192. What I Wish Pastors Knew About OCD with Rachel Kuchem Woodward, LCSW
Written by Carrie Bock on . Posted in OCD, Personal Testimony, Podcast Episode.
Carrie is joined by Rachel Kuchem Woodward, LCSW, a therapist with lived experience of OCD, to discuss how pastors can better support those who struggle through insights on discipleship, treatment, shame, and spiritual warfare.
Episode Highlights:
- Rachel’s personal journey with OCD and how her faith community played a role in her healing.
- How pastors can discern between normal spiritual wrestling and scrupulosity.
- The role of safe spaces, gospel-centered preaching, and grace-based discipleship in supporting those with OCD.
- The overlap of OCD and spiritual warfare, and how to navigate it without fear or confusion.
- Resources for pastors and helpers to grow in their understanding of OCD.
- Rachel’s upcoming book Gap Filler: Captive to Captivated and the hope it offers to both sufferers and shepherds.
Episode Summary:
Struggling with OCD in the church can feel overwhelming and deeply misunderstood. What if pastors had the tools and insight to offer real, gospel-centered support instead of leaving people stuck in shame and confusion?
In this episode, I sit down with Rachel Kuchem Woodward, LCSW, a therapist who not only treats OCD professionally but has also lived through it personally since childhood. Rachel shares her story of intrusive thoughts, scrupulosity, and the long road to finding help through both pastoral care and effective treatment.
We dive into the powerful connection between OCD treatment and discipleship, the ways shame and intrusive thoughts take hold in the church, and how to discern the difference between ordinary spiritual wrestling and scrupulosity.
We also talk about the overlap of OCD and spiritual warfare—not as something to be feared, but as a reminder that the enemy wants to distract us from Jesus and shrink our world down to our doubts.
Rachel’s story reveals how pastors, counselors, and the gospel can work together to point people back to hope.
If you are a pastor, a mental health professional, or someone walking through OCD yourself, this conversation will encourage you to see God’s grace more clearly and help you understand how to move toward freedom.
🎧 Tune into the full episode.
Connect with Rachel Kuchem Woodward, LCSW:
www.instagram.com/revivinglivescounseling
Transcript
Carrie: [00:00:00] Hello everyone. Today on the podcast I am joined by Rachel Kuchem Woodward for a conversation about what I wish my pastor knew about OCD. Rachel is a therapist with lived experience of dealing with OOCD, and she just has some great insights. We’re gonna get into topics like the connection between. C. D treatment and discipleship, OCD and spiritual warfare.
So this is a conversation that you’re not gonna wanna miss.
Hi. Welcome, Rachel to the podcast. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you became an OCD therapist.
Rachel: Yes. First of all, I’m just so thankful to be here. Thanks for having me, Carrie. I’ve enjoyed following you and what you do. I am a licensed clinical social worker in the state of Texas. I have a private practice.
It’s a Christian counseling practice called Reviving Lives Counseling here in Fort Worth that I started in [00:01:00] 2019. Short version of the long story is that I have struggled with OCD myself since about the age of 11. I’m now 35, and so I had a long journey involving pastors walking with me and OCD and helping me learn about it.
And then later on got clinical treatment with ERP, with my counselor, who I still see to this day. And I started seeing her around the time that I opened my private practice. And I really enjoyed getting to incorporate everything I’ve learned about my own OCD journey. Both from my pastors and my time in counseling into my practice with treating clients.
Carrie: That’s awesome. You told me that it was actually a pastor that had identified some scrupulosity for you and got you on that journey. Yeah.
Rachel: That’s such a wild story and the longer I am in this work with clients, the more I recognize how like rare that is. I guess to back it up just a little bit, when I was a preteen around the age of 11, it was when I really started questioning.
Am I a believer? Am I not? I didn’t have like a definable day ’cause I was blessed to grow up in a household [00:02:00] that never knew a day without Christ, thanks to my wonderful parents discipling me, but not having a day. Started off a couple years of just a dumpster fire in my little mind of not being able to define, you know, was I Christian or not.
