Unholy Charade - Jeff Crippen

Unmasking the Domestic Abuser in the Church

Author: Jeff Crippen Page 30 of 88

Abusers/Narcissists/Sociopaths are Trespassers

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On November 21, 2022

In Abusers

I should come up with an acronym of some kind to stand for the various labels of abusers. Hmmm. ANS. But then that’s not a word. Looks like “answer.” Oh well, I’ll try it out here.

We recently had some property surveyed at our church. We changed some boundaries and now the paperwork is at the courthouse to be finalized. Boundaries. Fence lines. Borders. These things all go along with private property – or even a nation’s boundaries. Unless you are the owner, then you need permission to cross the boundary. To fail to do so makes you a trespasser.

And that is what ANS are. They are trespassers. The country they trespass on is YOU. Your person. Your identity. Your right to be who you are, to think what you think (your own thoughts), to be your own person ultimately known and owned and directed by the Lord. But these ANS trespass. They don’t respect your property lines. They climb right over your fences and do all they can to rob you of your private personhood.

  • They tell you what to think and what you are not permitted to think
  • They tell you what you can buy and what you cannot buy
  • They tell you what you can read and what you cannot read
  • They tell you what you are thinking and what your motives are
  • They dictate to you about your body
  • They tell you and tell you and tell you, and whenever you start to exercise your own property rights, they launch their attacks.

If you live with this kind of thing long enough, guess what? Well, here is an illustration. As I understand it, if you own some property and if you let a neighbor use some part of your property (let’s say a driveway) for a certain number of years, that part of your property becomes his – at least for his use. There is some legal name for that, but you get the idea.

Now, if you let an ANS trespass upon your personhood long enough, what do you suppose is going to happen to you as a person? YOU are going to fade and fade and fade until you hardly recognize yourself anymore. And this is precisely what happens to us if we permit this trespassing to go on. Which is easy to do since it is so sneaky and deceptive – you often don’t really understand what is happening.

But these wicked people, including Revilers (have to work that R in somehow), have no hesitation in trespassing this way. They do not respect your boundaries, which is just another way of saying that they do not respect your rights. That is the same thing a tyrant ruler does.

So, what we have to do is learn about this trespassing so that we can recognize these trespassers more readily and then understand that it is right and good for us to have borders/boundaries/fences and to enforce those boundaries.

As a pastor I have had to deal with these creeps many times – only I didn’t really understand what they were for a long, long time (and they can still sneak up on me if I’m not on guard). I remember one time in a church board meeting one such guy started to accuse me of “abandoning the flock” because my wife and I were able to buy our own home and would not longer be living in the parsonage next door to the church building. He never missed a chance to do this kind of thing. ANS types want to control, to have power, to have ownership and to do so they have no hesitation about trespassing upon your personal boundaries.

No one except the Lord owns us. And when He sets boundaries for us (like the Law), He does so for our own good, so we won’t perish in hell. But the wicked trespassers only want to use us for their own glory – just like their father the devil. “Stop! You are trespassing. You have no right to be where you are now. Get off my land.”

Innocent of Evil does not mean Ignorance of Evil

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On November 18, 2022

In Abusers

Be sure and go on over to our other blog (which typically posts on Fridays) and read this important post there.

Here is the link.

The Man in the Iron Cage

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On November 16, 2022

In Abusers, Evil

We are currently reading through John Bunyan’s great classic, Pilgrim’s Progress, in the first hour on Sunday mornings. You can find videos of those sessions on our Youtube channel (Light for Dark Times) and at sermonaudio.com/crc. We livestream these classes on Sunday mornings at 9:30 on both Facebook and Sermon Audio.

One of the most powerful, sobering, and memorable portions the allegory comes when Christian is in the house of the Interpreter. Interpreter gives him lessons which will serve to preserve him on the Way to the Celestial City and protect him from the many wicked ones who will try to attack and deceive him. One of those lessons is a powerful scene where Christian sees a miserable, hopeless man locked up in an iron cage. This man is an Esau for whom repentance is now impossible (see Hebrews 12). He has despised the blood of Christ, returned to his own vomit after having made a claim to be an earnest Christian, which, it turns out, he never was.

Another powerful article (or sermon) which Bunyan wrote on the same topic is titled “The Barren Fig Tree” and is an exposition upon Luke 13:6-9,

Luk 13:6-9 And he told this parable: “A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none. (7) And he said to the vinedresser, ‘Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?’ (8) And he answered him, ‘Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure. (9) Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.’”

