Should You Detox From Toxic Relationships?

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Welcome to Bible Bash, where we aim to equip the saints for the works of ministry by answering the questions you're not allowed to ask.

We're your host, Harrison Kerrigan, Pastor Tim Mullett, and today we seek to answer the age old question, should you detox from toxic friendships?

Now, Tim, this is one that you were really looking forward to doing. You brought this to my attention.

Was there any sort of special reasoning behind that? Do you have a toxic friendship in mind that you've been thinking about detoxing from?

Yeah, I wanted to sit down and talk with you about our relationship.

Another live rebuke I see. I mean, I didn't know how to tell you without a camera rolling.

Yeah, in the public eye, yeah, I get it. Yeah, it seems like, you know, you're always getting me into trouble with some of the topics that we pick.

And so, Tim, we sit down and have a talk about this partnership that we have here.

Well, that is definitely not the way that I thought this episode was going to go. I had a completely different plan in mind.

But, okay, so putting the joking aside, putting the joking aside, what is this?

What does any of this mean? I think probably for a lot of people who run in the same circles that we do, we probably don't typically speak this way.

I don't know. Maybe some people do. I guess I don't normally hear this kind of language being used.

So I guess can you just start by, maybe let's define some of the language we're using in this topic question.

Well, part of the reason why this is unfamiliar territory for you is because this isn't a very masculine way to talk, talking about detoxing from toxic friendships.

Yeah, it feels like something I would read about on, like if I were to get on, oh shoot,

I can't even think of the, oh, Pinterest, Pinterest. Right, right. So this is a question that came to us from a lady, and this is detoxing yourself from toxic friendship.

This is very much a female way of speaking. And not only that.

Hang on, Tim. You can't just say that something is a female way of speaking. That's sexist.

You didn't even know what the topic was. It's okay. All right, all right. Point taken. I can see the point.

This is the kind of thing that my wife will, as she's on Facebook groups, she will point me to this kind of language is very frequent within female

Facebook groups and that sort of thing. And it's a very psychological way of talking in general. And so it's a new way of talking to where there is this seemingly moral imperative that individuals have to remove themselves from destructive relationships.

This is predominant in a lot of the abuse literature, too. And so this is a unique way of talking that individuals are embracing at this point in time that is something that may be foreign to people who are not in the know.

But yeah, but what was the question again? Just, you know, let's start off by defining some of the terms so that we all know what we're talking about here.

Right. Yeah. So, you know, part of the problem with a subject like this is if you're going to talk about something like a toxic relationship, it really isn't a biblical term.

So you're not going to read through the Bible and you're going to come up with rules for toxic relationships or, you know, 14 ways of identifying toxic relationships and everything else.

It's just a very new way of talking. And it's something that, you know, if you were to just do a simple, you know,

Google search or DuckDuckGo search or whatever search engine you use, if you don't want to use the search engine of the devil.

But yeah, you just type in that phrase, toxic relationship, and you're going to have any number of psychological articles, most of which are written by women.

So that are going to be talking about the features that correspond with being in a toxic relationship.

Now, the problem is that, you know, when you actually, like, if you know anything about this subject matter, you know anything about the abuse literature, if you know what we're talking about here, one of the things you'll realize is that this isn't a term that is by any means well -defined.

And basically any kind of relationship that an individual finds themself in that they deem in some sense to be unpleasant, they can describe that as a toxic relationship.

And so this is part of abuse culture in a certain sense. And so, you know, if you want to just...

I basically just did a search on this to try to give some examples of the kind of thing that I'm saying.

But what I'm saying is that this is a term that basically is way overused and there's no clear definition.

And basically any relationship you're in that you don't like to whatever degree can be described in this way.

But, you know, there's an article that I saw on RamseySolutions .com.

It says a toxic relationship is one that drains, damages and exhausts you. Hey, you know,

I guess my relationship with my daughter is a toxic relationship.

She throws things at you sometimes, damages your eardrums with her crying, you know.

So this is why these terms are so unhelpful because anything... Like this is just a worthless term, you know.

VeryWellMined .com says a toxic relationship is one that makes you feel unsupported, misunderstood, demeaned or attacked.

You know, so this is just... The adjectives there, unsupported, misunderstood, demeaned or attacked.

I mean, that is basically every relationship that has ever existed throughout the history of the world. If it goes on long enough, at some point you're going to feel misunderstood for sure.

And then at some point you're going to feel unsupported for sure. And then, you know, demeaning is part of the vast majority of relationships that have ever existed.

And who knows what this word attack means. It probably doesn't mean physically attacked. It probably means that your emotions are harmed or damaged in some way.

Well, I think, just to kind of butt in here for a second. I think what's really confusing about that is not even like the...

The definition is just saying it makes you feel like those things have happened.

So there's not even like a subjective, no, you have been attacked. So like, you know... You mean objective.

I mean objective, yeah. You know, so if my, you know... If a friend of mine were to come at me with a pair of scissors, that would be an objective attack.

I have been attacked, you know, in this relationship. Been physically assaulted. Yeah, but then to say, you know,

I feel like... That's basically implying it doesn't even have to actually happen. You just have to, you know, you just have to think that it could have happened.

Part of the rules of the game, you can't challenge a person's feelings, particularly a woman. You know, so you can't challenge a woman's feelings.

And so if a woman feels something, then you have to validate that, right? So you have to, you know, you have to support that.

Because a toxic relationship, by definition, is one that makes you feel unsupported. So if the person feels attacked by you, you have to...

Basically, you have to hang yourself in the process. You get what I mean? Yeah, yeah. So if they feel like this is a toxic relationship and you say it's not, you are the definition of creating a toxic environment, right?

Right, right. And so it's unfalsifiable in that way. Dr. Lillian Klaas was a

California -based communication and psychology expert. And she coined the term in her 1995 book,

Toxic People. So she coined this term, toxic relationship. And she defines a toxic relationship as any relationship between people who don't support each other, right?

See how helpful that is? Who don't support each other. Where there's conflict and one seeks to undermine the other.

Where there's competition, where there's disrespect and a lack of cohesiveness. So you see how these are, like, this is just an entirely useless term.

So, you know, you ask, what is a toxic relationship? Basically, my original summary of what a toxic relationship is, is a toxic relationship is a relationship you don't like.

Right. For whatever reason or another. And I can hear some people probably objecting.

Well, no, what they actually mean is something like this that happens over a long period of time, right?

But then the definitions you just read, there's nothing in there that qualifies it. For six months, you feel this way, right?

For a year, it's this way. Well, there's no way to come up with, I mean, these are not objective terms.

Right. This is just making up. There's nothing objective about anything that's happening here. You're describing the phenomenon of a person being in a relationship that they, with some of these definitions, a relationship that damages their self -esteem.

That doesn't make them feel supported or affirmed. I mean, this is all subjectivity put on full display here.

So, yes, I mean, there is no objective definition of what we're talking about or categorization of what you're talking about.

And even if there was, the kind of things that they're putting into this category are the kind of things that are characteristic of every kind of relationship imaginable under the sun.

Right. And there's no way that this is like a helpful, you know, in practical terms, there's no way this is a helpful way to look at relationships, right?

Or speak of relationships, right? Well, this is why it's so important that you believe the Bible is sufficient.

If you believe the Bible is sufficient, then one of the things that you have to do, and people are not aware of this, and this is one of the things

I'm constantly trying to help people to understand, is that you're living in a world right now that comes up with terms like these.

And these terms are not neutral terms. I mean, these terms come laden with a worldview that is hostile to the

Bible in every conceivable way. And so that seems like a fairly innocuous term, a toxic relationship on the surface.

And you can have plenty of Christians who buy into this, like, you know, they have this sense in which their own relationship, it doesn't feel fulfilling, you know, and it doesn't bring happiness to them.