And so at the time my parents were walking with me in that, a youth pastor at the time, but I don’t think any of us really saw it as OCD. Some of it just seemed as like a honest. Wrestling with faith with the pastor at that time. And then as I got older, I was like 19, 20, and at that point was talking with my pastor Darwin.
Pastor Darwin is his name. Shout out to him. He was the one who identified OCD in me. We were talking about some of my concerns about whether or not I was a pedophile and just some intrusive thoughts I was having about some sexual curiosities I’d had in the past. When that was coming up with him, that was when he kind of gently brought up like, Hey, dear, one, like, I think there’s some OCD tendencies going on here.
So the first time I really heard of like OCD and knew what it was, was actually from my pastor about the age of 19, who also knew I had some screw [00:03:00] velocity as a young teenager, but became more defined with some of the sexually intrusive thoughts I was having.
Carrie: Yeah, this is interesting and I would agree with you that that’s rare that I don’t know that I’ve had somebody come to me and say, Hey, I think my pastor actually like identified this or said, Hey, I think this is what you’re struggling with.
But I think about that and when you think about that middle school age, like that’s a common time for people to start questioning their faith. Like, do I really believe everything my parents believe? Am I actually saved or not? And then even like what you were saying with young adulthood, kind of in the 19 to twenties range, there may be a lot of different questions about sex relationships.
And so it just kind of shows how OCD can take those types of things that people experience and hijack them and blow them up into something even like way worse than that normal like wrestling process. And so. For all the pastors out there who are not Pastor Darwin and not as maybe mental health informed, or even if they are [00:04:00] mental health informed, they may know about anxiety and depression, but not necessarily OCD.
So we kind of kicked around this idea. How could we have a conversation about what do we want pastors to know about OCD? For you, like what was the most helpful support that you feel like you got spiritually during that time when you were having those wrestlings? What did that look like? Having people pray for you, having people like guide you about
Rachel: suffering.
Yeah, I love that question. I think both Pastor Joan, our age of 19, 20, 21 and later on, pastor Brian, shout out to him in my mid twenties. Both of my pastors did a wonderful job of pointing me to. The gospel in a way that I’d grown up with the gospel, but it became more specific to my actual struggle with OCD.
Like a lot of time spent around shame. I was feeling, I was feeling a lot of shame around intrusive thoughts, wondering if I’m a pedophile, wondering if I’m a Christian. Like it’s a very shameful topics. And so I think my pastor’s embodying to me like just a safe space to just be and to just get emotional support and pointing me to.
Just the [00:05:00] gospel and that Jesus wasn’t grossed out by me and they weren’t grossed out by me. And then just practically they would tell me like, yeah, I want you to go love on the kids in our church nursery. Like it was kind of without maybe them knowing it very like ACT and ERP informed of like, let’s take a step towards your values and let’s, let’s do some exposures.
Although I didn’t know what that was at the time, but Right. And so I think my fear, when I first shared this with my pastor years and years ago, I was like, oh my gosh, what if this, if I shared this, would he report me like all my OCD thoughts? And of course he didn’t. Just having people that embodied the Lord to me and letting me just take a breath, especially around the shame space, I think was one big piece that was really crucial for me.
Carrie: Was that something that got attacked? Like were you working with children at that time, like either professionally or in the church? Like was that why It was totally, you was stuck on that?
Rachel: Great question. I’d grown up working with kids like in children’s church and babysitting and all this. So it was already kind of, yeah.
Then at the age of 18, 19-year-old, I’m minor anymore, I do all these like ministry safe trainings. Oh right, yes. Which, you know, and I’m like, I can’t come get background checked and yeah. And [00:06:00] I’m like, what is this? So I think it just created this headspace of, oh no, a lot of it, the trainings were really what, if I remember correctly, the, the first time I did a ministry safe training was when like just became like a dumpster fire in my brain.
And that’s when I went and talked to my pastor at the age of 19.
