- Turn the other cheek.
- Suffering is being like Jesus
- Submit to your husband, who is the head of your marriage
Many Christians blindly share verses with people struggling in their painful relationships with the hope that they are helping. However, when you share Scripture without knowing the health or reality of their relationship, you can inflict spiritual abuse.
God’s Truth Guides Us
I grew up in the church, hearing Bible stories and sermons. Some stories and out-of-context scriptures spoken from the pulpit led me to believe that any suffering was okay. However, I didn’t realize the difference between suffering and persecution until I was in my thirties.
My inaccurate belief about suffering and my unawareness of the types and signs of abuse and what God says about abuse made me vulnerable to becoming a victim of domestic abuse. Deep inside, I knew that it could not be God’s will for me to be hurt and abused. But my attempts to find God’s truth through faith leaders only left me in spiritual and marital condemnation for life.
Now, I understand that the responses of pastors, faith leaders, and other well-meaning Christians revealed the reality that they were also unaware of the types and signs of abuse and what God says. I have also discovered that very little training is currently being offered to faith leaders on these topics. Unless faith leaders learn to identify, handle, and address abuse, divorce, and the abuser, they will continue to ignore or mishandle the victims and enable the cycles of abuse.
God’s Truth Brings Clarity
Each person must choose Christ to be their Lord and Savior. Our salvation cost Jesus everything, but it is his gift to us. When we receive his Salvation gift, we must honor it by learning what it means to follow Jesus as his disciple and how to honor him with our lives.
We must know God’s truth for ourselves to understand how to follow Jesus. We must learn to ask the Holy Spirit to teach us as we study God’s word in his context. As we study the times, circumstances, and audience, we can understand God’s meaning.
The statements at the beginning of this blog are only portions of Scripture. When we hear parts of a verse, we can twist them into the context we understand from our experiences and perspective to fit our situation. Using twisted or partial Scriptures to justify a circumstance is not being Christ’s disciples. We are opening the door for the enemy to bring confusion, doubt, and mistrust.
The Bible spans 1500 years. Forty different authors wrote the Bible in three languages, yet it is the only true moral compass that has kept humanity from imploding. Our basic laws and moral values come from the Ten Commandments. The truth of God remains the same and holds us to the highest standards of morality. Humanity struggles with God’s high standards of morality because they want to live according to their sinful desires without consequences.
To be a true follower of Jesus, we must know his truth and obey his ways because we love him and all he has done for us. We must realize that we owe Christ everything and pledge our lives to him. As we work with him and are being transformed into his likeness on earth, we will spend eternity with him one day.
While on earth, we must know his truth for ourselves and live in it. Let’s look at the full context of the verses at the beginning of this blog.
Turn the other cheek
"You have heard the law that says the punishment must match the injury: 'An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say, do not resist an evil person! If someone slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek also. If you are sued in court and your shirt is taken from you, give your coat, too. If a soldier demands that you carry his gear for a mile, carry it two miles. Give to those who ask, and don't turn away from those who want to borrow. But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also." (Matt 5:39, NIV)
This teaching is about revenge concerning nonbelievers. In Greek, the word slap refers to an insult, not a physical slap. The context of this passage does not refer to allowing or instructing a husband to insult or physically hurt his wife. However, when victims hear they should turn the other cheek, they can believe that it's God's will for them to be slapped or hurt by their abusive spouse. Abuse is never God's will.
Suffering is being like Jesus
"To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps." (1 Peter 2:21, NIV)
Submit to your husband, who is the head of your marriage
The context of this teaching refers to slaves. This verse is not intended to instruct a spouse to hurt their spouse. God never set up marriage as a means to make our spouse suffer or to allow our spouse to hurt us.
"Wives, understand and support your husbands in ways that show your support for Christ. The husband provides leadership to his wife the way Christ does to his church, not by domineering but by cherishing. So just as the church submits to Christ as he exercises such leadership, wives should likewise submit to their husbands.
Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, exactly as Christ did for the church—a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ's love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They're really doing themselves a favor—since they're already "one" in marriage.
No one abuses his own body, does he? No, he feeds and pampers it. That's how Christ treats us, the church, since we are part of his body. And this is why a man leaves father and mother and cherishes his wife. No longer two, they become "one flesh." This is a huge mystery, and I don't pretend to understand it all. What is clearest to me is the way Christ treats the church. And this provides a good picture of how each husband is to treat his wife, loving himself in loving her, and how each wife is to honor her husband. (Eph 5:22-33, MSG)
This passage of Scripture is the one that brought me freedom from my thirteen-year abusive marriage. I heard too many Scriptures and sermons with only the passage of wives being submissive to their husbands referenced in marriage. However, when you look at the whole context of this passage, you see many instructions for a husband. When you read God's complete description of marriage, there's no way for you to misunderstand that women are slaves, possessions, voiceless, valueless, or objects of abuse.
Satan’s Goal is to Destroy Us
The easiest way for Satan to lead us astray is through confusion, doubt, and by using our unawareness and false teachings to get us to walk away from our faith. When we only know part of God’s truth about love and marriage and that not all marriages are equal loving partnerships, how can we live in God’s healthy design of marriage?
When we are operating from our imperfect definition of love and know little about the types and signs of abuse, how can we live in Christ’s example of love? We must put on the full armor of God, which includes knowing his word and using it to defend against the enemy to protect us from abuse.
If you’re hurting in your relationship or marriage and don’t understand how you got here or what to do, I want you to know that you are not alone. God is waiting to show you his truth in his word. Jesus wants you to know that his love is founded on respect, honor, freedom, kindness, gentleness, goodness, joy, peace, faithfulness, and self-control. God never created marriage to be a place of abuse, and it is never his will.
To find more answers about the health of your relationship, the types, and signs of abuse, and what God says about abuse and divorce, go to the resource tab at www.GodsTransformingGrace.com.