[I plan to preach a series of sermons soon on this same text and use Bunyan’s great insights as a help. Those sermons will also be livestreamed on Sunday mornings at 11am PST and then uploaded to our same channels listed above]

Now, here is the point for this post. People who claim to be Christians, like so many of the abusers we learn about, but who never produce any good fruit which the Spirit will inevitably produce in the Christian’s life, one day reach a point at which the Lord says, “cut him down.” That is to say, the Lord is finished with him. The day of grace is over for him. He has sinned against much light repeatedly, trampled underfoot the blood of the Cross, but kept right on wallowing in the pig-sty mud of sin. He often continues to live his earthly life out, but the day of salvation will never come to him again. He is the man in the iron cage, except unlike that man, he takes delight in himself. When he departs this life however, he will find himself in that iron cage where the Lord will keep him until that Great Day when Christ comes to judge the world.

And this, I am convinced, is why we never see these “Christian” abusers repent. It is why I always say, “abusers never change” and “a marriage to an abuser does not need to be fixed, it needs to be ended.” I have known many such evil ones in these 40 years I have been a pastor, and not a single one has ever repented. They are barren fig trees, the seed that quickly sprouted (Matthew 13) but had no root. They were never born again.

When you first see the man in the iron cage revealed for what and who he really is, you feel a real jolting, confusing, shock. That evil one who has been covertly pretending, shows himself. This exposure may only be a brief flash before he puts his mask back on, or it may last longer – but it is a shock. You see this person you thought you knew for what he really is – and it can still be difficult to believe.

How many times have we actually even defended this man (or woman) to others? “He really is a godly person, he just has his glitches.” That sort of thing. But when the exposure is so blinding that we can no longer deny the evil nature that has been there all along, as I say, it is a real shock and sets your head spinning. Such is the deception of Satan who comes as an angel of light.

The Lord Does not Need a Majority

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On November 14, 2022

In Biblical Teaching, Supporting Victims

1Sa 14:6 Jonathan said to the young man who carried his armor, “Come, let us go over to the garrison of these uncircumcised. It may be that the LORD will work for us, for nothing can hinder the LORD from saving by many or by few.”

As we have all been reminded recently, to win an election we must gain a majority – and the bigger that number, the better. This is not true in regard to the Lord. When He decrees, it is done. And He delights in using the small things, the few in number, the weak things, to accomplish His works.

1Co 1:26-29 For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. (27) But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; (28) God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, (29) so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.

When we are targets of evil, we can be pretty lonesome, as most all of you know. There aren’t many allies to be found when standing with the oppressed requires paying a price. But it is in these times when we need to get our heads put on straight by the truth of God’s Word. The fact is, as it was in Luther’s day (and really always has been), the Lord does not need a mighty army to gain victory. He really doesn’t even need ONE person, though it does appear that He chooses so often to raise up one or a few to accomplish His purposes.

So, you can have the courts against you, your abuser against you, a church against you, family members against you, with hardly any (if any at all) to “have your back,” if the Lord is with you then you must put your trust in Him, believe His promises, and know that though the wicked rage against Him and His people, He who sits in the heavens laughs.

Deu 32:35-36 Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; for the day of their calamity is at hand, and their doom comes swiftly.’ (36) For the LORD will vindicate his people and have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone and there is none remaining, bond or free.

Do You Need Permission from Your Church to Divorce Your Abuser?

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On November 11, 2022

In Abusers

Here is a link to a post published today at our other blog, Light for Dark Times. It addresses the question in this headline.

How “Expository” Preaching can go Wrong

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On November 9, 2022

In Biblical Teaching

2Ti 4:1-2 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: (2) preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.

I went to a conservative seminary, conservative theologically. [I would hope it still is, but a written doctrinal statement does not necessarily mean that the doctrine is actually taught and practiced]. Seminaries and other Christian organizations seem to always drift from their original anchorage.

Like others attending such seminaries, I was taught to be sure to “preach the Word.” By that instruction was meant – “preach expositionally.” An exposition is, as the dictionary puts it, “a setting forth of the meaning or purpose” of some writing or communication. The point is that students are instructed to teach and preach the Bible by examining it carefully so as to accurately communicate the actual message God intended. The immediate (adjoining verses) and broader (the rest of the Bible) context is to be consulted so that our conclusions agree with other parts of scripture which speak to the same subject.

Now, this is all good and necessary, but in this article I want to call attention to a very common and damaging error which typically parades under the heading of “expository preaching.” Here is Jesus exposing this error:

Mat 23:23-24 “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others. (24) You blind guides, straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel!

Quite often this microscopic, gnat-straining dealing with Scripture (parsing individual words, examining original language meanings, detailed diagraming of sentences, consulting various commentaries and opinions, looking into variant readings in Greek manuscripts, etc) ends up leading us to that old error – missing the forest for the trees.