Carrie: That’s a really great training. My first exposure to that was like probably a couple years ago, and I’ll say it’s a really great training, but it’s also equally terrifying because it simply tells you that like anybody could be a pedophile and you just, you don’t know.
Rachel: Yes. Well, and I think about it too. I was a social work student and as you undergraduate, I mean child abuse and CPS and all these things were, which we needed to learn about as social workers. But that was also a backdrop of like giving my brain some water. So,
Carrie: okay. It all makes sense now. Like you kind of unravel the layers, right?
Yeah. And the different things that OCD attached to like, so you would say like, okay, understanding that this what the gospel in terms of this, about what Jesus did, not about like a [00:07:00] workspace salvation. ’cause I think sometimes with people with OCD, you really get stuck on the workspace piece of it.
Rachel: Totally. Yeah, I would agree. I think just having pastors who were pointing me to grace, and even when I think about it, not just in one-on-one time with me over coffee, but even like how they would preach, I always appreciated that Pastor Darwin and Pastor Brian, like if a topic of of sin came up, it was always in the way of like, Hey, and for those of you in the audience have a really sensitive conscience, please hear it this way.
Like they would intentionally preach that way, which again, as I’ve learned, is so rare as I word people who unfortunately their pastors maybe aren’t phrasing it that way. So. Both in one-on-one discipleship and then also just like how they work, how they are as shepherds over like the church and how they’re articulating concepts like sin.
Yes, it’s very like grace based and keeping your eyes more on Jesus than on like micromanaging your sanctification, so to speak. So
Carrie: that’s definitely a good way to say it. ’cause I, I’ve seen that a lot. Yeah. Micromanaging your scientification, like, yes, I’ve gotta do this, I’ve gotta make it all happen.
Let’s talk about how some of these [00:08:00] general doubts, like spiritual doubts that you see, we call that scrupulosity too. If people are new to OCD, those are your more religious based doubts and can be doubts about whether or not you’ve committed blasphemy. The unpardonable sin. Am I really saved? Like it can cover a variety of things.
A lot of questionings about have I sinned or not, like you said, and kind of trying to deal with that. Was this a sin, was this not? And then that can definitely come up in sexual themes. Have I lusted, have I not? We did a show on that quite a while ago, but how can pastors identify. The difference between somebody that’s having a genuine, just spiritual wrestling and everyday kind of, I don’t know, maybe I’m not saved, versus somebody that’s dealing with OCD.
Like in your experience, how have you seen that look different?
Rachel: You know, I think Carrie initially, ’cause I’ve been thinking about that question a little bit initially, it can look similar just to encourage pastors, like initially the wrestling. Versus OCD might look similar. So I think the [00:09:00] initial conversation, there’s such a space to like, yeah, people have honest, spiritual wrestling.
I think some things that to look for are if it starts to loop or repeat itself or like they’re gonna re-ask the question the same way or they’re gonna come back a week later with the same. Question. I remember one time Pastor Darwin, I don’t remember what my question was, but I remember he actually like paused me.
I remember actually being a little frustrated with him in my head ’cause he was like, Hey, basically like, I love you. I’m not gonna answer that again. Yeah. Which was so helpful ’cause he wasn’t like to use the word co compulsing with me to just reassure me about something we’d already discussed. And so I think if you find yourself as a pastor reassuring someone more than once or twice, it’s like it continues and it seems like there never is an answer.
I think we’ve moved outside of wrestling into an OCD space, especially if the person isn’t able to accept like any uncertainty, any mystery whatsoever. I think those are some initial flags I could think of.
Carrie: Yeah. You reminded me of another interview that I did with a guy who talked about he had been divorced and that [00:10:00] really the.
Scripture about remarriage had like really, really troubled him. And so every visiting pastor that he would see in the church that would kind of come through as they were traveling, he would ask the same question of them. Like, Hey, tell me about this remarriage. Like, is it okay to get remarried? And all of those things.
