Ann Maree
Welcome back to the final episode in this series of a reconciled relationship that had previously been abusive. We heard from Renee and then interacted with Tabitha Westbrook as an expert contributor. Then Charles told his story and Chris Moles chimed in. Finally, Charles and Renee shared some of the ways they encountered God in their circumstances and what they wish the church knew, in reference to people like them, people suffering from the impact of domestic abuse.

Today, I’m going to talk with licensed professional Greg Wilson and our own favorite Help[H]er guest, Darby Strickland. Greg and Darby have graciously agreed to provide their professional wisdom. Greg coming from the licensed perspective, and then Darby coming from a biblical lay counseling perspective, and they’re going to interact with Charles and Renee’s story. 

So by way of introduction, since Greg hasn’t been with us before, but we’ll fix that. He provides Christ-centered counseling to families, adolescents and men in individual, couple and family contexts. He has experience working with families in premarital and marriage counseling, as well as helping families navigate many of the normal issues and some of the more challenging ones. Greg is the co author with Jeremy Pierre of When Home Hurts, which is an excellent guide for leadership. We recommend it often, and it really is a very helpful resource for responding wisely to domestic abuse. Darby, as you may all know, is a CCEF counselor, speaker and author of, Is It Abuse?, as well as Something Scary Happened and the soon to be released, I think Something Sad Happened. Yes, also very good resources, not just for children, but adults. Find them very useful too. So welcome friends. I’m happy to have you here.

Darby
Great to be here.

Greg
Yes, thanks for having us.

Ann Maree
Absolutely. Greg, anything else maybe that you could add to your introduction to help our audience get to know you a little better?

Greg
Yeah, my counseling practice here in the Dallas Fort Worth area is called Soul Care Associates. I’ve had it for several years. My wife and I, Christy, we’ve been married for 26 years, and we’ve got a 21 year old daughter. We are fresh off of taking her back for her last year of college yesterday, so she starts classes today. 

Ann Maree
Wow, yeah. And then so you’re an empty nester as of today for a little while,

Greg
As of today for a little while. But you know how it is at this stage, they keep coming back for various seasons, which is always welcome and nice. We love, we love her. We enjoy being together. So we’re missing her today as of the day that we’re recording this but, but it’s that’s the normal rhythm at this point for the last several years. 

Ann Maree
Yeah, it is. Yeah, normal is good. Every once in a while, that’s right. And so Darby, tell us what you’ve been up to. I know you’ve had to resign from the board, and that just makes me cry as soon as I say it. But as well, for good reason, I know you’re busy and tell us some more of the things that you’ve been up to,

Darby
I’m actually you say that it’s just been an intense summer, actually trying to finish up a couple writing projects, working on a project with another co author, which I can’t divulge as of yet, but I’m super excited about that, and we’ll see where that goes. And then I’ve been working on a book on trauma this summer as well, but CCEF been just managing to keep me busy enough, which I’ve been enjoying, but it’s just different projects all the time.

Ann Maree
Well, those are like much needed resources. So we are hesitantly willing to give you up so that we can see more people impacted by your wisdom, which is vast. So both of you.

Darby
I’m still hoping things slow down and I can circle back. So let’s keep praying anytime

Ann Maree
And I’ll be knocking on your door, whether you want me to or not, even though you’re

Darby
Anytime and you’re tired. Thank you.

Ann Maree
So the audience, I hope, has now listened to both Renee, first of all, and then Charles and perhaps even heard some of the other expert contributors. And so I’m hoping this is just, you know, even additional great information that you’ll be benefiting from in your own counseling contact context. What would either of you say if you had a similar situation? But let’s say, for instance, that the couple was having trouble finding God in the story, and more of it was on the negative side. What would you say to somebody like that?

Darby
Probably just start off by saying, many faithful psalmists say the same thing, right? And so when we’re unsure what God is up to, we hear, we hear that echoed in Scripture. Where are you? Have you turned your face from me? Why won’t you do something? You’re not working quick enough. So I think even just permission to speak those words of asking God, where are you? What are you doing? Do you see me? Do you see my suffering? Come quick. You know, listen to me. Those are all things we hear really clear of faithful saints, even David saying. So I just invite people to ask the question directly to the Lord. He invites that. And I think that’s just a comforting reality. We can’t see, so I just think it’s helpful to invite him to answer it directly.

Greg
Yeah, I totally echo what Darby just said, you know, I think about even in, even in more kind of, what people might think of as more normal stories, or even more happy, positive stories than a story of abuse. We often, we often think that we see God’s hands sometimes, but we’re not actually sure. We look at, we see it more kind of in retrospect a lot of times, what God was actually doing in those times. And so, yeah, I think I would say, you know, he is there for sure, and he sees you, and he cares for you, and he knows and, yeah, I think about that. I think about that text at the very end of Exodus chapter two, right before we see Exodus chapter three. You know the deliverance of with the Lord reaching out to Moses and at the burning bush. But right before that we hear that, or we read that, God saw them, and he heard their cries. And it says that, I think the last three words, at least in my translation are, and God knew, and, you know, and that’s just, I mean, as Darby said, we see that in the Psalms. We see it all throughout Scripture. He does know. It is okay to not be able to see him in the moment. Again, that’s a common reality for all of us but just to be able to be open with him and say, Lord, I don’t see you here. I don’t see your hand. I, you know, where are you? Like to be able to ask those honest questions that the psalmist ask, I think is a good is a good place to be.

