staying in a marriage where spouse is violent on a regular basis?

[Daniel Marsh]

Super post! One thing you might want to give advice on, too. What if there are children and he is going to want to have visitation rights and they could be in danger in some ways? How can she document things he has done that make him unfit to be alone with them, and keep her children safe?

Medical Records, Sworn Statements by brave neighbors, Police reports.

 

[Daniel Marsh]

Your spouse's violence toward you is a breach of his marriage vows before God. He has broken the contract therefore the marriage is no longer binding. The only way this marriage can be saved is that he needs to renew his vow to love and protect you and then keep that vow for the rest of your married life. If he refuses, then you are no longer obligated to stay married to him.

As a retired Court Victim Advisor, dealing mainly with domestic violence, I have seen victims who have been terrorised and injured by violent partners and husbands. I have heard of abused wives being killed, and one of those was my client. One thing I will say is that most domestic homicides happen when the wife actually leaves. I have a friend who was knifed to death in front of her children because she left her partner and his attitude was "If I can't have her, no one will." Attached is an important article about keeping yourself safe. My suggestion is that you have a safety plan, build a support base of good friends who will give your protection and refuge and then pick your time to escape.

Don't listen to any pastor or elder who might tell you to be a better wife. Domestic violence never goes away, and in my experience, anger management programmes are not very effective. One judge remarked that most times the violent person sits down the back of the room smoking instead of taking part in a meaningful way.

Because there is no condemnation to those in Christ, God will not condemn you for walking out of a violent marriage, and so no one else should. If they try, then they are speaking against God who has lifted the guilt, fear and punishment off Christians.

Eph 5
25Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave his life for it. 26He did this to make the church holy by cleansing it, washing it using water along with spoken words. 27Then he could present it to himself as a glorious church, without any kind of stain or wrinkle-holy and without faults. 28So husbands must love their wives as they love their own bodies. A man who loves his wife loves himself. 29No one ever hated his own body. Instead, he feeds and takes care of it, as Christ takes care of the church. 30We are parts of his body. 31That's why a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and the two will be one. 32This is a great mystery. (I'm talking about Christ's relationship to the church.) 33But every husband must love his wife as he loves himself, and wives should respect their husbands.

 

[Daniel Marsh]

If he refused to change. Get out. Nothing justifies violence.

Abusers often jump back and forth from apologizing for their bad behavior, telling you what you want to hear, drink too much, then abuse again. If there is violence just get out to a safe place any Pastor who says otherwise does not really understand the problem at all.

 

[Daniel Marsh]

There is no one fix solves all problems. Yes if they think it safeer to leave they should, but the problem still has to be addressed.

Part of leaving is getting the Police and Law Enforcement involved. Let those trained to deal with him do it.

 

[Daniel Marsh]

At 9:49, in the video below, Smith Wigglesworth has a woman from New Zealand come into the meeting who was regularly beat up by her husband. This man was delivered from his evil by next meeting.

The Faith Healers [James Randi, Carl Sagan]

 

[mmksparbud]

Eph 5
25Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave his life for it. 26He did this to make the church holy by cleansing it, washing it using water along with spoken words. 27Then he could present it to himself as a glorious church, without any kind of stain or wrinkle-holy and without faults. 28So husbands must love their wives as they love their own bodies. A man who loves his wife loves himself. 29No one ever hated his own body. Instead, he feeds and takes care of it, as Christ takes care of the church. 30We are parts of his body. 31That's why a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and the two will be one. 32This is a great mystery. (I'm talking about Christ's relationship to the church.) 33But every husband must love his wife as he loves himself, and wives should respect their husbands.

You are right---that is what the marriage vows mean. When a man abuses his wife, he is breaking that covenant. Most drunks do hate themselves. Breaking the marriage vows is no less serious than adultery. We stand before God and vow to love---violence is not living up to that vow. If they choose to not live up to those vows, there is no reason to stay with them. It is their choice to behave this way and break their vows. It then becomes impossible to respect that man. She then breaks God's command to respect them. Get out until he proves you have something to respect.

