My Husband and Pastor Bully Me
Happy New Year Friend,
For some of you entering 2025, right now is not a happy time. I get it. I truly do. There are things that happen to us that we have zero control over. But can I ask you a question? What might grow and be different in you in 2025 if you stopped obsessing on what you cannot change, and you resolved to spend your energies solely on what you can change? Practice this shift for a few days and notice the difference in you and the things around you.
Today’s question will give you a peek into how you might begin to do that.
This week’s question: I do not normally do this, but I am lost and broken. You see when I met my husband, we both were Christians, but I was hurt from a church so pulled away. This resulted in me going through the motions with church. My husband was much the same but for different reasons, however, once COVID hit things changed.
My husband connected with a fundamentalist church, and everything changed. All of a sudden I was expected to home-school my kids, quit my job, and drop out of my master’s degree for counseling since it was seen as worldly.
I was expected to obey and follow my husband at all costs and not doing so made me the enemy and unrepentant, dishonoring God. Furthermore, the church was controlling but my husband didn't see it. They told me I was no longer allowed to come, they separated my family and encouraged us to spank our kids which I do not agree with. This has led me to lose my husband, and I worry, also makes me lose God. I have become angry with God. I have started to dislike Him if who the church says he is he truly is. I have also realized that I cannot save my marriage without submitting to abusive control, and I will lose myself and God if I do. I am just lost and broken and don't know what's next as I have no one left in my life who is there for me.
Answer: I’m so sorry you are going through this. I was hoping to do a more uplifting blog post for the New Year, but your question drew me in because it is so related to my last two blog posts, What is Spiritual Abuse, and How do you Balance Mercy and Strong Boundaries? Please read them as I won’t repeat what I said there.
You are facing a tough dilemma that many godly women in conservative churches are struggling with. The questions you must answer within your own heart are these: Is your husband your final authority for who you are, what you are to do with your life, and what’s true, good, and right? Is that how the Bible defines a husband’s role, headship, and marriage?
Second, does the church speak for the Holy Spirit, who Jesus says lives within your heart, guiding you into all truth? (John 16:13). Does the church have the authority of God to tell you what to do and punish you if you refuse, not because you’re sinning, but because you disagree?
If you want to become healthy and whole, you must wrestle with these questions because your husband and church leadership have overstepped their role. They have distorted the image of God for you, which is spiritual abuse. They are speaking for God, as God, but what does this God look like? From what you’ve written, their view of God is that He is male-centric. Females are created for a purpose, to serve the man, meet his needs, and care for children. As a woman, you must submit because you are not capable of thinking about God’s truth for yourself. You do not have the right to say no or have any God-given wisdom or Holy Spirit discernment of your own. That can only come from a man (husband/pastor). You are bad, wicked, and sinning, if you don’t believe this or do what the males in your life tell you to do because they are your “authority” and believe they speak for God. (To understand more of this teaching watch the documentary Shiny Happy People)
No wonder you’re angry – at them, at God. But trust me, friend, you are not going to change them. Power is an intoxicating thing to have, not easily surrendered by those who abuse it, even those who claim to know God.
But let me show you where you do you need to spend your energy. When I get confused about who God is I start reading the red print in the four gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John). The Bible tells us that Jesus came to show us what God is like. (John 1:18). The Bible also says that Jesus exactly represented the nature of God (Colossians 1:15; Hebrews 1:3). If that’s true, then we can best know who God is by paying close attention to Jesus. Not what others say about Jesus, but by reading closely what Jesus said and did. As you read, notice how Jesus treated women, especially those that society labeled “unworthy” or “sinful”. Read carefully what Jesus specifically warned his disciples not to do. He told them not to abuse their power over people as leaders in his church. (Mark 10:42-45). You see, even in Jesus’s time, there were those who were religiously powerful but spiritually empty. Jesus described them as whitewashed tombs. (Matthew 23:27) or worse, vicious wolves. (Matthew 7:15-20).
In my previous blog on Spiritual Abuse, I share the biblical story of the Rich Young Ruler and the story of the prodigal Son. In each of these stories, the person had choices to make. Jesus didn’t force them to make the choice he wanted, nor did he discard them for not making the right choice. He loved them. And my friend he loves you. There is nothing you can do to earn his love, nor is there anything you can do to lose his love. His love is unconditional.
