Topic: Can I Set Boundaries with An Abusive Spouse?

Happy Memorial Day Friends,

I have never had the privilege of serving our in our country’s armed forces but I want to thank those who have. It is a supreme sacrifice to be willing to lay down your life for the freedoms we often take for granted in this country. I have traveled to many third world countries and I am always grateful to step foot on American soil once again. Although we struggle with many internal problems, I would not want to live anywhere else.

Thank you moms and dads, brother’s and sisters, grandparent’s, uncles and aunts who have loved one’s who have served and are serving our country. For you it must feel hard at times, fearing for their safety yet feeling so much pride in seeing your loved one’s selflessness in serving their country.

This week's question is part three to a long e-mail I received. If you want to read the first two parts, scroll to last week and the week before.

Today’s Question: I have one other question which I hope you can also address. My husband says that he is put into a kind of uncontrollable rage when I disrespect him because it is his god given right as the husband to be respected. Last night I told my husband who has physically struck me in the past that I felt unsafe in our marriage and that I thought it was necessary that we lay some ground rules and boundaries specifically to be enforced during our times of arguing and fighting so that we can keep each other accountable.

He resisted in agreeing boundaries were the issue but finally agreed. I told him that a universal boundary should be absolutely no physical striking or threats of physically hurting of any kind toward one another. To that he said that his boundary equivalent to that was “no disrespect/raising my voice to him.” He said that when he is disrespected, he feels he is being verbally abused by me and it feels as terrible as I feel when he slaps me on the arm/leg/head.

In theory this sounds “right”. He says that I am making a double standard when I put a boundary on his behavior but that he cannot on me. And yet, something does not seem right at all about what he is saying. I agree that disrespecting your husband is as sinful as physically striking your spouse in anger. Is it biblical to see these exactly the same in terms of setting “off limit” boundaries in disagreements?

Answer: Your struggle to think clearly in this muddle is common to women who live with abusive men. I want to help clarify some important truths.

First your husband’s rage and subsequent acts of violence toward you are not uncontrollable. His behavior is always his choice. I’m sure he has experienced disrespect from other people in his life – his employer, a rude driver, your children, a friend, an enemy. People sin against us all the time in many ways and sometimes we do get angry. However, that doesn’t mean we hit them. In fact, isn’t that what we teach our children NOT to do when someone takes their toy or makes them mad? We don’t hit people when we’re mad. Period!

Let me ask you a question. Does your husband hit other people in the arm/leg/head when he feels disrespected? What do you imagine a police officer would say if your husband used that as his excuse when he hit someone who disrespected him in traffic or at the mall?

Hear this important truth. Your husband hits you when he is mad because he chooses to and you have continued to enable him by not enforcing legal consequences that would protect you from this kind of abusive behavior.

He says that it is his god-given right to be respected. It’s also your god given right to be loved and cherished. When he fails to love and cherish you and you feel hurt or angry, do you hit him?

The second truth I want you be crystal clear on is that you will fail your spouse and he will fail you. Sometimes these failures are big but often they occur in little ways. He doesn’t love me like I’d like or she doesn’t respect me like I want her to. The truth is, our spouse doesn’t always give us what we want even if what we want is a good and godly thing. Hurt and disappointment occur in every marriage and we can feel angry.

But is the right answer to treat our spouse with abusive behavior or abusive speech when they don’t give us what we want? Jesus says “never!” The Bible labels that kind of behavior sin and selfishness and is never justified.

The truth is no one get’s everything he or she wants all of the time. Part of growing up and maturing is learning how to handle ourselves in a godly, mature way when we are disappointed, angry and hurt when we don’t get what we want.

Your husband’s entitlement thinking has deceived him into believing that since he’s entitled to be respected, he’s entitled to hit you when you’re not complying with what he wants. That is absolutely not true. How do other men handle being disrespected by their wives? They might pray for their wife. They might talk with their wife. They might get counseling as a couple. A much healthier response to his disappointment or hurt when you don’t respect him is for him to say, “Honey, that hurts me when you talk to me that way. Would you please stop?” Or even, “When you talk to me that way, I can’t hear you. I’m ending the conversation.”

