Me Too? Sexual Abuse Discussed

Introduction

Today’s lesson requires more than a few minutes. It also requires great sensitivity and respect. Please know from the outset that my motives are only to speak truth. I do not wish to inflict greater pain or create more discomfort by my words. I am aware that those who have been victims of sexual abuse are sitting in this audience. While I have spoken to victims over the years, I am not presuming to understand what you have been through nor do I want in any way trivialize, minimize, or make your experience simplistic. Today is a sermon not a counseling session, but I will not ignore the counseling side. I am going to address our subject with directness while trying to be gentle. Please know that much prayer has been given to this sermon today.

For over a year now, we have heard of the Me Too movement. While various men of some celebrity have occupied the headlines, the truth is that the vast majority of sexual misconduct is perpetrated by men who do not receive notoriety. Not all victims of sexual misconduct are women but the vast majority are and so it is that today I turn our attention to sexual misconduct toward women.

So as we begin, I have asked Paul to choose songs that focus on God’s faithfulness and our response to be faithful when pain and suffering come. While this is not an easy sermon to preach nor an easy one to hear, let’s be reminded that even in the worst of times our God is still present. He never leaves us; he gives us strength to endure; he removes our shame; he seeks justice and he heals the inner person. Even in our tears, we can cry out to God knowing that he hears us. A couple of years ago, a group MercyMe released a song entitled “Even If.” Listen to just a portion of those lyrics. “I know You’re able and I know You can Save through the fire with Your mighty hand But even if You don’t My hope is You alone I know the sorrow, and I know the hurt Would all go away if You’d just say the word But even if You don’t My hope is You alone.” The Bible is filled with the true events of people who went through experiences that challenged their faith and even took them to the point of wondering where was God. But those people reveal to us all that in their despair, their shame, their hurt, and their desperation, they continued to cry out to God. Our God is a healer but he is also one who has expressed his full anger and wrath at the cross. We celebrate him today and seek to be whole.

Biblical Events

The Bible is not silent about sexual abuse. As with many subjects that make us uncomfortable, we tend to ignore or skip such texts. While such may help us feel better, it can also skew the way we view life. I am convinced that part of our responsibility as followers of Jesus is to be real about life. We must not present a distorted view of what it means to follow Jesus. We must not give a Facebook approach to being followers of Jesus. Facebook makes everyone appear that life is easy and wonderful. Vacation pictures, smiling faces, funny pictures and stories all lend to the idea that everyone else has it easy compared to me. But the real story is that following Jesus does not insulate us from the real challenges of life. Faith is not the means by which we avoid all kinds of problems; faith is the mean by which we deal with the problems of life. Being a believer doesn’t ensure safety on this earth. Being a believer doesn’t mean that God prohibits Satan from inflicting pain on us.

So we have biblical events that honestly portray the reality of life. We haven’t avoided David and Bathsheba but what we have avoided is the fact that David forced himself on Bathsheba. There is nothing in the text to suggest that she was a willing participant. We haven’t ignored the event that Abraham allowed his wife to become part of Pharaoh’s harem because he was more concerned about his own safety than he was about his wife’s purity. What we may overlook is that Abraham did the same thing a second time years later. What we have overlooked are the experiences of Tamar who had to turn to prostitution in order to convince her father-in-law to take care of her (Genesis 38). Or the experience of another Tamar who was raped by her brother Amnon (2 Samuel 13). Because of David’s reluctance to punish his son and to provide justice for his daughter, another son, Absalom commits murder and eventually the house of David divides.

There are too many lessons from these events to be covered in one lesson but if there is one lesson worthy of our attention it is this—we men must get better at preserving and protecting the dignity of women. This is not culturally approved but we are not here to appease culture. We listen to God’s voice not this world’s. I fully believe that both men and women are made in the image of God; however, men and women have different roles and one of the roles of men is to love our wives as Christ loved the church and within the body of Christ to treat all women with deep respect. Treat all with dignity.

Paul wrote this first letter to Timothy to instruct him about his work in Ephesus. Timothy is told to treat the older women as his mother and the younger women as his sisters. We men are to look at women as family members rather than as objects of sexual desire. This is our responsibility. It is not the woman’s responsibility to make us aware of it.

