September 25, 2020 Show with Jennifer Michelle Greenberg & Rev. Bill Shishko on “Help! There’s Domestic Abuse in My Church!”

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Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

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Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

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Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

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Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us, Iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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Matthew Henry said that in this passage, we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation, to make one another wiser and better.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions, and now here's your host,

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Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon,

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet

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Earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com. This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Friday on this 25th day of September, 2020.

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Although I've had both of my guests today on before, one has been on many, many times, this is the first time they've ever been on together.

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My guests today are Jennifer Michelle Greenberg and Pastor Bill Shishko.

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Jennifer Michelle Greenberg is a pianist, a vocalist, and songwriter who has received a wonderful commendation from Brian Ray, bassist and guitarist for Paul McCartney.

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She is a wife, mother, and half of a musical duo with her husband Jason, an advocate for victims of domestic violence and abuse, who has been commended by Tori Amos for her work benefiting these victims, and by President George W.

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Bush and Governor Sarah Palin for her charitable work for the military and veterans.

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She is also the author of Not Forsaken, the story of life after abuse, how faith brought one woman from victim to survivor.

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It's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Jennifer Michelle Greenberg. Thank you so much,

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Chris. It's great to have you back. And also joining Jennifer is Pastor Bill Shishko, one of my dearest and oldest friends in the faith going back to the 1980s.

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He is pastor of The Haven, an Orthodox Presbyterian congregation currently meeting in Bohemia, Long Island, New York, in the facilities of the

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Orthodox Presbyterian Church of Bohemia. He's also an advisory board member of the

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Bonson Project. And today, both Pastor Bill and Jennifer are going to be discussing

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Help! There's Domestic Abuse in My Church. It's my honor and privilege to welcome you back to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio as well,

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Pastor Bill Shishko. Hey, Chris. Good to be with you again. In comparison with Jennifer's resume, there's not much to say about me.

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Well, that isn't true at all. In fact, as far as my circles of acquaintances and friendships globally, since I've been doing

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Christian radio so many years, you are one of those friends that I have that it seems at least 90 % of the people that I come into contact with know who you are.

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And they say very wonderful things about you, I might add. And they know who

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I am, but what do they say about me? My wife said to me once, Bill, Jesus said, woe to you when all men speak well of you, but you've never had that problem.

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Well, I find that hard to believe.

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But today we are speaking of Help! There's Domestic Abuse in My Church.

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And Pastor Bill, if you could perhaps set the stage for what we're going to be discussing today.

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Sure. Yeah. Yeah, thanks, Chris. And it's an honor to be on the program and an honor to be on with Jen Greenberg.

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I pastored the Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Franklin Square on Long Island for 35 years.

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And during that time, we dealt with domestic abuse cases, although I don't think domestic abuse was as much of a problem then as it is now.

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And we had the benefit of a corporate attorney on our elder board and also a man who was a

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New York policeman and then was a retired New York policeman. And these men had had a lot of experience with these things.

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So when we dealt with domestic abuse, we dealt with things as we thought every church would deal with things.

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And then a couple of years back, when I was doing my own visit to the pastor's study radio program on domestic abuse,

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I was in collaboration with a very dear friend, Pastor Bob Needham. I was a former chaplain and pastor, now retired.

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His book, What to Do When You're Abused by Your Husband, was what

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I'd read and recommended. And in speaking with Bob, I was stunned when he began our discussion by saying,

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Bill, the toleration of domestic abuse in evangelical churches is the greatest scandal of the evangelical church today.

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Wow. And Bob Needham is not a man given to overstatement at all. And since getting into this world,

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I can only confirm exactly what he said. And then in 2019,

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I was sent a copy of Jen's book, Not Forsaken, which I cannot recommend too highly.

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As I was reading the book, at the first part, I could read only in small amounts.

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It's very intense. Jen is a gifted writer, and she is able to communicate what she and others have been through very effectively.

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I realized how horrendous the problem, how horrendous domestic abuse is when people are the victims of abuse.

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And then I was quite taken by the fact that Jen had phenomenal theological insights about what abuse is, what it does to people, what love is, what repentance is, and so on.

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And so following that and my writing the review of that, which was in the May 2020

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New Horizons, I was putting contact with Jen. And even though we're a couple thousand miles away, she's in Houston, Texas, and I'm in Long Island, New York, we had a lot of communication in which

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I've encouraged Jen in her efforts to help churches and church leaders know how to more effectively deal with domestic abuse.

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That has resulted in what really is a development of her book,

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Not Forsaken, the curriculum, which I'm very excited that Jennifer is going to introduce via your program.

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Thank you. Praise God. Well, Jennifer, what would you like to say about your curriculum? Yeah, well, the curriculum, it's a study.

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It's about the length of the book itself, and you can download it free through my website at jennifergreenberg .net.

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And basically what it does is it takes the reader, it's geared towards church leaders,

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Christian counselors, school admins, and so it basically takes them through the book and helps them understand how to respond to reports of abuse, as well as how to understand the dynamic, the spiritual, emotional dynamics that are going on, and hopefully help them see red flags so they can identify abusive situations, respond to them effectively, and be able to intervene as a pastor, as a church leader, as a

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Christian counselor in that situation, and tell them they're dealing with someone who is maybe a narcissist, or who is maybe a sociopath, and how do you distinguish between genuine repentance and someone who's just saying that they're sorry so they can keep doing what they're doing behind the scenes.

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By the way, Jen, I don't want you to be overly alarmed, but you do sound a little muffled.

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Is there anything that you could change in the way that you're communicating with us?

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Hello? Is that better? Oh, that's 100 % better. Oh, good.

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Sorry about that. 500 % better. Okay, good. Oh, no.

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Okay, so what I was saying was that the curriculum is geared towards church leaders, and it takes them through the book and helps them see red flags for abusive situations.

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For example, just different signs to look for in both children and adults.

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I go through the seven stages of recovery, as I call them, which is similar, I guess, the five stages of grief, but it talks about how, you know, depending on how far in the past the abuse is, the different signs that you're going to see, the different kinds of confusion and theological challenges you're going to be dealing with with that person.

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You know, it's like, why did God let this happen to me, and how do

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I know whether or not my abuser is truly repentant or if he's just lying to me again? And so, going through all these issues and trying to equip pastors, church leaders, counselors, school teachers, and the like, to just better identify and understand and respond to these situations.

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By the way, I want to let our listeners know that after this program is over, if you want to hear

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Jen's story, which she has chronicled in her book, Not Forsaken, you can go to ironsherpensironradio .com,

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and you can click on podcast past shows, and if you type in the search engine

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Greenberg, that's spelt with a B -E -R -G at the end, you will see her, the audio link for her interview, and you can find out more about that.

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Just so our listeners know, your specific abuse of which you were the victim was parental abuse.

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Specifically, your father had abused you sexually. Correct. There was domestic violence, as well as sexual abuse and psychological abuse, and then that abuse was furthered in the church when

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I tried to tell pastors what was going on. And when you say the abuse was furthered, you mean the mental and emotional abuse because of the fact that the churches were not really doing anything to adequately respond to your father?

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Correct. There was that, but also one pastor in particular, when I went to try to tell him what was going on with my dad, he actually propositioned me.

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Wow. Um, yes. Yeah, so it was very disturbing and confusing, and that, because that happened, it was very difficult for me to try to report again because I was thinking, well, are all men like this?

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You know, is this like, how do I know who to trust? And so that, and that also is a big thing that I deal with, you know, in my book.

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How do we help victims and survivors learn how to trust again?

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How do we avoid triggering them? How do we avoid, you know, treating them in such a way that maybe seems okay to us, but might actually exacerbate their situation or, you know, make them nervous?

