Here is a link to my article at Light for Dark Times entitled “Oh, How Forgiving the Hypocrite is – A Picture from Mr. Pecksniff.” Pecksniff is a character in Charles Dickens’ great novel – Martin Chuzzelwit. Pecksniff’s name is synonymous with “hypocrite.” One of Pecksniff’s tactics is to pronounce his “forgiveness,” insisting that not he, but YOU are the guilty party. Yet, so saintly and pious is Pecksniff and his kind that in spite of the terrible wrongs YOU have inflicted upon him, he forgives you.
Author: Jeff Crippen Page 10 of 85
Rom 16:18 For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive.
Why would someone use “smooth talk and flattery” on you? Deceiving words? Why? Paul warns us that it is because they are out to feed their own wicked appetites (lusts). In other words, they just want to use you to feed themselves. Abusers are users. RASNS are users.
Now, when one of these kind is using the one they have flattered and deceived, all seems to be well UNTIL their target is no longer any use to them. You can’t use a useless thing. And a used person becomes useless to the user when, for a number of possible reasons, they are no longer useful for feeding the RASN’s evil ego.
One reason might be that the one being used has started to realize what is going on. Or, another, that the person being used has undergone some type of change – economic, social standing, etc – which renders them of no value in the user’s eyes. As, for instance, a Christian grows in Christ and becomes increasingly hated by the world, they certainly are not going to be someone whose relationship adds to the world’s esteem of the user. That is why these kinds of relationships often end in a split second. The one used didn’t even see it coming. But you can be sure that the user did. Done. Over. Get lost.
You see this in the Lord Jesus’ experience:
Joh 6:65-66 And he said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.” (66) After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.
Abusers are users (and losers!). Revilers, abusers, narcissists, sociopaths – they all use people. There is no love in them. There is never any real friendship. So don’t be surprised when these kind toss you away like a worn out sock. Just keep right on following Christ and be glad you are no longer deceived by a deceiver.
This Psalm (121) is short, but it contains some of the most encouraging and powerful promises to be found in Scripture for Christ’s people. Here it is:
A Song of Ascents. I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot be moved; he who keeps you will not slumber. Behold, he who keeps Israel will neither slumber nor sleep.
The LORD is your keeper; the LORD is your shade on your right hand. The sun shall not strike you by day, nor the moon by night.
The LORD will keep you from all evil; he will keep your life. The LORD will keep your going out and your coming in from this time forth and forevermore.
(Psa 121:1-8)
Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.
(Rom 12:12)
Many of you have written to me and shared your stories of past and present suffering at the hands of an abuser. I greatly appreciate the privilege of being someone with whom you can share. Often, when I hear of the intense and prolonged trials abuse victims endure, I find myself wishing I could do more to help. I suspect many of you have experienced this wish as well.
Wicked, abusing, narcissistic people create horribly tangled webs of deceit, lies, accusations, civil and even criminal court actions, court filings battling for custody of children simply because the abuser must win. How is this web to be untangled? Many of these persecuting machines go on and on and on. What is our hope?
Help is to be found through becoming wise about evil, to learn about the mentality of entitlement and the abuser’s quest for power and control. To wake up to the weapons these evil people use against us. To get straightened out in respect to all the false, supposed “biblical” doctrines which keep abuse victims in abuse. We can find help in learning about trauma and its effects.
But in the end, what is our certain and ultimate hope? What is the real, final remedy? Where can we go for rescue that will never fail? Because unless we can find a Deliverer who will never fail us, who will with certainty one day put an end to this evil and make us free, there is no real hope. Who is that Deliverer? He is, of course, the Lord Jesus Christ.
It is very easy for us who have wised up to the evil of abuse, especially as it hides under a disguise of “Christian,” and creeps about in our churches, it is easy I say to forget Christ. To forget our real message of hope – to preach Christ and Him crucified. To set our hope and aim upon Him and His salvation. If we forget Christ, if we forget to keep our eyes upon Him, if we fail to point people to the perfect redemption to be found only in Him, then we are doing no more than applying a temporary salve to injured people. And the danger of this, of proceeding down a “therapeutic” path which leaves the real Therapist outside, is that we will only “help” people to remain in victimhood. Never showing them how to be ultimately free. We will fail to do what Bunyan’s character “Evangelist” did when Christian came out of the City of Destruction crying out, “what must I do to be saved?” Evangelist pointed Christian to that little gate off in the distance. He pointed Christian to Christ.
Knowing Christ is our only real hope. Putting our trust in Him and believing His promises to protect us from enemies “behind and before,” and to one day bring us safely home where evil abusers will never be seen again, there is the real thing. More and more and more I am realizing that the real therapy, the real help and hope for us is to be found in the Word of God. Therein we find Christ and this great and certain promise:
What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised—who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom 8:31-39)
Rom 16:17-18 I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. (18) For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive.
I have been naïve in my life more often than I would like to admit to myself. Smooth talk and flattery have duped me until, I hope, I have finally learned. In my 40 years as a pastor, these smooth-talker-flatterers have come along quite often and in the end, caused immense pain and harm in the church. They cause division. They work to gain a following for themselves and thus lead people away from Christ and His true people. They rise to lofty position in the church.