As far as boundaries – you’re right, you will never feel safe to have a conversation with your husband let alone disagree if you fear for your safety. In the same way, if your husband fears your tongue and being disrespected, it’s hard for him to share his honest thoughts and feelings with you.

However, I’m not sure of his definition of disrespect. You were very clear with your definition of what you want stopped, no physical threats or physical violence. His definition was fuzzy – “No disrespect or raising your voice”. Does that mean that when you feel strongly about something or disagree, you can’t speak with an elevated voice without him feeling disrespected? Does that mean that you cannot argue because he will feel you don’t respect his opinion? Does that mean you have to agree with everything he thinks because not to will feel disrespectful to him?

You need to ask him to define for you the behavior that feels disrespectful to him. Is it calling him names? Is it swearing at him? Is it rolling your eyes? If you know what it is specifically, then you can decide whether or not you can agree to stop or change it. If you don’t know what it is, then the rules always change and he can feel disrespected just because you open your mouth in protest.

Finally, a first step boundary or safety plan for both of you might be that when either one of you feels unsafe, the one who feels unsafe can stop the conversation and the other person will respect that boundary and stop talking.

If it continues to be unsafe to have difficult discussions together and you have important things that need to be decided, then you will agree together to engage the help of a counselor to help you learn to speak safely and respectfully with one another and to handle your disappointment in a more godly way.

These "rules" need to be agreed to by both of you and if he does not keep them, then it's time to let him experience the consequences.

Topic: Part 2, How to I "Minister" to an Abusive Spouse?

Good evening friends,

I had an extraordinary weekend that has left me physically exhausted, but with a great feeling of accomplishment. I PASSED my motorcycle safety course and am now the proud owner of a motorcycle license! Never in a million years would I have thought I would do this let alone pass!

The course is offered by the state to help you be a safe cyclist. Even though I just have a scooter, I had to take the course on a real cycle. The class consisted of nine hours of classroom instruction and then 10 hours of actual riding – all between Thursday and Sunday. I don’t know if I will ever ride a real cycle again, but I am thankful that I learned some great strategies and skills to stay safe on the road. I even posted a picture of my proud self on my Facebook page just after getting my license. My children were shocked that me, Miss Scaredy Cat actually did something pretty risky.

I have been inundated lately with lots of questions from all of you. I am thankful but feel sad that I can’t personally answer them all more quickly. I’m still counseling full time so am just not able to respond as I’d like but my goal is to answer them, so please be patient with me. At this time I can only answer a week.

I am going to answer part two to a long question from last week so scroll up to read last week’s question and answer first. I will add a new part today and part three next week. I am using her words because I know that many individuals become very confused about theology and what God says and I want you to hear where this person is coming from before I respond.

This week’s question: Though no one can be certain of another’s salvation, I have felt for some time now that my husband does not have a personal relationship with God and that he does not know Christ as Lord and Savior. Just 3 years ago after things got really unhealthy in our marriage I made a decision to make it my ministry to be an instrument of God to be used in his conversion process in whatever way God would be pleased to do so.

And yet, do I now hold it against my husband who does not yet have a pierced conscience which comes from having a new heart that can respond in faith and obedience to God? Can we hold our unregenerated spouses who are emotionally destructive responsible for their actions when they cannot even “see” their sin and need for God’s ultimate forgiveness?

Grace and undeserved mercy as the bible describes them isn’t something he fully comprehends from what I can tell which is why he justifies his behaviors and refuses to take responsibility for his abusive actions. If so, what is the biblical way for a wife to respond to her emotionally destructive husband whom she does not want to divorce nor separate from but at the same time does not want to be victim any longer to his abusive ways (verbally/emotionally/physically – i.e. slapping my leg, arm, head/shoving)?

Answer: First, let me encourage you. You obviously want to honor your vows and be a good example in order to draw your husband to Christ’s love, forgiveness, and mercy. That is very hard to actually want to do in our culture that doesn’t value self-sacrifice or staying in an unhappy marriage.

You talk a lot about holding your husband’s sin against him as if you are the judge. As I mentioned last week, your place is not to judge, but that does not mean that you are not to speak truth in love or prevent him from experiencing the consequences of his sinfulness.