Rachel: And I think the topics I see that come up with, I mean, to your point, it could be some morality question like marriage. It could be, I’ve seen it come up with am I a Christian? Am I going to hell? I know my journey. The other big one was the have I sinned one? ’cause I interpreted the verse first John one, nine that says if you confess your sins, he’s faithful.
And just, I took that to mean if I don’t confess my sins, I’m not forgiven. Ah. Just I think even how scripture is framed is important and how pastors like walk with people.
Carrie: Yeah, tell me about that discipleship piece, because I don’t know, I’m assuming this just from what I’ve heard from other people, but like what I see a lot of times is people have just, I don’t wanna say bad theology about who God is.
Who God [00:11:00] really is like, yes, there’s justice. There’s also love like, and the wrestling of combining and understanding that, and you brought up mystery, you know, there is some mystery in the Christian faith. There are some verses that we’re gonna wrestle with probably till we get to heaven and not fully understand.
And so what is your connection between discipleship and also getting good treatment and clearing up? I think some of those lies about who God is, what he wants for our lives, those types of things.
Rachel: Absolutely. Yeah. So I think pastor er one of my time with him, how he discipled me. I can vividly remember some conversations around the gospel, especially those passages, and I believe in First John, I think it’s four of how God is love and really fleshing out to your point, like God’s character is love.
It makes me think of someone I look up to currently. I might have heard of him, Ted Whittick. He talks about how God’s character. People of OCD tend to view as if God is gonna drop them, versus God is holding them like a kind parent. So I think in my time with Darwin to tie that illustration and learning that God was holding [00:12:00] me, not gonna like let go of me and pointing me to scriptures that were more about that and less about sin.
Not that sin is not important topic of course, but looking more at God’s character than about, again, micromanaging. Have I and have I not? And then I think what that looks like with Pastor Brian was, I vividly remember him pointing me to just stories in the gospels of where Jesus was interacting with people who felt shame, like women at the well, or the woman who was bleeding, or the adulterous woman.
I think John a, it’s one of my favorites. And so just pointing me to these stories of Rachel Luca, how compassionate Jesus is towards these women who feel shame. And that was very transformational for me. ’cause I, I read those story growing up, but had never connected it to myself and the shame I was feeling.
There’s just some specific initial passages I can think of of how my pastors like discipled me, and then specifically with being clinically treated. So I was 29 before I got formally only six years ago, which is crazy. Got formally diagnosed with OCD from my Christian, but clinical counselor, and I wasn’t even there initially for OCD, which is funny, thinking about it.
[00:13:00] And so she did a lot of the exposures with me around the fear of being a pedophile. Which I thought were dealt with by that point, but clearly we’re still dumpster fire in my mind. Yeah. And at the same time, I was still meeting with Pastor Brian who is still encouraging me around like Jesus and shame such that when I was going through exposures with Michelle, shout out to Michelle, my wonderful counselor, she would have me walk up to the shame, the fear if, if I was a pedophile and then I was hearing from my pastor.
And even if you were not that you are, but even if you were like, where would Jesus and the cross? And so really I feel like I have this Venn diagram story that’s unique of like, I had care at the same time from both my pastor and my counselor, which I think was really a beautiful marriage between clinical and the biblical.
Carrie: Was there a point where your pastor said, Hey, I think I’ll continue meeting with you, but I think you need to talk to a professional. Was that how you got into therapy or?
Rachel: That’s a great question. Yeah. Brian was always, and still is, very supportive. I’m so thankful. I’ve had pastors who are so supportive of mental health.
I’m like, yes, counseling go, which [00:14:00] is, I also have learned is rare. But again, at the time, what’s funny is I had kind of signed myself up for counseling to process, like life transitions, starting to own private practice. I wasn’t even there for, but then I think it was like five sessions in and she was like, hello, there’s something you really need to deal with.
So we started processing it that summer and then I would tell Brian. Thankfully having people at my church who, if I ever sounded like I was starting to loop on something, they would tell me like, Hey, why don’t you run this by Michelle? This sounds like a little OCD sneaking in. I’d be like, oh, thank you.
