to the possibility of caring. As followers of Christ, Dr. Wilson encourages us to regard caring as a privilege rather than an obligation.
Having established a foundation for the life of caring, Dr. Wilson develops in the remainder of his book some practical and helpful advice for those pursuing a life of caring. Highlighting the six practical chapters are: one which describes the various kinds of needs that people face, another pointing out several common attempts to help people which are not normally effective, and a third which identifies the basic tools of caring. Worthy of special mention is Dr. Wilson’s insightful chapter on needs. Here, Dr. Wilson discusses physical, emotional, social, intellectual and spiritual needs. His wholistic approach safeguards against focussing our caring in any one area, indicating that one who is caring should be sensitive to the total person.
Perhaps crucial to Dr. Wilson’s discussion on practical caring is the need to listen to people. Listening, he says, is a skill which involves all our senses. The caring person will see, feel and hear. Listening can enable us to know the other person, to reinforce his feelings of self-worth and value and to perceive his real needs.
Dr. Wilson’s training and experience as a psychologist are evident in the insight he displays into the difficulties that people face and effective ways of helping them, but his stance is not that of an expert speaking to beginners. Rather, he writes as a Christian who himself wants to be able to care for others and is passing on what he has learned. The book is not theoretical but practical in orientation and is illustrated with numerous examples from the author’s life and experience.
Dr. Wilson appears to be concerned that his ideas be biblical, and he seeks to illustrate many of his points from Scripture passages. Many of these are helpful and appropriate but his interpretation of some passages seems strained. In general, however, Loving Enough to Care reflects a thoroughly Biblical concern to practice love for others with effective actions.
The aim of this book is to encourage people to be more caring in all their relationships, to begin to recognize and to attempt to fill the needs of others. However, it would also provide a useful resource for those who are concerned about a specific relationship. In particular, it contains a great deal of advice with direct application to marriage.