In this New Year, as hard as it is right now, the most important relationship repair you need to work on is not your marriage but your relationship with God. He will help you see yourself more clearly, (as a precious daughter and image bearer) and see what’s going on with your husband and church more clearly. God isn’t asking you to lose yourself to your church or your marriage. He asks us to die to ourselves (our old immature, sinful ways), in order to become what he designed us to become from the beginning of time. Death to self doesn’t mean annihilation, but transformation. So how might you need to grow and transform into a stronger, more stable, mature woman through all this?
The second thing I notice in your question is that you feel all alone. You said, “You have no one left in your life”. This often happens when you are in a destructive marriage and/or cult-like church. Outside relationships are frowned upon and there is so much pressure to submit to groupthink that it’s difficult to have outside friendships. God made us for connection. Relationships are important but strive for healthy relationships, not controlling toxic ones.
Is it possible for you to spend your energy right now on your own healing and growth instead of fretting about what others think or say? Do you have family in the area? Another church you can join? A woman’s bible study you can attend? A hiking club, or other activity that can help you meet other women? Go back to school and finish up what you quit? You aren’t meant to walk through this life alone. However, marriage isn’t always the answer to loneliness. Marriage can be one of the loneliest places to be when your marriage is toxic and you have no outside friendships. I believe that if you continue your growth towards Christ-like maturity and can learn to Biblically love your spouse with good boundaries (Read the blog on Mercy and Boundaries), those changes will have the best outcome for your growth and potentially have a positive impact on him, and your children. No guarantees, but I can guarantee you that if you do not do your work, things will not get better for you, for your marriage or for your kids.
Pain in our lives warns us that something is wrong. Is that because it forces us to pay attention? Is it possible that God loves you so much he doesn’t want you to be stuck in this oppressive church or marriage? This pain you’re in is here to motivate you to take action. To grow and take your place as a mature woman of God who now embodies her voice and her choice. Your husband and pastor may disagree, and may not like it, but they don’t get to define who you are or what God wants for you. That’s between you and God.
Friend, how have you learned to trust God again after seeing him as supporting the bully at home or in the pulpit?
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My husband has always had controlling tendencies, but this summer he got involved with a church that is reformed, patriarchal, believes women who have had abortions, witches, gays should be executed via laws they want to pass, along with many other issues. It is very cultish. I have resisted attending with him but have received from him much manipulative behavior in exchange for my unsubmissiveness. I have been setting boundaries and enforcing them when needed. It has been lonely, but God has been speaking to me again. I reapoy have had to go back to my first love relationship with Jesus to find Him again. He has given me the strength to stand. I grieve for all of the women who are hurt in partiarchal systems. Spiritual abuse combined with emotional abuse is HUGE because our perceptions of God are so uniquely shaped by lies. We are very hurt lambs, but we have a shepherd who binds up our wounds and himself has been wounded.
Well said!
I’m so sorry, Star. That church and teaching sounds similar to Doug Wilson and his CREC followers. 😞
I recently left my manipulative, gaslighting husband. I assumed my pastor would tell me to go home. It was , in fact, the opposite. He told me my emotional and spiritual safety are as essential as physical safety. I’ve never felt more affirmed by a pastor, whose heart is that of a shepherd. He’s reached out to my husband wit no response. I’m grateful!
I love that your pastor is so supportive! Praying for you!
I’ve just finished your book The Emotionally Destructive Relationship and I’m trying to pick up the pieces of my life after my sister disowned me. Our parents passed and she didn’t agree with the inheritance that was left to me. It is selfishness, jealousy and greed…..she had her share previously and wanted me to give up mine so she could live in the house and not have to “go home”(she had been living in the house for years with dad….she has a beautiful home across the street, or she could divorce her emotionally abusive husband of 45 years and buy her own place with the money she’d get, including what I’d given her out of MY inheritance)she chose the latter…she went back to her home and I got blamed for forcing her BACK into a house where she felt unwanted and unloved. I’m trying to pick up the pieces….its hard when you’re blamed for someone else’s life choices because they aren’t strong enough to make a good choice for themselves. It sucks. But here I am, killin’ it with God’s help…..thank you, for this book♥️
Wish I’d had this advice 25 years ago! God gave me this info eventually. Leslie Vernick was a pioneer. Thank God for her! Excellent post.
