Debunking Lies the Church Told Me | As the "Head" He's Entitled to Control and Abuse
- nolesserlife
- Apr 29
- 14 min read
My Story
During the course of my marriage there were so many incidents of being undermined, overruled and ridiculed by my ex-husband, usually with our children as witnesses, that I lost count. There were also many times that I wanted to do something that would help me to develop spiritually or professionally where he purposely thwarted, sabotaged, harassed or otherwise worked to oppress me. While I certainly did not always respond to these abusive tactics with the strength and maturity that I have now, whenever I turned to the Church for help and advice as to how to handle these issues, all of the advice that I was given had one overarching theme: I had said “I do” and so he had the right to control me and our children.
It was his right to make decisions or not make them, to have everything his way, to have physical, sexual, mental, emotional and financial access to me no matter how he was treating me. He had the right to undo anything I had done, even if he had refused or neglected to participate in the decision making process beforehand. Basically, I should cater and kowtow to whatever his demands were, even if he had not considered me or the kids in his choices, and even if he had none of the information to make the decision because he refused to ask any questions or listen to me when I tried to share relevant information.
Here are a few direct quotes I was given by different Christian advisors over the years:
Regarding sex: "Give it to him when he wants it.”
I was also told to have sex with him even if he had been mistreating or ignoring me and the issue hadn’t been resolved. “Just tell him, ‘I’m going to put this on the back burner so we can “enjoy” each other’, but I still want to talk about this.” This advice ignores the fact that you cannot “enjoy” someone who is using you, and "later" never comes with an abuser.
“You need to let him know that you’d live in a pigpen with him.” This was in response to him refusing to agree to move our five person family out of a two bedroom house, or even remodel it to accommodate everyone, even though we could afford to do so.
“Just follow, no matter if he’s leading or not.”
“Pray for him.”
“Own your part, even if it’s just one percent.” This advice was always offered as a way to get me to find something that I could ask forgiveness for, so that he never had to be accountable for his actions or be the first to ask forgiveness. Which meant he rarely apologized and only asked forgiveness if I asked first, so there was no meaning behind it at all.
“Give him grace.” This was in response to my question to a “counselor” who was seeing my ex separately, with regard to his constantly badgering and haranguing me about offenses, real and imagined that had occurred literally a decade prior. The sentiment was that I could not place boundaries on how he was treating me in the present due to his choice to keep rehashing old offenses, even if they were imaginary, because that wouldn’t be giving him grace. But if I brought up things that had happened in the past that were STILL HAPPENING, then I was promptly told to let them go and forgive. No grace, or change, required on his part.
“When he tells you something ask yourself if he’s right. The way he delivers the message doesn’t matter.” Funny, the bible doesn’t agree at all that how something is said doesn’t matter. (See James 3:5–10 and Ephesians 4:29).
“If the house is on fire, and you can only get him or the kids out, he needs to know that you’d choose him.” Only a narcissist would want this. No self-respecting parent of either sex would think this way.
“The bible says submit to your husband, not to submit to him if he’s good or if he’s right. Just do what he says and God will work it out because you’re being obedient to your husband.” This is complete trash and the path that countless women have trod as they followed their husbands straight to hell. These are the same people that will tell you that no man should ever listen to any woman because Adam got into trouble for listening to Eve, but the remedy isn’t that now wives should do whatever their husbands say to do. The remedy is that husbands and wives should do what GOD says to do. Adam and Eve each listened to someone else and got into trouble for the same reason, that they didn’t obey GOD.
According to the Church, I needed to turn off my eyes, ears and brain and blindly follow his lead, even if he wasn’t leading. I was never to ask questions or challenge anything. I was just to do whatever he wanted, give in to whatever he wanted and smile sweetly.
The problem is- that was NEVER me. God didn't wire me that way. And quite frankly I have never personally met a woman who was naturally wired that way. He didn’t create me to be a doormat. He created me to be an ezer kenegdo. If you don’t know what that is, check out my previous blog titled Debunking Lies the Church Told Me – Created to be His “Helper”.