Darby
I think too, recognizing that when you’re in the valley, you can metaphorically even see yourself in the valley, right, just by being in the presence of something so low you can’t see up and out. So right towards it’s going to be so difficult, right? And God is a God who promises to be with us in the valley. So sometimes it’s just asking for, yeah, help me see smaller things, smaller deliverances or graces, right? Sometimes we’re so focused on how am I going to get up and out? We don’t see the little flower in front of us, or the cool drink that he’s brought us in the midst of that, but I think it’s just a reality of living in the valley that our vision is obscured, and God knows that about us. He made us right. He knows we can’t see what he sees.

Ann Maree
I love that you guys just kind of connected to each other’s answers, too, and that, Darby, you’re talking about the reality of speaking the words to God that it’s not happening quick enough, the rescue isn’t happening quick enough. And then Greg, you’re talking about, right? When God said he knew, or he heard, or whatever the version is that you have says, but then things got harder. Yeah, you know, my common bricks without straw. He took away even the supplies that made their work load harder. Yeah, talk about a little bit with me, that time element. We have that promise, we have all of God’s promises that will come true, and we’re basically in that waiting time, not just our devastating circumstances, but in life in general. But is there anything else that you could add that’s helpful for counselors to know when it comes to time, time and timing and impatience and in counselees? 

Greg
That’s a great question, Ann Maree, because we don’t see anything except for the time that we’re in right now. And again that’s the case in any circumstance, we can only be in the present. We can only be where we are. And so you know sometimes that in particularly in difficult circumstances like an abusive marriage or someone who’s going through grief, or a lot of the other struggles that are common demand that we, that we go through in the human experience. We want to see the deliverance. We want to see what God’s going to do. We want to see the redemption. We want to see the reconciliation. And the Lord just gently says to us, even if we can’t always hear the still, small voice, he gently says to us in our circumstances, just be here. Just be with me. Just abide with me and, man, that is so like as a counselor, I know that you guys can both resonate with this like that can be so hard when you’re when you’re dwelling with a person, walking with a person in just this little snippet of the story that is right now, and you don’t know how things are going to work out. That’s hard for the individual. It’s going through the circumstance, but it’s, I think it’s equally hard for the counselor, and it’s, I think it’s so important for us, who are counselors, people-helpers, coming alongside in whatever way that we just be in the present moment that we’re in and that we fully inhabit that moment, and then we just have to leave the rest of the Lord. 

Darby
I think there’s something sweet about that, right in that often people want to move through suffering, or we’re asking people to have hope in what’s to come. But actually, when you’re a people-helper, you have to be willing to sit in the hard and be willing to not move someone through or dismiss their summer suffering, or say, one day this will all be okay, right? It’s really our job is to sit with them in the moment that they’re in. And I think that’s true even for the person who is suffering. It’s okay to be brought low and to be needy and to be broken and to be wounded and to be hurting and to seek the Lord’s comfort where you are. Course, we want you to expect and hope in what the Lord will do next. But that’s sometimes a lot of pressure for someone to feel like, am I going to be I have to be anticipating that everything’s going to work out. When a lot of these situations, that’s not what happens. And so sometimes it’s, how do I be faithful in the very, very hard, how do I be honest with the Lord and the very, very hard. How do I seek His comfort when my circumstances aren’t going to change this week? That’s heroic living, actually, because you’re living in the reality that God has placed you, and that is hard and honorable.

Ann Maree
That’s a nice way to put it. Yeah, okay, on that note, and I know, I know there’s women out there who might be hearing this, asking this question, what would you say to them? Why doesn’t God reconcile every marriage?

Greg
Well, one thing is, the very act of abuse tells a lie about the gospel. It is, as Jeremy and I talk about in our book, the desecration of the image of God, both in oneself, so in the person themselves, as well as in the other person. Those you’ve got two image bearers in this destructive marriage in this case, and both of the image of God in both of them is being desecrated. So, you know, even to the woman in this case, Renee, like when, that woman finds the strength to tell her abuser what he is doing, she is actually preaching a version of the gospel to him. She is saying, “This is not right. This is not what marriage is intended to be.” And I think it’s, I think. I would say that you know that, and when that person meets with Chris Moles or Greg Wilson, that perpetrator, when they meet with a person like Chris or a person like myself, we will definitely carry that theme as well and say this, you know, “this is what your marriage is intended to look like. And it is not looking like that, and in that way, it is not representing who God is, and what God wants for you guys.”

Darby
Yeah, I think that’s such a difficult question, right? Because it’s asked in some sense. You’re saying, Why does God allow suffering and sin to continue? And Greg’s right. Like when it continues in a marriage, the harm done sometimes means the marriage needs to end or be dissolved, right for safety and for all sorts of reasons. But what I find, is most women actually are asking me that question in a really personal way. They’re saying to me, why isn’t God reconciling my marriage? What they really want to know is, why is God withholding something from me? Is it because I’m a failure, I haven’t prayed enough? There’s some sin I’m being punished for. And I just think it’s really important that we tell victims, it’s there’s nothing that you have done, right? God says he remembers our sin no more, and in that, he is saying he does not deal with us in light of our sin. So suffering is not a punishment for sin. So your marriage isn’t being reconciled because the Holy Spirit hasn’t moved, and that’s not up to you. It’s not that you haven’t confronted or being and I think that’s just something when we’re being abused, we often think everything is our fault, right? And so I just, I just really wanted to say, if, if you’re in the situation. I mean, I was really captivated by Charles and Renee. It was so sweet. But Greg and I will tell you that’s so rare. So most of you listening are saying, Why haven’t you done that with my husband? Why hasn’t his blindness lifted? And that’s not your fault. You’re not responsible for that. I think that’s probably the most important thing to be saying here, and we grieve with you, both of us. Yeah, that you’re in a situation where your oppressor hasn’t been repentant and restored to the Lord, and where your marriage therefore can’t be restored.

