Intimate Partner Violence: Healthy Steps You Must Take
SOURCE: Adapted from an article from the American Association of Christian Counselors
Provide for your Safety
Ensuring your safety (and that of any children involved) is always the first priority. You must take steps to separate from your abuser if necessary.
Have a Plan
Develop a plan for the next time abuse occurs. Be sure that you have numbers to call — police, a family shelter or hotline, and a trusted friend or counselor. If you decide to leave, where will you go? Who will you call? Have bags with essentials packed and in an easily accessible location so you and the children can leave quickly if needed. You should photocopy important documents and have them packed as well. You should think through how you can access money, car keys, and the important documents if you do need to leave suddenly.
If you need to leave at some point after an abusive incident, no argument or discussion with the abuser should happen at this point. You should calmly exit and go to a location you have predetermined with the people at that location. Do not hesitate to seek out expert consultation in this very serious and complicated problem.
Follow Up
As a victim of Intimate Partner Violence, seek continued help.
Be Reassured
Abuse is never deserved but is always wrong. A spouse’s role in a marriage never includes the right to manipulatively control or abuse another person.
Assess Relationships
Assess how much support you have and be encouraged to reach out to others for help. Have supportive family members join the effort. A victim of abuse is often isolated, both out of shame about the situation and the abuser’s need to control.
Biblical Insights
Yet your father has deceived me and changed my wages ten times, but God did not allow him to hurt me. Genesis 31:7
Trust involves being trustworthy and being willing to trust another. Originally Jacob fled from home because he had deceived his brother (Gen. 27:41–43); here he fled because he had been deceived by his father-in-law. Violated trust can destroy relationships. How much better to build a bond of trust with those closest to us.
And Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly together before the rock; and he said to them, “Hear now, you rebels! Must we bring water for you out of this rock?” Then Moses lifted his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod; and water came out abundantly, and the congregation and their animals drank. Numbers 20:10–11
Moses reacted in anger, and it cost. Anger can be the most damaging of all emotions, causing people to say or do things they regret. Out-of-control anger can ruin friendships and marriages and even cause nations to go to war. Some people end up living forever with the consequences of choices made in a moment of heated anger. People who struggle with destructive anger must find help to discover alternative ways to manage it. This begins by turning it over to God.
Then [Abimelech] went to his father’s house at Ophrah and killed his brothers, the seventy sons of Jerubbaal, on one stone. But Jotham the youngest son of Jerubbaal was left, because he hid himself. Judges 9:5
The tragic story of Abimelech pictures extreme violence used for selfish reasons. This illegitimate son of Gideon and a concubine (Judg. 8:29–31) brought disaster on the rest of Gideon’s family. Violence and murder became his way of dealing with all threats to his power (9:22–49). In the end, however, his violent ways resulted in his own destruction (vv. 50–56).
And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord. Ephesians 6:4
Parents ought to be careful in their training and discipline not to provoke their children “to wrath.” In other words, sometimes a parent’s discipline can be overly harsh, unfair, unloving, or irresponsible, causing children to become angry, discouraged, and resentful. Parents who discipline fairly, consistently, and lovingly are raising their children well.
Fathers, do not provoke your children, lest they become discouraged. Colossians 3:21
Although children are commanded to obey their parents, this does not give parents permission to be cruel or unreasonable in their treatment of their children. Parents who nag, belittle, or deride their children destroy their self-esteem and discourage them.
The purpose of parental discipline is to train children. Consistent discipline, administered with love, will help children grow into responsible adults. The hard and unvarnished truth is that violence doesn’t resolve anything, and ultimately leads to more violence.
Not only does a violent person fail to gain control, but he or she loses the person who would have loved him or her.