And so then they can latch onto a label like this. But the problem is that this label is not a biblical label.

And what we need to realize is that the Bible is sufficient. So God in His Word, He's given us all things that we need for life and godliness.

And if you really believe the Bible is sufficient, one of the things you're going to do is you're going to religiously and intentionally try to describe everything that you're thinking and feeling with biblical terms and not with pop psychological terms like this.

So the best thing you can do is just to take these kind of labels, remove them utterly from your vocabulary, refuse to deal in those kind of terms, and to make yourself say, whatever we're talking about,

I'm going to use biblical language to describe it. I'm not going to use psychological language. I'm not going to use feelings oriented language.

I'm not going to use therapeutic language. I'm going to use biblical categories to describe what I need to do, because if I don't use biblical categories, then it might be that I get the application all wrong.

Right? And we could talk about that at that point, but this is why this language is totally, utterly, absolutely unhelpful.

Just stick to biblical categories, and you might understand what kind of relationship you're in and what you need to do at that point.

Now, by making a statement like that, are you essentially creating a new law saying, hey, don't ever speak in these terms.

They're not good. Use biblical terms. Are you creating a new law here?

I'm not saying it's sinful to use these nonsense terms. I'm just saying that it will lead you to sin. Okay. Do you get what

I mean? Yeah. Like, if you speak this, you know… So, wisdom category.

Yeah. I mean, so, it's largely what we're talking about is a wisdom category, but the problem is that the

Bible says of unbelievers that they speak as the world speaks. Right? And so, if you speak as the world speaks, you will think as the world thinks, and you will act as the world acts.

Right. Yeah. So, your language isn't neutral at that point. If you speak the way the world speaks, you're going to feel the way the world feels, and you're going to act the way the world acts.

And so, the point there is just to say, hey, is the original speaking the language of the world?

Is that wrong? I don't think it's necessarily wrong, but if you internalize that language, that becomes your worldview.

That's the way you view the world. Without any check on the Bible, then you're going to be led into sin in one way or the other, and you're going to lead other people into sin.

Right. So, if you use this term, and you think about this, the issue is that this is not a neutral term.

This is a term that's put forward that has a moral imperative implied in the very language itself.

Right? Right. Yeah. So, we're talking about, should you detox yourself from toxic relationships? Well, obviously, you should.

Do you get what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. I'm not saying you actually should. I'm trying to say that… Yeah. No, I'm following what you're saying.

If you define the relationship you're in as a toxic relationship, then what you're saying at that point is that you staying in that relationship is like putting your hand in a barrel full of…

Vat of acid. Vat of acid. Yes, that's what you're saying. And that would be wrong, wouldn't it? Yeah.

Like the Bible says, no one hated his own flesh. Right? Right. We just read a verse this morning about those who mutilate the flesh.

Right? Right. So, the issue then is, if you accept this term, there's a moral imperative implied in it.

The answer is, obviously, yes, you should detox yourself from toxic relationships for your health, man.

Right. Or woman. Because it would be insane. We're not individuals who are in favor of abuse.

Right? You shouldn't just let yourself be abused, should you? Right? Be damaged or be attacked.

And so, that's where there's a lot more to these kind of terms than you realize. And so, the best thing you can do in terms of wisdom is to not speak that way and not think that way and to describe it with biblical language.

Right. Yeah. If you do that, you're in a much better position to figure out what God wants you to do in any given situation.

But if you insist upon using this nonsense language, you're going to act in a nonsense way.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Because, in a sense, the language is sort of playing into that victim mentality.

Right? And so, whereas the Bible is constantly telling us to overlook offenses instead of blow them up out of proportion or be completely…

Not if it's toxic. Not if you're in a toxic relationship. Right?

If you use that language, it's easy to think that way. Right? See, that language is a club that just swatted away that verse like an unruly fly or something.

The thing is, I've probably counseled a hundred people who have used this kind of language.

And in their minds, the moment they use that language, I know what they're saying. They're saying that not only do they have a moral imperative to exit that relationship, but I also have a moral imperative to let them and to support them in doing so.

So, it's not only a moral imperative to them, it's also a moral imperative to me.

You know what I'm saying? Yeah. And so, I've never heard the person who talks like that, who doesn't think that way.

Yeah. When you embrace that language, it is going down a path.

And you really have to be intentional and say, hey, whoa, let's back up.

Let's put this in different language here. Yeah, sort of like the man in Proverbs 6, maybe.

He walks down where the adulteress woman is or prostitute is, and then he gets seduced by her, right?

And Solomon basically says he's watching it the whole time, and he already knows the outcome before it even happens, because he went somewhere he knew he should have stayed away from.

Yeah. To give another example of that too, my brothers and I, we got into bowling for a little bit.

We kind of rotate sports. Was the underwater basket weaving in there anywhere?

We never quite got there. We played basketball or tennis or ping pong or pool, or we got where we were.

The bowling alley had like, I think you pay $5 and you could bowl for an hour or something like that, as many games as you want.

So we buy our own lane, and we got into that for a little bit. But part of the way bowling works is the lanes are actually oiled in such a way that if you curve it, you find the channel to throw it at, it's going to go where the oil tells it to go.

And so at a professional level, they have to actually mess with it to where it's not so easy.

But you can get to where if you find that lane, to find the exact angle at which to curve it, if you can do that, you can keep on doing it over and over and over again if you find that channel.

But it's like that with this word. It'll go down a path. If you insist upon using those words, it's going to take you somewhere, and you might not understand where it's taking you.

Okay. So I would just tell people, you have to constantly religiously examine your language and ask, is this in the

Bible? If you want to know how to honor God. So going back to talking about, should

I detox from a toxic relationship? We mentioned this sounds like victim language, right?

It is, yeah. What's the motivation behind using this kind of victim language?

Yeah, I mean, so you do have a lot of people who are essentially, they're not coming at things from a biblical worldview, they're coming at things from a secular worldview or psychological worldview.

And in that kind of framework, basically the goal of any relationship is going to be very different than a

Christian relationship's goal. So if you're a Christian, you think, well, what is the goal of this relationship?

You're going to answer that a particular way, right? As a Christian, my goal in my relationship is to glorify

God. That's my goal. For better or for worse, in sickness and health, right?

So you attach that goal of glorifying God and you put upon it all the vows that you take when you stand before the pastor on your wedding day or however you got married, right?

You have traditional vows that you basically say, for better or for worse, sickness and health.

You realize that this is a lifelong commitment that you're making and you're making it without strings attached, right?

There may be, I believe in terms of my philosophy of divorce, there's this two exception clause view.

I don't embrace a permanent view of marriage. I believe that there are two legitimate exceptions, adultery and abandonment, and I don't add a third.

I believe there's two as far as that's concerned. But by and large, this is a permanent union that we're operating under God's rule, right?

Under His authority to His glory. So He sets the parameters for the relationship as far as that's concerned.

Now you think about the secular way of going about it. There is no permanent of marriage in a secular mindset, and there's no necessity of marriage that is operating either, right?

Yeah. So marriage is a purely optional choice that you can enter into for as long as it benefits you, right?

Yeah. As long as it fulfills you, as long as it builds your quote -unquote self -esteem, it's a purely optional arrangement that you can enter into if you desire to do so.

And there's social benefits that are attached to that. So largely, this is a utilitarian kind of arrangement you're entering into at the level of marriage.

Do it if you want. If you don't, then don't, right? But then any other relationship you enter into, everything from a marriage you can get in another relationship, too.

And so fundamentally, the goal in those kind of arrangements is largely the goal of happiness and self -fulfillment, if that makes sense.

Yeah, yeah. I'm following you. So then in that kind of framework, then, a toxic relationship is a relationship that's not accomplishing those fundamental goals of being fulfilling and bringing you happiness.

