Love Like Jesus - How to Respond to Hurtful words

SANTOSO

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Dear Debbie,

I don’t understand why someone find that I asked you to offer your heart and health to abuse; for what I have written is all there for all to see.

When facing abuse, it is all right to sojourn and hide in the Lord.

For this is what we have heard:

Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my sojourning. -Psalms 119:54

Yes, praise the Lord in your despair, Debbie. He will give you oil of gladness instead of mourning. Also, He will give you a garment of praise instead of a faint spirit as the Lord promise in Isaiah 61:3

Likewise, I don’t understand why someone could think I have any notion that enable abuser to abuse further.

Debbie, do I ask you to demand repentance from abuser ? Wouldn’t such demand escalate abuse ? I never advise that.

I have been saying that you could seek the Lord’s strength in your distress and ask Him for strength to release forgiveness to your husband so that those hateful, bitter and angry words in your mind would not traumatize you but rather through the Lord that you are set free and can continue to love like the way the Lord loves you.

You can love like Christ. When you love like Christ, you can have the strength to love your husband through interceding for your husband’s soul in the manner that the Lord have taught.

Debbie, test the spirit what I have said and what others have said ; that is balanced and biblical.

I understand that others may have the circumstances like you but may be they have not reconciled to their husbands.

I don’t know what place others may bring you to but those living in divorce are those who have harden their hearts.

This is what we have heard that the Lord have spoken:

And Jesus said to them, "Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. -Mark 10:5

Debbie, do you consider that those who are divorced know how to love like Christ and how to respond to hurtful words?

I consider that they can love like Christ when they repent wholeheartedly, pursue peace, and be willing to suffer with Christ.

I hope those who are hurt not asking you to join their hurt but find the compassion of the Lord.

Debbie, meditate God’s words in Psalms 119: 49-56, Psalm 119: 153-160 and keep your mind filled with His words. For Christ’s words are love that are spirit and life.
 
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NerdGirl

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It's one thing for a woman to choose to wreck her life and her health and her spirit with a persistently abusive husband.

It's another thing entirely to drag three innocent children into the mix, and to permanently damage their psyches and inflict scars upon them that will affect their trust in adults and relationships for the rest of their lives.

This "husband's" behavior should not be tolerated, and I hope she takes the children (the two that are biologically hers, at least), and gets out of there.

If this man were punching and beating his wife and children, I have a feeling Santoso's advice might be different. Sadly, this woman and these children are suffering wounds internally, that will have farther-reaching and longer-lasting consequences than simple bruises.
 
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NerdGirl

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Have you all responded Debbie’s request on how to love like Jesus ? Have you considered what you advice whether it is according to her request on how love to like Jesus?
Pretty sure Jesus wouldn't tell someone to "love" by taking their children into an abusive home.
 
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SANTOSO

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Dear sisters,
It is my earnest desire to be reconciled with you. For I don’t want to make Debbie who seeks for help to be disturbed but rather find peace and love and assurance.

For this is what we have heard:
Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working. -James 5:16

If I have sinned against you sisters, please forgive me. I have prayed for our relationship with one another to be healed.

I may have said some bold statements that you may not find them unacceptable but I have been speaking as those in Christ for Debbie and others like her for their strengthening.

I understand what Debbie’s husband may have said is harsh or abusive to her and their children. Even though he sinned in this matter ! Don’t you all consider that he was also hurt ! Don’t you consider those faithful wives who wants their relationship heal ? Don’t you consider those faithful mothers who desire their children to be close not only to them but their children?

I understand mother’s heart to find conducive environment for themselves and their children.

That is why I recommend Debbie and her children to sojourn until they can be reconciled again as a wholesome family. Also, to take comfort in the promise in Psalm 119: 54, that says:

Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my sojourning. -Psalms 119:54 ESV

But why quarrel exists ?

This is what we have heard from apostle James:
1 What is causing all the quarrels and fights among you? Isn’t it your desires battling inside you?
2 You desire things and don’t have them. You kill, and you are jealous, and you still can’t get them. So you fight and quarrel. The reason you don’t have is that you don’t pray!
3 Or you pray and don’t receive, because you pray with the wrong motive, that of wanting to indulge your own desires.- James 4:1-3 CJB

So, how to respond to quarrel or hurtful words?
We have heard ourselves that we are recommended to pray rightly.

How about the harm ? This is what we have heard what apostle Peter have spoken:
1 Therefore, rid yourselves of all malice, of all deceit, hypocrisy and envy, and of all the ways there are of speaking against people;
2 and be like newborn babies, thirsty for the pure milk of the Word; so that by it, you may grow up into deliverance.
3 For you have tasted that Adonai is good.[a]

Do apostle Peter recommend all the ways there are of speaking against husbands/ wives/ others ? No !

Don’t we see the parenthesis “ ;“ between 1 Peter 2:1 and 1 Peter 2:2 ?
That means what apostle Peter have said in 1 Peter 2:1 incomplete without what he said in 1 Peter 2:2.

That is to rid all malice, apostle Peter call us to be like newborn babies, thirsty for the pure milk of the Word; so that by the Word, we may grow up into deliverance.

So, by the Word, we can be delivered from all malice.

Many wives, husbands, and children desires life and loves many days, that they may see good ! But how ?

This is what we have heard:

What man/ woman/child is there who desires life and loves many days, that he may see good? -Psalms 34:12
Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. -Psalms 34:13
Turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it. -Psalms 34:14

Let us keep our tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit. Let us turn away from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue the Lord’s peace.

God bless you all.
 
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RedPonyDriver

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OP - time to go. You can forgive from a distance. Remember the part about "husbands cherish your wives" in Ephesians 5? Yeah, he's not holding up his end of the marriage covenant.
The person who is telling you to stay is crazy...and is instrumental in the continuing domestic violence with no consequence we see in the Christian community.
 
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