And then, when they have the power and control handed to them, they show themselves to be the demagogues that they are.
I could tell you many stories about these kind who I have experienced and been harmed by, and I suspect many of you could tell your stories too. Let me give you a scenario which I will draw from several cases which I have seen.
Here comes, let’s say, Larry. Larry has heard that a new pastor has come to the small church in his community, or perhaps even a brand new church is being started. So there is Larry one Sunday morning with his family. Everyone is pleased to see some new faces and afterward Larry is sooo excited. The sermon was soooo spot on and biblical – nothing like the old church he came from. And it turns out that Larry is a bit of a figure in the community. A professional in a respected career. “My wife and I are eager to help. Just let us know how we can.”
Before long, Larry is a mover and shaker in the church. He volunteers for the treasurer position. He has community contacts. Need something done – just call Larry.
But no one has ever really talked to Larry about the Christian life he professes, other than to hear him say that he is a Christian. Things have been rushed. Adequate time has not passed for Larry to be tested and his profession of Christ to be observed. It isn’t long before Larry has a bit of a following in the congregation. “What does Larry think,” becomes a common phrase to hear. Larry even volunteers to put his name on the line as a co-signer for a building project mortgage, and Larry’s reputation takes a big leap ahead.
But then comes the day of reckoning. Larry and a few of his loyalists come to a church board meeting and express “concern” over the pastor’s preaching. “It is our job and your job as a board to be certain that the members of this church hear sermons that they want to hear.” (That very statement was one which “Larry” actually stated as an attack against me at a board meeting).
Now I shall speak in the first person. In response to Larry’s evil takeover plan to control the church and me as the pastor, I announced – “I have been preaching just like I always have, and no one is going to dictate the sermons I preach. I will preach God’s Word and I will not compromise.”
And here is one of my main points and one which most of you will be able to identify with because I suspect it happened to you. Not one single person on that church board backed me up. Not one. After the meeting a couple of them came to me and said “we agree with you, pastor.” Oh, really? Then why did you not stand with me in the meeting? Crickets.
It was not long before the Lord made it plain that He was going to take us out of that false church and lead us to a new ministry. What of Larry? Well, to this day – over 30 years later, Larry is still running the show. Larry is just the greatest, you know.
This is the very kind of person the Apostle Paul is warning us about – these smooth talking flatterers who creep in among us. We must be wise to them, but that wisdom so often comes through hard and painful experience. One day Larry will be called to account and his smooth talking flattery will be of no avail to him.
2Ti 4:14-15 Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm; the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. (15) Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message.
**RASN = Reviler, abuser, sociopath, narcissist
And this second thing you do. You cover the LORD’s altar with tears, with weeping and groaning because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. (Malachi 2:13)
I have written on this subject before but it is such a prevalent tactic of the RASN (reviler, abuser, sociopath, narcissist) that it bears repeating often.
Anyone who has experienced the abuse meted out by a RASN knows that we could make quite a long list of the sins and evils the RASN is guilty of. No empathy. Projection. Gaslighting. Minimizing. And on the list could go. Their slate of sins is lengthy.
However, when a RASN accuses their victim of one supposed wrong done to the RASN, suddenly it is as if the RASN’s list of crimes was one of those old “etch-a-sketch” toys that you just shake and all the writing goes away. Magic. In other words, the victim is required to regard the RASN’s slate as clean. Nothing on it is to be brought up. The ONLY “crime” to be considered is the one thing the victim is being accused of. That is to say, RASNs don’t admit to any guilt or wrongdoing. It is always the victim’s fault.
The RASN, having appointed himself judge and jury, regards himself as the arbiter who has the right to define what is going to be discussed in his courtroom and what is not admissible. Another way of describing this evil business is that RASNs, as they exercise illegal power and control, are a law unto themselves. They can do whatever they want to do and they insist that they are justified in doing so.
One way to see that you are being abused in this manner is to ask yourself, “am I always the one who is wrong?” “Is it always my fault?” Because this is a mark of a toxic relationship. It’s always your fault. Now, we are none of us perfect, but the probability that in every single scenario WE are the ones who are wrong, is pretty slim. I recommend ending any relationship, if possible, in which “it” is always your fault.
Joh 8:31-32 So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; (32) and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.”
This is a topic I have written about before, but it is also a topic which bears repeating. Perpetual victimhood is a trap that people who have been the target of evil, perpetrated by a RASN (reviler, abuser, sociopath, narcissist) can be trapped by. Perpetual victimhood will make a slave of a victim and even morph the, into the shape of the very one who abused them. Perpetual victims, in other words, can to one degree or another become abusive people themselves.
You may have come across such people. While every survivor of narcissistic abuse, for instance, experiences certain “trigger” scenarios which set off unpleasant emotions and in a sense “re-traumatize,” as time goes along – especially if the survivor is a real Christian – as time goes along, the Lord’s healing is at work. A Christian experiences the love of God and increasingly grows in believing the Lord’s promises. Promises, for instance, to one day deal with the wicked, to one day once and for all put an end to all suffering and crying and pain and evildoers. These truths are freedom! The truth really does set us free.