Right, yeah. So by definition, right. Some pretty selfish -sounding... Well, it is. It's the definition of selfishness.

Yeah. Right? Yeah. It's the definition because there is no God. This is not about God, right?

Right, yeah. Other -centeredness is only a tool to bring about happiness.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, okay. Alright, hang on. Let's sit on this for a second because I think probably most people outside of Christianity think that they are actually being selfless when they pursue loving another person.

But probably 99 .9 % of the time, they're being selfish, right?

So the husband might bring flowers home for his wife as a gift for her.

Well, why is he doing that? Well, the motivation is probably... For the Christian, the motivation would be, well,

I want to honor God, and God tells me to love my wife. Husbands are supposed to love their wives as Christ loved the church, right?

I want to love my wife. I'm going to go bring her a gift, and this will be honoring her.

This will be showing my love for her, and in doing that, I'll be honoring God, among other things.

There's other good things that come from it as well, obviously, but that's the primary foundational sort of aspect that's happening.

In an atheistic worldview, really the only reason to do that is because I would rather my wife be happy with me than mad at me, right?

Well, it's always about the God of self -interest in one way or the other. There is no God that's above you that is setting the parameters for your action in any way.

You are your own God in that way, so it may be that in the worst -case scenario, you're bringing your wife flowers because you want to put her in a better position to respond to your desires, right?

Right, yeah. But then, it could be that you're bringing her flowers just because you like the way it feels to do something for someone else so you can feel like a good person or something.

If you're not living to the glory of God, ultimately, the motive is going to center around yourself at some level, one way or another.

But as it relates to counseling, there is no higher purpose.

There's nothing objective beyond the self anyways, so the goal of the secular therapist is to help an individual pursue other -centeredness because it's in their own interest to do so.

Right, because it'll make you feel better. Yeah, or it's better for you in certain ways like, hey, if you kill everyone you see, you're going to end up in jail, right?

Right, yeah. So, all I'm trying to say is, ultimately, there is no such thing as selflessness in this kind of framework anyways.

You can look at any one of these websites that talk about toxic relationships, and the operating assumption that undergirds the entire project is the project of self -interest.

Right, yeah. It's the air that all of these projects believe in, because it would be harmful and damaging to yourself if you subject yourself to a relationship that is not leaving you feeling supported or understood, or that results in you being demeaned or attacked, or that drains you or damages you or exhausts you.

It's all about you, right? Mm -hmm. This is just a self -centered framework that you put on a relationship that's operating under, basically, these self -centered assumptions.

Right, okay. So, I think we've pretty well established that this line of thinking is not a helpful one.

It's definitely not a biblical one. So, with that in mind, putting that response to,

I guess, undesirable relationships in your mind, or difficult relationships, we understand that there are difficult relationships, right?

Sure. I mean, every relationship gets difficult at some point. It might not always be a world -ending sort of difficulty, but there's definitely disagreements, there's arguments, we're all sinful, so there's points where selfishness comes into play.

There's so many different ways that relationships can become difficult. What should the biblical approach be to handling a difficult relationship?

Yeah, I think that's what's so hard about the subject, is that it's impossible to give a one -size -fits -all answer to this kind of question, because you have to take it on a case -by -case basis.

But then the problem is that if every difficult relationship is called a toxic relationship, then what you've done is you've taken a broad range of things that could fit in a broad range of relationships, and you've lumped them all under one sloppy category, right?

And then what you've done is you've given the same application to every single one of them.

And so, what you want to do is you want to figure out, well, what scenario are we in here? What are we actually talking about?

And the only way to objectively go about doing it is to categorize the types of things present in this relationship with biblical language and forget the term toxic, right?

So I don't care about that term. And this is what I will—I mean, I will essentially say that in counseling, if I'm counseling a person, and they're saying that they're trapped in a toxic relationship,

I'll just say, hey, what I want you to do is I want you to describe this relationship in biblical terms.

So what's happening in biblical terms? We're not going to use therapeutic terms. What are we talking about in biblical terms?

I may not say it exactly like that, but that's the point that's going to come across. I'm going to try to figure out what is happening in this relationship and encourage them at some point.

I may not—like the first thing I do is disagree with the language, but I'll say, well, what does that mean?

If they were to say, I'm in a toxic relationship, it's like, well, what does that mean? What's going on in it? If they say,

I feel unsupported, I feel misunderstood, I feel demeaned, I feel attacked, it's like, well, what's happening, right?

So the best thing you can do is ask, well, what is happening, not how are you feeling at that?

Does that make sense? Because you'll get better information that way. So the broader point is there's a broad range of things that we could be talking about.

The Bible basically is—what you're getting at is the Bible gives us probably different responses depending on what is happening, whereas talking about the toxic world view is more just saying, if it doesn't benefit you, if you feel attacked, if you don't feel supported, if you don't feel understood, there's only one proper response, no matter what's happening.

Self -care, right? Do the self -care, pull the plug.

So what are we talking about, though? You can imagine on the one end, let's say you have a lady who basically lets her house go and doesn't do anything at home.

Her husband wants to have family worship time because we just talked about that.

So the husband wants to have family worship time. The wife is fighting that at every level. She's letting the house go to mess.

He's trying to take her and the family to church every week. She's fighting that. She's constantly sleeping in. She's staying up all hours of the night, refuses to get up in the morning, go to church.

She might look at you and say she's in a toxic relationship. She feels unsupported. She feels misunderstood.

She feels demeaned. She feels attacked. And it's like, well, what do you mean he's attacking you? He just doesn't think

I'm a Christian because he just thinks he's so much better than me or whatever else, right?

It's like, well, what is happening here, right? What are we talking about? Well, in that scenario, what is the application?

Well, whatever the scenario you're just in, this is a toxic relationship, if you want to use that language, that you've made, right?

Right, yeah. You're the source of this toxic relationship by rejecting everything the

Bible tells you to do and then making your husband's life literally miserable, right? Now, on the other end, like you can have a situation where you have a guy who, like, so, like I just paint, like there's a, the girl's a bad, bad one in that scenario, right?

But on the other end, you can imagine the kind of scenario where you're married to a guy who basically has high expectations of you.

He wants the house entirely spotless every single day. He wants you to have, you know, 20 kids or something like that, plus adopt, you know, as many kids as he wants you to adopt.

And I'm not saying it's wrong for a guy to expect a wife to have, you know, as many kids as she could have or something along those lines.

But you can imagine the kind of guy who basically is just never satisfied with anything that she says, doesn't listen to any of her concerns, is constantly putting on her, you know, an overwhelming list of expectations that he has.

You know, every day he goes to work, he hands her a list of 30 things that she's expected to do or something like that.

That are just unrealistic and show that he's taking no consideration to the amount of time that some of these things take, you know, so you can imagine the kind of guy in that scenario.

He has nothing good to say to her. Everything he says to her is just, I'm disappointed in you and you're a failure, you know, you can't do anything right.

And, you know, I don't even know why I try, you know, because you're just worthless and everything.

And you can imagine, you know, and then that could even like, he's so frustrated with her to the point where he's yelling at her and screaming at her and maybe even, you know, threatening her with physical violence or transitioning into that.

So, yeah, I mean, there's that's a big, long spectrum between those two different scenarios, right?

Yeah, like there's a big spectrum there, like in between. So like, if those are the two extremes on both sides, and then you have, you know, it was even make that guy a wife spanker to, you know, just make him as bad as possible.

So, like, there's a broad spectrum of people that can fit in any one of those.

And yeah, I mean, that one feels more toxic than the other one, right? Yeah. If you're going to use that expression, that feels like it fits more on that end of things than it does on the other end of things, but it's an entirely unhelpful, it's still an unhelpful expression.