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And so, yeah, so I go through all this different stuff, and I'm really excited about it.

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It's a free download through my website, jennifergreenberg .net, and I've already heard wonderful feedback about it.

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One of the pastors who downloaded it recently told me that he's been dealing with a situation in his church where the wife was dealing with psychological abuse, and he didn't know how to respond to this because he'd never heard about it before.

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You know, it's like he's always heard about physical violence or sexual abuse, and so he, this idea of psychological abuse was completely foreign to him.

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And he said that reading the curriculum had helped him understand what was actually going on and helped him understand the dynamics of the situation so that he could pastor to both of those individuals better.

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And I want to repeat your website, even though we plan on doing that throughout the program.

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jennifergreenberg .net, and remember, greenberg is spelt with an erg at the end. jennifergreenberg .net.

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And can you give us a basic outline of exactly how churches and others, individuals, counseling ministries, what have you, how they actually make use of this curriculum?

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Absolutely. Well, it's, you know, I tried to design it in a way that was very flexible, so you can read through it as if it's a book, just in your individual time.

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But it also would work in a class setting. So you can, you know, say you're a pastor and you want your session or your group of church leaders, elders to go through this curriculum, you can do it in a class format, or if you're a seminary professor, you know, it would work in that format as well.

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So I try to make it as versatile as possible and just kind of, kind of give, you know, church leaders a baseline and the information that they need.

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And the other, the other thing you can use it as is almost kind of like an encyclopedia. So say you don't have time to sit down and read 135 pages about preventing and handling abuse.

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Well, you can also just have this, you know, on your computer or your smartphone or whatever, your

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Kindle, you can have it there. And then say you went into someone who, you know, they have abuse in their past and their abuser keeps saying that they're sorry, but then they keep abusing and they keep saying sorry and then doing, you know, being abusive again.

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And so how do you respond to that? Well, you can just open up Not Forsaken, a Shepherd's Guide, and you can scroll down to chapter 12,

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The Truth About Repentance, and you can run through the various signs of repentance, you know, what to look for, red flags, that maybe an abuser is not as repentant as they claim to be.

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And so you can kind of use it in that way as well. It's kind of a reference material. I remember in both my interview, previous interview with you and Pastor Bill, that fake repentance is a very, very common, in fact, it's almost guaranteed when an abuser gets caught.

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Is that, is that correct? Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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And a lot of times they'll say things, you know, like, I'm sorry, you know, I'm sorry that you feel this way. I'm sorry that you're, you know,

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I'm sorry that you're upset. But a lot of times, you know, some of the, some of the red flags you can look for is, well, are they demanding forgiveness of you?

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Like, do they expect you to just up and trust them because they said sorry? Because a genuinely repentant person will understand the gravity of what they've done.

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They'll understand that they've lost your trust, that they've done something that has proven them to be untrustworthy.

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And so they're not going to try to pressure you into trusting them again, pressure you into forgiving them immediately, pressure you into letting them around the moment, you know, whatever.

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They're going to understand that you need time to heal. They're going to understand that you have reason not to trust them, and they're going to be respectful of that.

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That's one of the number one red flags that I've seen is abusers demanding forgiveness.

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And it's just not something that we see backed up by Scripture at all. Yeah, the one thing that makes my skin crawl in any circumstances where the guilty party involved in some kind of a sin that who has harmed someone either physically, spiritually, mentally, or emotionally is when they say,

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I'm sorry you were hurt by this, or I'm sorry you feel that way.

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Because basically what that means is I pity you because you're so weak and sensitive.

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That's really what that means. Right, exactly, exactly. They're not apologizing for what they did.

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They're not repenting of what they did. They're saying they're sorry that you feel a certain way.

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And that's not the same as repentance. Now, do you agree with Pastor Bill's comment before?

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I think he was just saying this by his gut feeling, but he was saying that spousal abuse or domestic abuse and violence are on the rise from previous years and generations.

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Do you agree with that? Do you have any knowledge whether that is a statistical fact?

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In the church, that is. I'm talking about in the church. Right, I would imagine so.

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I mean, I feel like the climate in the church has, especially in the evangelical church, unfortunately, has become more worldly.

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And as we lose our Biblical definitions of things like repentance and forgiveness, and we forget the rich Biblical theology that teaches us how to deal with sin and how to respond to sin, or just sin in general.

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You know, there's so many churches these days that preach about grace and the love of God, but they don't want to preach about sin.

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And that's a huge problem. And I think that it has enabled abuse, and it's resulting in just sort of a failure to confront abuse when it's seen, because nobody wants to deal with the yucky, dark, dirty secret that's happening behind closed doors.

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Now, Pastor Bill, as a pastor, and your experience in all kinds of boards and leadership positions that extend even beyond your local congregations where you have pastored, why is it that conservative, doctrinally and theologically

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Biblical churches that are otherwise sound, and in many ways, sound and reflective of the way

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Christ's church ought to be, other than this area, why on earth do you believe these churches and these church leaders are not responding like Biblical shepherds to the victims of abuse the way that they ought to be?

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Well, that's a massive question, Chris, and I appreciate you asking it. Let me back up a little bit and then answer your question.

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There are certain cultures in which abuse is more ingrained just by way of cultural tradition, and at least in Franklin Square, as the church became more like the

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United Nations in many ways with people born in different countries, I think that's when we became aware of certain cultural patterns, and there are cultural sins.

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I mean, I can say this because my grandparents on my mother's side were from Crete. Paul said the

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Cretans are all liars and slow bellies. This testimony is true for this reason.

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Rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the faith, and as we became aware of cultural sins that we had to deal with, one of which was domestic abuse.

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Normally, it was what I would call was trying to run the house by the decibel level. Men would yell and scream and holler, and we had to deal with that as abuse, so I mean, that's part of it.

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What I was getting at as far as the increase of, at least as I see it, of abuse cases in our own culture is what

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Jen said. Our worldliness today includes with it an incredible disrespect for human life, and that worldliness is going to affect the church.

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Now, as far as what you raised, Chris, let me just use a reference to Scripture.

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You're talking about conservative, Reformed churches. I tend to think that when

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Reformed people, of which I'm one, Reformed ministers in particular, look at Acts 20 and Paul saying, watch when ravenous wolves come in your midst, seeking to destroy the flock,

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I think that the fault of particularly Reformed people is to think of the ravenous wolves as charismatics and dispensationalists and Arminians.

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Rather than say, what about a pedophile? What about a wife abuser? What about a child abuser?

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That's what a wolf does, and so I think there's been, number one, a truncated understanding of what that is, and we've got to get out of our shells in that regard.

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I think the second thing is the tendency has been, at least in the past,

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I don't think it's as bad now, but it's still there, is not to believe it when a person would come forward and say they've been abused.

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I mean, for a person to come forward and say he or she has been abused, and Jen can confirm this, that takes a lot to do that, and rather than not believe it, listen to it and work with it.

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I think the third reason, and I appreciate Jen's input on this, is frankly,

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Chris, there's a lot of pastors who don't want to get their hands dirty with this stuff. They would rather have a kind of insulated, at least in our circles, kind of a doctrine club, as I call it, and if you work with people who have been abused, it is a lot of work.

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Trust needs to be built up. That takes time, and you've got to overcome the lack of trust factor in those who have in some cases even been abused by the quote -unquote clergy, and I just wonder if, hopefully there's a lot more than I think that they're willing to do this, but I think a lot of men are just not willing to dirty their hands dealing with this and commit the time and quite frankly exercise the leadership that's necessary to deal with this effectively, and it takes leadership.

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You know, and here's where I'm probably going to get myself in trouble with some people, but...

