Wednesday, January 30, 2013

Does God Always Hate Divorce?

CAUTION!

I know this topic is a can of worms. But, due to the encouragement of friends and family, I'm finally willing to open that can and let the slithering, slimy contents spill out into the open. I can't bear to see other Christian women suffer needlessly in excruciating, marriages. Their children are suffering too. Working with children, I see it all the time. Even my own children suffered for too long.

If my words do not resonate with you personally, thenyou are blessed. However, you might know of another woman who will relate to what I have written here.

Many women are enduring difficult marriages. Some of those women are Christians. The mistreatment of wives by Bible-believing husbands is a challenging topic. Due to the painful memories it conjures in my own spirit, I have delayed writing about it until now. But, I think, if I write a little at a time and not all at once, I will pray and rely on God’s strength to accomplish the task.

The Questions:

What does the Bible say about the treatment of women in marriage? Does God care about a wife who is treated unjustly, cruelly, berated, put down, criticized, trampled upon, enslaved? Does He care about innocent children who are forced to see their mother yelled at, beaten, locked up, starved? We know God hates divorce, but does He value the preservation of marriage higher than a woman’s personal protection...or higher than the protection of children?

These are questions that haunted me during seven years of marriage to my husband (now ex-husband). But the answers to these questions gave me the courage to finally make my escape. As a Christian woman, I knew God hated divorce. I was afraid of sinning against Him. I was also fearful of how a divorce might alienate me from other Christians.

I know that at least a few Christian women are trapped in bad—really bad—marriages. And they're married to "Christian" husbands. I know how confusing it can be. Everything may appear lovely on the outside, but behind closed doors, there may be strife, chaos, suffering, and unimaginable cruelty. You may be ashamed of the way you live, sorry for making the foolish mistake of marrying the man you did. He fooled you and everyone. You hide the truth. No one would believe you if you told them what he’s really like. Besides, you tell yourself, he can be so nice sometimes. He can be “good” and life can feel almost normal much of the time. You may think he's done being mean and that he’ll remain kind and loving from now on. How many times have you told yourself that? You're likely a forgiving person. You hold onto those happy times, push back the traumatic incidents into the recesses of your memory, and pretend everything’s fine…until the next time you step sideways on that bit of eggshell and the tiniest crackle is the excuse he needs to explode again.

The fact is, your life is a lie, full of secrets, hypocrisy. You don’t want anyone to know how he treats you. You cover for him, hide his ugly, bad habits, put on a happy face for your friends and family, instruct your kids how to behave, protect them so he’ll hurt you and not them, apologize for whatever you did to cause him to lose his temper, confess falsely to any crime he accuses you of just to keep some semblance of peace. You tell yourself it was your fault he yelled at you or hit you. You pray for him to change for the better, pray for a way of escape; even pray for the mercy of death to take you…until you remember for the thousandth time that you can’t abandon your children to their father’s cruelty. You’re trapped. There’s no escape. You must survive, if for no other reason than to save your children's lives. But is staying with him really saving your life…or theirs? Is there really no way out?

If you are a Bible-believing wife, how can you leave your Christian marriage? How can you break your promises and renege on your marriage vows? Do you have any Biblical grounds for divorce? As far as you know, your husband hasn’t been sexually unfaithful to you and he hasn’t abandoned you (although you might wish for it).

But sexual unfaithfulness and abandonment are not the only Biblical grounds for divorce, as many unkind Christian husbands try to claim. Jesus Himself “recognized a range of marital conditions that are worse than divorce.” So did Moses and Paul.[i] Do you find that surprising? Are there other situations in which God might actually approve of or condone divorce? Oh, yes. If I didn’t finally come to the startling realization of how much God loves women and wants to protect them from harm, I might still be stuck in my horrific marriage; I might still be playing the poor, wretched martyr, watching my children grow up to be future victims and abusers. According to the very words of the Bible, God wants women to be loved, protected, cared for; He wants this even more than he wants an abusive marriage to remain intact. God wants you to be free from abuse, and I’ll prove it using Scripture as evidence. You can read about it in my next post.

[i] God’s Protection of Women, by Martin R. De Haan II, p. 3

Thursday, January 24, 2013

Why do Victims Stay in Abusive Relationships?

CAUTION!