We should stop using it. And so then you figure out what you're doing, like, you figure out what the biblical response is based on what the situation you find yourself in that way.

So the first woman, yeah, no, this isn't some relationship that you're morally mandated to leave in order to pursue self -care, right?

Right, yeah. The second one, you know, you need to ask a lot of questions about what, what are we talking about here?

What have you done, right? What are the steps that you've taken? You know, now, a lot of that, if he's, like, if there is no abuse that's happening, and this is just, you're married to a miserable man with miserable expectations who isn't very encouraging, but there is a category in the

Bible of just persevering through and loving difficult people. And so, you know, contrary to what the world thinks, just because someone's mean to you and persistently mean to you and persistently really mean to you, that doesn't mean that it's time to pack up the bags and, you know, get out.

Yeah, and I think, you know, one thing that the toxic friendship view of things really neglects,

I mean, obviously it neglects this because I think it comes from a worldview that doesn't have

God as the foundation, is when you view things as, like,

I need to get out as soon as possible for my own benefit, then what you're, what you're doing is not only are you, are you basically, like, just leaving a relationship that, you know, depending on the relationship, you might not even really be allowed to leave according to what

God has said, but then you're also, like, denying the other person the opportunity to try and change, right?

So, you know, if the wife were to just leave that relationship, the one that you described earlier…

Yeah, I mean, now if we're talking about, like, though, like, if you're talking about, like, he's beating her or if he's, you know, the wife's spanking stuff or something like that,

I think at that point you need to have a real conversation about calling the cops and talking to your pastors. Right. Seeing what,

I mean, I would, you know, a lot of people think that you add, like, abuse as an additional qualification for a permissible reason to divorce, and without, you know, weighing into that kind of controversy completely,

I would just say that shouldn't be the first instinct you have. Take a, you know, call the cops, reach out to your pastors if possible, you know, and that, you need to handle that on a case -by -case basis to see what you're talking about.

But, I mean, granted, like, barring that, you know, if you're just talking about a guy with really high expectations who's never happy and never satisfied, then we're in easier territory with some of these things, and then we're denying them an opportunity to repent as you're talking about.

Well, I think even with that sort of physical altercation happening time and time again, even with that, you're sort of denying them the opportunity to change, right?

I mean, when you call the police and when you get in touch with your pastors, part of what is supposed to happen there is alongside whatever legal process takes place, there should be, like, a church discipline process that also takes place where that man is confronted by his pastor or pastors.

You know, assuming they're able to, like, verify or whatever else, then, like, that guy is confronted and he's basically told, you need to repent of this, this is wrong and this is evil and this goes against what

God's taught us in the Bible, right? Yeah, so let me clarify for everyone listening that you're not talking about a woman just staying in a relationship where she's being beat every night in order to be a means of bringing – you're saying the process of calling the cops, the process of removing yourself from danger in that way, eliciting help from the church.

Yeah, you should remove yourself from immediate physical danger. That doesn't necessarily mean you should remove yourself from the relationship entirely.

Cut all ties, never tell your pastors, possibly never call the police in the first place.

All of those things should be happening simultaneously, but yeah, I mean, yeah, that's not necessarily meaning you should stay, like, in the house and get beat every night, right?

Yeah, and that's what some people don't understand as it relates to these kind of topics in general. Now, I mean, you know, if you want to go into the, you know, is there a third exception in the case, like, permissible reason for divorce in the case of abuse,

I don't know that I planned on going there in this episode, but I mean, I'm happy to go there. Based on what you're saying, like, there is an assumption in the minds of many people if you are in, like, an actually abusive relationship in the one that you're describing that has turned into physical abuse, for lack of a better term.

And they would have known about,

I mean, it's not like that was invented in the 21st century. Yeah, and, you know, and it does, when you do read 1

Peter, you know, a woman's told to not fear anything that's frightening in 1 Peter 3, so it's conceivable that a woman could be in certain situations that she might, that might be at the very least unsettling as far as that's concerned.

But then, like, I don't, like, you don't have to add a new exception clause. You don't have to add a new, like, so the last thing you want to do is add a new exception clause.

And there's no reason to add that. I mean, you can, you can say, hey, if you're in that kind of relationship where your husband is breaking the law by physically hitting you, call the cops, remove yourself from the situation for as long as it takes, right?

Well, you don't have to check your marriage vows instantaneously and immediately right then.

So it's not in either or a proposition. It's not either like you just stay there and get beat or you get divorced.

It's like, hey, you have another option. Remove yourself. Yeah. Pursue separation. If a wife separates from her husband, encourage her to get to be reconciled with her husband or to remain unmarried.

Right. And so there's another option there. And the individuals who take the permanent view of marriage, they go, they go that route anyways.

Right. It doesn't matter. It's always permanent. That doesn't mean you stay in a situation where you're getting where you have an individual by length law, but you still have to.

You take the covenant that you've made in a very serious way. Now, other people then they will view like that exception as a part of the, you know, if the unbeliever departs, let him depart.

And so they'll, they'll treat abuse as an expansion upon the idea of like being married to the unbeliever who is abandoning you.

And I would just say, well, I just, I don't want to do funny things with words. I don't want to treat that as I would just, let's just let there be two exceptions.

And then there is a procedure that the Bible gives for a woman who is in a very difficult relationship.

If she leaves, let her, you know, let her, let her depart. But encourage her to be married.

And I think that's the route you go. You don't have to make a new exception. But regardless, your point there is just to say, not stay in the midst of it, but I confront him, call the pop, call the police, talk to your elders, move yourself from the situation.

That's much better than just a gone without a word. Right. Right. You do bring them to account.

Yeah, because ultimately what that's doing, and again, the larger point beyond just that is what you're doing there is number one, you're holding that person, you're holding that husband in this example, accountable, both legally and spiritually.

Right. And, and probably, you know, if you have, if you're a family, you're probably protecting your kids by removing yourself from that situation.

But then what you're doing is you're presenting that husband with an opportunity to repent.

Right. So when he's being, and, and I think you're, I think you're protecting yourself just from like a,

Hey, I know, like, so I, as a, you know, as a woman, I'm a part of a local church that has other, you know,

Bible believing men in this church that can protect me from my abusive husband.

Right. So not meaning like, all right, now I'm going to go marry them now. And we're going to, you know, not anything weird like that, but just saying,

Hey, there are men who are going to come and hold, you know, my husband accountable. And I know that they can protect me from my husband.

And, and so, and so I think that is like a benefit of being a part of a local church that I don't,

I don't think is really recognized all that often. But, um, the point is, Hey, look, we are

Christians. We, we are supposed to love one another. And part of loving one another is confronting sin and how you do that.

And these sort of relations and in relationships, however, they get difficult is not to say, let me just up and get out of here.

Right. But, but, um, you know, as much as it applies, say, how can

I help? Number one, is there any, so this is what

I'm about to say is, is sort of leaving the example we've been talking about, but, and speaking a little more generally about relationships that are difficult.

But number one, is there any way in which I have sinned? Right. So, so the first step should always be like, what am

I doing? Let me take the, let me take the log out of my own eye before I try and take the speck out of my brother's eye.

Right. But then this, you know, assuming you've gone through that step faithfully and you've been honest with yourself, then, you know, we, we're supposed to love one another and say,

Hey, I love you. I want, I want to, if I see sin in your life, I want to call it out because I know that sin is bad and it leads to destruction.

It leads to pain. It leads to suffering. And I don't want that for you. And so I want to tell you if I see it and like, let's work through it together.

Right. Yeah, that's even true. I mean, that's even true with some of the more extreme kind of things, like things that are more on the extreme end of like this relationship, toxic relationship category is not a, this is not meant to be like a, an abusive relationship category.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Like this is not like if it, if it were an abusive relationship,

I'm not trying to like what you have is you have two terms that have semantic overlap. Okay.