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But join the crowd, brother! Being a Christian, as long as I have been a

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Christian, having been saved in the 1980s, I have met, especially since I've been involved in the media for most of that time,

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I have met so many different people from so many different churches, and one thing that I keep hearing about over and over again is almost the exact opposite of what you are both discussing today.

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I am hearing from men who are dismayed, who are discouraged, who are spiritually and mentally and emotionally crushed because, and I'm talking about a lot of men over the years, who have said to me that their churches who have been involved in counseling during their marital problems have gone so overboard to try to dispel the notion of feminists and egalitarians that the church is abusively patriarchal, that it's misogynist, that it's chauvinistic, that they tend to go overboard in siding with the woman in any dispute.

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And I keep hearing about this over and over and over again, and I was wondering how especially

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Jen would respond to that, because obviously, just because one thing may be a reality, doesn't negate what you are saying either.

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I mean, it could be cowardice all around on the part of church leaders, and it also,

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I'm not saying that these men that I hear from are, in some cases, and of course

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I would never say all, or even most, but in some of the cases, they may be delusional, and it might be pride that is bringing them to that conclusion.

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But if you could, comment on what I said. Yeah, I mean, I think that in a lot of cases, you know, there's a tendency, you know,

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I think too in courts, you know, when you read about child custody, you hear about it a lot of times will be given to the woman.

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And I'm not talking necessarily about abuse cases, just generally speaking, the courts, you know, our culture tends to lean that way.

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One thing I think that, one misconception I think that we really need to break through, and that I tried to do in my curriculum in particular, is realize that not all abusers are male.

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There are a lot of female abusers. I mean, we're all human. We all have sins. And so, you're going to meet women who are narcissists, and women who are sociopaths, and women who abuse children.

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And actually, if you look at studies, if you look at statistics from the Department of Public Health, you'll see that over 50 % of child abusers are female.

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And so, you know, it's kind of... I'm really shocked by that, actually. Yes. Yeah.

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Well, I mean, we all have sin, you know, you've got a woman, say maybe she's got a temper or, you know, what have you, and she's stuck at home with the kids all day, and she's just, she's abusive.

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Now, would that be more in the realm, when it comes to the woman being the guilty party of abuse, especially of children, would that be more in the realm of physical violence as opposed to sexual abuse?

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I think, generally speaking, it's usually more violent, or just verbal, you know, just being really cruel verbally.

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But again, these are not hard and fast rules. So, you know, and for that matter, you know, you look on the news, you look at these school teachers who are having affairs with their students, you know, little boys who are 11, 12, 13 years old.

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That's a sexual predator. Yeah. That's a female sexual predator. So, we've got to get rid of this idea in our head that all abusers are, you know, drunk men in white beater shirts.

29:24

Just, it's not realistic. In fact, we're going to pick up right where you left off, Jen, because we have to go to our first break right now.

29:33

If anybody would like to join us on the air with a question for Jennifer Greenberg and Pastor Bill Shishko, our email address is

29:41

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, C -H -R -I -S -A -R -N -Z -E -N at gmail .com.

29:47

Please, if you're just asking a general question when it comes to ecclesiology and how church leaders are to respond to the tragedy of domestic violence in their own congregations, if you're asking a general question about that, please give us at least your first name, your city and state, and country of residence.

30:09

But if it's a personal and private matter, not only would we request, but we would insist that when you write in that either you remain anonymous or you not mention anyone else's name involved in the charges or the account that you are mentioning in your email.

30:32

So feel free to remain anonymous. This is one of those programs where there's a possibility that most of our emails will be anonymous.

30:41

I don't know that for a fact. But feel free to write in anonymously if it's about a personal and private matter.

30:48

Again, it's ChrisArnzen at gmail .com, ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back with Jennifer Michelle Greenberg and Pastor Bill Shishko on our theme,

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Iron Sharpens Iron financially. Would you consider sending either a one -time gift or even becoming a regular monthly partner with this ministry?

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I know it would be a huge encouragement to Chris if you would. All the details can be found at ironsharpensironradio .com,

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where you can click support. That's ironsharpensironradio .com. and Prescription Center of Long Island in Hempstead.

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Greetings in the matchless name of our Lord Jesus Christ. My name is Bhanu Gadi. I'm a pharmacist in New York, which is the epicenter of the latest crisis the world is going through.

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In Psalm 139 verse 14, the psalmist offers praise to the

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Lord like this. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made, and wondrous are your works that my soul knows very well.

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He saw God's goodness and mercy, kindness, and the beauty in what

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God has designed, and he has erupted into praise. In any crisis or problem, brothers and sisters, our only fallback position is to trust

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God's design, and once we do, there is nothing for us to do but to erupt in praise to him.

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When the whole world is searching for a solution, God, in his infinite mercy, has given us what we need to address this illness, which can be very serious.

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Such is the beauty of his design. Knowing that design, how can we not erupt in praise to our great

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God like the psalmist did? May God bless you and give all of us wisdom to see greater things in his design.

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Call 1 -800 -669 -4870. Welcome back.

42:45

This is Chris Arnzen. If you just tuned us in, our guests today are

42:50

Jennifer Michelle Greenberg, author of Not Forsaken, and also

42:57

Pastor Bill Shishko of the Haven and Orthodox Presbyterian Church. Now meeting, at least temporarily, in Bohemia, Long Island, New York, we are discussing the theme,

43:10

Help! There is Domestic Abuse in My Church. If you have any questions, our email address is chrisarnzen at gmail .com.

43:20

I do want to go to at least one or two of our listener questions before we continue with the discussion.

43:27

Let's see here. We have Mary in Cork, Ireland, and Mary says,

43:36

Ecclesiastes 3, verse 7, says, There is a time to keep silence and a time to speak.

43:42

I have kept silent because it is not a nice topic and it is even worse when you are the actual victim in an abuse relationship in an abusive church.

43:53

I write this as a survivor. I write this for the sake of just one woman who feels alone in a hopeless situation, who is not listened to and is not heard.

44:05

God hears you. God hears your cries. He will rescue you. He cares deeply for you and loves you.

44:11

I was married for about nine years and suffered mental, emotional, and physical abuse from my husband on a constant basis, even to the point of ribs being broken and not having food for myself or my baby.

44:24

I was always covered up, keeping my bruises not seen. I went to church and held my guitar as a protection so that no one would know that I was being abused and seemed quite normal, but behind it,

44:37

I was in agony. I reported the abuse to the elders and they took me away from my friends and put another supposedly older woman over me.

44:47

They blamed me as an unsubmissive wife. When my baby was about one year old, my sister took me in for a few weeks only to be told that I was the older brother full of pride, and my husband was the prodigal son, and I was to go home.

45:08

I went back to more abuse. God led me out of that group eventually, and I went to another church where I was told to turn the other cheek and keep singing just like Paul and Silas in jail.

45:22

It dawned on me one day that Paul and Silas weren't beating each other up, but were being persecuted for Christ.

45:30

The leader told me to keep taking it and wait for the angels. Imagine, these leaders were twisting scriptures to keep me in this relationship.

45:39

I received counsel from a Christian counselor who helped me and told me I needed to mind my son.

45:46

This was my priority, so I began to move forward toward legal separation, and this was desperately opposed by the church.

45:54

I was told if I got a divorce, I would not be allowed in the church, so I was terrified, and another pastor said to go for an annulment.

46:02

After some time, we got to state annulment declaring we were never married.

46:09

This broke my heart and even more because now it is said that my little boy's parents were never married.

46:16

I am in tears writing this. This is all in the past, and although my marriage is annulled, and I am on my own for the past 29 years,

46:25

I am still considered married by my family, and if I date a man, I am called an adulteress.