Ann Maree
Yeah, it’s again, you guys are complimenting each other. It’s the thing that we see when with unrepentant, unsaved family members, or, you know, the people we care about that we keep sharing the gospel with, and I love that you tied Greg, the woman’s response even to her husband’s abuse, is the gospel. Or did you say that? Darby, I’m sorry. 

Darby
No, Greg did. 

Yeah, okay, um, and when family members and friends don’t bow the knee, if you will, it is just as discouraging. I guess you know, possibly because it’s domestic abuse is included in it. It’s worse, sure, but the frustration of what witnessing people over and over deny and reject the Lord is devastating, too. 

I’m going to shift gears, though, here just a second, because Charles, he had a few things to say which, well, maybe I’m not really shifting gears because Darby was talking about a woman not taking the blame. And this statement that Charles made was about not dealing with a woman’s quote, unquote issues during the counseling of abuse. But anyway, I’m rattling on. Let me just play the cue, and then I’ll have you guys interact on that.

Charles recording 

Once a male abusers is dealt with appropriately and behaving correctly, there should be proper leadership in the home, then you give opportunity for God’s designed work before thinking about trying to correct any of the abused woman’s behavior.

Ann Maree
So actually both spouses, both Renee and Charles, talked about the inappropriateness of addressing the woman’s issues early on in caregiving. Yet I know from when I talk with pastors and church leaders that that makes them really itchy because they are witnessing these unbiblical behaviors in the woman, the responses that she has to the abuse. So help us understand. Help the audience understand. Why is it? Why is it so important to just kind of table those issues and responses? 

Darby
I was gonna say Greg does this so well with when he’s just communicating, when we team teach at the ABC conference on domestic abuse, he’s done this so well. And just saying, we start out with victim care, right? We want to make sure she’s safe and her needs are being addressed, and that everything we do in the process centers around her care, and I hope he speaks to that. And one is just recognizing that anything, if we understand what’s at the heart of abuse, right? You are being abused because your spouse has a sense of entitlement. They want their world their way, they want it.  In any way that we ask the victim to do that for her spouse, right? Cook better, more sex, talk less, right? We’re actually feeding his entitlements, and we’re making his idolatry and the monster quite bigger. So not only is she not safe, but we’re actually feeding what he wants. And that’s just dangerous for her, but it’s bad for him. And just recognizing too a lot of the behavior, which I think they said in the previous episode, or even in this episode, was just victims of abuse are often responding or resisting abuse or having a trauma response, and so it’s quite cruel to move in and start addressing their behavior as sin before we understand the layers of suffering that are contributing to it. Now that doesn’t mean that there aren’t immediate corrections to be made, right? Sometimes I’ll have a woman who’s being sexually abused and she’s misusing alcohol at night, right? And I’m going to jump in there for her own good and correct some of those destructive patterns for her benefit. But as far as how she’s reacting to her spouse, we have to just remember that she doesn’t have freedom, she doesn’t have choices, and anything that she does is not going to make her situation better or the abuse stop. And so it’s an undue burden. But also she’s the most compliant one, so churches and everybody know, right, let’s ask her, because she’s the most willing person to make a change. So it’s so tempting to leverage her obedience and fear when we need to be addressing actually, the root of the issue, which was his unrepentance. 

Greg
And, yeah, that’s so well said, Darby. You can tell the listener that Darby and I talk a lot about these topics together, and she gave, definitely some of what I would say, which is, there is a reason, a protocol that we lay out in When Home Hurts, why would you start with the safety of the victim and making sure that she is safe and offering her help and making sure that we’re not addressing some of the behaviors that you see until we address the perpetrators behaviors first, and Darby gave some great reasons for that. One that is something that, if we were teaching together, she would spend a little bit more time probably talking about and delving into is that idea of trauma? So you know, I think it’s important, and I’ve said this often in the times that we’ve that we’ve taught together, if a church leader or a people-helper does not have good eyes for the concept of trauma, if they don’t understand what trauma is and what trauma looks like, then they will see, sometimes, they will see the victim’s behaviors as abusive themselves, and they will tend to mutualize the abuse. Instead of saying, you know this while it may be unhealthy, it may even be sinful, it is a traumatic fight, flight, freeze, kind of response from the victim that once, as Charles said, so well, once the male abuser is dealt with appropriately, and I would just correct what Charles said in his hopefully behaving correctly, because that, I mean, he can be dealt with appropriately, as Darby already said, and praise the Lord for what he did with Charles and Renee, but that’s less common, and for a lot of people, he may not be behaving correctly. Even after he’s dealt with appropriately. But if he is, then you’ll be able, because now he’s safe for his wife and so then you can address some of the things that she’s been doing. You can address them from a traumatic response perspective, which is going to be a lot more helpful. Also keeping in mind that while the abuser is still himself, often correcting his wife’s behavior, right? So correcting her behavior is something that probably she’s quite used to if she’s in an instructive marriage. You know what? We are doing as people-helpers in the church, if we step in to correct our behavior, is we’re just re validating, reaffirming what he has already said. We’re colluding really with him unintentionally, but we’re still colluding with him, and we’re basically saying it’s your fault if you just change these behaviors, then everything would be better and and you know, certainly in that situation, the Charles, person in the relationship who hasn’t yet repented of his behaviors or even really seen his hurtful behaviors, is going to jump right in and say,” Yep, see, that’s I told you, that’s what the church was going to say. It’s, it’s all your fault. If you would just change, everything would be everything would be better.”