I will say one thing---99% of the time, they do not change. Mine did. Why?? Because I will not tolerate violence against me and I then loose control and beat the tar out of him!!! I sent mine to jail 3 times, he had to take anger management classes 3 times. 3rd time did it. He got to fully comprehend that I will absolutely defend myself and he has suffered a considerable amount of pain in the process of learning that lesson. I was raised with 3 older brothers, --biggest 6'5"--shrimp 5'10" and worked out to look like Mr. America. They taught me to stand up for myself. I fully comprehend that I did not react in a Christian manner---like him, I would then apologize for loosing control. He decided that we really do get along when he treats me well and we are happy and it was only when he drank that he got violent. The behavior changed also as he learned to forgive the horrible things his mother did which lead him to feel absolutely no respect for women. He may have learned to respect my right fist first, but in the end he learned some respect--- and he actually thanked me for not taking his bullying and whomping on him!!! That floored me. I do not recommend this method of dealing with them!! It is a one in a million thing that did work, but I was about to leave,

 

[Hank77]

Bang, you just let him kill her. Read the Stats, I published.

Really how? Exactly what did I say that would have gotten her killed, EXACTLY.

 

[Hank77]

Abusers often jump back and forth from apologizing for their bad behavior, telling you what you want to hear, drink too much, then abuse again. If there is violence just get out to a safe place any Pastor who says otherwise does not really understand the problem at all.

I agree and too many people think this is just a problem where the spouse drinks, that isn't even close to the truth. A sociopath does not need alcohol.

 

[RaymondG]

Based on Eph 5 which I quoted today, not this early in the discussion. If one is an abuser the marriage never was vaild or took place in the first place.

25Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church and gave his life for it. 26He did this to make the church holy by cleansing it, washing it using water along with spoken words. 27Then he could present it to himself as a glorious church, without any kind of stain or wrinkle-holy and without faults. 28So husbands must love their wives as they love their own bodies. A man who loves his wife loves himself. 29No one ever hated his own body. Instead, he feeds and takes care of it, as Christ takes care of the church. 30We are parts of his body. 31That's why a man will leave his father and mother and be united with his wife, and the two will be one. 32This is a great mystery. (I'm talking about Christ's relationship to the church.) 33But every husband must love his wife as he loves himself, and wives should respect their husbands.

If one is physically abusing the other, there was not a valid marriage in the first place.

Was Sarah’s marriage to Pharaoh valid or invalid?

Matthew 19:6 ESV
So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

How does one know for sure, whom God has joined together? And, whom simply choose to be together? If two have relations without a wedding are they joined together by God or Not?

With this line of thinking, the divorce rate will double. Where is the line drawn? verbal abuse is just as damaging as physical.....So now we can say that the husband only has to say a few mean words and then the marriage isnt valid anymore.... This is a slippery slope, yet good news for many looking to find ways out of their marriages.

I, personally, dont believe the talks of married in the bible to be related to the physical marriage, but spiritual ones......so I find no fault in what anybody believes concerning the physical ones.

 

[LoricaLady]

You are right---that is what the marriage vows mean. When a man abuses his wife, he is breaking that covenant. Most drunks do hate themselves. Breaking the marriage vows is no less serious than adultery. We stand before God and vow to love---violence is not living up to that vow. If they choose to not live up to those vows, there is no reason to stay with them. It is their choice to behave this way and break their vows. It then becomes impossible to respect that man. She then breaks God's command to respect them. Get out until he proves you have something to respect.