46:31

I am in a wonderful Baptist church now and am loved and cared for. I raised my son to love the

46:37

Lord, and he is a minister of the gospel and a pastor of a church. God has used our pain for our good and his glory.

46:44

I pray that God will use my testimony to help women. He is my strength and my song, and I have forgiven all of these leaders and my ex -husband.

46:54

OK, that was not a question, obviously, but just a very sacrificial on her part to pour open her soul and pour out such a moving email, and if you could both comment on it.

47:13

Absolutely. Just the depth of the spiritual abuse. You know, not only did she suffer through abuse from her husband, but that's ecclesiastical abuse, that's spiritual abuse from her church leaders.

47:26

So, you know, that's the kind of response that you'd expect from a cult, you know, or a group that actually wanted to enable abuse, and too often

47:40

I see that kind of response from just very ignorant people in mainline denominations.

47:48

It's extremely disturbing, and I just think that, you know, hearing Mary's story, it just struck me how much

47:58

God has honored her for what she went through and for what she survived and for protecting her child, and he's a pastor now, and he's able to help people in a biblical and Christ -like way, as opposed to the way her previous pastors and church leaders dealt with her in an abusive way.

48:21

It's just absolutely devastating, though. Pastor Bill? Well, what a heartbreaking testimony.

48:30

I wish that I could say that what Mary wrote is rare, but it's not.

48:38

There are so many cases of ministerial malfeasance when it comes to dealing with people on this issue, not least when it comes to the issues of marriage and divorce.

48:49

I mean, that counsel regarding an annulment had absolutely no basis in Scripture.

48:56

Now, there are biblical views of marriage and divorce and what constitutes desertion, but that was a horrible way to deal with that.

49:03

As far as Mary's first point about a time to be silent, there's a time to speak, and you see that in Proverbs 31.

49:13

Open your mouth for the mute, for the rights of all who are destitute. Open your mouth, judge righteously, defend the rights of the poor and the needy, and people who are abused are needy.

49:27

The mouth must be opened, number one, because lives are at stake in this.

49:33

Number two, when you're dealing with abuse like this, this is a crime, and it must be brought up.

49:39

And number three, people get hurt. I mean, thank God the Lord overwrote what happened with that child.

49:46

But God knows what could have happened with those children. And again, I just wonder if ministers in particular are aware of the kind of harm that comes.

49:55

Let me give one illustration. What's often said, as it was with Mary early on, is you just need to submit to this stuff.

50:04

Excuse me, you don't submit to violence in the house. That's a crime. And you may need a pastor to go and report it with you, but no, that's not biblical counsel.

50:16

Not at all. And you know, another pastor sent me a verse from Ephesians 5 recently, verse 11.

50:24

It says, take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them.

50:30

Yes. Expose them. So we bring these things to the light so that justice can be done, so that the innocent can be protected, so that the truth can be known.

50:39

You know, and we need to be... The church, so often I hear church leaders, they seem to have this instinctive reaction where they think that, oh, if we expose that abuse happened in our congregation, or this church leader was abusive, or this guy over here was abusive, if we expose these things, it's going to embarrass

51:02

Jesus, and it's going to be a smear on the name of Christ. But you know what a smear on the name of Christ is?

51:09

Is when you don't expose evil. When you sweep sin under the rug, that is a flight to Christ.

51:19

And so, you know, Jesus wants us to protect the sheep and nurture the sheep, not just pretend like the sheep are okay when we know that they're not.

51:28

By the way, Mary, I'm going to break a rule that we have here at Iron Trip and Zion Radio.

51:33

We have a rule that only residents of the United States receive free books when we are giving them away during an interview with the author.

51:42

But in your case, I'm going to personally ship out your copy of Not Forsaken by Jennifer Greenberg.

51:50

So if you could email me your full mailing address in Cork, Ireland, so I can ship that out to you.

51:57

And we're going to go to our midway break right now. This is the longer than normal break. I ask of your patience because Grace Life Radio, 90 .1

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FM in Lake City, Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show so that they can air their own public service announcements localizing

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Iron Trip and Zion Radio to Lake City, Florida in order to keep in obedience to FCC regulations.

52:21

And while they do that, we air our globally heard commercials. So please use this time wisely.

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Please write down as much of the information as you can for as many of our advertisers as you can so that you can more frequently and successfully patronize our advertisers, even if you just reach out to them and say, you know,

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I want to thank you so much for sponsoring Iron Trip and Zion Radio because I love that show. But of course, if you can patronize them either by purchasing their products, using their services, or visiting the churches that we advertise, that would even be better.

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But if you could as much as you can, often as you can, reach out to our advertisers, that helps us to remain on the air because when our advertisers are happy, they remain our advertisers.

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And that means we can remain on the air because we rely upon the financial support of our advertisers to exist.

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And of course, use this time also to write in questions to Pastor Bill Shishko and Jennifer Greenberg and send them to ChrisArnson at gmail .com.

53:23

ChrisArnson at gmail .com. Don't go away. We'll be right back after these messages from our sponsors. Attorney at Law is committed to sharing this collection along with an inspirational historical message that will captivate you and your church.

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and click support at the top of the page. But most importantly, keep Iron Sharpens Iron Radio in your prayers.

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We hope that Iron Sharpens Iron Radio blesses you for many years to come. As host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, I frequently get requests from listeners for church recommendations.

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This is Pastor Bill Sousa, Grace Church at Franklin here in the beautiful state of Tennessee.

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Grace Church at Franklin is an independent autonomous body of believers which strives to clearly declare the whole counsel of God as revealed in scripture through the person and work of our

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Lord Jesus Christ. And of course the end for which we strive is the glory of God.

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If you live near Franklin, Tennessee and Franklin is just south of Nashville, maybe 10 minutes or you are visiting this area or you have friends and loved ones nearby, we hope you will join us some

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Our website is gracechurchatfranklin .org, that's gracechurchatfranklin .org.

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This is Pastor Bill Sousa wishing you all the richest blessings of our

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We are excited to announce another new member of the Iron Sharpens Iron Radio advertising family,

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Greetings in the matchless name of our Lord Jesus Christ. My name is Bhanu Gadi. I'm a pharmacist in New York, which is the epicenter of the latest crisis the world is going through.

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In Psalm 139 verse 14, the psalmist offers praise to the Lord like this,

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I praise you because I'm fearfully and wonderfully made and wondrous are your works that my soul knows very well.

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He saw God's goodness and mercy, kindness and the beauty in what

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God's design. And once we do, there is nothing for us to do but to erupt in praise to him.

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When the whole world is searching for a solution, God in his infinite mercy has given us what we need to address this illness, which can be very serious.

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Such is the beauty of his design. Knowing that design, how can we not erupt in praise to our great

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God like the psalmist did? May God bless you and give all of us wisdom to see greater things in his design.

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Without their financial support, barring a miracle of God, we would likely not exist. So, please, whenever you are purchasing a birthday gift, a retirement gift, a wedding anniversary gift, a gift for someone's baptism to celebrate some other special occasion in their walk with Christ, perhaps a bereavement gift for those who have lost loved ones, a back -to -school gift, no matter what the situation is, no matter what the reason to either celebrate or share in someone's sorrow, go to Solid -Ground -Books .com

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01:08:08

Before we return to our discussion with Pastor Bill Shishko and Jennifer Greenberg on the theme,

01:08:15

Help, There's Domestic Abuse in My Church, we just have a couple of important announcements to make.

01:08:20

We have joining us for the second time on the program this Monday, that's the 28th of September, Bishop Peter Robinson.

01:08:31

And Bishop Robinson is the bishop, the presiding bishop of the

01:08:39

United Episcopal Church of North America, which is a conservative confessionally reformed episcopal body true to the scriptures.