Many of you have been harmed by this very thing. Why? Because one main “forest” that is missed when the camel is swallowed while the focus in on the gnat, is “mercy.” God’s mercy. God’s faithfulness. God’s justice. In other words, the question that is so often not asked in Bible study is this – “Does the character of God agree with my findings?” “Is my application of this Scripture a conclusion that we see lived out in Jesus?”

These warnings are for the liberal as well as the conservative Bible student. “God loves and forgives everyone”?? Really? Did Jesus love and forgive anyone and everyone no matter what? Better go back to the Bible drawing board on that one. “God does not permit divorce for any reason.” Or, “God does not permit divorce for abuse – Jesus only listed adultery.” Sooo, no matter what an evil spouse does to his or her spouse, the victim is required by God to remain married, to stay enslaved in Egypt and to suffer for the Lord? “But I have carefully done a detailed word study on ‘adultery’ (“porneia”) and there is no question that my conclusions are correct. I, above any other Bible scholar, have reached the truth here and all must obey my teaching on this or be at odds with God.” Really? How does that camel taste?

And still another form of this error concerns proper application of correct results. If we fail to rightly apply what the Scripture says, then we are still not handling the Word of God correctly. This error extends from not making application at all, to creating applications that do not properly grow from the Scripture we are studying. I heard R.C. Sproul recently say toward the end of a sermon on the subject of salvation, “this means that very probably in an audience this large, some if not many of you are not born again.” That is proper application – and it tends to thin out the pews!

So, when I hear someone say “I want expository preaching,” I don’t quickly assume that we are talking about the same thing. It may be that we are dealing with a gnat strainer who is all caught up in staring at one single tree – maybe even one twig on one branch on one tree – while the forest around him is burning.

If We Confess Our Sins – but the Narcissist Will Not

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On November 7, 2022

In Abusers, Evil

1Jn 1:9-10 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (10) If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

These are very familiar verses to us and greatly encourage the real Christian. The Lord is willing to forgive us, to cleanse and wash us from the stain of our sins…if we confess our sins to Him. He faithfully forgives and He does so in full agreement with His justice…because of Christ and the Cross.

But have you ever wondered about the negative part of this Scripture – “If we say we have not sinned”? I mean, who would do that? Even the common unsaved person will, if pressed, acknowledge he or she has sinned (though they usually try to minimize the gravity of their sin). But who says “I have not sinned”?

The narcissist. The abuser. The sociopath. And if you have been the target of such people, you know very well that this is true. They are never wrong. Never to blame. It’s never their fault. YOU! You’re the one who sinned, who wronged them. In other words, as the Scripture says, they say they have not sinned. They will not confess their sin.

I have seen this in action soooo many times. Meeting with people who insist that they are eminent Christians and yet who refuse – even in meetings lasting for hours (meetings which I stopped having long ago) – they REFUSE to acknowledge their sin. So, guess what? Their sin is not forgiven by the Lord. IF we confess – but they will not confess. They are calling God (as John says) a liar. The Lord says to us “you have sinned.” But this kind of wicked person denies it – “No, God, you are wrong. I have not sinned.” “Yes you have.” “No I haven’t.”

Therefore they remain in their sins, covered with the mire of their wickedness, and if they persist in this denial (which these kind inevitably do), they will perish in their sins.

Joh 8:44-45 You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. (45) But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me.

Creeps Creep in Among Us – We Must be more Watchful

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On November 4, 2022

In Churches/Church Response, Evil

This is a link to an important post at Light for Dark Times which published this morning. I hope many of you will read it and will find it not only instructive, but validating and encouraging as well.

Creeps among us

No, Sinners are not all the same

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On November 2, 2022

In Abusers

Jud 1:4 For certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation, ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into sensuality and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ.

Jud 1:12-13 These are hidden reefs at your love feasts, as they feast with you without fear, shepherds feeding themselves; waterless clouds, swept along by winds; fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted; (13) wild waves of the sea, casting up the foam of their own shame; wandering stars, for whom the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever.

Jud 1:18-19 They said to you, “In the last time there will be scoffers, following their own ungodly passions.” (19) It is these who cause divisions, worldly people, devoid of the Spirit.

You have no doubt heard it before. “But we are all sinners. Sin is sin.” Some years ago I was explaining to a pastor and his wife what my book Unholy Charade was about and how wicked abusers pretend to be Christians, creep in among believers in the church, all the while doing their wickedness behind the scenes. The pastor and his wife responded – “but that is just another type of sin. Domestic abuse is sin and we are all sinners.” I went on to try to get them to see that is false. All sin is not the same. Some sin is more wicked than other sin. We do not all carry out the evils that the narcissitic, sociopathic, evil person performs. Yes, we are all born into this world lost, in sin, and without being born again in Christ we would perish in hell. Nevertheless, the Bible is quite plain that there are degrees of sin and degrees of hell:

Joh 19:11 Jesus answered him [ie, Pilate] “You would have no authority over me at all unless it had been given you from above. Therefore he who delivered me over to you has the greater sin.”