You ask, “Can we hold our unregenerated spouses who are emotionally destructive responsible for their actions when they cannot even “see” their sin and need for God’s ultimate forgiveness?”

Let me ask you something. Do you think God holds people accountable when they are blind to their sin? For example, do you think God will give the Pharisee’s in Christ’s day a pass because they did not see their envy or their pride or their hypocrisy, even when Jesus directly told them? Read Jesus’ words to them in Matthew 23:13-38

Second, you say, “Grace and undeserved mercy as the bible describes them isn’t something he fully comprehends from what I can tell which is why he justifies his behaviors and refuses to take responsibility for his abusive actions.”

I don’t think your husband’s problem is that he doesn’t understand grace and mercy. His problem is that he feels entitled to abuse you when he doesn’t get his way or what he wants. There are many, many non-Christian men who know nothing of God’s grace and mercy yet they treat their wives with love and respect. They do not verbally, emotionally or physically abuse them. It has nothing to do with your husband’s lack of understanding of God’s grace and everything to do with his attitude of entitlement.

That takes us to your last question, how do you respond? If you want to “minister” to your husband as a godly wife, what does not look like specifically? Does it mean that you are to simply continue to allow your husband to sin against you without protect or consequence? Is that the best way you could be “love” your husband?

Or, is a more bold love required? A love that is strong enough to hold him responsible and accountable for his sinful choices. A love that might call the police and let him experience the legal consequences of his abusive behavior which very well could be a wake-up call that helps him “see” the sinfulness of his behaviors.

There is no easy answer here, but finally, if you do not want to be a victim any longer you must take steps to prevent your own victimization. You can do this lovingly but firmly as you leave the house when he escalates, refuse to engage in arguments, call the police when he gets violent and separate from him until he gets the help he needs to change his sinful behavior so that your marriage has a chance of being healed. If not, trust me, nothing will change. It will only get worse.

Remember, you are not just taking these steps for you. You are also doing them for him with the hope that as you draw a line in the sand and say “no more” your husband will begin to repent of his abusive behavior and want to change.

Readers: Please what wisdom would you give this struggling wife?

Topic: How do I "minister" to my abusive spouse?

Good morning friends,

It’s morning here in Seattle where I write this before I catch my plane for the long journey back home. It’s been a mixed time here. The weather has been rainy most days which made sight seeing more challenging. However God did bless us with two afternoons of partial sun and for that I am thankful. My bones desperately needed some vitamin D and my spirits too. I hear there is more rain forecasted for next week in Pennsylvania.

I have so much I want to tell you all.

1. I want to share a few things about the PASCH (Peace and Safety in the Christian Home) conference I spoke at in Abbotsford, British Columbia. It was amazing to be with men and women from all around the globe committed to ending domestic violence in every home, especially those who call themselves Christian and yet still live with abuse and inflict abuse in their families.

2. I want to share with you a poem I’ve read that has resonated with that stuck place we all find ourselves in and invite your feedback.

3. I want to get back to answering some of your very important questions, one of which is rather lengthy. I’ll introduce it at the end of this blog and invite your thoughts on it and begin the answer next week.

The PASCH conference was a two day event, packed with speakers from every area, from victims, to perpetrators, to counselors and pastors, researchers in the area of DV as well as police, shelter workers, client advocates, attorneys, and college professors.

Today I want to highlight two of the main things that spoke to me during this event and would love your help to spread the word. Juan Carlos Arean spoke on the effects of love on children. We so often hear about the effects of violence on children (even if they aren’t the intended victims). Although those effects are real, Arean said that love can act as a potent antidote to the toxic effects of abuse on children. Research shows that resilience is fostered by loving support from people within the child’s network that can help them learn new ways of relating.

Ask yourself and ask God, where are their children in my circle that are vulnerable, that need some extra encouragement, attention, support, and help? You may not be able to change their families but you may be able to impact their future as you love a child who is living in a difficult, destructive and/or abusive home.

The second thing that spoke to my heart is the importance of men being advocates against the abuse of women. Rus Ervin Funk spoke on Preventing Violence Against Women. He quoted George Albee who said,

“No epidemic has ever been resolved by paying attention to the treatment of the affected individual.”

