For all of you women who know this, but who’s emotional and spiritual abusers have (as they are so good at doing) caused you to question the truth….you KNOW this. Those whose husbands are ensnared by sexual sin (ANY sexual sin), drunkenness (yes you do smell it), drugs (eyes look funny?)….whatever….maybe seeing it in black and white will help you to hold it and not give it up to the mind game playing abuser. They lie. It is what they do. You know what you know, and you know what the word of God says…never let anyone cause you to question those things. Truth…it is a life raft tied to Christ. Cling to both. Jesus says we WILL know them by their fruit, and the fruit of genuine repentance is so astonishingly clear to see. And so is the fruit of unrepentance. ❤

If they are genuinely repentant, abusers will:

  • Stop all blame-shifting. Stop blaming their spouse. Stop making excuses.
  • Commit to going to a professionally run Behavior Change Group for spouse-abusers.
  • Admit, confess and accept responsibility for all their abuse, in full detail.
  • Identify the attitudes that drive their abusiveness.
  • Relinquish their attitudes of entitlement and superiority over their partner, even the last bastion and stronghold of their selfish sense of entitlement.
  • Be accountable to group leaders, probation officers, courts, and any others who are overseeing their actions and attitudes.
  • Accept the consequences of their actions.
  • Resist feeling sorry for themselves if they have to pay consequences.
  • Be honest and non-manipulative in their communication.
  • Be empathetic to the multiple and long-lasting effects of their abuse on the partner and children.
  • Attempt to right the wrongs by restoring losses which they’ve caused to their victims.
  • Allow the hurt partner and children to take as much time as they need to heal.
  • Not attempt to use behavioral improvements as bargaining chips.
  • Not demand credit for behavioural improvements.
  • Carry their own weight in all matters, including parenting.
  • Develop respectful, kind, supportive behaviours.
  • Change how they respond to the grievances of their partners.
  • Accept that overcoming abusiveness will be a decades-long process.

And I would certainly have to add the biggest tip off of all…..

  • Seeking to do whatever it takes to establish for themselves solid biblical boundaries and stringent accountability, and guard those as precious, so as to not sin against God and their wives like that again. Not having to have those imposed upon them. As to the Lord.

http://cryingoutforjustice.com/2012/03/29/checklist-for-repentance-via-not-under-bondage/

Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. 2 Cor 5:17