UPDATE Sept 2021: I have come to believe that Jeff Crippen does not practise what he preaches. He vilely persecuted an abuse victim and spiritually abused many other people in the Tillamook congregation. Go here to read the evidence. Jeff has not gone to the people that he spiritually and emotionally abused. He has not apologised to them, let alone asked for their forgiveness.
***
The wicked, like the abusers we have all confronted, are like black holes who suck life and energy out of us. Why? Because when we are in the presence of an abuser we must be on guard at all times.
The soul of the wicked desires evil; his neighbor finds no mercy in his eyes. (Proverbs 21:10)
The wicked watches for the righteous and seeks to put him to death. (Psalms 37:32)
Call it walking on eggshells or what you will, the fact is that life with an evil person like this requires vigilance. As soon as we let our guard down and extend even a bit of trust, pow! The assault comes.
Constantly on guard. Watching moment by moment. Just consider how draining that is. We don’t like to do it. We would rather believe that we can rest and trust, if only for a bit. But we cannot. Here he comes, big smile on his face, some offer of kindness. You are tempted to take a breath and relax, but if you have been with such a person very long you realize that would be a big mistake. Not even his smiles or gifts or apparent expressions of love can be trusted.
And as we said, this requires great energy, and such an existence cannot be healthy. It isn’t. This stress level is one main reason so many abuse victims are in poor health. Many times their ailment is some immune system related illness. Stay fired up and on full alert long enough and your body is going to be negatively affected, not to mention what this does to our mental and emotional health.
Drive out a scoffer, and strife will go out, and quarreling and abuse will cease. (Proverbs 22:10)
Scoffers, revilers, abusers don’t change. But we can change our lives when we have an opportunity to be done with such people. This truth applies to local churches as well. Stop giving sanctuary to the wicked! Drive the wicked out. Suddenly, surprise, surprise, you will start to experience peace and unity. Quarreling and abuse will cease.
Final note. Proverbs 22:10 quoted above and many other related Scriptures are God’s command and instruction to us regarding what we are to do in respect to a wicked, reviling, abusing, scoffer. God’s command! So tell me, all of you out there who push the “no divorce for abuse” line. Tell me. Why are you insisting that abuse victims disobey the word of God? I don’t see a footnote on that verse that says “Drive out a scoffer….unless you are married to him. Then you are stuck.”
***
A Cry For Justice 
There aren’t footnotes for other family relationships or for authority vs. submission, either, but just try saying that 1 Corinthians 5:11 or Matthew 7 or any such thing applies to your parents, and even folks who are generally [not] supportive of abuse will often have a knee-jerk reaction of “I’m sure your parents love you and did the best they could!”
Yanno, I guess it’s possible they do, particularly one of them who sometimes displayed a conscience that questioned what they were doing although the other would actively destroy that, but… Luke 11:11–13 and Matthew 7:9–11 have always made me uncomfortable.
“Who among you gives your child something useless or harmful when they ask for food?” Jesus asks.
If it’s so unthinkable that someone would do that, why was it ignored when one of my parents would do it to me in public? Some of the witnesses of that are among those who insist that I need to repent and reconcile, though I haven’t received so much as an apology. My refusal to do so and willingness to talk about it is taken as “proof” that I must be angry or the one in the wrong.
Because, of course, holding your tongue in the face of injustice is completely consistent with God in Scripture. /s
Misti, I have absolutely no doubt that your parents gave you stones — poisoned stones — not fish or bread.
I’ve heard a version of this my entire life. Now that I know the truth of this — that some people have NEVER loved others — and that my life has been full of such people — I get very angry and then I get very sad.
I woke up this morning realizing once again what wasted lives people without a conscience live. But the much sadder thing is realizing that because we’ve been lied to about such people, those of us who marry them and who in some cases never even find out the true nature of these people, or we find out after a lifetime invested with them — we end up wasting our lives as well.
People like me who are faithful, loving and desiring to have a committed long-term relationship are SEVERLY USED AND ABUSED by the church, by society, by ANYONE who perpetuates the lie that EVERYONE is capable of loving others. It is simply not true that everyone is capable of loving others.