Let me start be saying I don’t necessarily believe that it’s any more difficult for a woman of faith to escape her abusive marriage than it is for any other victim. All abusers use manipulation to maintain control over their victims. However, I do think that playing the ethical card is a particularly destructive weapon in the hands of certain calculating spouses, using Biblical pressure to keep their victims feeling trapped and hopeless. If your Christian spouse is using the Bible to inflict pain on you and tell you that you cannot leave him because it would be a sin, then that fact alone should be an indication that you are in an abusive and controlling marriage. First of all, it’s a lie that you must remain with him for Biblical reasons. In fact, there are many Biblical reasons for you to leave an abusive relationship, but I’ll list those in another article. (In the meantime, go back and read my article titled, God Commands Divorce—in Certain Circumstances for one powerful Biblical example.)

I spent years on my knees, praying and reading my Bible. Despite the truth of God’s Word right in front of my nose, I saw no way out. I sought help from countless marriage books—Christian marriage books. Not one of them showed me a way out of my abusive marriage until I read God’s Protection of Women: When Abuse is Worse than Divorce, a small booklet by Martin R. De Haan II[i]. Most marriage books only encouraged me to focus on changing myself (not my spouse) to keep growing, keep trying to be a better, more patient and loving wife. So that’s what I did. Of course, trying to be “better” in a relationship with an abusive person does not work. Nothing ever changed for the better in my marriage—at least, never long-term—because I was the only one making any effort. I know you have heard the boat paddling analogy before, but let me remind you again: If two people row a canoe together, they can succeed in making positive, forward progress, but if only one person does all the rowing, or even just most of the rowing, the boat will spin in circles and go nowhere.

So, again there is the question: Why do victims stay in abusive relationships? I can’t answer that for everyone. Each victim has her own reasons. I can only tell you about my particular situation. I talked with counselors and friends. Despite the help I had all around me, I still felt trapped. Why? Because I never told anyone I was being abused. Why on earth would I not tell anyone? For three reasons:

1) Fear. Usually, my husband was sitting there beside me on the therapist’s couch. However, even when I had the opportunity to speak with a friend or counselor alone, fear kept me silent. My ex-husband frequently used the Bible to remind me that I must submit to him and obey him, no matter what he did to me. Yes, I knew the truth that Jesus loves me (John 3:16) and came to give me abundant life (John 10:10) and that Jesus was sent to heal the brokenhearted and set captives free (Luke 4:18, 19), but my ex’s twisting of Scripture confused me. I became less sure of God’s truth, less certain of God’s love for me. The twisted lies that sounded like Biblical truth became stronger than the pure and unadulterated truth of God’s Word.

2) Shame and Pride. It's difficult for me to separate shame and pride, so I have combined the two. I was so emotionally beaten down by my ex that I had no self-esteem left. I was ashamed of anyone seeing me in the abased state to which I had descended. I was too proud to show anyone that I was not in the perfect Christian marriage. I had once been a healthy, happy, self-assured, well-educated woman. What if my friends saw what I had become? I had made a terrible, terrible mistake in my choice of a husband. Pride compelled me to portray my husband in as positive a light as possible, playing up my husband’s positive qualities in any public setting, covering his negatives, hiding my grief, trying to look like I had a stable, secure marriage. I was a classic enabler. All that “covering up” was living a lie that led to further denial.

3) Denial. I could not face the truth that abuse was happening to me. I am a smart, sane, educated woman. If a woman is being abused, she should just get out, right? That’s what I always believed. Even in a counseling setting, I would minimize my husband’s abuse and say, “He’s mean to me.” For some sad reason, no one ever seemed to pick up on my secret code and ask me what I meant by “mean," but I also kind of convinced myself that he was never that bad or that his hurting me was really my fault anyhow. No wonder counseling did nothing to help me.

If you are in a hurtful marriage and your spouse is mean to you, maybe you're afraid to admit you're being abused. That's okay for now, but I want you to see God’s truth from His Word for what it is. God loves you. Jesus came to heal you and set you free (Luke 4:18, 19). That’s His will. He does not want you to stay stuck and trapped in constant wounding from your spouse; He does not want you to remain a prisoner in your own home, a captive of your own husband. But I know how it is. He hurts you, you cry out to the Lord, His Spirit comforts you, you feel at peace again, you pray for God to transform your husband’s heart and mind, you tell yourself you’re growing stronger through these constant trials, and then you pick yourself up again and go on as though nothing ever happened. You can keep doing this for months, years. I did. But if you stay, that sick cycle will never end. Oh, yes, if you stay long enough there’s a slim chance your husband will mellow with age and become slightly less abusive, or receive a debilitating head injury that will render him unable to hurt anyone, or perhaps even have a true change of heart. Miracles do happen.