Appreciate that. So they were aware of it. That’s good. It was kind of how that, I guess, organically came up.
Carrie: That’s interesting. So for your exposures, were you spending more time around children or were you doing some imaginal script writing? Like what did that look like?
Rachel: Yeah, it was a lot of imaginal in vivo script writing or I guess, yeah, I guess not in vivo, but imaginary script writing and like writing out the word pedophile.
What if I’m a child molester? Just like, and kind of walking it up to it in my mind at that point. I would say still [00:15:00] some contact with children, like children nursery occasionally. I remember a fall. I intentionally was like, okay, let me just like sign myself up to serving in children’s nurse free again, because literally my mind hasn’t processed this yet.
They probably don’t dunno, that’s why I was there, but I was like, I there to serve, but I also need to expose myself. They were just happy to have the help. I mean, yeah, I was like, I, I need to take diapers and be okay, you know? But anyway, but yeah, I, um, very much, a lot of it was imaginary, writing out certain words that were triggering and letting it just flow where it did.
So for me, a lot of it was riding the wave of shame. I think a lot of exposure rate can be riding in the wave of anxiety. I wasn’t like physically anxious about it or panicky. I was just very, had a lot of shame. It led to very dark thoughts of self-harm. I mean, that kind of a thing was riding the wave of, and that’s where Jesus met me and showed me like, there’s nothing I can’t fill.
I can fill the gap for you on anything including this horrific thing.
Carrie: That’s incredible. I mean, I think that that’s a really great testimony just to say that Jesus has released you from that shame of having those [00:16:00] intrusive thoughts. And was the diagnosis part of that too? Just recognizing like, oh, it’s not really me just creating this randomness in my mind, this is actually like OCD.
Rachel: Absolutely. Yeah. I think that knowing that I had OCD, so I forget, first heard the term from Pastor Darwin and then went to different conferences and was learning more about it. But then when I got to Michelle going like, oh, I have OCD with Viro subtype, you know, spiritual screw velocity, and then realizing even.
Gosh, it was only a couple years ago. I realized through the I-O-C-D-F, which I’m very passionate about, what they do, kind of shout out to them. There was a group session they had for pedophilia, OCD, and I was like, what is this? I was like, wait, this is an actual subtype of OCD because Michelle was treating me for it.
She didn’t label it as like, this is pedophilia, OCD. So it was more recent. You realize like, oh, like there’s all these different subtypes. I have like five of them. Along with like harm OCD relationship, OCD, all those like hidden kinds are ones that I’ve wrestled with. But definitely knowing that it was OCD is very liberating.
’cause then to your point, not in my head about why I’m in my [00:17:00] head.
Carrie: Yeah, that’s great. It is helpful to know. It’s like, oh, I’m not the only one. That’s going through this. I think that’s really huge in breaking down the stigma and the shame of the whole thing. I wanna talk about a little bit about mental compulsions.
’cause you said it’s really all going on in your head. You’re not checking doorknobs, you’re not wiping things down with disinfectant or, and this is a lot of people that I see as well deal with a lot of mental compulsions. So what did that look like for you in the spiritual realm? Was there a lot of like repetitive praying or things of
Rachel: that nature?
For sure. So kind of walking through my seasons group velocity, I would say initially it looked like a lot of mental ruminating. Am I Christian? How do I know if my sweet dad or pastor said something? Encouraging, which it was, but then analyzing, well, how do I know if that’s true? Just ruminating on things.
In my mind, confessing sin. Sometimes I was a little external, but often like reviewing, have I sin? Do I need to confess this? And then
Carrie: like internal checking.
Rachel: Internal checking, right? And then [00:18:00] certain verses, which I have a lot of precious clients who also have this, but certain sermons or verses, I’m like, I take it black and white, very literally.
