War in God's Holy Temple

My dad waits in jail to be tried for sex crimes committed against one of several children in our family. No one who knows my father can comprehend how this could have happened. For years, he has been an elder in the church, a leader in a civic organization, and the type of man everyone in town admires. A woman once said to me, "Your dad is just a big, lovable teddy bear."

Incest is a terrible sin. Innocent children trust the adults in their lives to love and nurture them. When someone we love suddenly commits such an awful act against us, our minds become confused. Love and sexual abuse should not go together. Statistics, however, reveal that they often do. One out of four girls and one out of six boys is sexually molested at some point during their childhood. Most of their perpetrators are people within their own families.

When someone we have always viewed as good is suddenly exposed as evil, it shakes our faith in God and our confidence in our earthly parents and community leaders. As survivors, it creates so much inner turmoil that we can barely stand to breathe at times. Whom can we trust? What can we believe?

Lately, I have found some answers to these questions in 2nd Corinthians 6:14-16a. The Message translation of this passage reads:

Don't become partners with those who reject God. How can you make a partnership out of right and wrong? That's not partnership; that's war. Is light best friends with dark? Does Christ go strolling with the Devil? Do trust and mistrust hold hands? Who would think of setting up pagan idols in God's holy Temple? But that is exactly what we are, each of us a temple in whom God lives.

If we are Christians, striving to live in the light of God's love, we cannot remain partners with people who reject God. Adults who force children into sexual acts are people who reject God's laws and his love. Their actions are wrong. This is why we feel a war waging in our spirits after we have experienced sexual abuse. And if the people who molest us are adults who are supposed to protect and nurture us, we find ourselves fighting a battle of incredible magnitude. God commands us to honor our parents. How can we, when they dishonor us?

My body is a holy temple, a place where God lives. As a child, I may have little or no control over adults who tell me lies and threaten me so that they can molest my body. However, if I grow up and learn that abuse is wrong and allow someone to continue hurting me sexually or emotionally, I am giving Satan permission to set up house together with God. If you want to experience a war of unbelievable proportions, try living in a temple where God is doing battle with Satan. The agony of living in such a place is unbearable. For many, including me, it has caused depression, relationship difficulties, suicidal thoughts, pain, and illness.

When people experience war in their country, they find relief at times by relocating elsewhere. When the war we are experiencing is going on inside of our bodies, minds, and souls, there is no place for us to find safety. Wherever we go, the battle goes with us.

The worst part of this battle lies in trying to forgive. There are many places in the Bible where God calls us to forgive people who hurt us. I agree that this is a wise practice. But in the case of incest, this is combat between God and Satan that goes far beyond my own strength. I cannot just wave a white flag and say that I have forgiven my father. Instantly forgiving my mother for failing to protect me and other children in her care is an equally impossible task. Trying to minimize the emotional abandonment caused by incest would be as foolish as standing up between lines of clashing armies firing machine guns at each other.

It is ludicrous for people to tell me to just forget what happened and get on with my life. The work of remembering for the sake of keeping myself safe from future harm, as well as the subsequent forgiving, can only be done through the power of the Holy Spirit. Forgiveness for incest happens over a very, very long period of time. The only thing I can do in the midst of this war is to tell God that I am willing to work at forgiving people who have wounded me. With God's help, I can love my perpetrator from a distance, and I can pray for his reconciliation with the Lord.

Others who have not been victimized cannot understand why we as survivors are unwilling to reconnect with our abusers who also happen to be our relatives. What most of these people don't comprehend is that while God does call us to forgive, he does not expect us to force ourselves to remain in a relationship with people who have committed such evil acts against us. God's Word asks us, "Who would think of setting up pagan idols in God's holy Temple?" For us, healing comes more quickly when we put ourselves at a safe distance from people who have harmed us this deeply.

Sometimes, people who are inexperienced in working with sexual abuse victims can cause further harm by trying to 'help' us to quickly forgive and forget. We may need to distance ourselves from such helpers for a time, at least until they come to understand that their attempts to fix us are hurting us more.

At other times, members of our own family may try to quickly force things to appear normal. Their shame over the incest leads them to say and do things so that they can pretend it never happened. We cannot allow their need for instant normalcy to distract us from the slow recovery process required for complete healing. Rushing the healing of incest would be as ridiculous as asking a person whose legs have been blown off in combat to stand up and walk. Sexual abuse and combat injuries take a long time to mend and require special care.

This situation with my dad has torn our family apart. I have had to step back and assess what I can do as the battle rages on between God and Satan. I have prayed for discernment so that I can clearly see what is of God and what is from the pit of hell. Often, I return to the Bible so that I will understand how God defines good and evil. As much as possible, I have surrounded myself with true Christians whose lives reflect the love of Christ. For a time, I have distanced myself from people whose 'helpful' actions have only served to hurt me more.

In spite of this war between the Light of the World and the forces of darkness, I have great hope. Because the God that lives within me is much more powerful than the evil that walks in this world. Philippians 4:16 (NIV) reminds me, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” In time, I know that I will find healing as the Holy Spirit works in my heart, mind, and soul to restore me fully. When the war is won, I believe that God will use me in a mighty way to bring good out of a battle that Satan meant for evil.