Darby
And I would just add, like, the principle behind that is the Bible tells us to protect the vulnerable, right? And Greg and I could probably tell you story after story of the church usually gets interested when the wife shoves. She’s been cornered in the corner, right? She’s terrified. What she does is she shoves him out of her way to escape, and now we’re hearing about how the wife pushed him, and the abusers very good about bringing that accusation clearly an entitled, angry way to the church, and her reaction gets everyone’s attention, and we all care teams just feel like they’re in the washing machine, right? Because this thing has happened, and I think it’s helpful just to remember we have to protect the vulnerable, and that means we have to slow down and try to understand her behavior before we rebuke it, but also knowing that victims tend to over confess and abusers are going to highlight the one time she sinfully responded. And it’s just really tempting when someone’s clear and angry to do like collude with them against their spouse and correct a trauma response or a valid response to being cornered. 

Greg
Actually, yeah, Darby, I just want to repeat for the listener, but I heard you say it’s so important, which is, try to understand her behavior first before we correct it. That’s really important to listen and to understand and ask the question, you know, where is this coming from? Why might this be the response. I think that that’s actually really important to do with both parties, that our first step is really to try to understand what’s going on. So thank you for saying that’s a good word.

Ann Maree
Yeah, one of my first cases was a pastor who came to me because the wife aimed a car at her husband, and he was very confused why she was claiming abuse. 

Something I want to draw our attention to is just in the church. This is so we don’t ever talk about this. It doesn’t get spoken of in counseling, it doesn’t get talked about from the pulpit, and that is that if you just change your behavior, the other person will change. Where in the world have we ever taught that except in domestic abuse cases? Just find that ironic. Can we go a little bit further into this discussion about trauma, since it’s out there right now in the social media world, and it’s getting a lot of bad rap, if you will. But if each of you had a definition for trauma, I would love to hear that, but I’m going to ask another question about trauma responses and then our situation where the woman and man have been reconciled. But first, let’s just hear your basic definition of what trauma is.

Darby
Trauma is really tricky to define. I actually just say trauma is a way to talk about the impacts that of an event, an unpredictable, sudden, near death experience, horrific event on a person’s body and soul. So. I think it’s actually hard to define people and define it by what had happened, but trauma is actually the reaction that an embodied person wrestles with after something horrific happened, and it prevents human flourishing in all the typical ways that we would hope someone could flourish and recover.

Greg
Yeah, I would say something very similar, which is, trauma is not the event. It’s not the thing itself what happened. It’s not what happened to us specifically. It’s what happened inside us as a result of what happened to us. And it’s a very personal thing. I sometimes use the example of, like, you could have two identical people in a car accident, for example, really bad car accident, one in which, you know, they, they, by the grace of God, they didn’t die, but they easily could have, it’s that kind of a car accident, you know, and, and they were in the very same car accidents, they’ve shared the very same experience. And for one of them, for both of them, it’s going to be hard in the future when they hear about on the news a similar car accident, or if they happen to drive past the the location where that car accident happened, or if they happen to drive past a similar car accident, it’s going to be very hard for both people, because they shared a really hard experience. But one person, they’re going to be able to say, man, that was hard. I sure would want to have to do that again. Let’s pause and pray for that, that family or that person that was in the car, hope that they’re okay, and the other person, literally, might have a panic attack, you know, and they are experiencing all of the feelings and all the emotions of the car accident that they were in when this triggering experience happens. That’s what trauma looks like. It’s like you are in your body. You are feeling that the very things that happen when the traumatic event happened, even when it’s not happening. And again, for church leaders, I think that there is a and for people helpers. I think that there’s a word there where I could, as a counselor, innocently say something to a woman, you know, just because I maybe I don’t have a lot of experience in this particular situation, or whatever, I could innocently say, you know, is there anything that you did you know, or something you know, something along those lines, just trying to, maybe I’m just trying to understand, and the person could really like, come at me, And then all of a sudden, if you don’t have, if you don’t have eyes for trauma, you know, a people-helper, a pastor, a church leader, is saying, Man, you know, no wonder he responds. No wonder he put his fist through that wall or whatever. I mean, she is, do you see how easily she came at me when I just, you know, and, but if a person understands trauma, it’s, it’s a completely different response. It’s like, Oh, I see I touched on, I’m so sorry. I touched on something that was really tender for you, and I really apologize for saying that, you know. And it’s a whole different response when you understand so, so even understanding trauma, if you’re a church leader, if you’re a people-helper, helps you, because we’re all going to last thing I would want to do in in our book or in this podcast or any of these teaching times is like, cause people to think, man, just I don’t know what to say. I can’t say anything because I’m afraid, like I’m going to set somebody off. It’s not so much that, you know, I don’t want to hamstring someone who’s really trying to help, but if you can understand where someone might have a kind of quick knee jerk reaction to something out of a traumatic response, then when that happens? Because I’m not even going to say if, like, when that happens, because it probably will. You’re going to have a completely different response to the event than just assuming that, like, yeah, both of these people are, you know, just, you know, abusing each other, basically, which is, I think a lot of times, is where people go in those situations, they end up mutualizing it and they don’t understand the difference between the reactive response and the abuse itself.