A big part of my testimony with that was, I think I was 20. I don’t know why it is a vivid memory. I was driving on the highway one day and it occurred to me, I think this was the Holy Spirit, but at the end of Psalm 1 39 says, search me and know me. Save there, be any hurtful way in me. Leave me in the way ever lasting.
And so just putting that responsibility on God. God, you’re the Holy Spirit. You show me if I’ve sinned. I don’t need to keep micromanaging and triple checking, have I sinned and letting him be the spirit rather than me trying to do that. But the age of 20, thankfully, a lot of the spiritual scru, really after a decade of it.
Majorly died down. I’m still aware that I have tendencies like that to this day. I have to be very careful if I confess this and it’s like two seconds, move on. Like we don’t ruminate. So I still have some inclinations towards that, but that’s kind of what that looked like for me.
Carrie: But I mean, that’s very hopeful for people to hear that.
There was a time period where it was really, really rough and consumed a lot of thought energy, and now you’re just able [00:19:00] to say like, uh, okay, don’t slip back into that. Like the warning signs, like, that’s a slippery slope. Don’t keep going. This thing that I’ve seen with clients, and maybe you’ve had people say this to you too, is they’re like, I don’t wanna just blame my OCD.
What if I’m really sinning, but then I’m saying it’s OCD, getting attached to this. How do you address that? I’m laughing ’cause I had a sweet client tell me that last week and I was like, oh,
Rachel: how I process. I literally told her, I said, what a great question. Let’s process that together. I think somehow, Carrie, when we’re working with clients that are believers, which this climb speak was, if we can point ’em back to the cross in the gospel of like, thankfully Jesus has you.
So let’s walk up to, okay, sure. Let’s pretend you were sydnee. I’m confident that the spirit in you will show you through conviction, not condemnation. Yeah. And so CD is always gonna have a voice of condemnation and a blooping and never ans it never resolves. And the spirit is going to be through conviction.
That leads me to love God and love people not implode. I think something in my own story I’ve learned over the years is just not get on the [00:20:00] despair train. Like if it’s leading towards despair and doubt, that’s probably not a fruitful thing for me to get on and trying to explain it that way to clients.
Carrie: No, I think that’s great. I think we, kind of going back to what you said about micromanaging your sanctification, it’s like if we can help people see, you really can trust the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit. It’s just so mind willing. The Holy Spirit is in us. So I can’t wrap my mind around that. That is a really big concept.
Yeah. Yeah. And so like we can trust that conviction is a good thing and it’s healthy for us, and it maintains our relationship with God, and we don’t have to run around and micromanage our spirituality. We can show up every day and say, here I am, God, I’m a mess. I’m broken. I’m dealing with this sin issue like I’m fighting and I need you.
We really wanna create that healthy level of dependence and trust on God versus. Feeling like we’ve gotta do it all ourselves.
Rachel: And I think that even ties to identity as believers. Something Pastor Brian really kind of drove [00:21:00] home with me is that like we are the beloved, like we are his beloved children.
And if my posture towards God, or towards my head space with OCD is I’m just a beloved child, that gives so much more breathing space than trying to drill down. And again, micromanage. And trying to make sure to cross every T dot, every I, it’s like, well, if Jesus already died, he crossed every T and dotted every I for me.
So I don’t have to keep doing that anymore.
Carrie: I am really interested in this next topic, OCD and spiritual warfare, because this is something I think I’ve been asking God about. It’s like, what role does spiritual warfare play in OCD? And we want to be really careful because then people get. Super freaked out like, am I possessed by demons?
No, that’s not what we’re talking about here. We are talking about that we do see in scripture that our battle is not against flesh and blood, and that there’s spiritual things happening, even like our flesh and the spirit. There’s a war between Satan and what he’s trying to accomplish in Jesus and what he’s trying to accomplish on this earth.
So how do you see those playing [00:22:00] out like the spiritual warfare in OCD?