How do we end the cycle of Domestic Violence against women? He says, this problem will only be solved when men do the work and step up and see this as their problem, not only individually, but culturally.

Rus works with males: coaches, teachers, policemen, fathers, grandfathers, uncles, brothers, plumbers, contractors, doctors, businessmen, athletes, and others, to build a mindset that not only sees abuse against women as wrong, but are willing to stand up and speak against it to other men. He says, “We need men in that man’s life (the abuser) to hold them up to be the kind of man they want to be, the kind of man that they can be.”

What would be different in our churches if men would initiate discussions with other men when they observe disrespectful and/or abusive attitudes or actions by men toward women or children?

Rus described an incident in a men’s locker room at a health club when men were talking disrespectfully against women and he spoke up. His voice was the only one but when he left the locker room he got the thumbs up from a number of other men who were watching what was happening.

How would things have been different if instead of a silent thumbs up, those other men would have joined Rus and spoken up too? I believe a much more powerful message would have been sent by the group rather than the individual.

Men, what keeps you silent?

Last week I gave you some steps toward getting unstuck in your own life. It might be around a difficult/destructive relationship issue, or it might just be around some bad habits you’ve allowed to fester for far too long in your life. Here’s a poem by Mary Oliver that I read this week that resonated with that movement toward change. It’s called, The Journey.

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice—
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life?”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
you knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do ---
determined to save
the only life that you could save.

How does this poem resonate with you? What are those internal voices that keep shouting their bad advice to you? What gives you the strength to forge ahead and make that change?

This week’s question: I’ve writing after another abusive episode last night. Something you said in one of your previous posts was about how God shows unconditional love but does not offer unconditional relationship. I understand that you’re saying that healthy relationship is impossible when someone continues to be blind to his/her own sin against us and refuses to acknowledge It, take responsibility for it or repent of it.

My question is this: I’m pretty sure our marriage is emotionally destructive based on all I have read. And yet I also acknowledge that I am a sinner as much as my husband is a sinner. I am no more deserving of grace than he is. I do not earn God’s favor any more than my husband does. Neither of us do.

We are all utterly sinful and only by God’s sheer undeserving grace are we loved and saved and brought into God’s family. So if I think about that powerful gospel truth…I wonder…is it right of me to hold my husband’s sin/blindness to his own sin against him? Do I hold it against him that he cannot see his own sinfulness?

Answer: There are multiple parts to this person’s question which I will address in the next blog but I want to thank her for bringing this issue up. The short answer is No, you have no right to hold someone’s sin against him in a judgmental kind of way.

We are all sinners. One is not better than the other. That’s why Jesus says that we need to take the log out of our own eye before we try to take the speck out of someone else’s.

However, scripture is quite clear that our sin separates us from God and from one another and that without repentance, there is no fellowship with God. God says he is generous and gracious to both the good person and the evil person (as we should be when Jesus tells us to love our enemies and to them good). But God does not have intimate relationship with the person who will not “see” or repent.

The Old Testament books of Isaiah and Jeremiah are full of examples of God inviting people into repentance, of being gracious, but also of distancing himself from them when they refuse to repent. So you’re right, ministry to your unrepentant, blind spouse may be an important way you can invite him into a repentance, but what that “ministry” might look like is different depending upon the person. Jesus ministered to the woman caught in adultery differently than he did to the Pharisees who refused to see.

Sorry I can’t say more but if I don’t post this NOW I will miss my plane.
Next week I’ll write more.

Love you all?

Topic: How to make the changes I need to make

Good Monday Friends,

I am sitting in a hotel room in Seattle, WA after a full day of sightseeing. It’s been freezing cold here, overcast. I‘m not sure why I was hoping for sunshine this week. It seems like the last two years of any kind of trips have resulted in cloudy, cold weather, whether we were heading to Hawaii, Florida, Southern California and now Washington and Canada.

I do hope I get one or two days of some sun. I think I have a touch of SIDS and it’s definitely wearing on me. This has been about the coldest, gloomiest spring I can remember. I’ll be speaking in Canada at the PASCH (Peace and Safety in the Christian Home) conference on Friday so would appreciate your prayers. I’ll write you all about it next week.