Ann Maree
Okay, so great definitions. I’ve marked the time slot, so I can use those definitions in our resources too. Okay, so now let’s do some application in our situation. And this could be true in a situation where a woman ends up divorcing and perhaps remarrying. So she has been perhaps. Perhaps isolated at times. She’s been made to fear. She walks on eggshells. Almost every woman I’ve talked to in abuse in the home has said that phrase. She may have been hit, strangled, worse any of the above. Okay, I’m not saying that that’s what happened with Charles and Renee, but hypothetical. Now they’re reconciling. She still has those triggers, as you just talked about, Greg. She still responds in ways that are probably reactionary, but they’re moving towards reconciliation. How do you help her? And I guess, is there a cure for trauma? Is the question at hand, you know, is there a remedy going forward? Hope that makes sense.

Darby
I think one is, I think if we’re we see what the culture says about trauma, it makes it seem as if trauma is the most important shaping influence in the life of a person and they will not recover. And I think as people who believe in Jesus, we want to clearly be saying, Jesus is the largest shaping influence in someone’s life, and healing can come about to what degree and how we don’t know. So yeah, for a victim who is trying to reconcile, particularly if their abuser had had any sexual violations or physical violations, they are right to be scared, right? Takes a long time to prove repentance in and of itself. But add that to that, a trauma response where their body is automatically responding out of fear, right? It probably seems cruel to them, like I want to trust this person, but my body just won’t let me. And so I think in large part, and I hope Greg will speak to this, it’s what the former how the former perpetrator loves them in that, and how much patience he shows in that. And I think just to expect it that, yeah, if, even if, my my husband, now, is not raising his voice, but I can tell that he’s angry with me, which is always a precursor, right for something, I’m going to be having a physical reaction to that. I’m going to be tense, I’m going to be nervous, I’m going to maybe get defensive. I think just recognizing that’s a normal response, and over time, when the interactions go differently, and maybe it’s dozens or hundreds of time, the body will learn to respond differently, I think that’s we want to lay that expectation. I think it’s just about being honest, saying I’m feeling afraid right now. And that’s not necessarily saying to your spouse, you’re making me afraid. It’s just saying I am afraid, and then care for that should come in. And if someone’s truly repentant, they should be wanting to tend to the fear and the unsettledness. They wouldn’t be being defensive, well, I didn’t right. They should be saying, oh my gosh, let’s tend to your fear, which is, I think Greg will speak to beautifully. So I don’t want to say too much there.

Greg
No, you, you’re, you’re great, you’re great, Darby. Yeah, a couple couple of things that I have. So I’m, I’m on the board of an organization called the Christian Trauma Healing Network. So I definitely the first answer to your question. The short answer is yes, there is definitely healing there, and there are lots of approaches to that. I agree with Darby. It’s like in, certainly in a situation, if we go back to Charles and Renee, my guess is that Renee is a I haven’t had the opportunity to meet her, post his repent, or even at all, but like I would assume, that she is far less reactive now in the process because he is less abusive, and hence there’s less to react to. And over time, her body, as Darby said so beautifully, has been, you know, retrained to respond in different ways. Now we have to address, you know, because we’ve already said that Charles and Renee’s story is a bit unique in the sense that there was repentance and reconciliation, there still can be healing. So again, the answer is an unequivocally, unequivocal yes, there can be healing. Trauma does not define anyone. Keep in mind, again, trauma is just what happened inside a person as a result of what happened to them. And so just like there is, just like we have trauma centers, we call them emergency rooms and hospitals for peoples whose bodies have been physically traumatized. And there’s healing there. There is also. A soul healing for people whose bodies have been traumatized, whose souls and bodies have been traumatized, and so, yeah, there is, there’s definitely healing, speaking from the, you know, the licensed professional side that you’ve brought me in to talk about, although I I’m equally comfortable talking about the unlicensed side, for sure, but from the licensed professional side, I mean, yeah, there are therapies that can be applied and lots of things that can be done, that can be that can be helpful to healing for someone, even if there’s not repentance and reconciliation, and I think that that’s I think that that’s really important. So yes, there’s definitely healing. And neither Darby nor I nor Ann Maree would want the listener to see this as something that like is a stigma that’s just going to be with them or it becomes their identity. So, yeah.

Ann Maree
Yeah, my mistake for emphasizing the licensed professional piece of it, because you are as much a biblical counselor. I just, I want our audience to recognize even the teamwork that you guys do together with your different emphases. 

So taking another turn here. I’m just thinking about how many times both Charles and Renee said that their marriage was reconciled. It was God. It was obvious that it was God. What are we looking for as counselors to be able to say a similar thing?