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He will be joining us once again for part two of a discussion he began just on Tuesday of this week, which is the fall of the

01:09:01

Episcopal Church and the rise of biblically sound episcopal bodies. Tell all of your

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Episcopalian and Anglican friends especially to tune in to this program, perhaps even especially if they are in liberal episcopal churches or even the other side of the spectrum, the

01:09:20

Anglo -Catholic Episcopal and Anglican churches that deny the primary doctrines of the

01:09:27

Reformation. Both of those wings of Episcopalianism and Anglicanism are in deep water, deep trouble doctrinally and theologically, so have them tune in perhaps more than anybody.

01:09:39

Also on Tuesday, the 29th of September, we have a mutual friend of Bill Shishko and mine joining us again,

01:09:50

Pastor Joe Moorcraft. He is going to be continuing his discussion on basically bringing forth the riches, the theological riches of the

01:10:03

Westminster Larger Catechism. And very briefly, Pastor Bill, what do you have to say about our mutual friend

01:10:08

Joe Moorcraft? What would you like me to say about Joe Moorcraft?

01:10:15

Whatever you want to say. I mean, what more needs to be said when Joe Moorcraft speaks?

01:10:22

Well, I know that you happen to have a very high fondness in regard for Joe, and he will be joining us on Tuesday.

01:10:29

Also, folks, if you love this show and you don't want it to disappear from the airwaves, please go to ironsharpensironradio .com,

01:10:38

click support, then click click to donate now. You could donate instantly with your debit or credit card in that fashion.

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And if you prefer mailing in a check via snail mail, an address will appear on your screen when you click support at ironsharpensironradio .com,

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where you can mail a check made payable to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio. We are in urgent need of your help.

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We lost our two largest financial supporters in the midst of the hysteria from the coronavirus pandemic.

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And that has just put us in a very shaky ground financially.

01:11:20

If you want us to remain on the air, please go to ironsharpensironradio .com and click support today and help us to survive on the air.

01:11:28

If you'd prefer advertising with us as well, you can do that. Just send me an email to ChrisArnson at gmail .com.

01:11:35

ChrisArnson at gmail .com and put advertising in the subject line. As long as whatever it is you're promoting is compatible with what we believe, we would be more than happy to help you launch an ad campaign because we are in urgent need of your advertising dollars.

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Remember, folks, I never want anybody taking money away from your local church where you are a member in order to support

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Providing for my radio show is obviously not a command of scripture, but if you are financially blessed above and beyond your ability to obey those two commands, please give as frequently as you can and as generously as you can to ironsharpensironradio .com

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Even though we are commanded by Christ to be anxious for nothing, we certainly are concerned about our finances and we need your help.

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Also, folks, if you are not a member of a local Bible -believing church, it is your duty to prayerfully seek one out and join it and be under the oversight of elders in a biblically faithful church.

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If you are in that position of not having a church where you live, I have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the planet earth and I may be able to help you.

01:13:14

I have helped many people in our audience already find churches that they didn't even know existed, sometimes right around the corner from where they live in all parts of the world.

01:13:23

So if you are in that position, send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:13:29

and put I need a church in the subject line, whether you are looking for a church for yourself or perhaps a family friend or loved one who is without a church, or if you're going on vacation somewhere and you need a church wherever you will be vacationing so that you can not forsake the assembling of the brethren during your vacation.

01:13:48

That's chrisarnson at gmail .com and put I need a church in the subject line. I thank all of you. We've had an increased number of you reaching out to me for churches where you live and I hope that I have helped all of you find churches that are satisfactory to you because they are faithful to the scriptures.

01:14:09

And that's also the email address where you can send in a question of your own to both

01:14:15

Pastor Bill Shishko and Jennifer Greenberg. chrisarnson at gmail .com

01:14:21

chrisarnson at gmail .com And before we have Pastor Bill give his pastoral advice to his colleagues in ministry and what they can do to improve the situations they are in, handling situations of abuse in their own congregations,

01:14:37

I just want to read one more question so far because we do have a number of them waiting patiently.

01:14:43

I hope they're waiting patiently. We have another listener in the Republic of Ireland. This one is anonymous.

01:14:49

I was hoping you could give me insight on this question. How can men and women of God claim

01:14:56

God shows them insight to situation gives then dreams and speak in tongues?

01:15:04

I'm not really sure what she means by that because she maybe have written this in haste.

01:15:10

But it says when they don't have insight of an abusive man that sits in church but then when it has been made aware by opening up to them by word of mouth, they overlook it and welcome him every week knowing he is an abusive man.

01:15:29

But then they reject the woman who makes a choice to divorce this man as she knows he is playing his situation and didn't even follow through with God's word but plays it every

01:15:42

Sunday. And then these people would thank him for his pray and was good this week.

01:15:52

How come they allow this when they allow this man take part in breaking in the bread when

01:15:58

God clearly says good and bad have nothing in common? You can't serve God and the enemy, it can't be done.

01:16:05

This man has also abused God's word for control and been very abusive to his kids.

01:16:13

But again, the woman is rejected. Thank you. And this is an anonymous listener also in the

01:16:20

Republic of Ireland. And I think what she was saying is a church that goes out of their way and their belief they are obeying

01:16:27

God with speaking in tongues and dreams but they're ignoring and neglecting other commands that are more vitally urgent and important when a wicked man remains unrepentant and undisciplined in the church.

01:16:42

I think that's where she's coming from. Yeah, that's what it sounds like to me too, Chris. I had a strange experience during my early 20s when a man was kind of a self -proclaimed pastor and he would have visions and he would have dreams about what

01:17:03

God wanted him to do and God was leading him to basically start a little home church and to marry multiple women.

01:17:15

And so there are spiritual abusers who will claim to be prophets, they will claim to have some sort of a connection with God outside of the

01:17:27

Bible and they will claim that God has told them to do this and that or that God has told them that an abuser is genuinely repentant when they're not or that God has told them that you need to just be quiet and stick it out and stay in that abusive relationship.

01:17:44

Those people are abusers. They are not only abusing God's word but they are enabling abuse, like physical abuse, sexual abuse, and in her case, child abuse.

01:17:57

She's talking about children who have been abused and yet these, quote, Christians, end quote, are claiming to have signs from God that this guy is a great guy and I'm sorry but that's just a lie.

01:18:10

They are, they may claim to have some sort of insight here but they're clearly, best case scenario, they're mistaken.

01:18:20

And so my advice in this situation is go to law enforcement when, anytime, anytime you're in physical danger but particularly when children have been abused or are being abused or even if you just suspect that child abuse might be happening, you must go to law enforcement so that those law enforcement officials can investigate and protect those children.

01:18:46

Anonymous listener, I am going to break the rule for you as well and out of my own pocket

01:18:52

I'm going to have Jennifer Greenberg's book, Not Forsaken, mailed to you in Ireland.

01:18:58

I'm going to obviously need off the air, of course, to keep your identity anonymous.

01:19:05

I'm going to need your full name and your mailing address in Ireland so I can have that shipped out to you.

01:19:10

Pastor Bill, do you have anything to add to that? And also if you could let us know how pastors can improve this horrible situation in the church.

01:19:21

Well, one of the many things, Chris, that I appreciate about your program is your commitment to the final authority of a completed scripture.

01:19:30

And as far as, frankly, this foolishness, and it really is a blasphemous foolishness, about signs and visions and everything else directing people, please read

01:19:41

Ezekiel chapter 13. It speaks about foolish prophets who follow their own spirit and have seen nothing.

01:19:49

That's the kind of thing you're dealing with there and when it gets into waters like the listener has written about, that's really, really dangerous.

01:19:59

In fact, anything like that, trying to live out of what really is a deception of a person's own heart is very dangerous.