I will say one thing---99% of the time, they do not change. Mine did. Why?? Because I will not tolerate violence against me and I then loose control and beat the tar out of him!!! I sent mine to jail 3 times, he had to take anger management classes 3 times. 3rd time did it. He got to fully comprehend that I will absolutely defend myself and he has suffered a considerable amount of pain in the process of learning that lesson. I was raised with 3 older brothers, --biggest 6'5"--shrimp 5'10" and worked out to look like Mr. America. They taught me to stand up for myself. I fully comprehend that I did not react in a Christian manner---like him, I would then apologize for loosing control. He decided that we really do get along when he treats me well and we are happy and it was only when he drank that he got violent. The behavior changed also as he learned to forgive the horrible things his mother did which lead him to feel absolutely no respect for women. He may have learned to respect my right fist first, but in the end he learned some respect--- and he actually thanked me for not taking his bullying and whomping on him!!! That floored me. I do not recommend this method of dealing with them!! It is a one in a million thing that did work, but I was about to leave,

I love it, especially about the working out part and right fist! Actually you showed him a lot of compassion by not just flat out leaving him. Just as you don't recommend that with others, I wouldn't either, though. There are some guys who would just go get a gun or something.

 

[Daniel Marsh]

boxing taught me the self control I needed for marriage and basic training in the military taught me to take orders from my wife.

 

[Anhelyna]

I would be grateful if all posters in this thread would re-read the SOP
Statement of Purpose - Christian Advice Statement of Purpose

 

[Daniel Marsh]

I would be grateful if all posters in this thread would re-read the SOP
Statement of Purpose - Christian Advice Statement of Purpose

View attachment 217627

Thank You, I thought I was only having a discussion, not a debate.
daniel

 

[look4hope]

Abusers often jump back and forth from apologizing for their bad behavior, telling you what you want to hear, drink too much, then abuse again. If there is violence just get out to a safe place any Pastor who says otherwise does not really understand the problem at all.

I agree with you. But I tend to give people at least one chance, for the better.

This situation seems like the kind of no turning back, so to the original poster...
Please leave and be safe.

 

[NothingIsImpossible]

People need to remember the rules of this forum state we are NOT allowed to advocate divorce. Its in the bible to for a reason that marriage is a sacred thing. The reason its so happily/easily used today is because people find any excuse to divorce. So no christians even use the law to their advantage to divorce someone. In my wifes country there are no laws that let you divorce. Now this does mean there are alot of people there who cheat openly. But by law they are still married.

Also someone mentioned:

If marriage was sacred why did God write divorce laws?

God did not make any divorce laws. Christian cherry pick that "verse" to fit their wanting to leave someone. Just as they cherry pick other things to fit their views. People often reference that one verse. But the thing is they take it out of context. Its a parable if you will, a story. The guys kept coming up to him saying things to see if it qualified as a reason to leave their wife. Every day they would come back up with new reasons. So eventually he gave in to them and talked about divroce. This was done to show US the readers that if a person wants something bad enough, they will do anything they can to try and get what they want. Including distorting/twisting a scripture.

Hence people are always eager to divorce because they assume marriage is some happy ever after thing and are shocked to find out its not. Thats why I urge young people who are like 18-21 NOT to marry right away. They rush into it with giddy feelings of love and don't take it seriously enough to realize its a commitment that is VERY hard at times.

 

[Daniel Marsh]

questions

 

[Daniel Marsh]

Really how? Exactly what did I say that would have gotten her killed, EXACTLY.

I think you gave her bad advice. abusive relationships based on the stats I posted get worse and too often turn deadly. That's all

 

[Daniel Marsh]

moved to questions

 

[Hank77]

I think you gave her bad advice. abusive relationships based on the stats I posted get worse and too often turn deadly. That's all

What advise did I give her that was bad advise, exactly. I need to know.

 

[All4Christ]

From the Statement of Purpose:

Christian advice is defined as advice which contains basic Christian principles that do not conflict with the site's Statement of Faith. We would ask that members direct their responses to the member who started the thread and refrain from debating one another's theological beliefs and viewpoints. Do not use this forum to debate with other Christians as that is not the purpose of the Christian Advice forum. If members would like to discuss/debate specific Christian theological doctrines, they should do so in one of the Theology forums.