Rachel: I love this and I loved knowing that you’re gonna ask about it. One of my most passionate topics. Yes. So I think initially, if I’m processing this with a client or friend or whoever, making sure they first know, to your point, you know, OC D is a mental health issues so that people don’t oversize because we both probably heard horrific stories of people who had demons prayed out of them, and it wasn’t a demon, it was just OCD.
So usually always start with making sure someone understands it’s a mental health issue. Then once they have grasped that, then I will gingerly tie in spiritual warfare. If I sense, honestly, I pray like the spirit leads me to bring that into a session. I think with spiritual warfare, I often see that come up.
I’m gonna quote Ted would say again, but he’s phrased it as OCD is kind of the surfboard that’s already there and the enemy kind of rides on the back of that surfboard. And so thinking of, you know, in John 10, it talks about the thief comes to kill, steal, and destroy. These are the brethren. What revelation is it?
[00:23:00] 12 or wherever that is. And so if I see a client really being accused, often it’s the accuser coming on on the back of OCD, which is the doubting disease anyway. And I think helping people know spiritual warfare, to your point, doesn’t have to be this woowoo thing I think we think of as demon possession.
Not that I don’t think demons are real, that’s a thing. But I think it can even be through the enemy trying to distract us. Because enemy’s goal is to get our eyes off of Jesus. However that looks with someone who has a sensitive conscience like me. It might look like, let me get her to stew so much on her sin that she’s not looking at the cross anymore.
I believe that spiritual warfare, I think the enemy wants us to micromanage our faith and shrink our world down to the size of that, and that is spiritual warfare. So I think you’ve been helping people define like if your world is shrunk down to the size of a sin, that’s maybe the accuser accusing you of something to get your eyes off of the Lord.
Carrie: And just this idea that in terms of OCD and values and acceptance and commitment therapy is about moving towards your values. And so we’re, we’re helping people with that in the process of [00:24:00] therapy. And oftentimes people want to do something and it could be a variety of different things. It could be, I want to get married, I want to date in order to get married.
I want to go on a mission trip. I want to serve in the children’s ministry. Feel like they can’t because they feel like OCD is so bad. I’m just, life is a little bit arrested because of all these thought loops that I’m constantly in. And so that’s where I see it as like people having difficulty moving towards the things that they really believe wholeheartedly, that God wants them to pursue.
And so I think anything that we can do as believing clinicians to help support people in that process is, is so huge to know. Like. No. Like we want you to walk in the abundant life that Christ has for you and move forward.
Rachel: Absolutely. And I really love the verse in Psalm 34 that talks about magnifying him because I sometimes I tell clients like, Hey, whether it’s the enemy attacking you, or it’s OCD, we don’t even have to like analyze.
I’m all about saying one prayer, like, Lord, if there’s attack going [00:25:00] on, protect us one and done. So it doesn’t become a compulsion. But after that it’s like we don’t even have to scrape the bull, so to speak. And pinpoint is this enemy, is this OCD? Is this leading me to magnify God? No. That’s all I need to know.
I think sometimes that’s really helpful for someone with SCR loss or OCD to know that they don’t even have to completely like, well, is this the enemy or is this OCD? This isn’t of Jesus. It’s not leading me to love God and love people. So I’m gonna, to your point, walk towards my values of love, God and love people, and be embraced by God and his character, and move towards that.
Carrie: I think another way to say that is like love or fear, am I in complete terror? We know that that’s not of God. Yeah, that’s a helpful distinction. Yeah. Perfect. Love cast out fear. Yeah. That’s awesome. So you’re in the process of writing a book, which is really exciting. So tell us a little bit about the book and where that’s going.
Rachel: Yeah, I love that you asked. So my book, Lord Willing, will be coming out next summer. I’m in the process of figuring out self-publishing and that whole process, but it’s called Gap Filler Captive to Captivated, and it’s a [00:26:00] unique book, I think, ’cause I’m trying to speak to two audiences and build a bridge between people who have OCD, the suffer.