01:20:08

Yeah, I think, just a few minutes, because it's important that pastors, in particular elders, deacons, know what to do when you're dealing with domestic abuse.

01:20:20

And a lot of times people are just ignorant of this and they're broadsided when something like this comes up.

01:20:28

I love to normally be a bearer of good news, but this is bad news. Things are going to get worse.

01:20:35

We have a continued erosion of Christian moral base and values in this country, and that includes an erosion of respect for life, for gender, and for sexuality.

01:20:50

And with that erosion, there is going to be the consequent increase of abuse in various ways, and pastors better buckle their seatbelts because that's going to be the real world.

01:21:04

This lockdown culture that we're in, our semi -lockdown culture, homes, in many cases, have become incubators for abuse.

01:21:14

And we have so focused on wanting to protect people's lives from COVID -19 we are missing the fact that people's lives are being endangered in homes every day just because people are closed up to one another.

01:21:30

And so it's not surprising there's the increase in accounts of abuse.

01:21:36

And then the toleration of abuse in our culture really is encouraging more abuse.

01:21:41

I think that's one of the reasons why Jen blows the whistle, as she does, if church leaders, who really are supposed to be salt and light, just blink their eyes at this, more abuse will proliferate.

01:21:57

So anyway, as far as practical counsel, church leaders must take the time to inform themselves about the subject, the kind of standard of volume in the secular realm.

01:22:11

And frankly, until recently, there hasn't been a lot from a Christian perspective.

01:22:16

But Lundy Bancroft's book, Why Does He Do That, is, in my opinion, one of the most masterful openings up of what it is that a man's desire for his wife will often, or his leadership of his wife, can turn itself into a kind of tyranny.

01:22:38

And the way he opens that up is fascinating. From a Christian perspective, Chris Mull's volume,

01:22:44

The Heart of Abuse, is very helpful. And as I've mentioned before, Bob Needham and Susan Pryde, P -R -Y -D -E's book,

01:22:53

What to Do When You're Abused by Your Husband, which is available from Amazon. I want to respect your book distributors,

01:23:00

Chris, but they're going to get that, the book by Bob Needham and Susan Pryde. You've got to get it from Amazon, What to Do When You're Abused by Your Husband.

01:23:09

And then, obviously, Jen's book, Not Forsaken, and the related curriculum.

01:23:16

And she has other companion volumes that are projected. For pastors and elders,

01:23:22

I can't overstate this, you must know your state's reporting or mandatory reporting requirements.

01:23:32

You can get that on the internet, mandatory reporting for sexual abuse.

01:23:38

I recommend to pastors in particular that they get a representative of their state attorney's general office and speak with him or her about this, because sometimes the internet information can be, maybe not so much confusing, but not clear.

01:24:03

And so make the phone call. Am I right, Jen, in that? Absolutely. I think that's great advice.

01:24:10

The other thing that you can do, too, is get to know your local police department. The people over there that are going to handle abuse complaints, or really any kind of, just build a relationship with those people.

01:24:25

Because that way, when things come up, you're not just left scratching your head trying to Google who to call.

01:24:32

You know people at the police department, or the sheriff's department, or whatever. Here in Texas, it's the sheriff's department, but you already know those people.

01:24:41

You've got their card, and you know their names, and you have their information. And it's available quickly.

01:24:48

You don't have to go looking for it. So get it now, as opposed to once you're already in that crisis situation.

01:24:55

Yeah, exactly. And don't fall into the trap of somehow thinking, as churches, we're in an adversarial relationship with these representatives of what the

01:25:05

Bible calls the magistrate. They are ministers of God. They're meant to be for good.

01:25:11

And they're out on the front lines battling this. They appreciate it if you tap into them.

01:25:19

And they also appreciate knowing what you're doing. So I really can't overstate that kind of meeting with local or county.

01:25:25

In our case, it was, I think, every couple years or so, our officers would meet with someone from our

01:25:31

Nassau County Police Department, the district that we were in. Meetings with local agencies that provide counsel, assistance, and sheltering to abuse victims.

01:25:45

Because if a woman is in an abuse situation, she's got to get out. Where are you going to put her?

01:25:52

Where are you going to put the children? Find out where the shelters are. Obviously, the abuser should not know where that person is.

01:26:00

Have an agreed -upon plan, as Jen mentioned, with your church leaders. I can't overstate again

01:26:05

Jen's curriculum. And then that should include agreement with your deacons regarding financial assistance and assistance in other material needs.

01:26:18

This can get expensive. And your deacons need to be on board with doing this. Pastors, pastor associations getting together in our circles, presbyteries that discuss this, they train together.

01:26:31

We're not in this alone. This is not a place, or is any place, for lone rangers.

01:26:37

And then I'm going to say again, pastors count the cost.

01:26:44

That you work with abuse victims. You work with their children. You work with the abuser.

01:26:50

This takes time. And either, brothers, commit yourself to work with those abused as long as necessary, and as much as possible.

01:27:02

Or don't get involved to begin with. Refer them to someone who will do it. I'm sure you can confirm this.

01:27:10

It is incredibly demoralizing to people who have been abused if right in the middle of your life, you just kind of drop them.

01:27:19

I mean, am I right, Jen? I probably stated the obvious. Yeah, you know, for example, in my case,

01:27:26

I endured over 20 years of child abuse, domestic violence, sexual abuse, psychological abuse.

01:27:33

And, you know, I've had the reaction from, you know, well -intentioned, really sweet, godly

01:27:39

Christian pastors. Oh, well, you know, I've already met with you, you know, three times for coffee.

01:27:45

Aren't you better yet? I was just like, uh, no. No, that's not how that works.

01:27:51

The other thing I was going to add, you know, you reminded me, Bill, when you were saying, you know, about how it gets expensive.

01:27:58

Depending on local state laws, and I outlined this in the curriculum, Not Forsaken as Shepherd's Guide is available as a free download at jennifergreenberg .net,

01:28:09

jennifergreenberg .net. And one of the things I outlined is that certain states will have financial assistance for victims of abuse.

01:28:19

For example, when I reported my dad to law enforcement, they were able to recommend free counseling, free therapy.

01:28:28

They had help for housing. So, for example, if someone needs to move because their abuser knows where they live and they need to get away from that house, from that address, in the state of Texas, the state will help that person move financially.

01:28:46

And so there are a lot of resources that people don't even know exist. And so make sure that you know those resources so that when you need them, you have them available.

01:28:57

Now, one thing that I'm sure you would agree with is that when listeners are getting government assistance on all of the things that you were just mentioning, they have to be very careful and have biblically sound elders and deacons side by side with them, because there are all kinds of crazy things that come under the name of counseling that a secular government might lead one to.

01:29:30

Yeah, exactly. Oh, yeah. Very good caution, Chris. Yeah. And you both have said something that I think bears repeating, because I don't know why it didn't dawn on me before, but I remember when you first brought it up, one of you,

01:29:43

I can't remember which. But I remember thinking to myself, now, a couple may live in a gorgeous, palatial estate.

01:29:54

Why does this cowardly slob of a husband get to stay in that house while the wife is the one that has to leave?

01:30:02

And then whoever it was I was interviewing said, because the husband will know where she is if she stays.

01:30:08

And I said, oh, yeah. So that's a very important factor, isn't it? Yeah, it is. I think

01:30:16

I mentioned that, Chris, in the previous program we've done on domestic abuse. You've got to be very careful with that kind of information.

01:30:23

Okay, we have another anonymous listener who has a question. My wife was ordered away from the home in a

01:30:30

CPS case. And perhaps, Jennifer or Bill, you could tell me what that means.

01:30:37

Why don't you do that now? Jennifer, what's a CPS case? Do you know? Child Protective Services.