Do I sound faithless, like I don’t believe in God’s ability to work miracles? Probably, but remember, even though God works miracles in people’s lives, He does not want you to remain with your abusive spouse while He’s working that miracle. When God changes an abusive person’s heart, it can takes decades. Oh, an abuser will pretend to have been changed by God, but after the tenth or eleventh time of bullying you after he has supposedly received this miraculous change, you really should wake up and get a clue that he’s lying to you…again.

Let me put it to you bluntly: Christian marriage or not, if you stick around, praying and waiting for God to change your husband like I did, the abuse will continue, it will even grow worse, and you’ll finally either be killed, your children will be abused, or you’ll escape by the skin of your teeth.

Think I sound too extreme? I could point you to hundreds of stories of domestic violence that ended up in murder—even when the abuse was not technically physical; psychological abuse causes suicides, as well—even for Christians. Sometimes a psychological abuser will suddenly go into a rage and kill his spouse after years of never inflicting bodily injury to her. Look into your abuser’s eyes. You can’t tell me you don’t see murderous intent there when he's in one of his rages. What does the Bible have to say about that? (Check out 1 John 3:15.)

Oh, yes, I know what you’ll say here too: But those are only brief outbursts; most of the time he’s loving and kind. Really? A lot of "kind and loving" spouses kill their husbands or wives in a brief outburst of anger. Do you really want to risk that? If you have children, do you want to leave your kids with such a violent person if he doesn't get caught by the authorities?* Why are you remaining in your prison? When is enough enough? What are you waiting for?

*If you have kids, you have to be extra careful with how you leave your abusive partner. You don’t want to leave your children alone with your violent spouse for even fifty percent of their lives after you potentially divorce. Don’t think he’ll abuse your kids, because he only abused you in your marriage? Think again. Some abusers will inflict pain on the children to get back at you for leaving him. Don’t take that risk. You know you have to leave; just do it correctly and with help. Get assistance from your local domestic violence office or women’s shelter first. In fact, in many cases, I recommend getting their help before you go to the police. If you call this domestic violence hotline, someone can recommend to you whether or not you should seek police assistance: 1−800−799−SAFE(7233) or TTY 1−800−787−3224.

[i] [i] God’s Protection of Women, by Martin R. De Haan II, published by RBC Ministries

Friday, January 18, 2013

You Might Hear God More Clearly If...

CAUTION!

I have stated before, in order to regain your sanity, you must leave your abuser and cut off all contact and communication with him for an extended period of time. During this period of retreat, you might even begin to hear God’s voice again.

You might be wondering how I can I so rudely accuse you of not hearing God. What if you’re a godly Christian woman of prayer? What if you feel God has called you to remain with your spouse to pray for him? I know I’m stepping on your toes here, but even if you’re studying the Bible regularly and you’re reading great devotional and marriage books—even if you are hearing from God in myriad ways—if you’re listening at all to God’s Word to you via your husband’s twisted interpretation of Scripture or through a marriage book’s reprimands to follow certain Biblical principles that do not apply to abuse victims, then you are not hearing all of what God is trying to tell you. I’ll say it again another way: If you have been hurt in your marriage but you’re confused about whether or not you have abused--or if you know for sure you have been abused--you must completely remove yourself from your spouse or partner.

Here’s what you must do:

1) Cut off all contact and communication with your spouse or partner for at least three months. I wish I could remember where I read that three months is so important. I think it was either Lundy Bancroft or J. G. Silverman, but I can’t find it in any of their books. (I own two and just because I can’t locate the reference doesn’t mean it’s not there. I’ll probably find it eventually and rewrite this section.) Three months may be too long; it may not be enough, but it’s my prescription for you. Tell your partner it’s only temporary. That may not be the truth, but you’re probably still in the mindset that you’ll go back to him anyway, so don’t worry about that right now. This is extremely difficult, I know. It means moving out and living in a women’s shelter or with a friend or maybe even with your parents or grandparents. It’s humbling, humiliating, pride-shattering, and maybe not even economically feasible. This is a great opportunity for you to put your faith in God and do it anyway.