Luk 10:12 I tell you, it will be more bearable on that day for Sodom than for that town.

I could cite more, this is enough to prove the point. Not all sin is the same.

And you have it plainly here in this little epistle of Jude. These “certain people” who creep into the church – these creeps as I think Jude would call them – have a reservation with “the gloom of darkness.” They are “designated for condemnation.” You don’t see a lot of wiggle room here for adding on an addendum – “so we must work doubly hard to lead them to Jesus and get them saved.”

In many ways this little letter of Jude isn’t so little. It is a declaration of condemnation for people who put on a disguise of saintliness, sneak into the church like the enemy agents they are, with the goal of carrying out the designs of the chief enemy whom they serve. Just read it again. Is this not a perfect description of so many of the evil people we have had to face in our homes, in marriages, in our churches? Well, says Jude, they have a reservation in hell. And there are LOTS of them:

Mat 7:22-23 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ (23) And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’

If your abuser, if the one who reviles you because they are, by his or her very nature, a reviler, and if at the same time they profess to be a servant of Christ, a respected member of a church, putting on that evil angel disguise every Sunday morning, then they are NOT your typical sinner. They aren’t even your typical hypocrite. Yes, they are hypocrites…but these kind actually and actively are on a mission to destroy Christ’s church. Like a hidden reef in the ocean that goes unseen until the ship hits it, these kind come in among us and sit with us at the Lord’s table, all the while having the intention of dividing us, twisting and distorting the gospel of God’s grace into an evil message of “sin all you want because Jesus will forgive you.”

No, all sinners are not the same. Jude did not write a postscript to this letter – “so be sure you all pray hard for these creeps because we have to be sure to get them saved.” No, the Lord’s message for this kind is – “there is a place reserved for you in hell where you will receive perfect justice for all eternity.”

Have You Ever been too Quick to Share Your Life with Someone?

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On October 31, 2022

In Abusers

I am not sure that title expresses the subject I want to talk about here as clearly as I would like. Perhaps the following scripture will do a better job:

2Ki 20:12-17 At that time Merodach-baladan the son of Baladan, king of Babylon, sent envoys with letters and a present to Hezekiah, for he heard that Hezekiah had been sick. (13) And Hezekiah welcomed them, and he showed them all his treasure house, the silver, the gold, the spices, the precious oil, his armory, all that was found in his storehouses. There was nothing in his house or in all his realm that Hezekiah did not show them.

(14) Then Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah, and said to him, “What did these men say? And from where did they come to you?” And Hezekiah said, “They have come from a far country, from Babylon.” (15) He said, “What have they seen in your house?” And Hezekiah answered, “They have seen all that is in my house; there is nothing in my storehouses that I did not show them.”

(16) Then Isaiah said to Hezekiah, “Hear the word of the LORD: (17) Behold, the days are coming, when all that is in your house, and that which your fathers have stored up till this day, shall be carried to Babylon. Nothing shall be left, says the LORD.

There it is. Understand? “They have seen all that is in my house; there is nothing in my storehouses that I did not show them.”

And, of course, as Isaiah told Hezekiah, those Babylonians would one day be back and take it all.

Have you ever been too quick to show “all that is in your house” to someone who then subsequently used this knowledge against you? I have. The fact is that wicked people like narcissists flatter us – like the false teachers who flattered the Galatians for self-promoting purposes. And it is really refreshing to find someone who seemingly and apparently genuinely is ready to be a friend.

We must be wise. We need to learn not to be so quick to “show people our treasures” as Hezekiah did. I mean, here comes these Babylonians because, they claimed, they had heard that Hezekiah had been sick. They brought gifts from the Babylonian king and perhaps the ancient version of get-well cards. Hezekiah, like us, really appreciated this kindness and his response was to show them everything. To share his life with them. Mistake.

Now, the truth is that there is no sure-fire answer to the question – “how do we know someone’s real motives?” “How can we know if someone is trustworthy?” But one bit of wisdom is, don’t be too quick to share your life. An evil person will one day use the “treasures” you have shown them against you. As Proverbs says, such a person will one day “reveal” the things they now know about you as ammunition for their own profit.

Pro 11:13 Whoever goes about slandering reveals secrets, but he who is trustworthy in spirit keeps a thing covered.

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