So like, if you picture like two, you know, circles or something like that, right. So yeah, you have the toxic relationship circle and then you have, you know, the abusive relationship circle.

So naturally, more naturally, if you're in the abusive relationship, most of what you're supposed to think is you're supposed to think, if you were saying you would think this is physically abusive, but because that word is so useless at this point, you know, then who knows, even with that, right.

Who knows what you're talking about, but if there is a word that. Yeah. Words are, words are violence, Tim. Yeah.

Who knows what you're even saying with that word too, but, but that would be more though, the term that you would use for the physically, like the relationship where there's like assault that's happening in it.

It would be the, that would be the way you would go. It would be the abuse survivor, you know, in the language that we're told to use at that point, you're a survivor of abuse.

Right. But then toxic relationship is more of the tame category. Right. Yeah. This is more now it can go all the way up there, but that's not what we're talking about.

Right. Like by and large, like most of what you're talking about is just the unfulfilling relationship.

It's the one that drains or damages or exhaust, exhaust you. It's the one that makes you feel unsupported, misunderstood, demeaned, or attacked, not physically, but emotionally.

Right. Right. So this is that kind of category, but you know, like whatever we're talking about, like, and this is what enrages people.

It's like they, you know, you don't, they don't, this is why the abuse literature, the abuse subject is so ridiculous.

It's like, you don't, it's so out of touch with the way that relationships actually work. Right. So, I mean, you can be in a relationship where you've literally provoked someone to the point where they're screaming at you and you might think to yourself, did

I have anything to do with that whatsoever? Right. Now to the abuse people like that is totally an inappropriate question to even ask and to ask that is to reabuse the person, but it's like, my goodness,

I have kids. Right. I know what they do to each other. Right. Like when one of them screams, like I know that someone else is doing.

I mean, almost 99 % of the time when one of them screams is because I know that someone else did something to them.

Right. Right. Now, what do you do as a parent? You look at the one who screams and you say, hey, don't scream.

And then you have to look at the other one and say, what did you do? You know? So, there's two people there and that's the way adult relationships actually work the vast majority of time.

It's not as if you have one person who is this, you know, literal saint, Mother Teresa, Virgin Mary and go full

Catholic Church sainthood there at that point. You don't, it doesn't exist. Right. Like people don't exist that way.

So, you do, even if, you know, you're being treated in an unjust way, you do have to ask yourself, is there anything to it?

Right. So, like when Jacob stole Esau's birthright, Esau comforted himself by wanting to kill him.

Right. Right. Yeah. But if you're Jacob, you can't think to yourself, well, what a crazy person here.

Right. Right. Yeah. You literally just dressed up as him. You literally dressed up as him.

You lied to your dad. You put on, you know, you put hairy garments on your arms or hairy skins on your arm and made food the way he would make it in order to deceive him out of giving away his blessing.

Right. So, come on, you know, like now, is that response way out of proportion? Sure. I mean, that's a pretty cold blooded kind of response, you know, that now,

I mean, in Esau's defense. Like stealing someone's birthright is like taking. I mean, that's a pretty big deal, especially back then.

Stealing his blessing or whatever. That's a big deal. Right. That's like, especially, especially if you know, like where that blessing ends up leading.

That's like stealing his life, you know, like it's more than what you think.

Right. So, but that that being the case, that's an overreaction, but it's provoked. Right. So, so, yes,

I mean, step one is always to ask yourself, how am I contributing to this? And like, when you're in this kind of framework for your view, everything through this lens of I'm in a toxic relationship, the assumption is that you're just totally innocent and no one's innocent.

Like the only innocent person who's the only person who could ever say that they're in, you know, a toxic relationship was

Jesus with literally everyone else. Yeah. Yeah. Like he's the only person who can get away with saying that with a clear conscience.

Completely and totally. Right. None of us are perfect. And, you know, and like one of the things that's so ridiculous about the abuse kind of literature at this point is it really is just so naive about the way people actually work.

And you could see this happen with every new abuse scandal that shows up on Twitter. It's almost as if they've never talked with real people in real life before.

It's just like, oh yeah, like this person, this person is literally a saint and the other person is literally Hitler. Give me a break.

That's not how life works. Right. Now there's people who are more responsible than others on a scale, but it's never like a hundred percent zero.

It's not, that's not the way life works. I'm sorry. Well, it's kind of like, I mean, if you remember that Amber Heard versus Johnny Depp, you know, so that case had been going on for a few years and the first few years of it, it was all

Amber. You know, Amber Heard's a victim. Amber Heard is the victim here. She has done, you know, she's done nothing to deserve like this abuse that's been going, that's allegedly been going on now.

They weren't adding in the word allegedly more often than not. But, and then, and then, you know, more information comes out and it looks like, it looks like,

I mean, in reality she was probably doing, she was doing a lot more abusing than Johnny Depp was.

But the, the, the big takeaway was, well, they were both doing ridiculous things to each other right along the way.

And so, but then the, the talking point for a long time was to say

Amber Heard has done nothing wrong. And then it flips over to Amber Heard is an evil, evil woman.

And Johnny Depp has done nothing wrong. When, if you listen to what was going on, it's like, yeah, you know,

Amber Heard, it sounds like she was doing, she was like the primary, the primary offender here.

Right. But then they're both, they're both treating each other horribly the whole time.

Yeah, I can't, I didn't listen to enough of the trial to develop like a helpful perspective of, of it other than I saw clips and it seemed like, it seemed like maybe he's just a lot better actor than her too.

Like maybe that's part of it. Like he's a lot better actor. Like, whereas like seeing her act in the courtroom was pretty embarrassing at times.

It was just like the, you know, the sad looks on her face and everything else.

It really didn't do her any favors. But it like, yeah. I mean, I think after looking at what pieces of the trial

I looked at, it seemed like it was more on her end, but they're both crazy. But then if you isolate on anyone, like the problem, like part of the problem with those kinds of things is like, you can isolate on any one of those moments where one of them is being crazy and you think, man, look at what they have.

The other person has to deal with. Right. But then the problem is, and this is why, like, this is why people need to wake up about the way relationships actually work.

You can't just isolate in on one crazy moment that one person has, because these problems don't happen in a vacuum.

Right. Yeah. Like the, like this is whatever's happening right here is the long culmination of a lot of events.

And that doesn't mean you excuse, like when he's, um, you know, slamming cabinets or throwing bottles on the ground or whatever he's doing and yelling and acting drunk and acting crazy like that.

You don't excuse that kind of thing, but you might think, well, this is more complicated now that I have more information.

Right. Yeah. There's a lot to deal with on both sides. Right. Right. And so there's sin here on both people that needs to be addressed.

If this is going to, if you want to see the relation improve, there's a lot of sin that needs to be repented of on both sides.

Yeah. Let me record you while I'm, you know, on my best behavior recording you. And that's one of the things that's really odd about watching that kind of thing.

It's like, I'm going to record you. And when I record you, I'm obviously going to be on my best behavior. Right. Once I, you know, but who knows what happened before the recording started, how you got them worked up or whatever else.

Right. Right. And so what a strange relationship where both of them are secretly recording each other in order to show them how it's like, you don't know what's going on.

Yeah. Yeah. You don't know what's going on in any of it. Right. Like, and, and then, you know, I don't know what it'd be like to marry a drug addict kind of person like Johnny deck and drunk, you know, whatever.

And then, you know, on the other end, I don't know how, what it'd be like to marry a psychopath like her too.

Right. Yeah. The contentious woman. Yeah. Yeah. So it's just, it's crazy both ways, but, but if that, that, that does give you a real life example of how these things are not nearly so simple as what people are saying.