So, effectively I was being told to become a lesser version of myself, to shrink down and pretend to be someone that I wasn't. My difficulty with this could sound like pride, until you reflect on the fact that Jesus encouraged His disciples in Matthew 5:13-16 that they were salt and light, and not to lose their saltiness or hide their light.
The Church, over and over again, made sure to let me know that a Christian wife never challenges her husband to be a better version of himself. That he is not to be held accountable by anyone, including the pastors and elders of the church. I literally had a pastor's wife tell me, after sitting in a counseling session with my husband and hers, that it was not their place to challenge whether or not he was actually a believer. According to her they couldn’t question him about how he lived out his faith in order to prove his claim of following Christ. I was aghast. If not those in leadership then whose place is it to challenge one who claims he's in the faith? Especially if his wife, who lives with him day in and day out, is not allowed to challenge or call him out?
The teaching from the churches never addressed what to do when there was conflict, physical or sexual abuse, verbal or emotional abuse, or any kind of oppression in the home, other than to issue platitudes to me about forgiveness, submitting more and praying harder. Though it should be noted here that due to the covert nature of the abuse I endured, I never called it out as such, I called it control. But even then they never called it abuse either, and made it clear that they believed he had a right to control me, after all I had picked him. However, as any woman who's been in the clutches of a covert controller knows, the man you got was definitely not the one you picked. The one you picked was who he pretended to be, for however long he pretended to be that guy, to get you to marry him or otherwise become ensnared by him.
Whatever went wrong in our home it was always on me. If I tried to establish family routines to make the kids feel safe and supported and he refused to participate, then I had given up too easily. But if I pushed and kept at him, then they said I was nagging, being contentious or trying to control him!
If he refused to speak to me, or cursed me out whenever I brought up finances, attending services with the family, or any of the problems in the marriage, and I responded in kind- with anger, yelling, cursing, and giving him the silent treatment- or withholding sex, (I mean, who wants to open herself up to someone who’s harming her?) then the focus of any counseling was ALWAYS on my reaction and not his behavior that had contributed to it.
The thing that these Christian lay-people never seemed able to discern was the heart of the issue. Because his goal was to control, there was no scenario in which any response of mine was going to deescalate the situation. Abusers abuse because they want to, not because they're provoked. A woman can literally ask a man if he wants lunch and be just as viciously attacked as if she had launched a verbal assault on him. Telling a woman that she needs to back down, be sweet and answer with a soft voice so the rage and abuse he’s hurling at her doesn’t escalate, is actually setting her up to believe that she can and should manage his emotions, which is exactly what the abuser wants in the first place.
A show of anger and aggression is meant to silence you and ensure that the abuser never has to change his behavior because a) you’ll have to deal with his abuse and b) if you react to his behavior at all, badly or otherwise, then you're just as much to blame for the problems as he is. By the end of my marriage I was able to respond with perfect calmness to verbal attacks from my ex and he still accused me of trying to "punish" him or "control" him. I was told by a mentor once that refusing to let him control me, while not attempting to tell him what to do, was still me "wanting to be in control".
Abusers purposely create a dynamic where no matter what you do you’re in the wrong, and the Church, assuming that both parties are just "sinners" who both need to change, miss the fact that they are being manipulated more often than not, to the detriment and destruction of countless women and children. Oppressors are not interested in changing, they are interested in controlling others. They are not seeking the good of their families. They are wolves, very often in sheep’s clothing.
As a person who has no desire to manipulate and control others, the advice that I should be sweeter, kinder and gentler so as to be able to persuade him into doing whatever he needed to do didn't sit right with me. I didn't want to trick or guile my spouse into doing the right things for our family, I wanted him to do what was right because it was right.
I'm not the sort of woman who is remotely motivated by guile and artifice. I don't want to convince a man that my idea was his; I want him to hear my idea, weigh it with an open mind and wisdom, either agree or disagree and then be able to articulate why, as well as what he thinks would work better. It was all so exhausting.