People who are trying to help OCD, the helper, whether they be a clinician or a pastor, have a big heart for shepherds in the church and for pastors particularly. And so it’s a resource to help bridge helpers and sufferers to have less triggering, more fruitful conversations around specifically pure o those more hidden types of OCD.
I’m gonna try to address it holistically and biblically and show how Jesus fills the gap, which the whole book unpacks the gap. Illustration is something Michelle drew me back when I was in counseling with her for OCD, and then Jesus kind of gave me part two of the illustration of the cross filling it.
And I’ve used the illustration with clients. They have found it really transformative, and so I’ve decided to build a book around that whole. Illustration from my own counseling journey.
Carrie: Oh, that’s really exciting. I’m so excited for you. And I think that that’s gonna bless a lot of people and hopefully God will open doors for you to be able to share more about that.
If pastors are looking for other [00:27:00] resources, like you mentioned Ted Wick. Sorry, so I said his name wrong. But, um, are there other like books that you’ve read or things that you’ve found helpful?
Rachel: Ted has some great resources. One of my friends and colleagues, um, Justin Hughes. He’s in Dallas. He is a Christian counselor and very passionate about this topic like I am.
I would definitely point to his resources. He’s writing a book as well on OCD, which is very exciting. And then I think there’s even just some great resources on OCD, like on Piro in general. Like there’s different workbooks and I think are helpful just for pastors to understand like what it is. Um, I like Mike Emile’s article on OCD.
He’s from CCEF, if you’re familiar with them. He kind of talks about kind of spiritual as heart themes that we have with OCD, like perfectionism and certainty and those sorts of things. And there’s a good book called Christianity Cure, OCD by Ian. I forget his last name. Osborn. It’s Osborne. Yeah, that’s a good one.
Yeah, so I would say there’s some on group velocity, spiritual OCD, and there’s some, even just basic OCD [00:28:00] ones. I think if pastors even just understand what OCD is, it can be helpful.
Carrie: And for anybody who’s wondering why I haven’t had Dr. Osborne on the uh, podcast, he has declined saying he is too retired and old to be on the podcast, but we still love him anyway.
We love him. Hurts out to him. Yes, absolutely. Hard part. Yeah. That’s a very interesting book and talks about Martin Luther’s story. Mm-hmm. And just like what grace and that understanding and how that changed everything for him was really insightful. Yeah. From what I remember of that and really just getting to that place of can you trust God with a, whatever that Harry scary thing is.
That’s what I kind of remember the takeaway from that book. If you can boil it down, like is this something you can really trust God with?
Rachel: Absolutely. I think he has another book out about just Martin Luther. I saw something a couple weeks ago and I was like, oh, I don’t know. Anyway, but, and there’s even some great devotional resources like Pastor Brian years ago recommended I read Gentle and Low Leaf.
You’ve heard of that. That one is great to just point people to God’s character. It’s not OCD per se, but I feel like it [00:29:00] was written for someone like me. So worth mentioning. That’s a great resource as well.
Carrie: Getting back to that father, heart of God is so huge, and that can be hard for us to understand and really conceptualize.
Well, this has been a really great conversation. I’ve enjoyed chatting it up with you. I know we could probably go on and on and on, but we’re gonna Yeah. Wrap things up. I like to ask some of our guests who have struggled with OCD, like, what do you feel like recovery looks like for you now?
Rachel: I love that. I think an ongoing embracing of uncertainty and taking leaps of faith every day in my life.
Whether that’s with how I read a verse that used to trigger me or how I interact with a client, if that triggers my harm, OCD or how I’m with a kid in the nursery, if it triggers pedophilia, OCD, like I’ve still triggered. I just have a relationship with uncertainty now that I’m more resting and um, Jesus is my certainty.
Carrie: That’s great. Thank you for sharing. That’s very helpful.
Rachel: I just appreciate you having me in everything you do.
Carrie: Thanks so much for tuning [00:30:00] in today. If you know a pastor that needs to hear this or a friend that needs some encouragement, will you please send this episode to them so that more people can experience hope and know that God is with them on their OCD journey.