01:30:42

Oh, okay. So, yeah. Okay. My wife was called away from the home in a

01:30:47

CPS case, Child Protective Services case, by the court due to domestic violence and child neglect, so that I had to raise our five children on my own.

01:30:58

Years later, she was still unrepentant, refusing to acknowledge wrongdoing to me or the children.

01:31:05

And I asked my pastor if a divorce was acceptable. His response at the time was no, firstly, because she was diagnosed as mentally ill, and he didn't believe she should be responsible for her actions.

01:31:17

And secondly, because she hadn't abandoned the family since she was forced out of the house by the courts and not by choice.

01:31:25

So it wasn't a case of abandonment. It was only a short while later when she admitted that she was sleeping with another man, or to file for divorce, which

01:31:40

I did. How does your guests feel about the way this and similar situations are handled?

01:31:48

Let me field that one to the pastor, Chris. Number one, what

01:31:54

I feel about it, does it make a bit of difference? Right, right. What does the Word of God say about it?

01:32:00

Right, amen. Number two, and I realize there are differences within the evangelical and to some extent the

01:32:08

Reformed community about this. And you may want to do a whole program on this separately, but desertion does not have to mean that a party just says,

01:32:20

I'm out of here. There can be something, we call it a de facto desertion, in which a party, after being dealt with by elders about his or her sin, for whatever reason, becomes out of a situation.

01:32:38

A person is imprisoned. A person is put in a mental institution, or whatever it would be.

01:32:45

But in a case where, not in every case, but there are cases in which

01:32:51

I believe that elders can make a determination that there has been a de facto desertion, which does give grounds for divorce in that case.

01:33:00

What's tricky is if a party is hospitalized or even put in a psychiatric institution for time.

01:33:08

I'm not sure that I would call that a de facto desertion, but those things don't just come willy nilly.

01:33:16

There should be some dealings with that person beforehand. But yeah, I'm sorry that that man did get that kind of counsel.

01:33:26

Well, brother, send me your full name and mailing address, because you have also won

01:33:33

Jennifer Greenberg's book, Not Forsaken. And we thank the Good Book Company for supplying us with these free giveaways.

01:33:42

And we also thank Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service, CV, as in victory, bbs .com.

01:33:49

CV for Cumberland Valley, bbs for Bible Book Service .com. We thank them for shipping out these books to our listeners at no cost to us or to our listeners.

01:34:00

We have another anonymous listener who says, Jen, during your last interview with Chris, you said you had a memory of when you were two and you saw your father looking at you in a hateful way.

01:34:15

Later in that broadcast, you referred to your father raping you at that age. How did you move from that memory of a hateful look to a certain knowledge that he raped you?

01:34:28

Um, that's kind of a very personal question. I'm not sure how I feel about that one.

01:34:34

Okay, that's quite all right. Yeah. Well, thank you for the question.

01:34:40

In fact, we have one more break. It's going to be a lot shorter than the other breaks.

01:34:46

So if you have any intention to send in a question, please do so quickly, because we are rapidly running out of time.

01:34:53

Our email address is chrisarnson at gmail .com. chrisarnson at gmail .com. Don't go away.

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01:43:07

This is Chris Arnzen, and this is our final segment of our interview today with Jennifer Michelle Greenberg and also

01:43:16

Pastor Bill Shishko on the theme, Help! There's Domestic Abuse in My Church.

01:43:23

If you want to join us on the air with a question of your own, send in your question immediately because we're rapidly running out of time.

01:43:29

The email for questions is ChrisArnzen at gmail .com.

01:43:35

ChrisArnzen at gmail .com. And as always, give us your first name at least, your city and state of residence, and your country of residence if you live outside of the

01:43:44

USA. Please only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter.

01:43:53

Let's see. We have somebody whose name I will give in full because it is a pastor who

01:44:01

I respect and who is a faithful listener to this program.

01:44:07

His name is Pastor Gary Wagner. And I will give his website for his church momentarily after I read his question.

01:44:20

Pastor Gary says, for both interviewees, have they heard of the book,

01:44:29

It Is Abuse? And do they have any comments about it? And this book was written by Darby Strickland.

01:44:43

I've heard of it. I have not had the honor of reading it yet, but I'm friends with Darby and she's a sweetheart.

01:44:50

So I'm looking forward to reading it. You're looking forward to reading it?

01:44:57

I'm surprised. Like Jen, I've heard of her.

01:45:03

I've heard of the book. I just, I've not had a chance to read it. I think what Bill meant by his little joke there is that it's obviously a disturbing topic.

01:45:14

Yeah, right. It's kind of like whenever, whenever someone says, Hey, I read your book,

01:45:20

Jennifer. I'm like, Oh, I hope you enjoyed it. And then I'm like, Why? You don't enjoy that book.

01:45:27

Believe me. I hope you found it informative. Yeah, there you go. That's right. I just want to give a plug.

01:45:34

Jen knows from working with me for months now what a stickler I am for words. The poor young lady, she must feel flagellated by all of my correcting her with words or picking her up on things.

01:45:47

Not at all. No, Bill, Bill Shiska is one of the most encouraging and very wise pastors

01:45:53

I've had the honor of working with. Ditto, ditto, ditto. By the way, our listener,

01:46:00

Pastor Gary Wagner is the pastor of Reformed Heritage Church in Los Gatos, California.

01:46:07

And his website is reformedheritage .org, reformedheritage .org. I always like to plug solid churches whenever their pastors contact us with a question.

01:46:21

Let's see here. We have a listener who wants to know another book question.

01:46:31

Have either of you ever read Protecting Your Child from Predators?

01:46:37

How to Recognize and Respond to Sexual Danger by Dr. Beth Robinson and Dr.

01:46:42

Lestane C. Scott. Dr. Beth Robinson is an approved supervisor for licensed professional counselors, a certified school counselor with a teaching certificate and a frequent expert witness in legal proceedings involving sexual abuse.

01:47:00

Well, it's interesting to our listener who sent in that question.

01:47:06

John and Bangor, Maine, actually. Because I have interviewed both Dr. Robinson and Dr.

01:47:12

Scott on this book. But have either of you heard of it? Not heard of it,

01:47:18

Chris. Although it sounds like something would be very important to read. Yes, I found their -

01:47:23

I haven't either. I found their interview fascinating. And go to cvbbs .com

01:47:30

and order it. If they don't have it, they will make sure that they order it for you. Well, I want to make sure that we'll start with Pastor Bill, that you folks have some uninterrupted time to say what you want to include for certain in this discussion.

01:47:46

So I don't run out of time by answering listener questions. As important as they are,

01:47:52

I don't want to have you folks miss out on an opportunity to say something that you believe is urgent.

01:47:59

I'd like Jen to be able to have most of this time. I would simply draw attention again to her outstanding curriculum,

01:48:06

Not Forsaken, A Shepherd's Guide. Do you need to use it in conjunction with her book?

01:48:12

I would add that. I think I'd highlight, especially for pastors, her material on the seven stages of recovery is very important for pastors to understand as they work with people.

01:48:26

About the heart of a shepherd, it'll make a shepherd examine his heart about ways by which we wrongly respond to abuse and so on.

01:48:38

But that's a helpful and very convicting section. I can't overemphasize the material on the truth about repentance and church officers really doing a careful study of 2

01:48:54

Corinthians 7, verses 10 to 13a. And thinking specifically about how those things apply to abusers.

01:49:07

The only thing I would say, and it's not a criticism, because I think Jen would say too, as good as this curriculum is, it's still a work in progress.

01:49:16

But the chapter, When Abusers Come to Church, really needs a lot more development.

01:49:23

Pastors are going to be wrestling a lot with, okay, if the person's repentant, do they come back to this church?