Except for advocating for forgiveness, which is a requirement of all believers and is backed by irrefutable scripture, all of the marital advice I received from the Church was terrible, and of course none of it ever worked, (even though I tried and tried for decades), because a heart that hates cannot be placated, no matter how much of your soul you sacrifice to it. Psalm 120:6-7 (NIV) says "Too long have I lived among those who hate peace. I am for peace, but when I speak, they are for war."
If you are always in a cycle of confusion, anxiety and anger, feeling overwhelmed and frustrated because of his pattern of hurtful words and actions, you are being abused. If you are being ridiculed, undermined, overruled and otherwise disrespected in front of your children and others, you are being abused. If you are financially vulnerable or in the dark because of choices your spouse is making, despite your best efforts to gain information and clarity, you are being abused. If you are being coerced, lied to, manipulated, guilted, physically harmed (this includes not only slapping or punching, but squeezing, pinching, shoving, kicking and so forth), then you are being abused.
If you're being iced out, also called stonewalling or the silent treatment, for days or weeks at a time, humiliated or threatened, or abandoned for any period of time, then you are being abused. If you are being sexually attacked or coerced, if things you have not consented to are happening in your bedroom, or you have literally said "no" and were physically forced or harassed all night until you “gave in”, this is marital rape and you are being abused. If violence or sexual harm has been threatened against your children, you are being abused and you need to get your babies to safety immediately.
Christ-Centered Headship is Never About Power and Control
While my ex never technically "hit" me, he did hurt me physically, but as noted above, physical abuse is not the only kind of harm that can be done to a woman in an intimate relationship. Coming from a family of women, with a long history of domestic abuse in the home, it still took me fifteen years to realize what was happening to me, because I had only been trained up to recognize one kind of harm. It took me another five years after that to finally leave. In all those years, not one person in the Church ever questioned or recognized what was happening to me. The people of God cannot afford to be so blind and uninformed.
Ephesians 5:23 and 1 Corinthians 11:3 had been thrown in my face many times over the years, as they have been for most Christian wives, but what the Lord taught me about those verses is this- if the head of every man is Christ and the husband is head of the wife as Christ is Head of the church, then men and husbands should be conducting themselves in every way AS CHRIST DOES. If they are not conducting themselves as Christ-followers, but as Gentiles, and infidels outside of the faith, then they have no claim to headship and authority in the Church or in a Christian home!
Below are several verses describing Christ’s headship and how He wields authority in the Church and in His interactions with women and children.
Scripture References for Study & Reflection
Christ as Head of the Church
Ephesians 1:22-23 — God placed all things under Christ's feet and appointed Him head over everything for the church, which is His body.
Ephesians 5:23 — "For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, His body, of which He is the Savior."
Colossians 1:18 — "And He is the Head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything He might have the supremacy."
Colossians 2:10 — "And in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority."
Christ as Servant to His Disciples
Mark 10:45 — "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life as a ransom for many."
John 13:4-5 — Jesus rose from supper, laid aside His outer garments, took a towel, and began washing His disciples' feet.
John 13:14-15 — "Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you."
Luke 22:27 — "For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one who is at the table? But I am among you as One who serves."
Philippians 2:7 — Christ "made Himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness."
Christ’s Treatment of Children
Matthew 19:14 — "Let the little children come to Me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."
Mark 9:36-37 — He took a little child and placed the child among them. "Whoever welcomes one of these little children in My name welcomes Me."
Mark 10:16 — "And He took the children in his arms, placed His hands on them and blessed them."
Luke 9:48 — "Whoever welcomes this little child in My name welcomes Me; and whoever welcomes Me welcomes the One who sent Me."
Christ’s Treatment of Women
John 2:1–11 - When the wine ran out, Mary told Jesus, "They have no more wine." Jesus turned six stone water jars of water into wine — His first recorded miracle — honoring His mother's intercession.
