So many times, when the abused seek counseling at church, they’re advised to reconcile. When they walk away, people suggest they are not good at reconciliation when, in fact, they are pros at it. They’ve reconciled thousands of times. When counselors suggest this, they’re asking the abused to do something they’ve done thousands of times. The resistance comes from them knowing that it won’t work. It will seem like it’s working, but it just continues the cycle.
As soon as reconciliation becomes the sole focus of counseling, they immediately regret reaching out for help because their situation is being misunderstood. They’ve just been told the solution is to keep living in the cycle of destruction. Asking for help just gave them another battle to fight. They often don’t have the emotional energy to defend themselves.
The problem is that they don’t have the solution either. Many victims are trauma bonded from an abusive childhood and the treatment has been normalized. All they know is that they are struggling, it keeps getting worse no matter what they try, and it’s becoming more than they can handle. When their attempts at getting help fail, this is a dangerous situation and usually when a victim begins to unravel and consider another way of desperate escape.
What they need to know is what real repentance is and that an apology without true change is manipulation. They need to be told that they are being deceived and abused. They need to learn how to fight the spiritual warfare and take care of themselves.
God’s Word doesn’t tell us to reconcile with the darkness. He came as the True Light to separate the light from the darkness and overcome it through His death and resurrection. If you want to help survivors, avoid focusing on reconciliation as a solution, help them separate from evil, and hold the manipulator accountable. Most likely, no one has stood with them or fought for them their entire lives. Just siding with them and being gentle with them will teach them more about their value than you will ever know.
For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure, or who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not become partners with them; for at one time you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of light is found in all that is good and right and true), and try to discern what is pleasing to the Lord. Take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. – Ephesians 5:5-12
The salvation of the righteous is from the Lord; he is their stronghold in the time of trouble. The Lord helps them and delivers them; he delivers them from the wicked and saves them, because they take refuge in him. – Psalm 37:39-40
Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked. – Psalm 82:4