Yeah. And so, you know, we, we talked about the, there is no cookie cutter response.

Right. So the way that you would handle like the, the guy who is physically harming his wife, right.

You would handle that a lot differently than the, you don't even have to call it a toxic relationship to handle it.

Right. Right. Right. There's no value in calling it that whatsoever. Just get rid of that way of talking about it.

You didn't say that. I'm just saying a person in general, there's no you, you, you, if you just dealt with that as a, his own category, everyone would know what to do a lot better.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Instead of giving the blanket toxic thing that could mean that, or it could just mean, you know, someone said something that I didn't like, and it hurt my feelings.

Right. So basically what I'm trying to say here is there, you know, you have to handle these things differently and we do have to recognize that every single relationship is two sinful people trying to get along with each other.

Right. So there, so there's going to be difficulties along the way. One thing I did want to ask you is, all right, so let's assume, you know, well,

I guess I won't assume it. Let me just, let me, I'll just ask this first. Do you think there are any relationships where you have to say, you know, okay, don't you, you know, don't use the detox language, don't use the toxic friendship stuff, but you do have a relationship where someone has, has repeatedly sinned against you.

Right. And, and you've tried to work through the process. You've, you've asked yourself, Hey, is there any way in which

I'm sinning in, in this relationship? Let me, let me seek repentance and forgiveness from God and from the other person.

And, and, you know, however, that, however, that, whatever that looks like, you've done that.

And then you've confronted the other person and said, Hey, I feel like I'm seeing this kind of sin in your life.

And, and they just keep doing it for whatever, and it is a legitimate sin. Right.

What, what do you do then? Are you supposed to just, is there any point where you say, all right,

I'm just, I can't, I just can't be a part of this anymore. Like, you won't listen to me.

I feel so emotional. Yeah. Yeah.

But I'm, I'm, I'm basically just trying to find, like, is there any sense in which, like, yeah, you don't call it the detoxing from the toxic relationship, but then you do say like the, yeah, yeah, no,

I understand. Okay. Okay. I think so. All right.

There are different rules for different kinds of relationships. So, if you're in a friendship, like, there's friendships, right? Right. Yeah.

There's like, quote, unquote, dating relationships, right? There's professional relationships.

Yeah. Professional relationships, church relationships, everything else. Okay. So, you know, like, if you're, you're in a work environment where you're constantly being berated by your boss, right?

Constantly being berated by your boss. Uh, he's just kind of a guy with a temper, you know, misunderstands everything that's happening.

Whenever there's a problem, he's going to go in yelling and, um, you know, he or she is just going to go in yelling.

You're going to be falsely accused and blamed and whatever else. Like there's no biblical, moral imperative to work there until you die.

Right. That's not like the nature of the commitment that you're making when you sign up for a job. Right.

If you're, you're an at will employer, you're not a slave. Right. So you're an at will employer. And you, you know, if you determined, you know, and, and not just like, um, um, willy nilly, but I mean, if you just determined that,

Hey, you know what? Like, I just, I don't really like going to work every day. You have the freedom to not like going to work every day and you don't have any kind of moral imperative to, you know, stick it out to death, the apart, you know, in that.

Kind of relationship. So now if you say it's a toxic work environment, I'm just going to roll my eyes at you and say, grow up, you know?

But like, if you want to, um, particularly if you're a man, right. If you're a man, I'm going to say, grow up, man, you know, put on your man pants and, you know, use different words.

I don't ever want to hear you say that to me again. You just gave me an ear infection, you know, talking that way.

I will. I mean, I will, I will say you just defiled my, my ears, my eardrums with this girly language, you know, and I wouldn't say that to a woman in that way, but I would, you know,

I would say the female equivalent of you've defiled my eardrums, you know, unless I could get away with it, you know, and they laugh, you know, then

I may say it, but if I thought I could get away with it, I may, I may, but, um, no, that's interesting.

Okay. Okay. Keep going. Keep going. That's, that's not the main point here. I'm getting distracted.

I'm getting distracted. Um, no, you don't have a moral imperative at the work, you know, to work there until death do you part.

You know, that's not that kind of relationship. You can find a better paying job. That's going to treat you better or whatever.

It's like, that's well within your rights. Um, but I mean, I wouldn't just, you know, go out.

I wouldn't just like pack up and leave. I'd do it in an honorable way. Right. Give it, give your notice and you know, everything else, they're going to make you feel guilty.

Whatever it does, you don't have to accept all that. Now, if it's a friendship, I mean, I think there are, um, like there are people who just, um,

I mean, there, there are friendships where like, um, you know, you just, you, you, you don't have the same, this is not a lifelong covenant that you're making.

Right. You know, and often, I mean, I think with friendships, I mean, I think you can, um, my impulse with friendship is not just to get your feelings hurt and leave, or, you know, get irritated or annoyed or bothered.

If God's put you in their life, for some reason, you have to think, what does God want me to do in this kind of relationship?

And, and so like, contrary to the toxic friendship kind of logic, where you are the center and your feelings are the thing that matter most, like in, you know, like in biblical friendships, you have to say,

God has in his sovereignty, sovereignty has put me in this person's life to be a good influence. And there might be a time where you just wipe the dust off your feet and say,

Hey, I've done as much as I can do here. Right. Like, um, you know, but I'm more of a fan of trying to run people off than just, you know, uh, doing the self -care thing and leaving, you know, get ran off yourself.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I'd rather get ran off. I, I, I rather them run me off, you know, and, and typically, um, it's not all that hard to do what you would rather them run you off.

Yeah. Do you mean you run them off?

You would rather you run them off? Yeah. Okay. Okay. You would, you would rather run them off as opposed to them running you off the relationship.

Yeah. I'd rather if possible be the one who is saying the things they don't want to hear with such a frequency that they don't want any more to do with me.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. And then I would feel good about it for the most part, you know, but I mean, if it's the kind of thing where they're just like, like, if they're taking it like from just normal standard milk toast, toxic relationship to like, they're like losing their temper and, you know, acting weird and strange and breaking boundaries and that kind of stuff at some point, it's just like,

Hey man, you know, like I'm not going to hang out with you. If every time I hang out with you, you're going to be yelling and screaming and lose your temper.

Like, you know, and I'm not going to do that for your benefit, you know, not just because I'm hurt or it hurts my feelings or, you know, it's just like,

Hey, like, uh, look, you don't get to be around me and just yell at me whenever you want. That isn't the way this works.

Right. Right. But you can do that from a position of strength or you can do that from a position of weakness. Right. And so,

I mean, as a guy, I would advocate you do that from a position of strength. Not like, Hey, I'm so sick of this and you know,

I don't deserve this and no one treats me this way and whatever. Like, that's just silly, you know, just, Hey, like, look, if you don't have self -control,

I'm not going to hang out with you. If you can't control your tongue, if you can't control your temper, every time around you, you're just going to yell at me and scream at you.

Then, you know, I'll, I'll hang out with you when you learn to get control over that. Right.

But, you know, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm not just going to keep on like being here, you know, and, um, you know, obviously just, uh, like I'd rather protect you from your own sin nature and not feed it in that way.

Now, I mean, if, are they a church member, there's different rules as church members too, right? So, I mean,

I think as a church member, if you have someone who's persistently sinning against you, you know, that's what you have a church discipline process for.

But the church discipline process in that way is totally different than like this toxic relationship thing.

Right? Right. So, with the toxic relationship, like the whole point of it is self -care and, you know, self -fulfillment and building your self -esteem and being validated and being affirmed.

It's like, you hurt my feelings and, you know, this is sad for me. And like, that's just like, there's no place for that in the

Bible. I mean, that kind of, like the Bible tells us, like, look not to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Uh, you know, uh, it's more blessed to give than to receive. You know, we, we ought to be people who, you know, it's a glory of a man to overlook an offense.

