I meant that you are not to associate with anyone who claims to be a believer yet indulges in sexual sin, or is greedy, or worships idols, or is abusive, or is a drunkard, or cheats people. Don’t even eat with such people. – I Corinthians 5:11, NLT
Some bridges need burning!
I am thinking of those bridges to demonstratively abusive individuals who refuse to stop hurting you. Don’t eat with them. Burn the bridge.
-This might mean ending a “friendship” with someone who believes he or she knows more than you do about honoring God amidst infidelity discovery.
-It might mean walking away from a local church community and/or a pastor who does not “get” that he or they are being spiritually abusive and hurtful.
-This might mean giving a long-time “friend” one more chance to change via a rebuke over his or her hurtful words in regards to your infidelity-destroyed marriage.
-It might mean writing off the former in-laws as lost to the divorce and accepting that they will never choose to hold their own cheating child accountable for destroying his or her family.
I don’t know what it means for you.
But remember:
Some bridges need burning!
Somehow, we have gotten all twisted over God’s intentions for us. We–I did, at least–internalize these messages that tell us that we have to accept abusive treatment and never, ever burn a bridge. We thinking cutting out people from our lives is so very un-Christian.
This is not a healthy or godly message.
Clearly, the Apostle Paul wasn’t afraid to burn a bridge or two when it came to people with stubborn sin issues.
That is not to say burning a bridge is easy or always fun. It is painful to grieve the loss of what we had hoped was a loving and supportive relationship that just isn’t.
A surgery is not painless; but that says nothing about its necessity. Sometimes we need to cut someone out of our lives to be healthy.
Some bridges need burning!
Great post for this Thanksgiving day, thank you for once again allowing God to work through you by putting out exactly the encouragement I needed, exactly when it was needed.
I do grieve the loss of certain family members in life but I also had to draw healthy boundaries with the people who kept berating me and blaming me: “maybe he just needed someone skinnier to hold on to at night”, “you should be inspired by [OW], she blogs about her bikini contest prep and you could learn from her”, “if you hadn’t asked so much from him with the kids and the house maybe he wouldn’t have felt the need to escape your expectations and have a midlife crisis”, “you were just a mom, you didn’t keep things spicy at home and let yourself go”, etc etc.
I tolerated those abuses for too long, until I eventually internalized that although some of those things may have some truth (I am overweight, I had 5 kids and it happens) that none of those things excused his infidelity. I tearfully explained how much their judgement about how I “caused” him to run into the arms of a 20-something hurt me, and they just.did.not.get.it. So I let them go, and told them as much.
Now they are having the traditional holiday celebrations without me, and it is sad and lonely not to be invited, but it’s also liberating to be free of the lies I believed for so long, and to instead walk in the truth of who I am in Christ.
Hopeful,
Thin, and good looking men and women get betrayed.
Keep those who put you down out of your sight.
There is a very good reason for you to be happy, those traitors chose to remove themselves from your presence… You’ll recover and will be stronger person. There is a world of good people around.
Happy Thanksgivings.
Hopeful, those are some of the cruelest things I have heard said to a faithful spouse. So sorry that you had to deal with such attacks. Glad you are drawing a healthy line and excluding such mean and hurtful people from your life now.
-DM