Darby
I just, I mean, I just want to say I was so impressed by the work that God did with Charles and that I don’t know their marital history, but it was a long one, right? So there had to be hundreds of acts of abuse, right? And he didn’t shy away from it. Even throughout the interview, he just kept saying, Yeah, I was an abuser the way I abuse, it was so clear that he he could live in the freedom of his past because he knew of his covering in Christ, right? And I really feel how can abusers repent. How hard it would be to own what you had done if you didn’t know the grace and mercy and love you had waiting for you. And it’s just so clear that he feels loved by Jesus, much like the apostle Paul, never shied away from minimizing anything that he had done. And I just think, I work with so many women who they get a little tiny apology or an excuse, or they modulate their hate behavior just a little bit, right? And if we listen to Charles, he did not shy away from anything, right? And he wore that with, I say this to you as a redeemed person, openly, confessionally, and that’s what you want to see. You want to see someone who perpetrates abuse, willing to say, clearly, I perpetrated abuse and and the Lord has kept me from that, and I’m working on that, and I’m horrified by that. And when someone can make clear statements about this, these are the things that I’m doing without blame shifting, without belittling or minimizing what they have done. That’s a beautiful thing. And repentance, this is a whole different fruit, and I think he modeled that for victims who are still in a similar situation, who who want to attach themselves and a lesser glimmer of hope. It should just be so clear that this God has made it so clear that he is at work.

Greg
Yeah, and that’s a good just to emphasize again, what Darby said, which I think is is really good, even in situations where the the person who has been abusive maybe does not yet see their their sinful, their abusive behavior, just the clarity that the Lord has given to that person who has been abused, that this is abuse and this is not okay, is God at work? And something that Darby said earlier is also relevant here, which is the the idea of like, being able to see the small mercies, the small glimmers of like where God is in the story is really, I think, helpful. So again, part of the work of for all of us, the work of like seeing God in the midst of what we are going through whatever that is, is being able to be present in the moment with the Lord and look at the small graces, the small things that he’s shown. And then, you know, in a case like Charles and Renee, to be able to hope, if you’re Renee, for the Lord to do something like what he like what he did with Charles, which is just a really beautiful thing. But even if the Lord, for whatever reason, does not do that, the Lord has already shown up by revealing to Renee what’s happening to me is not okay here, and by bringing people around her, who hopefully are listening to these podcasts and gaining better tools in terms of how to understand the hurt, understand the abuse, understand the person, I think is all of that are sweet graces of the Lord. 

Darby
Can I ask you a question, Greg? How would you say that to when, when you talk about your category of someone who’s confronted and they’re then they’re hostile, their spouse is hostile to change how. I love, when you talk about how that’s God still showing up.

Greg
Well, are you talking about, you know, the idea of, like, just even, even the understanding of their hostility, 

Darby
Yeah, but you’re referring clarity of it, right? 

Greg
Just the clarity, yes, the clarity of just understanding that, okay, we we now we know, we know where we’re at, right? Like, sometimes Chris Moles and I have both said this in connection with our work with perpetrators where, because, again, I just have to say this. I don’t want to discourage people, but Charles’ is are are less common than a lot of you know, the people that Chris and I and other people who work with abusers have seen, but sometimes just the clarity of like, okay, we can now somewhat, this person has walked with a Chris Moles, or they’ve walked with a Greg Wilson, or they’ve walked with a pastor who’s well informed on these dynamics, or an elder or someone, and this person can now look Renee in the eye and say, You know, we see what you see, and we don’t see, I use these categories in my own hearts of seeing and owning and hating and turning for repentance, and we don’t see that he even sees much less owns, you know, or the the other things his abuse or we see that he sees it, but he’s still blaming it all on you. So he doesn’t, he sees it, but he doesn’t own it. That is still clarity, and that is still the Lord at work. Is that what you’re talking about? 

Darby
Yeah. 

Greg
You know Darby that like so you know, if a person responds in a hostile way to a pastor, then you know, that can be real clarity for the pastor to be able to say, or the or the church leader, whoever the person is, to be able to say, I see, I see what you see. And man, you know, for a victim, that is just so I mean that that’s just such a balm to hear, especially a man say, I, I see it. I agree with you. The danger, you know, where these situations get a lot stickier is when the person’s not actually in that hostile category, right? They’re in that in one of those ambivalent categories that we talk about, which a lot of times, it’s where we see them at first, where, like them, they are not overtly hostile. They’re they’re open, they’re open to hearing, and they might even, lot of times, they have this real slick, smooth appearance to a church leader where like they’re even like that the person leaves with with less clarity at that point, because the person just doesn’t seem to them like what their picture of an abusive person might look like. And again, that’s where to Darby already said this, but we’re seeking to understand, rather than to like, you know, make, you know, some kind of an initial judgment, if you will, on what’s going on here. We’re seeking to really understand over time what’s going on, and that’s where there will be eyes to see, you know, a situation like this, with greater with with greater clarity. So sometimes that clarity of like God at work doesn’t come as quickly as we want it to.