We don't need to be so thin skinned. We need to be individuals who realize that if they're acting that way, it says something about their relationship with God and we want to help them.

Yeah. If they want help, you know, if they don't want help, then they don't want to help.

They're just wasting everyone's time. Right. Right. But if you're in church with them, I think there's a, there's a very real, like, it may be that you're pursuing church discipline with them, but the goal of church discipline is not just to remove myself from this toxic person who is permanently viewed in a toxic category.

Right. So once you say they're a toxic person, it's like you literally categorize them as Hitler and you categorize yourself as a, as a

Jew. Right. And like, the only answer is for you to protect yourself from them for the rest of eternity.

Right. Right. And it's like, well, that isn't church discipline. The goal of church discipline is restoration. It's like, Hey, I want this relationship to be fixed.

You know, it's a blessed of the peacemakers. Like, it's, you know, it's good for brothers to dwell in unity with each other.

So that's what I want. I want this relationship to be fixed. Uh, and if you're unwilling to stop sinning, it's not going to be fixed.

And then I'm removing myself from you so that, that I'm delivering you over to Satan so that you will experience the consequences that come from that and then be restored to me.

So I can be like the prodigal father waiting from a distance for you to return. Right. So, and that's totally different than the, you know, like a detox from toxic friendship logic.

Right. Totally. Yeah. There's a much greater commitment there. There's a, a desire to see the other person, um, pursuing obedience to God.

Right. Right. And be restored, you know, so restored to God restored to you. That's the goal. And that's what's so pernicious about this whole topic.

Right. And then if it's a marriage, I mean, it's the same. I mean, um, do you have like, you have a relationship you can't just, you know, cut off ties with in the same way that you might have freedom with a lot of these other kinds of relationships.

So, you know, it may be perfectly natural in the course of a normal friendship. Um, I mean,

I, I described this in another episode, you know, being, um, you know, having, um, being at seminary and having guys like basically come to me and say,

Hey man, you're not keeping up with me and calling me like you should. And all that. And me just like looking at them and saying,

Hey, you know, I don't, I don't have these kinds of conversations with men. Right. I don't,

I don't want to have these kinds of conversations with ladies, you know, but I will, but we're not going to go there, you know, we're not going to go there, you know, but, but I mean, it's just like, you know, they can do whatever they want with that, you know, but I do think you have with your friendship, some sort of ability to define the terms of your, you know, uh, the rules of the game in, so to speak.

Right. Yeah. There's a little more freedom there. Right. Yeah. So like, you, you've been in situations where you've tried to evangelize men and they're trying to hit on you and like pervs, you know?

And so at that point you say, no, you know, I, I'm going to detox myself from that.

You know, personally, I think it sounds way cooler to say

I'm delivering, I've delivered them over to Satan for the destruction of their flesh. Then to say,

I'm going to detox from this toxic friendship. That's just me. That's just me. I don't know.

It does. No, it does. And it's a lot, like conceptually, it makes a lot more sense. It's a little more, it's, it's a lot clearer in terms of what happening, because what's implied there is like,

Hey, there's a process that we went through, whatever that looked like. Right. And, um, and, uh,

You can feel good about, you can feel good about that. We went through a biblical process and God's behind it. Right. Right.

Yeah. And you did the right thing. There's peace there. Yeah. Yeah. It wasn't just about like my own selfishness and me, like not enjoying this or me not liking whatever it's, it wasn't about all that.

It was about like, God, I want to honor God. He told me what to do. I followed what he told me to do. Now I can go to sleep at night knowing that, that he, uh, we did what he said.

Yeah. It wasn't influenced by subjective feelings that may or may not even be, you know, in, uh, aligned with what's actually, actually happening in reality.

Right. And, uh, and oftentimes they're, uh, the biblical process is normally bringing other people in to examine what's going on and say,

Hey, am I seeing this right? Or have I, have I misunderstood something along the way? You know?

And, and so, uh, and I think that's the point of things like church discipline is it's supposed to restore and it's supposed to protect all of us and a lot from sin.

Right. And, um, and so, so I, you know, obviously I think that's a much better way to now, should we church discipline friends who aren't a part of our church?

I think, you know, I don't, I don't know. I don't know that you can go through all the steps, but I think you should make whatever,

I think you should do the best of your ability. And this is where some, this is a issue where I think, uh, people need to think more about what they're saying and that you can't, you obviously can't like church discipline is if your brother sins against you, you go tell him his fault between you and him alone.

Right. Yeah. There's no one, nothing to stop you from doing that with any person who claims to be a

Christian who sins against you. Right. Yeah. So yeah, you can, you can do that step.

Right. And you can also, like, if you have a real bad disagreement with them, you can also bring two or three other people like that.

You're not going to prepare the witness so that you can establish every charge. Right.

And most people are just allergic to even doing that at all. Right. Yeah. But I mean, even in your own friendships, you may not even be a part of your own church.

You say, Hey, you know, we're having a difficult time dealing with this. I love you. I care about you. I want this to be fixed. Right. Can we get a few people to listen to this so we can try to resolve it?

And like a godly person would have, should have no reason to say no to that. Right. Right. Like at least to say, like to say,

Hey, I've done everything. Okay. If it's possible, if as much as it lies within me, I want to live at peace with other people.

You should have no disagreement with saying, all right, I'll try to go to the next step with you and see what we can do here.

Right. Yeah. Yeah. Can we agree on, you know, people and not fill their head with, our side of the story before we do it, you know, can we just, you know,

I think that's fine, but you can't go to the third step on it for sure. Right. But, but one more thing

I would say though, to just related to this topic in general with toxic, toxic friendships is that, you know,

I think there is, um, there's a reality that if it's, um, like not everyone deserves all of your time, you have to find some way to prioritize the amount of time you're given to people.

Does that make sense? Okay. Flesh it out a little more for me. So like my life consists of, you know, hundreds of people in, you know, in my, maybe a hundred people.

I don't know if I have, maybe I have a hundred people or so in my closest kind of circle or something.

Right. Well, you've got like 150 people just in your family alone. Well, you know, but a lot of them,

I'm not, um, you can't keep track of everyone. Right. So what, so, you know,

I don't, I don't know what the number is for me. So we'll just leave that aside for a second. But, um, you know,

Jesus had, um, he had a hundred, by the end of his ministry, he had 150 committed followers, basically, give or take.

And then he had 12 really close followers. And then within the 12, there seemed to be three that were even closer than that.

And then within that, he had one, you know, John disciple whom he loved. Right. So what the

Bible talks about, you devote yourself to faithful people. Right. So as leaders, you devote yourself to faithful people. So everyone should have some kind of, um, something like that.

Right. Yeah. Like maybe a few, like one really close person, maybe three closest.

Right. And these are not scientific numbers, you know, 12 that are get a lot more of your time and then 150 acquaintance kind of people.

Right. Now we call everyone friends and this is a big problem. And sometimes this is a problem along gender lines too, is that, you know,

I, I will use the word with people that are outside of, like,

I use the word friend in more of a meaningful way. I don't just call everyone my friend, despite what

Facebook says. Right. So I prefer to say like, like friends are people, you know, and I don't think there's anything biblical about this, but like a friend is more like in my mind, someone like I'll hang out with one -on -one kind of thing.

Right. And acquaintance is kind of someone that is in my circles. I know

I can have a conversation with, but I don't go that extra step with right now, whether or not that's right.

The thing is like, you do have to have whatever you call the difference between a person you hang out with on a regular basis, a person you hang out with every once in a while and people that are in your circle that, you know, that you never hang out with, you have to have some way of some language, some kind of vocabulary of dealing with that.