Two weeks ago, I spoke about the gift of sex that God has given for married couples. But the beautiful gift can be misused. Because of sin a person may become a victim of someone’s sinful approach to sex. A man can treat a woman as a sexual object. To treat a person as an object is sin. It is disrespectful and dehumanizing. Such treatment does not uphold the true value and worth of a person. This is where feelings of shame often come from. Having been mistreated a person feels unworthy and may accept such.

So what? This means that we men must make sure that treat all women with dignity and worth and value and respect. It means that we look women in the eye not anywhere else. It means that we are not flirtatious. It means that we do not whistle at women. It means that we do not say things that tear down a person’s dignity. It means that even in marriage we men treat our wives with respect and that we stand in place to protect her holiness. As Paul says in Ephesians 5—your wife is your body and you are to make your body holy and pure. Do not place your wife in a position that in any way dehumanizes her.

It means young men that at school you do not touch a girl. It means that you do not speak to her in sexual jokes and stories. It means that you become the one guy in school where she feels safe and respected. It means that you build trust and that you build a reputation that all people are to be valued especially those who are devalued by your peers. This will take courage and may result in being shunned. But this is God’s will for you.

Path to Healing

To those who have been dehumanized sexually and this would include just about every woman and girl in this audience, I want you to know that God loves you. He is the one who gave you dignity and worth and value and you are his beloved daughter. He wants nothing more than you to know your value as he sees you rather than the lack of respect as seen in this world. Your strength is found in God. But I want to speak bluntly about how difficult this path may be for you and what this path to healing may look like.

First, it is absolutely normal to be angry or even afraid. As a woman of faith it does not mean that you have no emotional response to being devalued sexually. You are right to feel angry. You are right to want justice to be found. Do not allow me or anyone else make you think that you are in some way failing God for having these emotions. Too many faithful men and women have long called out for God’s healing for you to be pushed to believe otherwise.

The path to healing may run through a legal system that doesn’t act quickly or through a congregation that may not understand. To speak aloud about what has happened to you is your story to share if you are willing. And all of us must support, encourage, and seek healing for you. Demand justice. Speak against the one who has hurt you. And may we listen with hearts that seek healing rather than assessing blame. Shame on us if we ask what one could have done differently rather than asking how can I best weep with you. Shame on us for being quick to add to a woman’s feelings of unworthiness rather than helping her to know the dignity that God has already given to her. This needs to be a place where it is safe to confess to others while knowing that you will be received with grace and mercy.

At some point the path to healing has to include forgiveness of the one who has hurt you. This takes time. It isn’t easy to forgive especially with an event that cuts to the core of who you are. It is not easy. The path of healing takes time. There are wonderful counselors in our city who can help. There are wonderful people in this congregation who can share with you. As leaders we want to pray with you and seek your spiritual health. I say to us all that healing is a process and the healing that comes because of sexual abuse is not a quick process.

Tough Question

The truth is that there is one question that must be answered or at least an attempt must be made. If God loves me so much, where was he when the abuse was occurring? That is a fair question. I am going to answer truthfully but no answer will fully alleviate your emotional pain.

God’s gift of sex was never intended to be used to hurt another. But with the entrance of sin into this world, sexual sin would soon follow. Where was God? He was there when it happened. He saw the event. He hated it. He did not want you to suffer this way. He didn’t create you for this kind of treatment. He didn’t create the man to do what he did. But instead of making us always do the right thing, he gave us all the privilege to make choices even despicable ones. Without this ability to choose we could not choose to love him either. To love when we have no choice is not real love. Just as it is possible for a person to misuse God’s beautiful gift, so it is possible for you to choose to love him even though you have been hurt so profoundly and deeply.

God did not abandon you. He is still with you. God is so interested in justice that we need to revisit the cross. While it is true that the cross is where there is hope, healing, forgiveness and reconciliation, it is also at the cross that fullness of God’s wrath and hatred of sin is poured out. On the cross is God’s son, Jesus. God in the flesh. So much did God hate sin that he poured out his wrath on his own son. Do not doubt God’s desire for justice. He wants all wrongs punished and he wants all hurting hearts to be healed. That is what he wants for you. The cross is the place where God heals even as it is the place where he pours out his wrath.

I do not fully understand the cross. But I understand that the God who will allow his own son to die so that I do not have to is the God that I choose to love. He is the one who drives me to my knees in absolute amazement and in fullness of possibilities to express my complete dependence on him. “I know the sorrow, and I know the hurt Would all go away if You’d just say the word But even if You don’t My hope is You alone.”

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