I separated from my husband 10 months ago because of many forms of abuse, probably the only one he didn’t use was physical. We had been married for 31 years, I separated from him after the first 10 years and went to a safe house. At that time he repented and was baptized and started serving in the church. After 6 months I reconciled with him because I felt that is what God would want, even though my counsellor advised against it. After that he continued with the abuse but was more covert about it. Fast forward another 21 years and after we separated this time, he flung himself into everything spiritual and even sent me a devotional for Christmas through my pastor (we are attending separate churches) who is being a mediator for me. I am so thankful for this post because just this morning I was wrestling with how the pastor may perceive me (different pastor than 21 years ago) and what others think when they see my husband doing all the right things. I do not feel that this time God wants us to get back together. I went through deliverance prayer and felt God very strongly say that He is the one who separated my husband and I, not man. Another time when I was praying and questioning whether I should go back, I heard the words “dogs vomit” I had to look up to see if there was a scripture about dogs vomit, sure enough God was telling me I would be a fool to go back. It has been such a tough road as my dad passed suddenly and unexpectedly 12 days after my decision to separate from my husband. God has been faithful and walked with me through it all even through all of my mistakes (one being accepting the gift from my husband without seeking Him first) I am trusting Him and doing all that I can to learn what is in His word about His will for me and how He sees me. I am learning what healthy looks like from Leslie and many other sources but mainly from His word and time with Him. Praying for all those on this same journey, for full and complete healing and that God will use all of this for His glory.
It’s truly awful when churches are used to steal, kill, and destroy. Whenever we as humans get our eyes off of Christ — the Christ of scripture — and make anything else more important than He is (tradition, politics, safety, fear), it all goes just as the enemy would have it go.
I was also part of a church like this after marriage. It wasn’t quite as extreme, but my then-husband, who I’m nearly sure has undiagnosed Asperger’s (and the associated black-and-white thinking), took it to the extreme. About every 6 months I would break down and basically beg for us to find another church home, but he would not allow that. Our relationship became more like a parent-child relationship than a marriage, since I was to obey and nothing I brought to the table (other than food, childrearing, etc.) was valued. It was heartbreaking. He was basically asking me to embrace things I knew weren’t true and to abandon the things that I knew were.
It was a beating session with the youngest that finally did it for me, and evidence through independent counseling that he did not want to change.
So many of our churches are clinging to extra-biblicals that are not filled with the Lord. He brings life! The only death found in Him is death to self – which includes pride, the need to wield abusive authority over others, and even finding comfort in traditions of man instead of Him. And of course changing that means individuals (including ourselves) must change first. We must know the truth, which sets us free.
Find a church that speaks to you. You’ll be so happy that you did!!!
I have been in a similar situation in the past and God, through a few strategies , showed me how to change my situation. First, I started to journal and spend time talking to God and writing down what I felt he was saying back. This takes faith because it sounds like your own thoughts but the Bible is the governor on this, so it will agree with scripture. I find what He says is always loving (more loving than my own voice, so I know it’s not me). Second, He had me file for divorce. This was not sudden, we were married for 18 years but he was not surrendering to the Lord and God did not want me submitting to what he was submitting to anymore. I had to face my fears of persecution from Christians because they had no empathy for me. I was completely alone, except I had God. Through this process which literally happened right before Christmas of this last year, God revealed I had issues of betrayal from my childhood, He revealed to my husband that he had emotional trauma from his childhood as well. My husband did not want me to leave and so he finally took responsibility. I can see a 180 difference in him and our relationship. Literally from hell to heaven. All that to say, you are never truly alone because you have the Lord, Also, Christians oftentimes do not act like Jesus, so get to know Jesus in your alone time with Him and then you will not be deceived by what people who claim to be Christians but are not speaking from His spirit. There is so much I learned from my experience. The biggest being to get so close to God that you can fearlessly follow His leading. Also, He expects you to take responsibility for yourself and be your own advocate. Did you truly have to quit school or were you just pressured but didn’t stand up and say no? We need to stand up for ourselves because no one else will.
Oh sisters.. it is so heartbreaking to hear the stories of the church taking the side of the abuser, and also furthering the toxic beliefs that enable abuse. I have also left an abusive husband with my little one, to later find out our pastor had been supporting my ex’s side of the story for years, while outwardly saying he was “neutral”. It’s gut-wrenching. And I’m discovering it is much more common than I’d like to believe, that abuse is oftentimes not seen for what it is. It’s very isolating. I believe for all of us, this season is to lead us to something far greater. That God will restore everything broken. There is a much better way, and his name is JESUS. He truly will make the way… I’ve seen so many miracles in this process. Believing for you all – there is NOTHING impossible for God. He is with us. Sending love to you all.