01:49:29

What do we do? What scriptures do we have? What do we tell a congregation? You can't obviously recommend they go to another church because that brings the problem with them.

01:49:38

And that is a really challenging topic. Jen brings up some things that may make pastor's eyebrows open up, but it must be addressed in churches.

01:49:53

And then the last thing I'd say, and I'll turn it over to Jen, I get the biggest kick out of her dictionary. In the book,

01:50:01

I had to figure out what gaslighting was. And I don't know, Jen, if you're aware of the interesting,

01:50:07

I think I sent you an article on the interesting history to that word, gaslighting. But the other one

01:50:12

I get a kick out of, and I'm not going to say what it is, you have to get the curriculum to find out what this means.

01:50:19

But it's the phrase right before it, a flying monkey. That was a new one on me.

01:50:27

So it is kind of good after getting through the demands of the curriculum and you're saying, oh, all to deal with, to kind of come to these things.

01:50:35

And it points, gets, I think, kind of a humorous term for things that really, frankly, aren't very humorous.

01:50:43

Right, exactly. And also, one of the things that I thought about with the dictionary is, one of my goals, one of my aspirations is to be able to help pastors and church leaders communicate better with abuse survivors and counselors and therapists.

01:50:59

Because one of the things that I really promote, particularly in chapter four, when

01:51:05

I talk about building your network, I talk about, okay, how can we outsource these issues?

01:51:12

And I'm not talking about handing your congregant over to a counselor. I'm talking about treating them as a whole person, taking kind of a holistic approach to counseling.

01:51:24

So, you know, the pastor can care for their spiritual well -being while the counselor or therapist can talk more about, you know, practical and medical and just worldly wisdom type things.

01:51:40

You know, and then, of course, you might have a medical doctor and a lawyer and a police officer.

01:51:45

So one of the things that I help with in that chapter is thinking through, okay, what kind of people does this abuse survivor or this abuse victim, who do they need in their network?

01:51:56

How can we surround them with people who are going to support them and give them the advice and the care that they need?

01:52:04

So that they're not, you know, we can't just address their spiritual concerns. We need to keep them physically safe, financially stable, et cetera, et cetera.

01:52:13

And one of the things that I really want to do with the dictionary in particular is just give pastors the vocabulary so that when a survivor comes up and says, oh, you know, my ex -husband is a sociopath, what does that mean?

01:52:28

I mean, because a lot of pastors, they think Hannibal Lecter, you know, or something like that. It's no, no, no, no, no. Sociopathy is not nearly that.

01:52:36

Not always. I mean, maybe in some really extreme situations, not nearly that theatrical.

01:52:43

But what do they mean? And, you know, and how do you communicate with their therapist?

01:52:48

Because we want to stay in touch with their therapist. We can't just, you know, say, okay, this therapist looks good.

01:52:54

Now, you know, good luck, bye. We want to work with those people so that the survivor is getting as much care, coordinated care, as they can.

01:53:06

And so it's just one of the things that I'm trying to do there. Yeah, I know somebody. It was a blast to put it together.

01:53:13

I know somebody that was actually clinically diagnosed as a sociopath, and he told me that is an absence of empathy.

01:53:22

Is that how you would describe a sociopath? Yeah, that's a very, like, in a nutshell way to say it, yeah.

01:53:30

Yeah, I think the other thing with a sociopath, a sociopath hurts people and doesn't realize he or she is, well, they may be deep down inside.

01:53:43

They may realize. Yeah, but they don't admit, right, that they're really hurting people.

01:53:49

And sociopathy is much more common than people think. It's very common, yeah.

01:53:56

By the way. I mean, you just look at, you know, social media, you can see that narcissism is a huge problem in our culture.

01:54:03

By the way, I just wanted to let you know that our previous anonymous listener obviously feels horrible about the question that you did not want to answer, but he or she, because I'm not sure which it is, says, sorry for asking such a personal question, asking because I am sorting through my own shadowy memories, but I understand you're not wanting to answer.

01:54:25

I just wanted to let you know. Gotcha. No, that actually helps me understand the question. So what

01:54:32

I would recommend is, and I went through this myself, is look at your state laws and see how child abuse and sexual abuse and sexual assault, see how they are defined.

01:54:46

Because a lot of times, you know, like for example, I didn't realize that I was raped for a very long time.

01:54:53

And the reason was because I thought that all rapes were violent and that there was always a big fight and that there's no way

01:55:02

I could have ever forgotten something like that. But that is actually not the case. So because I had a memory come up,

01:55:12

I was able to look it up and under Tennessee law, it fell under the descriptor of aggravated rape of a child.

01:55:20

And when I read that, I was stunned. I mean, because until then, I had even just kind of watered it down in my head to say inappropriate touching or sexual harassment or something like that.

01:55:35

I had really like, and I think my child mind really worked on minimizing that because I loved my dad and I didn't want to think about him doing something so horrible.

01:55:48

But according to the law, this is what that means, you know. And so that was a huge milestone in my recovery process was being able to put that label, that legal label on what happened to me.

01:56:04

And it's a traumatic process and I do not envy you going through that. I am so sorry.

01:56:11

But, you know, if you want to email me actually through my website, I might be able to help you more directly.

01:56:17

And Anonymous, if you want to give me your full mailing address, you will receive our last giveaway copy that we have available from the

01:56:25

Good Book Company of Not Forsaken by Jen Greenberg. And if you could, we'll start with Pastor Bill Shishko.

01:56:32

If you could wrap up our discussion in a minute summary and then we'll have Jen have the final word.

01:56:40

To pastors, please study these issues, think them through carefully, talk with your fellow elders and with others.

01:56:49

This is not a place where you should be... You're going to be dealing with minefields and you don't want to step on those mines and blow yourself up and other people.

01:57:01

And the second is probably the best introduction to the whole thing is Jen Greenberg's book, Not Forsaken.

01:57:07

Read that. The chapter, I haven't mentioned it yet, the chapter on love and what love is is really an aspect of repentance and how it shows itself.

01:57:18

I found that to be a masterful treatment with a lot of material ministers can use even in preaching on those themes.

01:57:27

And Jen, if you could conclude the program. Well, I would just say, you know, if you are an abuse survivor and you are out there listening and you feel that you are not understood or you're in a church where, you know, you feel like your needs are not being met or you're not being believed or your situation is not being handled well, you know, please reach out to me at jennifergreenberg .net.

01:57:54

I will do my best to help you and I will provide for free this curriculum to try to help equip your church, to equip your church leaders, your counselors, your school administrators, whoever it may be, equip them to help you better and to understand what you're going through and take it seriously because let's face it, if they don't handle your situation now well, then they can't handle the next situation well and there will be more situations because we live in a fallen world full of sinners and abuse is sin.

01:58:34

It is evil and we as Christians, especially as a Reformed Christian, we believe in total depravity so we can't hide our heads in the sand and hope that this goes away.

01:58:46

We have to take a proactive, biblical, Christ -like approach to abuse.

01:58:52

And which I say amen. Amen. And Jennifer Greenberg's website, once again, is jennifergreenberg with an erg at the end, jennifergreenberg .net.

01:59:04

And the website for The Haven, the church where our guest Pastor Bill Shishko serves as the pastor, that is thehaven .com,

01:59:13

thehaven .com. I want to thank, oh, I'm sorry, thehavenli .com

01:59:20

for Long Island, thehavenli .com. I want to thank you both for being such superb guests as always.

01:59:25

I want to thank our listeners, especially those who took the time to write. I hope you all have a safe and blessed and Christ -honoring weekend and Lord's Day.

01:59:34

And I want you all to always remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater Savior than you are a sinner.