Darby
And I would just add like God at work isn’t always in the outcome that we want. We’re looking at abusive marriage. God is at work when sin is being exposed, when truth is being redeemed, when children are being protected, when a victim can speak honestly about their horrors, right? We often we want the happy ending that often isn’t. Case. But that doesn’t mean that God isn’t redeeming and restoring and rescuing and also works. It’s just such a delightful story that we got to see some one here that is redeemed, right? And the victim by the redemption and the restoration of her husband’s relationship with the Lord that was beautiful. That’s just not always the rescue we see. So we want to give victims the ability to see God’s work in a variety of different ways. Yeah.

Greg
And I do want to say, since I’ve already said this a couple of times, and Darby just said as well, I I’m working on a situation, a case right now, that is, they haven’t been married as long, but, but the situation in terms of like the redemption, that the Lord is working and the reconciliation is so abundantly evident that often, you know, when I’m talking to this individual, just brings me to tears to hear, you know, what the Lord is doing in his life. So I don’t want to imply as often as I’ve said this, and Chris may have said it as well when you were talking to him, by talking about how rare it is, I don’t want to imply that never happens. I mean, obviously people like Darby and Tabi and Chris and I stay in this work, and you Ann Maree, because we have seen we long for and hope for a a Charles and Renee story every single time and we continue to hope for that, because that is that we know that that’s what, what would be, you know, the ultimate outcome. But we also have to recognize that even if that’s not the outcome, as Darby is so beautifully saying here, God is still at work in all of those different ways. And that’s where we look, and we see the Lord at work, and we praise him for that.

Ann Maree
Yeah. I think you’re kind of alluding to an important thing that Renee wanted to talk about, and I’ll play her statement just a minute. But sadly, more often than not, the way churches have been responding in abuse situations has been hurtful, detrimental, and you know, to be fair, we are all just learning more about domestic abuse in the church and hopefully getting an education about the victims and survivors and perpetrators, and so we’re playing catch up in many ways. 

But let me just let me play what Renee said, because she felt it was so important to say that we had to go back and record it so that it was clear enough. But let me just play this and then I’ll have a question for you. 

Renee recording
First, I want to say that even though I feel like our church failed us, God did not. God is the one who, who did the work. 

Ann Maree
And that’s it’s always the case, right? It’s people fail. God does not. But I guess what I want to just final, you know, final question for you guys. What I want to end this note on is, how can women whose churches are potentially not really responding well to them maybe doing some of the things that you’ve kind of both instructed don’t kind of do that? How can they? How can the victim hold on to God, not equate God necessarily, with the poor response, and then still find strength? You know, find the strength even to do that first of all, to keep leaning on him. But also find strength when their immediate family, their church family isn’t as prominent around them as God is obviously still there, but the church isn’t, I guess. Yeah, flesh that out if you can.

Darby
Or I would say churches will fail, right? I have a counselor have failed people. That’s why I’ve learned about abuse through my own mistakes or even going to churches. And the first word of encouragement, I would say, is sometimes churches fail because they are ignorant in a good sense of the way, right? They don’t know what they don’t know. And often I have to have 10, 15, conversations with them before they get a picture and understand what’s happening. So sometimes it’s worth educating your church or bringing an advocate or a counselor with you. And then there are other times where I start to recognize that, oh, they’re willfully ignorant, or there are paradigms of this is a marriage problem will never shift, and I think it’s important just for a victim then to have clarity, to say, My church isn’t trying to love me, sadly. But that doesn’t mean that the Lord has stopped his desire for me to have help and rescue, right? Jesus is a relentless pursuer and a relentless rescuer. And he himself, right, we think about him sitting on the throne, he is making imprecatory prayers for you right now, even things that you don’t even know what to ask for, I think, is a great comfort. And so he would not want you to stop seeking help for the sin that you’re enduring, and the suffering that you’re undergoing, and sometimes that means seeking help outside your church right, readjusting your expectations, grieving that your church is not helpful, but valuing that the Lord delights in you, and he would not want his child suffering this way. And so be praying for what other way? What other people? What other way can you get help? And I just think we, early on, my hope was for the churches, once they understood what was happening, that they would just be compelled to rush in and rescue. And sometimes they don’t get it. Sometimes they’re not equipped, sometimes they’re willfully ignorant. But that doesn’t mean that God’s only vehicle of rescuing you is through your local congregation, and so don’t be dispirited or lose hope in that, just to continue to seek a different means of help.

Greg
That’s right, you know, as Darby said, and I think all of us, all three of us here and the other people that you’ve had on would say, we have, we have all failed counselees. We have all, not, you know, done things that we wish we could take back, or said things that we wish we could take back. And so at the end of the day that the church is, it’s God’s people, but it is still it’s people, it’s human beings and everybody is in process in some way. And all of us, all three of us, would look back, you know, a number of years ago and go and think about situations that we faced that we would handle completely differently now based on the things that we know. And so the church is going to fail you. It’s just a question of when and to what degree, because they are God’s people, but they’re still they’re still people, and they’re still human beings. God, on the other hand, is completely trustworthy. He will never fail you. He will sometimes surprise you. And I think we all understand, have seen that where, like the hope that we had in the Lord was ultimately not disappointed, because God does not disappoint. But that, you know, sometimes our hope was in a different outcome. Our hope was in something that the Lord, you know, he didn’t have that thing for us. He had something else for us, whatever that was. And of course, what the Lord has for us is always the better thing. It’s always the it’s always the best thing, in fact, what He has for us, but sometimes in the waiting that we’ve talked about it, it can feel not so and so, yeah, I think the question really is, what is it that you’re waiting for? Who is it that you’re waiting for? What are you waiting on? What are you hoping in? What are you hoping for? If our hope is in the Lord, our trust is in the Lord, He will rescue. He will deliver, as Darby said so eloquently, that’s what he does. He cannot do anything other than that. And yet, the deliverance doesn’t always look like what we expected it to look like. And even with Charles and Renee, where we would sit here now at this point, knowing their story, and we could say, okay, so they did get, you know, what they, you know, wanted, so to speak, what they what, what they hoped for in this, you know, you gotta look at other things. You know, Charles had a battle with cancer and so, I mean, there’s just so many other factors, so many other things that are going on in a person’s life. And the Lord is always at work. Sometimes we see it, and sometimes we don’t, but he is always at work and I’m glad that you went through in the recording and made sure that Renee saying, even though our church failed us, God did not got on there. That’s worth taking the time to make sure that gets on there, because that really is the capstone of this whole thing. And that would have been true. We have to say this. That would have been true if Charles and Renee did not reconcile. That would still have been true that God did not fail them.

