What counts as abuse?

Genesis 9:5-6“I will require the blood of anyone who takes another person’s life. If a wild animal kills a person, it must die. And anyone who murders a fellow human must die. If anyone takes a human life, that person’s life will also be taken by human hands. For God made human beings in his own image.”

Exodus 21:12“Anyone who assaults and kills another person must be put to death.”

Psalm 72:12, 14He [the Lord] will rescue the poor when they cry to him; he will help the oppressed, who have no one to defend them. . . .He will redeem them from oppression and violence, for their lives are precious to him.

Violence and physical abuse are expressly forbidden by God and have no place in relationships. Violence is the use of force to take or destroy something. Violence in relationships is abuse and must be stopped immediately. If someone you know is physically abusing you, seek help. Abusers rely on fear and isolation for what they do, and the first step away from it is in finding support and counsel from friends.

Proverbs 15:4Gentle words are a tree of life; a deceitful tongue crushes the spirit.

Proverbs 26:18-19Just as damaging as a madman shooting a deadly weapon is someone who lies to a friend and then says, “I was only joking.”

Matthew 5:21-22“You have heard that our ancestors were told, ‘You must not murder. If you commit murder, you are subject to judgment.’ But I say, if you are even angry with someone, you are subject to judgment! If you call someone an idiot, you are in danger of being brought before the court. And if you curse someone, you are in danger of the fires of hell.”

James 3:9-10Sometimes it [the tongue] praises our Lord and Father, and sometimes it curses those who have been made in the image of God. And so blessing and cursing come pouring out of the same mouth. Surely, my brothers and sisters, this is not right!

Verbal abuse is not a “lesser abuse.” In Scripture, hurtful words are described as deadly weapons or an uncontrollable fire, and Jesus himself describes verbal abuse as something akin to murder. Name-calling, mocking, or belittling someone degrades their worth and bruises their spirit as easily as a fist bruises a body.

Judges 16:15-16Then Delilah pouted, “How can you tell me, ‘I love you,’ when you don’t share your secrets with me? You’ve made fun of me three times now, and you still haven’t told me what makes you so strong!” She tormented him with her nagging day after day until he was sick to death of it.

1 Samuel 25:14-17, 19Meanwhile, one of Nabal’s servants went to Abigail and told her, “David sent messengers from the wilderness to greet our master, but he screamed insults at them. These men have been very good to us, and we never suffered any harm from them. Nothing was stolen from us the whole time they were with us. In fact, day and night they were like a wall of protection to us and the sheep. You need to know this and figure out what to do, for there is going to be trouble for our master and his whole family. He’s so ill-tempered that no one can even talk to him!” . . . [Abigail] said to her servants, “Go on ahead. I will follow you shortly.” But she didn’t tell her husband Nabal what she was doing.

Colossians 3:19, 21Husbands, love your wives and never treat them harshly. . . . Fathers, do not aggravate your children, or they will become discouraged.

Emotional abuse is about manipulation and control, and often involves shutting down others’ feelings or opinions. Nabal was blessed with a wise wife and honorable employees, but when Nabal made a foolish decision to insult David, both his employees and his wife were afraid to talk to him. Nabal had established a behavior pattern of being harsh and badly behaved. In this high-tension situation, Abigail and the shepherds feared that talking to Nabal would make the situation worse. An emotional abuser doesn’t always shut others down through harshness. Sometimes, they wear others down through nagging or making the victim feel guilty. Delilah wore Samson down through constant nagging and claiming that, if he truly loved her, he would tell her the secret of his strength. An emotional abuser’s manipulation methods may vary, but the goal is the same: control over the victim.

Deuteronomy 22:25-27“If the man meets the engaged woman out in the country, and he rapes her, then only the man must die. Do nothing to the young woman; she has committed no crime worthy of death. She is as innocent as a murder victim. Since the man raped her out in the country, it must be assumed that she screamed, but there was no one to rescue her.”

2 Samuel 13:6, 9-12, 14So Amnon lay down and pretended to be sick. And when the king came to see him, Amnon asked him, “Please let my sister Tamar come and cook my favorite dish as I watch. Then I can eat it from her own hands.” . . . But when she set the serving tray before him, he refused to eat. “Everyone get out of here,” Amnon told his servants. So they all left. Then he said to Tamar, “Now bring the food into my bedroom and feed it to me here.” So Tamar took his favorite dish to him. But as she was feeding him, he grabbed her and demanded, “Come to bed with me, my darling sister.” “No, my brother!” she cried. “Don’t be foolish! Don’t do this to me! Such wicked things aren’t done in Israel.” . . .But Amnon wouldn’t listen to her, and since he was stronger than she was, he raped her.

1 Corinthians 7:4The wife gives authority over her body to her husband, and the husband gives authority over his body to his wife.

1 Corinthians 13:4-5Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged.

Ephesians 5:3Let there be no sexual immorality, impurity, or greed among you. Such sins have no place among God’s people.

Sexual abuse often comes from people we should be able to trust—friends, family members, mentors, even spouses. Like Amnon, sexual abusers can be persuasive, even charming, and rely on deception to arrange the right situations for their abuse. They may try to convince their victims with lies that the victim was at fault. Sometimes, even a husband or wife may push their spouse into unwanted sexual acts. They may claim that 1 Corinthians 7:4 says their spouse’s body is theirs to do what they want with, or that their spouse has a marital duty to satisfy them. While a husband and wife do indeed have a duty to provide sexual fulfillment to one another, that sex is meant to be performed in a loving and mutually enjoyable manner. Marriage is meant to reflect the union of Christ and the church (Ephesians 5:22-30). That love is patient and kind, not aggressive or manipulative. Any “love” that operates out of selfish lust is a far cry from what God desires for us.