NOTE: This is redundant, but it’s important. I have a BIG warning for you here. If you decide to leave—even if you do not go to a battered women’s shelter—I strongly urge you to consult with a domestic violence counselor before you go. Even if you think your husband would never hurt you or your children to the point of “serious” injury (as if what he has done to you is not already serious), a counselor will help you to carefully plan and strategize the best and safest way for you to escape. I made the mistake of leaving my abuser without first contacting my local domestic violence and crisis center. I won’t go into it now, but it was a HUGE mistake that led to dramatically increased abuse against me and my children.

2) Surround yourself with people who can help you: friends, family, counselors, therapists, a pastor, etc. However, be careful here. Make sure that they will not take a one-sided “Biblical” view that Christians must remain in their marriages no matter what abuse they suffer. Shelter yourself with the protection of people who will love and care for you while speaking God’s truth to you—that He loves you and wants you and your children to be protected and safe from abuse.

Why is zero communication and zero contact so important? I will quote Lundy Bancroft, Family Issues Specialist and author of Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men. Bancroft writes that “breaking up with an abuser can be very hard to do…. Few abusers readily allow themselves to be left.”[i] He also writes that if you try to leave your spouse for a “break,” he might agree initially, but he will gradually erode the edges of your agreement by sending a card, emailing you, or showing up “by coincidence” at places where you happen to be.[ii] Why does he do this? He is afraid of what you might discover if you succeed in getting a true break from his control. You might begin to think your own thoughts and see that a lot of people around you treat each other kindly in their relationships.[iii] In other words, you might come to your senses, regain some of your sanity, and realize that you are being abused and that you don’t deserve to be so mistreated.

The fact is, God is speaking to you. He loves you. He wants you to be safe and protected. It breaks His heart to see you being hurt in any marriage, much less a Christian marriage. You need to get away from the confusion of whatever your husband is saying to you so that you can separate truth from lies. Do you find yourself getting defensive, wanting to protect your husband right now? That’s a big indication that you’re in a toxic, codependent relationship. God does not want you to be in an abusive marriage. God is trying to speak to you. Are you listening to Him?

[i] Bancroft, Lundy, Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men, p. 213.

[ii] Bancroft, Lundy, Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men, p. 222.

[iii] Bancroft, Lundy, Why Does He Do That? Inside the Minds of Angry and Controlling Men, p. 223.

Would You Know if You Were in an Abusive Marriage?

CAUTION!

One criticism I have received is that I condone divorce. Actually, that is not true. If you are in a struggling marriage and you and your children are not being abused or mistreated in any way, then by all means, stay in your marriage and do whatever you can to make it work. That’s what I did. Divorce was definitely a last resort for me, even though I was in an abusive marriage. The problem was that I didn’t know I was being abused.

How could I not know I was being abused? The answer is complicated. The first time your spouse or partner does something to hurt you, you’re in a state of shock. You reason with yourself. Perhaps it was a mistake or a one-time explosion of anger. You assure yourself that it will never happen again. You minimize it, dismiss it, forget it, deny it. If you’re like me, you tell yourself it never happened in at all. I brainwashed myself.

Unfortunately, denial only sets you up psychologically. You create for yourself a survivalist mentality that prepares you to remain a victim for the next time your partner hurts you. It is better to confront your partner right away after the first time. Ask him why he did that to you. Too afraid to do that? Think it’s too dangerous for you? Then go talk to someone outside of your situation. Get help from a friend, pastor, counselor, or family member. Do this soon, however, because most abusers will work strategically to remove friends and family from your life.

Let’s say you do confront your spouse. Does he apologize profusely, cry, and give you gifts and flowers? Beware of that scenario. Abusers are masters of histrionic mea culpas. Even worse, an abuser will carefully, artfully turn everything around and convince you that it was primarily your fault—that you caused him to hurt you. Before long, you’re the one crying and apologizing, promising to work harder to be a better person so you won’t anger him again. Are you getting this? If you’ve never been in an abusive relationship, you can see the blatant lack of logic here and you’re probably wondering how any sane, educated woman could remain with such a man. I’m both sane and educated, and I stayed with my abuser for a long time. I think only a victim of abuse can truly relate to what I’m saying.

If you remain with your abusive husband or partner, you set yourself up for a cycle that will not end. I know I sound like a pessimist with no faith in God’s ability to change people. Well, God can and does change people, but usually not as quickly as we need for our own safety.