I keep pondering why we as a society on the whole, are not allowed to know the truth about people without a conscience and the extremely high numbers of them that exist today. And I guess that maybe the “experts” don’t want us to know lest we quit playing or insist we’re allowed testing for our future spouses, children, business partners or any number of other reasons that would give us the ability to make decisions based on truth.
[Maybe it’s] because we are “too far gone” and there are simply so many of them and it’s easier to keep those of us with a heart to love others enslaved then it is to release us.
I commented on a mental health website one time years ago that if psychopaths were allowed to be what they were — if they were released from the societal restrictions we place on them–we could find out more about them because they love to brag about all the evil they’d done, the evil they dream of doing and the evil that they’ve seen others do. A psychopath actually responded to this and his response went something like this,
(This is NOT the actual response.)
Others responded back to him but I never did.
We dress psychopaths up as “real” humans and when their evil nature starts peeking out from under the disguise, instead of just taking it off and letting them be the evil person that they are, so that those of us who aren’t like them and don’t like evil people could have a chance to get away so that they’d be left with the FULL WEIGHT AND RESPONSIBILITY OF THEIR OWN ACTIONS, instead we dangerously force those of us with a heart to love others to “help” the psychopath “act” better by tightening the mask they are wearing, pointing out ways they can better manipulate others etc., with ZERO concern for those of us forced to be their coach. And when we inevitably fail in our endeavors we are once again FORCED to take the blame and responsibility for THIER evil and failure to conform in the form of forcing us into marriage counseling, blaming us because our “perfect behavior” that we are modeling for them isn’t “perfect enough,” and pouring our empathy out on them so they then have access to our hearts.
But the BEST (most long-term and damaging) one is the one that started this comment and the one that started early in our lives. It’s the one that was thrust on our beautiful, sweet-smelling little baby heads and hearts from the time we are able to verbalize the TRUTH that we saw about our parents—that we didn’t feel loved by them, “I’M SURE YOUR PARENTS LOVE YOU AND DID THE BEST THEY COULD!” And all the person had to say in response was something like this, “I’m so sorry and you seem to be right, and it’s not your fault little one, and I love you.” (But then we’d have to wonder why we as a society allow these people to be parents or why we don’t have measures in place to catch and care for those born to such people. A Pandora’s box would be opened….nope, it’s MUCH easier to keep those who are innocent, blind and working like mad and to INCLUDE them in the blame so that they NEVER STOP to see the truth.)
I agree. It seems to be a taboo among many to believe that some parents do not love their children, especially in the case of abusive mothers…most just cannot comprehend that a mother would willingly not love her child and therefore think you must be over exaggerating, or misguided. I mean this in the case of abusive mothers who were able to keep up the image to the outside. This has been one of my greatest sources of frustration and invalidation: not having hardly anyone understand, and so I stopped even talking about it really, years ago. I think mainly only those who have had wicked, narcissistic mothers ‘get it’.
Notlongnow, What you’ve written is sadly so typical among those of us who grew up under such a parent. And “even” if a mother isn’t super abusive physically or verbally, a mother like this has NEVER loved any of her children, her husband or any other person–she NEVER did. So “even” though a child grows up without these obvious signs of abuse and neglect they STILL carry the truth of the matter which is that THEY WERE NEVER LOVED BY THEIR MOTHER, AND THERE IS NO SUBSTITUTE FOR LOVE AS MOST EVERY EXPERT IN MENTAL HEALTH IS AWARE OF!
So those of us with a mother who may have just seemed “odd or “eccentric” are told that we really didn’t have it that bad and we should be grateful…..so shut up and turn around and help others and deny your own feelings and get over it. Take the love that’s in YOUR heart and dump it indiscriminately on EVERYONE else cuz you know how it feels not to be loved….hurry up now!
So heartbreakingly sad but it’s what I love about what God did in my life. He made it so that I could no longer care about all these other people’s opinions or social norms and the love I had left in my heart He made sure I could only use it on myself. I thought it was wasted on me cuz I thought I was worthless…..in time God showed me where He’d written in His word that this was RIGHT to do. Love first goes to the brethren –of which I am one. It took me years to be able to love myself thru Jesus, but now I’m so glad and grateful. You are not alone, none of us who belong to Jesus ever is, sometimes it just takes Him cleaning out our lives to let us know it. Thank you so much for sharing and of course I believe you!