But where an abuse victim chooses to remain a victim, where victims do not believe in or focus upon the truth of God’s Word, this nasty business of perpetual victimhood can put down its roots.
Have you ever been around a perpetual victim? Just as they once had to walk on eggshells around their abuser, so now everyone around them must walk on eggshells, lest the trigger get pulled. Such people are angry, angry people who lash out at anyone who says or does something which they deem “insensitive.”
This is not a path any of us should go down. A choice to do so will erode and destroy any new relationship. I once had the unpleasant experience of knowing such a person. She was an angry, bitter, and yes…abusive person. Years earlier she had been in a marriage that was a disaster. But years later she had allowed herself to become what she once was the victim of. Her adult son told me one day “my mother is an angry, bitter person, but….” and what he went on to tell me is that myself and everyone else had better walk on eggshells around her and never rebuke her for her sin toward others. This lady had everyone in her circle enslaved and fearful lest they trigger her and set her off.
Christ sets us free. That lady did not know Christ, though she claimed to be a Christian. But her fruit evidenced that she was not. She had chosen to be a perpetual victim….and indeed, she became a perpetual victim of her own doing.
Psa 26:5 I hate the assembly of evildoers, and I will not sit with the wicked.
Does that statement seem harsh to you? Like overkill? I hate evildoers. They are wicked. Overboard, perhaps? But then, this is the Word of God. God Himself hates evildoers and the wicked.
Have you ever been struck with the realization that you tend to minimize evil that is done to you? In particular, when the perpetrator is a friend or supposed loved one? Can you look back over the years and now realize how you perhaps made excuses for that behavior? You realized it was wrong, but the full nastiness of the thing was not something you really comprehended.
I think this is a tendency in us, and probably even more so if we are a Christian. We don’t enjoy thinking the worst. We don’t think like an evildoer thinks. But then comes a kind of awakening moment – often quite a long time after the wrong done to us and it strikes us – “that was really wicked what he/she did to me.”
It seems to me that this may well help explain why we tolerate a RASN (reviler, abuser, sociopath, narcissist) for as long as we do. We don’t grasp the real evil of the evil. For myself, I have seen this in my own experience. Suddenly perhaps even years later a realization will strike. Not because I am embittered or looking for vengeance, but simply because I think the Holy Spirit shows it to me and I come to see the sinfulness of that sin.
It is very evil to revile someone. It is very evil to abuse someone to gain power and control. It is very, very evil to wrong someone repeatedly and have no conscience about doing so. It is incredibly wrong to function as a narcissist, insisting that you are entitled and superior to others. The Lord hates it. He sees it perfectly for what it is.
Go Here to read my latest post by this title at Light for Dark Times –
2Pe 2:22 What the true proverb says has happened to them: “The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire.”
As most of you know, I always tell abuse victims these two things: 1)Abusers never change, and 2) A marriage to an abuser does not need to be fixed, it needs to be ended. The wolves howl and protest loudly, accusing me of denying the “gospel.” According to their gospel, no one is ever beyond repentance and salvation. “My God is bigger than that. He can save anyone.”
That of course is false. God cannot save everyone. He cannot because His holiness will never be compromised by saving an unrepentant person. God cannot save Esau, for whom repentance was impossible. God cannot save the devil. God cannot save Pharaoh. He cannot save the apostate of Hebrews 6:4-6 –
Heb 6:4-6 For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, (5) and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, (6) and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt.
“Christian” abusers and RASNs (revilers, abusers, sociopaths, narcissists) are not your “typical” sinner. The old mantra “but we are all sinners” is a simplistic denial of the biblical truth that some kinds of sinners are more wicked than others. More hardened. You were born, like I was, into this world as a sinner in need of Christ. As much as we walked according to the course of this world and in agreement with the kingdom of darkness, I doubt that any of you were as evil as Ted Bundy or some other serial killer psychopath. You weren’t a Hitler.
Ted Bundy’s don’t change. Hitlers don’t change. If you want to know what they are going to do, just look at what they have been doing. And so it is with the domestic abuser. They sometimes even weep and wail when the consequences of their sin come down upon them and they are about to lose the power and control they lust for, but it all remains what it always has been and always will continue to be – just another tactic to keep power, control, and mastery over their target.
Let’s extrapolate further. Hell is going to be populated. There is a Lake of Fire in which all the wicked will one day be cast and where they will be tormented day and night forever and ever. Is there any indication in Scripture (in spite of the false Roman Catholic doctrine of Purgatory) that the Lake of Fire will effect repentance in even one of its inhabitants? Think about this. If ANYTHING should be able to “change” someone and effect their repentance, would you not think 10,000 years in the Lake of Fire would do it?
But it won’t. No one cast into the Lake of Fire will ever repent. They will weep and wail about themselves and how they are suffering so. In other words, they will continue to do what they have always done. Forever.
So don’t be drawn in by the false guilting of an abuser who claims to have changed. Who says he/she is oh so sorry. Who displays “fruit” of change. The whole thing is a sham meant to keep you right where you are – in abuse.