I did the godly Christian thing: I forgave and forgave endlessly, repeatedly. My ex would say he was sorry and beg for forgiveness time and time again, so how could I not forgive him? He told me his anger was ultimately my fault anyhow, so I lived with heaps of guilt. Then there would be times when things were actually “good” in our home and marriage—that tentative calm between storms. I would convince myself again and again that, this time, my husband had finally changed for the better. The lies I told myself kept the abuse cycle going.

I left my husband the U.S. national average of seven times before I finally left him permanently. But I learned something profoundly important in leaving him that last time. You have to cut off all communication with your abuser for at least three full months before truth will begin to creep back into your brain again and sort out the sane from the insane. Three months might not be the prescription for every victim, but it’s what I recommend to you.

If you leave and allow your abuser to communicate to you in any way, his carefully crafted lies will weave their way back into your mind, play on your emotions, and before long you’ll be back with him, apologizing for your “sins” and forgiving him for whatever he did to you…again. Nothing will have changed. You’ll think something has changed, but it hasn’t really. Only by getting away from him with zero communication can you hit the reset button on your entire psyche and begin to hear the voice of reason and sanity.

So, back to my original question: Would you know if you’re in an abusive marriage? The answer is very possibly no. I’m sorry to say that, unless you remove yourself from the situation long enough, you may not realize the truth of just how bad your situation is.

NOTE: I have one BIG warning for you here. If you decide to leave—even if you do not go to a battered women’s shelter—I strongly urge you to consult with a domestic violence counselor before you go. Even if you think your husband would never hurt you or your children to the point of “serious” injury (as if what he has done to you is not already serious), a counselor will help you to carefully plan and strategize the best and safest way for you to escape. I made the mistake of leaving my abuser without first contacting my local domestic violence and crisis center. I won’t go into it now, but it was a HUGE mistake that led to dramatically increased abuse against me and my children.

When God Commands Divorce

CAUTION!

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With that last "can of worms" still open and wriggling from my last article, let me shock you again with this truth: Believe it or not, there are places in the Bible where God actually commands divorce!

The apostle Paul tells us in 2 Timothy 3:16 that all Scripture is inspired by God. With that in mind, let me point you to the Law of Moses in the Torah (Old Testament) and at least one place in which God provided for the protection of women in ancient times. Of course, if God meant it for way back then, it is still meant for us today.

As morally reprehensible as it sounds, the buying and selling of wives in the ancient Middle East was common practice. Unfortunately, such a practice continues in many parts of the world to this day. But, thankfully, God’s laws provided some measure of justice for women. For example, in Exodus 21, the law states that a husband must provide food, clothing, and marital rights (probably sexual relations so that she could bear children and thus be honored in society) for his wife, regardless of whether or not he loved her; regardless of whether or not she was a slave wife or a free wife.

If a husband did not provide the most basic needs of food, clothing, and other marital rights for his wife, then God’s law required the husband to set her free—formally divorce her. In other words, God allowed divorce as a means of protecting wives from neglectful, unloving husbands in bad marriages. It’s true that the law does not command wives to divorce, but it does command the "sinful" husband to do so. Wives were probably expected to tell a trusted loved one (probably her parents) who would then speak on her behalf and pressure the neglectful husband to either change his ways or divorce. Mercifully, if he did divorce her, the divorced wife owed her ex-husband nothing—no money, no debt of any kind.[i]

A manipulative Christian husband might argue that the Torah laws do not apply to marriages today or that the laws of Moses were and are only for Jewish people, but remember two things: 1) all Scripture is God-breathed—all meaning both Old and New Testaments; 2) the entire Bible reveals God’s character. In a Middle Eastern culture of gender politics that demeaned and debased females, God’s laws revealed His protective lovingkindness toward women.

That same manipulative husband might also try to argue that the Old Testament’s references to divorce open the door for more Christians to unnecessarily break apart their marriages, but consider this: God’s perfect design for marriage has always been for husbands to properly love, provide and care for their wives. Knowing, however, that not all husbands would be good and kind to their wives as they ought to be, God not only allowed, he commanded divorce as a means of protecting uncared-for wives. Jewish Rabbinical teaching applies God’s commands from the least to the greater, so by legally commanding husbands to divorce their mistreated, unloved, unwanted slave wives, God made it very clear that He does not tolerate the mistreatment of any wife at any level, slave or free.[ii]

[i] God’s Protection of Women, by Martin R. De Haan II, p. 7

[ii] God’s Protection of Women, by Martin R. De Haan II, p. 7