Thank you for today’s vigilant reminder. I need to hear it over and over. Each time, I take assessment of those I know to be abusers in my world. Complacency comes from years of brainwashing. It has been communicated to me for so long and in so many ways that I am my own problem and I need to lay my concerns to rest. Such a lie! Along with abuse from spouse and sibling, many, many “one sentence” statements by religious authorities have been used to shame or silence me.
I peel one layer of lies and deception off at a time. It stirs up negative emotions, but that’s another one of the devastations of abuse – the deep wounding only we know and continue to discover.
Hi Jeff and Barbara, thanks for the timely post. I have posted on here before that seems like we are in a situation with [an] abusive pastor. We confronted him about several specific issues. Are we required by scripture to follow through Matthew 18 to take it to another brother and the church if we are in a system where no one sees what he is doing is wrong. Two times the Lord brought us to 1 Sam 4-8 yesterday. Seems like they want a king and not the truth. Are we disobeying God by not following all the way through on Matthew 18? We took it to an Elder in our church and seems like if we would just go away then the “problem” would go away, you know forgive and love covers all. I know you you have said just leave, its a non-church, but seems like we shortchanging the process. Do we tell our close friends? Or do we leave them under a wolf?
I just enjoyed reading this because the author knows the truth! A truth that needs to be accepted.
I’m over 50 and I’m finally free. Several months ago I went no contact for good and I can only now finally report that the yoking is gone. Finally gone! After all these years. No more obsessing…no more ruminating…no more mourning, no more anxiety, etc. All the influence of that yoking has been severed. All distorted beliefs have been resolved and it’s a completed work in my heart. Forgiveness is a natural byproduct of completing the lessons and the grieving.
My experience has been that …no matter what the cost I had to accept that the abuser would deteriorate if I remained yoked to the abuser. I would deteriorate mentally, emotionally, spiritually and physically! It would have profoundly crippled my walk with Christ the longer I remained yoked to the abuser.
Glory to God for leading me out of that long dry wilderness!
Hi Lisa,
I disidentified your comment a little and recast some of your wording into the first person. We encourage readers to write about their own experiences.
Congratulations Lisa!
Hi Lisa. Reading your comment has reminded me of Ezra chapter 10. I just recently came across this profound Bible passage and its given me a lot to think about. I congratulate you for breaking that yoke and one day I hope to come on here and report that I have also done the same.
After 3 decades of abuse I ended up with fibromyalgia, so even tho I’m no longer living under his abuse, it still impacts me every day of my life. After a decade of freedom from daily abuse, I’m a little better; if I had listened to my ex-church and stayed with him, I shudder to think where I’d be health-wise today. I continue to thank God for delivering me from my Egypt!
I have a sister-in-law that has been abusive towards me for decades. She took the side of my adulterous ex-wife, “Your treatment of her is responsible for her going outside the marriage.” The kicker was when she left poisonous postings on my Facebook wall so that “I would have to confront my issues.”
Done with her.
I forgive her antics but will not subject myself to them any more! My energy can go to positive activity instead of cringing in wait for the next bomb to go off.
Reblogged this on Speakingtruthinlove's Blog [Internet Archive link].
This post solidified something that I have been pondering lately. In the years since my divorce, I have been asked this loaded question many times: “but at least he’s a good dad, right?”
NO! He’s not a good dad! He’s a wicked, evil man. How can someone so wicked possibly be a good dad? An abuser is never going to be a good dad.
Many victims, like me, have to “co-parent” (as if that’s truly possible) with these evil men. We need to call evil what it is and help the mothers in these situations. All they are doing by asking such nonsense questions is plant seeds of doubt and confusion in the fragile mind of a victim.
This is my main concern if I do divorce…I have a child with special needs and I do not want the child to ever have to be alone with their dad. Thankfully child lives in a group home most of the time now, so the contact with dad is much less than it was. In a few years time, when the child turns 18, perhaps I can have full custody and move away from here. I am hoping this is the case, I am going to ask a lawyer about that. … I am ready to move on from this.
I struggle with this all. It seems that I no longer know (assuming I ever did in the first place) as to who is who……is it me? Is it them? I’m the common denominator, but I might simply still be surrounded by abusive persons.
What becomes so quickly normalized is really sad. Then the aftermath of brainwashing, trauma, compounded trauma, isolation, lack of trustworthy persons in your life who acknowledge all that has been done to you…….