John 4:7-26 — Jesus spoke openly with the Samaritan woman at the well — crossing cultural, ethnic, and gender barriers — and revealed Himself to her as the Messiah.
John 8:10-11 — To the woman caught in adultery, Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you. Go now and leave your life of sin." He refused to shame her.
Luke 7:11-17 — Seeing a widow who had lost her only son, Jesus had compassion on her and raised her son from the dead, giving him back to her.
Luke 8:43-48 — A woman had suffered from bleeding for 12 years. Not only did she suffer physically, but she was ostracized as unclean. When she sees Jesus, she tells herself, "If I just touch His clothes, I will be healed," and instantly she is. Jesus then turns to her publicly and says, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace." He publicly approved of her and restored her dignity.
John 11:1–44 — When Lazarus died, Jesus wept with his sisters Mary and Martha in their grief. He then raised Lazarus from the dead.
Luke 7:36–50 — A woman in the city who was a sinner, having learned Jesus was eating in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster jar of ointment and anointed His feet. After forgiving her sins, Jesus said, "Your faith has saved you; go in peace."
Luke 8:1–3 — The women who followed Jesus had all been miraculously helped by Him — Mary Magdalene (from whom seven demons had been cast out), Joanna the wife of Chuza, and Susanna, plus many others who supported his ministry out of their own means.
Luke 10:38-42 — Jesus affirmed Mary sitting at His feet as a disciple, defending her right to learn.
Luke 13:10–17 — Jesus cures a woman who had been crippled for 18 years, laying hands on her in the Temple and saying, "Woman, you are set free of your infirmity." When the synagogue ruler objected that it was the Sabbath, Jesus defended her publicly.
Mark 7:24–30 / Matthew 15:21–28 — A Gentile woman begged Jesus to heal her demon-possessed daughter. Jesus commended her persistence and great faith, and her daughter was healed from that very hour.
Mark 12:41–44 / Luke 21:1–4 — Jesus watched a poor widow drop two small coins into the temple treasury and called His disciples over to honor her, saying she had given more than all the rich, "for she gave out of her poverty everything she had."
John 20:14-16 — Jesus appeared and spoke first to Mary Magdalene after His resurrection, entrusting a woman with the most important news in history.
As I began to heal, I often reflected on the many ways that my own lack of knowledge and willingness to listen to the advice of men, rather than God had robbed me of growth and intimacy with the Lord- times of fasting, prayer, communion with other believers and study that could have been mine and SHOULD have been at the forefront of my life as a believer. I learned the hard way that there is no substitute for seeking the truth in the Word for yourself and trusting the Holy Spirit within you to guide you. Psalm 119:133 says, (NLT), “Guide my steps by Your word, so I will not be overcome by evil”. I encourage you to pray this for yourself as well.
If you have done all you know to do to save your marriage and still nothing has changed, or things are getting worse, it’s time to realize that you may be listening to the wrong counsel and God will not bless anything that is contrary to His word.
People are often wrong. They may not have bad intentions (although some do want you to suffer as they suffer), but listening to them can put you and your children in a worse position if you listen to them against the prompting of the Holy Spirit within you. Christ-centered headship is not about control and abuse of the other. It is self-sacrificing service, as evidenced by Christ's actions in the verses above.
If you’re tired of going to counselor after counselor, begging, pleading, placating your spouse, trying to change every little thing about yourself based on his supposed needs (which are really just selfish demands); if you’re tired of diminishing and degrading yourself, becoming a version of yourself you never imagined you could be and maybe even despise; if you’re sick of hurting due to abuse and neglect and watching your babies be hurt through abuse and neglect as well, it’s time to do something different.
Click the links below for resources that will help you to gain clarity and move toward safety and strength.
That’s all for today sisters and survivors. I’m here to remind you that you were bought with a price, paid for by Christ, so choose to live no lesser life than the one God put inside you.
If you'd like to have your story of healing shared in an upcoming blog post, please click here to submit your story. Let me know your thoughts in the comments and stay safe and sane in the Lord until next time!
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