Leviticus 25:35-37“If one of your fellow Israelites falls into poverty and cannot support himself, support him as you would a foreigner or a temporary resident and allow him to live with you. Do not charge interest or make a profit at his expense. Instead, show your fear of God by letting him live with you as your relative. Remember, do not charge interest on money you lend him or make a profit on food you sell him.”

Proverbs 3:27Do not withhold good from those who deserve it when it’s in your power to help them.

Proverbs 14:31Those who oppress the poor insult their Maker, but helping the poor honors him.

Ezekiel 47:21-23“Divide the land within these boundaries among the tribes of Israel. Distribute the land as an allotment for yourselves and for the foreigners who have joined you and are raising their families among you. They will be like native-born Israelites to you and will receive an allotment among the tribes. These foreigners are to be given land within the territory of the tribe with whom they now live. I, the Sovereign Lord, have spoken!”

1 Timothy 5:8Those who won’t care for their relatives, especially those in their own household, have denied the true faith. Such people are worse than unbelievers.

1 John 3:17-18If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person? Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.

Finances can provide strong leverage for abuse. Threatening to take or withhold belongings puts an abuser in a position of power over the abused. Often, financial abuse is accompanied by emotional abuse. Especially in family situations, the fear of being unable to provide for oneself or one’s children without the abuser’s help can make the victim feel trapped. As with all abuse situations, seeking trustworthy counsel and support is a wise course of action.

Ezekiel 34:2-5“What sorrow awaits you shepherds who feed yourselves instead of your flocks. Shouldn’t shepherds feed their sheep? You drink the milk, wear the wool, and butcher the best animals, but you let your flocks starve. You have not taken care of the weak. You have not tended the sick or bound up the injured. You have not gone looking for those who have wandered away and are lost. Instead, you have ruled them with harshness and cruelty. So my sheep have been scattered without a shepherd, and they are easy prey for any wild animal.”

Matthew 7:15“Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves.”

Matthew 21:12-13Jesus entered the Temple and began to drive out all the people buying and selling animals for sacrifice. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves. He said to them, “The Scriptures declare, ‘My Temple will be called a house of prayer,’ but you have turned it into a den of thieves!”

Matthew 23:13, 23-24, 27-28“What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you shut the door of the Kingdom of Heaven in people’s faces. You won’t go in yourselves, and you don’t let others enter either. . . .What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are careful to tithe even the tiniest income from your herb gardens, but you ignore the more important aspects of the law—justice, mercy, and faith. You should tithe, yes, but do not neglect the more important things. Blind guides! You strain your water so you won’t accidentally swallow a gnat, but you swallow a camel! . . .What sorrow awaits you teachers of religious law and you Pharisees. Hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs—beautiful on the outside but filled on the inside with dead people’s bones and all sorts of impurity. Outwardly you look like righteous people, but inwardly your hearts are filled with hypocrisy and lawlessness.”

Luke 12:42-46The Lord replied, “A faithful, sensible servant is one to whom the master can give the responsibility of managing his other household servants and feeding them. If the master returns and finds that the servant has done a good job, there will be a reward. I tell you the truth, the master will put that servant in charge of all he owns. But what if the servant thinks, ‘My master won’t be back for a while,’ and he begins beating the other servants, partying, and getting drunk? The master will return unannounced and unexpected, and he will cut the servant in pieces and banish him with the unfaithful.”

John 10:11-15“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd sacrifices his life for the sheep. A hired hand will run when he sees a wolf coming. He will abandon the sheep because they don’t belong to him and he isn’t their shepherd. And so the wolf attacks them and scatters the flock. The hired hand runs away because he’s working only for the money and doesn’t really care about the sheep. I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me, just as my Father knows me and I know the Father. So I sacrifice my life for the sheep.”

1 Peter 5:3Don’t lord it over the people assigned to your care, but lead them by your own good example.

All kinds of abuse—physical, verbal, emotional, sexual, and financial—can be more easily committed by those in positions of power. Our Christian communities should be safe places, but in our fallen world, spiritual abuse is too often a harsh reality. From the Old Testament to the New Testament to modern times, those in spiritual leadership are tempted to use their authority for selfish purposes.

At no time in the Bible is Jesus’ anger more evident than when he confronts spiritual abuse taking place in the Temple courtyard. This court (the Court of the Gentiles) was supposed to be a place where non-Jewish believers could worship the one true God. Instead, it was being used as a marketplace. Worse, those merchants were more or less robbing those who had traveled far to worship God in the Temple. Not only were they able to charge high fees for the animals they sold, but the moneychangers could charge a high exchange rate on their captive customers. After all, how could a devout believer pay the Temple tax without converting their money to shekels?

Time and again, Jesus confronts members of the Jewish religious elite for twisting God’s law to control and burden people. Spiritual and emotional abuse often go hand in hand. The Pharisees turned the Sabbath into a series of rules rather than the blessing it was meant to be (Mark 2:27, Luke 6:6-11). When Jewish spiritual leaders found their authority resisted, they verbally and physically abused Jesus and his disciples (Matthew 12:24; Mark 15:1-15, 31-32; John 9:34; Acts 5:40; 7:54-60). God speaks very strongly against spiritual “shepherds” who prey upon their sheep. In contrast, Jesus set an example of servant leadership, self-sacrifice, and compassion. Christians who find themselves in a community with toxic leadership should consider carefully whether to move to safety or confront the abuse (Matthew 18:15-17; 1 Timothy 5:19-20).