So many people wish to see me suffer indefinitely. Whatever I try, whenever I try, I am subjected to further abusive antics. Roadblocks put up in my path. Then I am further demoralized and negatively affected by the snarky, crappy people looking to further my harm, and I have nothing to show for such efforts but more failure.
Proverbs 22:10 has been used against me before, in that, if the victim protests the abuse, then strife is created, whereas, it is supposed to be the victim’s job to ‘take it’ and at the same time, make life pleasant for everyone else, as I am the one who brings problems with me. But thankfully Proverbs 21:10 and Psalm 37:32 are provided and I can see that indeed, it is not me, I don’t desire evil, I am merciful, and I abhor the thought of watching for the righteous in seeking to kill the righteous.
It’s really tempting to just return to your default position of ‘taking it’, not saying a word, staying silent, covering things up, eating one’s earlier words, and thereby absolving the abusers of any actual accountability, etc. Then at least the pressure, the antics, the cruelties, the smear campaigning, the stalking, harassing, spying, etc. will not be so intense…….I don’t know anymore. I am at a loss about pretty much everything. But then again, even if I was wrongly led to believe somebody in my community was this evil, horrible, woman, worthy of spite, hatred, etc……I wouldn’t seek her out, make a point of injecting myself into her life, do everything possible to further harm, demoralize, harass, distress, degrade, humiliate, and diminish her. Nope. So indeed, it has to be them, not me. And if nothing else, I’m proud that I dared to say something, dared to oppose some very evil, criminal, corrupt, and predatory persons with a tremendous amount of power, sway, influence, authority, and resources.
Like in 300 (the movie), the Spartan king goes and meets the opponent king and refuses to kneel or bow down to him and the opponent basically says we’ll slaughter you and your sacrifice is pointless, so bow now……and the Spartan guy says that history will at least show that they fought to remain free, stood against a tyrant, that few fought against many.
I’m really tired and referencing Hollywood scripts probably isn’t appropriate but it kind of shows how tyrannical, power-lusting, abusive mini-god wanna-be’s wield power and control. Demanding submission, basically enslaving others, via fear tactics or bribery. Silver or lead. Whips or ‘favors / trinkets’. Pressuring, coercing, demanding, forcing. Recruiting allies to abuse by proxy. Looking to destroy anyone and everyone who dares to protest, resist, complain, challenge, question……
I really, really am thankful this website exists! Yea, Jeff and Barb and the others whose names I do not know! 🙂
Thank you for your post. I empathize with you 100%!
You might like to check out this page of ours — it’s one of the pages under our Insights tab in the top menu:
Allegories, Analogies, and Fairy Tales (from our posts)
Your comment brought to mind the Backstitch Analogy. You’ll find a link to the Backstitch Analogy on that page. 🙂
It was presented to me in a Christian Reformed church that I am responsible for answering to God for my deeds, answering whether I did what He called me to do- regardless of how anyone (even my ex husband) treated me. A good Christian wife is submissive, obedient, and revered her husband… no matter what. This is driven home in wife Bible studies like “Created to be a Help Meet” by Deb Pearl.
I have to say, there is much in the Bible about how a woman is to behave and act. But what of the husbands? What if they don’t hold up their end of the bargain, so to speak?
Divorce was handed to me, and much of the expectations of Godly wives is ludicrous.
Hi ResistingTheLies welcome to the blog! 🙂
We always like to encourage new readers to check out our New Users’ Info page as it gives tips for how to guard your safety while commenting on the blog.
You had submitted your comment giving a name that is probably your real name, so for your safety I changed that name to ResistingTheLies. If you want us to change your screen name to something else, just email The woman behind the curtain: twbtc.acfj@gmail.com — she will be happy to assist. 🙂
I encourage you to check out our FAQs as there are lots of topics there that I think will interest you.
The Bible does give plenty of instructions to husbands but the problem is, most churches are under-emphasizing the instructions to husbands, or giving them just lip service, while over-emphasizing the instructions to wives.
ResistingTheLies, Thank you so much for your comment! The oppression that’s dealt to those who live under this tyrannical and unbiblical teaching is UTTERLY soul-destroying.