And then you have different expectations all along those lines. Right. Right. Now, if you have like a person who is like, just absolutely difficult to be around and awkward to be around and just like in every way possible, everything you say, they're going to take offensively or going to turn into some kind of problem.

Like it, you do have to ask yourself, is it the best and wisest use of my time here to devote all of my energy to this person with this relationship that, you know, whether you're talking about discipleship or something else, it's just not going anywhere.

Right. Nothing good is coming from it. It's just like a dead end road here. Now, I think, you know, a wise person is just going to try to prioritize their time, but then what you're not thinking in terms of at that point is like, you're not thinking in terms of the toxic categories, but you're thinking in terms of is prioritizing the limited, like making the best use of the time for the days are evil.

You're best utilizing this time that you're given and you want to give more of it to people who will be better investments.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah. Meaning better investments, meaning like relative to the amount of influence you have in their life.

Right. Yeah. They're willing to give you or, you know, the kind of fruit that they, that may come from that too.

Right. So, you know, a rookie mistake that pastors often make is that they'll like completely devote themselves to all the problem people that they have there.

And then they get sucked dry, you know, because they're devoting themselves to all the people who are never going to be happy, no matter what you do, period.

Right. Because they're the person who are people who are reaching out. And then it may like, you know it may be that, you know, if you can do what

Paul is saying and find faithful men to entrust yourself to that, you'll bear more fruit in their life.

It will be more of joy. That doesn't mean that you like abandon the toxic people, you know, it just means that you just, they don't, they have to show themselves faithful and trustworthy to get more of you.

Right. Because you only have so many hours in day. And then, you know, Jesus says, you know, so the woman, like he says, it's not good to give the children's bread to the dogs.

Right. And what that means is like, you do have, like, you have to prioritize your time, even as it relates to family relationships or running against others.

So your immediate family should get more of you than anyone else. Your church family should get more of you than anyone else.

And beyond that, you know, you don't have, like, if you really devote yourself to your church family and evangelization, as far as those things are concerned, you probably don't have a whole lot left to give.

Right. And like, just to devote yourself to, like, you know, endlessly to people, you know, missional projects, for instance, that are going nowhere, nothing's coming from it.

And all that's happening is you're adopting all their, you're just, you know, throwing yourself mindlessly into all their entertainment preferences and hope that one day you can, you know, be able to share the gospel with them or something like that.

At some point, it's just like, this isn't bearing the same kind of fruit as what it could. Does that make sense?

Pete Yeah. Yeah. Like, there's a, we need to be wise in how we spend our time, basically.

Yeah. And there is some, there's wisdom in saying, hey, look, there's times where, you know, sure, someone does something that you don't like, you feel like, um, whether it was sin or it's just like something you didn't prefer or whatever, sometimes it's better to just overlook the offense than to like, blow it, like, turn it into this big ordeal.

Right. Right. And if you have no category for that, like if you have no category for dying to yourself and like overlooking an offense, and if someone does something you didn't like, if, if the only thing you can do at that point, and this is something that ladies are uniquely tempted with more than men, um, is that like, someone doesn't do, do something they like, and then they get, you know, hurt from it.

And then it's just so unbearably awkward to ever be around them again.

Right. To the point where they literally cut them out of their lives. I mean, you could see this as it relates to a lot of the, you know, difference between male fighters and female fighters and in the sports nowadays, uh, to where, you know, men they'll punch it out and they'll hug each other and kiss each other.

Like they're exponentially more affectionate after the fight, you know, uh, then like ladies don't know how to fight and in the same way and then come back to the table.

Right. That's more of a manly thing. Um, like in terms of gender stereotypes, but you know, like you do have to have some category for saying, yeah, they did me wrong.

And I'm not going to sit there and run it over and over and over again in my mind all day long until I make it like, like painfully.

Yeah. It was so painfully awkward to ever have to subject myself to their presence again.

Like it's a very immature way of thinking if, if, if that's what you're doing, right. It's a very immature, like, uh, like it's, there's nothing biblical about that.

That's pure vindictiveness. That's pure bitterness. You know, the Bible says that all bitterness and wrath and anger and slammer and clamber clamber be put away from you along with all malice.

That's cold anger. That's bitterness. That's just like grow up. Right. Yeah. Like, so that, yeah, there's so, but that's, you know, in prioritizing, what are the relationships that are bearing fruit in my life?

I'm going to devote myself more to that. Like, that's a very different calculus that you're making than the toxic detox calculus.

Right. Yeah. Okay. Um, well, I think that's a place to end. Uh, is there anything that we didn't cover at all,

Tim, that you just, you want to mention briefly? Yeah, no, I'm, I'm sure that we could go on forever about this topic, but you do have to,

I think the summary is you want to, uh, it would just be much better to use biblical terms when we're dealing with the, this kind of subject.

And this is just another example of why using these kinds of terms, you might not know the kind of baggage that's, um, associated with it.

And you could test it. I mean, just look on Twitter and you'll see people use this term and ask yourself if, if there is implied within that term, a demand, moral obligation to remove yourself from that relationship and then ask yourself the follow -up question, what did they do?

Right. Yeah. You know, what is the situation? It would be, it would be interesting to, you know, find the people that speak that way online.

And then, and then the first response to be, well, what, what did you do anything and see, see what their response would be.

And I think, I think we all know what the answer is, what their response would actually be. So you're not even allowed to ask, man.

Right. Exactly. Yeah. It would be a vitriolic response for sure. Um, but yeah,

I, I think the main takeaway that I'm getting here is look, when we use this kind of language, when we think this way, when we, when we use the sort of victim and mentality that you and I often, you know, speak against, what ends up happening is you avoid, uh, you, you end up thinking about yourself.

Ultimately, you think about yourself and how you can vindicate yourself or satisfy yourself in some way.

Whereas God has given us different, uh, he's given us ways to handle disagreements.

He's given us ways to handle sinful actions that we commit towards others and that others commit towards us.

And all of those, um, all of those responses that he tells us to pursue are not about us, right.

They're about honoring God and, um, uh, honoring other people, right.

And, and considering them more significant than ourselves. And sometimes that does look like, Hey, look,

I think you, my brother or sister are in sin. And there's a, you know, there's a process you can go through all of that.

So that at the end of the day, instead of saying, you know, ideally at the end of the day, instead of saying,

Hey, I'm just going to remove myself from the situation. I'm not even going to try, you know, to fix these things.

Then, uh, instead of that, we have the opportunity to be reconciled.

And I think ultimately that is what glorifies God the most when we can be reconciled in spite of our sin.

And that's why the Bible says that, you know, the world will know that we as Christians are different from the rest of the world by the way that we love one another.

Right. And, and, um, going through those processes with each other, overlooking offenses, uh, all of those things are ways that we love each other, that the world, um, the world doesn't do, they don't love each other in that way.

So, so hopefully that's encouraging for you guys. Hopefully, uh, you, you, um, this gives you a lot to think about as it comes to the relationships in your own life and how, um, how we should go about disagreements, how we should go about sin, uh, against one another.

Um, and, and, you know, I think there's a lot of ways that you can apply this because relationships are difficult.

Relationships are hard. It's not like Disney movies where, you know, everyone lived happily ever after.

There's, there's, there's all sorts of controversy that happens along the way because we're all sinful and we shouldn't expect any different, um, than to experience periods and relationships that, that can be difficult and trying.

And, and we need to know how to handle them in a biblical and God honoring way that considers the other person more significant than ourselves.

So we want to thank you guys for listening, uh, for supporting us each week. And we look forward to having you guys on the next episode.

If you would like to be Bible bashed personally, then please know that we also offer free biblical counseling, which you can take advantage of by emailing us.

Now go boldly and obey the truth in the midst of a biblically illiterate world who will be perpetually offended by your every move.