Ann Maree
Yeah, amen. Uh, okay, thank you both. I mean, feels like a master class when I sit with you. Darby, earlier, you brought up that you and Greg teach together with ABC at the ABC conference, and I’m not sure who the speakers are next year, maybe you can hint.

Darby
I think there might be an announcement made. Greg was leading a new track this year on a different type of abuse, which I’m super excited about. 

Ann Maree
Okay, yeah, a little enticing. Yeah,

Greg
So that’s right, but stay tuned for that information. But yeah, and we, and we, we teach together in other settings as well. It’s always a delight. Everybody that you’ve had on for this, these series of podcasts, including yourself, Ann Maree, we are all part of a group of people that are that care about this topic and care about the church, and try to make it so that the church at least if we’re going to fail people because we are again, but maybe we’ll fail in new and different ways, and not the same old silly ways that we failed people before that, like Darby said, or just got based on ignorance and not knowing at least, at least if, if we fail, we’ll fail up. We’ll keep trying to get it, we’ll keep trying to, trying to get it right until, until we see Lord face to face.

Darby
And we will be together with Chris Moles at PeaceWorks live in October, which is a training event for churches and caregivers on domestic abuse, which I think you can do online or in person, if I’m not mistaken. PeaceWorks Live, yeah. If you need more training, PeaceWorks Live is a great place to get it. We will be there in early October. 

Greg
I bet Ann Maree will put it in the show notes. 

Ann Maree
I was going to say, I’ll put that in the show notes, since this is probably going to air in November. But Chris also promoted it, which was good. So wonderful. Wonderful to hear you all. And I’m just a groupie, honestly, of all of the experts that I bring on so that I can learn. It’s my continuing education plan. So again, very good information. Interacted with our story really well, and I think you really handled them with care and handled and I know you. I know both of you handle many victims and survivors with care. So thank you for being with us and gracing us with your presence.

Darby
Well, thank you for having us. 

Greg
Yes, thank you so much for having us. I hope it’s helpful.

Ann Maree
That’s all for today. If you are concerned about domestic abuse in your home or in that of a loved one and you’re looking for more information, we recommend you go to the Called to Peace website link in our show notes and or ChrisMoles.org and we’ll have that link in the notes as well. 

In our next season, we are going to change the format just a bit to accommodate a story that will take six episodes to air. In between the storyteller, six expert contributors will interact. This is a different approach to the Safe to Hope podcast, and we decided to air it this way because of the nature of the subject matter, the difficulty of hearing the type of story our storyteller will be sharing, and the importance of our expert’s voices in helping us in the church respond well to women who’ve had a similar type of crisis. I will say in advance that this story will be very triggering, and I caution the listener or reader of the transcript that it will be raw. It is explicit, but it is a reality that we all need to hear and learn about. 

Watch the help her dot help website and or subscribe for scheduling information and further details as they become available, we’ll begin airing that story in January of 2025.

[closing]

Safe to Hope is a production of HelpHer. Our Executive Producer is Ann Maree Goudzwaard. Safe to Hope is written and mixed by Ann Maree and edited by Ann Maree and Helen Weigt. Music is Waterfall and is licensed by Pixabay. We hope you enjoyed this episode in the Safe To Hope podcast series. 

Safe To Hope is one of the resources offered through the ministry of HelpHer, a 501C3 that provides training and resources for those ministering in one-another care and advocacy for women in crisis in Christian institutions. Your donations make it possible for HelpHer to serve as they navigate these crises. All donations are tax deductible. If you’d be interested in partnering financially with the ministry, go to help her dot help and click the give link in the menu. If you’d like more information or would like to speak to someone about ministry goals or advocacy needs, go to HelpHer.help. That’s help her dot H E L P.

[disclaimer]

We value and respect conversations with all our guests. Opinions, viewpoints, and convictions may differ so we encourage our listeners to practice discernment. As well. guests do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of HelpHer. It is our hope that this podcast is a platform for hearing and learning rather than causing division or strife.

Please note, abuse situations have common patterns of behavior, responses, and environments. Any familiarity construed by the listener is of their own opinion and interpretation. Our podcast does not accuse individuals or organizations.

The podcast is for informational purposes and is not a substitute for professional care, diagnosis, or treatment.

[end]