But I’m reading a remarkable book giving to me by a dear friend, Dee Brestin, called One Thousand Gifts, by a gifted writer, Ann Voskamp. Here’s a taste of something that resonated with my soul.

“I wake to the discontent of life in my skin. I wake to self hatred. To the wrestle to get it all done, the restless anxiety that I am failing, always failing. I live tired, afraid, anxious, weary. Would I ever be enough, find enough, do enough? But this morning, I wake wildly, wanting to live.”


Me too. I’m tired and weary of trying to get it all done. I want to really live, fully alive to life. But what does that look like when you’re stuck between where you are and where you want to be? A few weeks ago I told you God asked me to choose peace over productivity.

That has required some hard choices and soul searching. From your responses, I know you have gotten stuck too. Here are some of the questions I have asked myself during these past few weeks to begin to get unstuck.

1. Where am I now? How does the way I live and spend my time impact my quality of life?
2. How do my choices impact my family and those I love?
3. Are there any incongruities between my current way of living and my values and dreams?
4. What specific things do I need to change to close the gap from where I am right now in this present moment to get where I want to be?
5. What do I need to do more of or less of in order to get where I want to go?
6. Who will hold me accountable to the changes I want to make?

I am changing my schedule to free up some time so that I am not so busy, rushed and tired. I am going to stop trying to get it all done and enjoy what I do more. I’ll keep you in the loop and let you know how I’m doing, but this is my prayer.

How about you? What would you like to see different in your life or heart?

To get you started, answer the question. I am a person who…….

Topic: A Time to Say "No"

Hi Sweet Friends,

This weekend I had the awesome privilege of speaking at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Johnstown, PA not only for their women’s event but also for their Saturday evening and three Sunday services. God truly was present and it doesn’t get any better than being a vessel that He uses to help people grasp transformational truth.

Thanks for all of you who hold me in your prayers. If you’d like to be a part of my prayer team, let me know and I can let you know of special requests.

This week I’m going to be sharing with you a devotional I wrote for a new book out by Moody’s Mid-Day Connection team called Tending the Soul: 90 days of spiritual nourishment.

God’s Empowered Woman

“On the seventh day of the feast, when King Zerxes was in high spirits because of the wine, he told the seven eunuchs who attended him…..to bring Queen Vashti to him with the royal crown on her head. He wanted the nobles and all the other men to gaze on her beauty, for she was a very beautiful woman. But when they conveyed the king’s order to Queen Vashti, she refused to come.” Esther 1:10-12 NLT

“Why did it take me fifty years to wire up enough courage to stand up for myself?” Sara sighed. “I’ve always put everyone else first. Now I understand that I’ve only enabled my husband’s selfishness to flourish.”

From a young age, many women are trained to give, to go along and to not hurt anyone’s feelings at all costs. “Be nice,” we’re told, “Or people won’t like you”. We’ve learned to please, to placate, and to pretend in order to not make waves, just to keep the peace.

Before marriage and after, I was told to obey authority and to submit to my husband, even if his requests seemed foolish or harmful. Passivity seemed to be the Biblical definition of a gentle and quiet (feminine) spirit.

Yet the Scriptures reveal many women who were strong and stood firm. They didn’t always obey or submit. They sometimes said “No”. Queen Vashti is one of my favorites. She refused to allow herself to be treated as a sexual object for her husband’s friends to ogle. Another woman, Queen Esther, approached the same king hoping to right a terrible wrong even while knowing she could face expulsion or execution for her boldness.

Scriptures tell the story of Abigail, a wife who overruled her husband’s foolishness and took charge when her family faced the wrath of David and his men (1 Samuel 25). Earlier in Jewish history we find two midwives who refused to obey the pharaoh’s orders to murder Hebrew babies (Exodus 1:17).

In a culture where females were often devalued and disrespected, God empowered women to stand up for themselves, for others, and for what was right.

Lord, give us the courage to stand up and say “No” when it is necessary.

Reflection: Identify the times that you been too nice, too accommodating, or too passive. What has it cost you?