[Debi Pearl and others of her kind give] anti-biblical teaching — EVERYTHING (all the blame and responsibility) falls to the wife. EVERYTHING. They force us [wives] to act like “god” in the sense that WE are supposed to be absolutely “perfect” acting (their paper-doll version of perfect), to be calm, silent, long-suffering, have NO wants / needs / desires of our own and also to ensure we are “perfect” in the way we raise the children, clean the house, pay the bills, perform sex, present to the outside world etc. And even though they make it as though we should be all things to all people, we are also supposed to have no value and worth other than what husband and the church allow.
Now, let’s just pretend for a moment that we could actually comply with this evil rendition of a “godly” wife. (Sadly so many of us have been able to abuse ourselves enough to actually fit into this extra small kennel. We smashed our emotional and spiritual selves down so badly that we could finally fit into the smallest one–our spiritual “skin” bubbling out between the bars, knowing it was only a matter of time before our spouses / pastors “asked” us ONCE AGAIN if we really needed “all” that room–couldn’t we POSSIBLY squeeze into a guinea -pig sized one? I mean HOW greedy were we that we NEEDED a cat-sized spiritual kennel when if we TRULY loved our spouse / the children / God enough, we would at least TRY to do this…..SEE how selfish and demanding we were that we wouldn’t at least TRY!)
And let’s pretend we could do ALL this AND more (as many of us have)! Would this satisfy a husband who belongs to his father the devil? ABSOLUTELY NOT. IF you could hollow yourself out emotionally / spiritually enough to only be filled up with this evil version of a godly mate, and you allowed yourself to be replaced with this lie of a woman, an anti-Christ husband would NOT EVER be satisfied with you — it’s simply a characteristic of evil people and 2 Tim 3 describes this.
So many of us LIVED this lie to the detriment of our relationship with God — which a truly godly husband would care about more than our relationship with him or our children etc. A truly Godly husband treasures his wife, takes what the Bible says about loving her as Christ loved the church to mean what it says — that HIS WIFE is a gift from God to be treasured, appreciated, loved deeply, and if he can see that she is suffering, loves and prays for her and tries to relieve her burden.
… Debi presents as a great example of how “C”hristian wives can PRETEND to be humble and following God by TELLING others how to perform and then throwing some scripture in to make it appear biblical. Like with the Duggar parents — if you pay attention you can see that they seem to hate and resent their children, but it’s the way they use to get attention and have access to other people. Avid Reader did a great review of one of Debi’s books here Amazon: Avid Reader’s review – Twisted [Internet Archive link]
Guilt trips are usually the first “go to” that abusers use to try to control others. If you refuse to allow them to be successful in this they move onto the next tool—they have tool boxes FULL of abuse tactics. The abuser’s guilt-laying tactic, “I am responsible for answering to God for my deeds…” is easy to turn to. My answer? “Awesome! I talk to Him CONSTANTLY, He guides my life and it’s how I know that you are evil! He’s shown me through His word that you are an Anti-Christ.” Then I [say to the abuser] “It’s never too late to repent! God desires all people come to Him as you know. The Bible says that while we breathe we have hope, so don’t wait till it’s too late!” I’m very well aware that abusers of this caliber can NEVER internalize truth / grow / gain wisdom… but for a few minutes (until the abuser comes up with a new lie / “plausible” response), I get some rest.
Welcome and we understand AND BELIEVE you!
I know this is a bit off topic, but I was really damaged by Debi Pearl’s book. At first it seemed like the answer; my adulterous, abusive husband would finally melt at my sacrifice of submission and all would be well. Rather what happened was, he did love it, but because it meant I finally had become his doormat slave, ever controlled with the words “you have to submit to me!” and never questioning any of his sin or abuse. Her book is truly abusive to women, and I am sad to say I believe she is either an abuser herself or at the very least an ally of her abusive husband who likes to abuse women by proxy through her books. He no doubt is behind her twisted doctrine. It all looks so pretty, sweet, humble and holy, but it is false and poison. If only I had never read that book at a crucial time in my life,
Yes, Debi Pearl’s book Created To Be His Help Meet. is VERY HARMFUL to women who are married to abusive husbands. I encourage you to go to Amazon and write your own review of it (you could simply copy and paste what you’ve written here).
And if you don’t want to submit you own review on Amazon, at least up-vote Avid Reader’s review of that book [Internet Archive link.