Friday, February 9

The Week That Was

Yesterday during my lunchtime I went to the bowling alley to get some exercise. With this cold, windy weather I haven’t walked in quite a while. My scores were twice what they were the previous week. I’m not sure why, but it was nice to have two good games. The prayer meeting on Wednesday at work went well- good discussion about “forgiveness” and prayer. For some reason the women have stopped praying aloud as part of the group. I don’t know why things have changed, but they have. At Monday’s Bible study at work we took a break from 1 Samuel and read an article about grace that I got from Relevant magazine.

We had hoped to take the boys to Ruby Tuesday’s for lunch on Tuesday, but E had made plans to work overtime to help pay for his vehicle repairs. Hopefully, we’ll be able to use the remaining gift card that we got for Christmas with both boys there. It was nice to have E home for a day or two, but we don’t get much time with him because he’s on the go. Last night we had taco salad on trays and watched Batman Begins with C. It was fun.

The Sunday school class is going well- at least with the group that decided to stay. After the first class we lost almost half of the group. Some folks are a little skitterish with the wives’ submission passages, which isn’t surprising. Two more sessions to go and we’ll be done with Marriage. Last Saturday we two went to see The Cherry Orchard in Boston to celebrate our anniversary. Before the show we had lunch at Café Jaffa on Gloucester St. just off Boylston- very good Middle Eastern food. It was a nice day and a nice and quiet celebration.

Thursday, February 8

Battering

Just a note to follow up the discussion from last Sunday regarding your question about submission and abused women.

My comments were focused on one aspect of the question- that a clear biblical teaching (wifely submission) cannot be disregarded because it poses serious difficulties in some situations (where there is abuse). (The same reasoning can be applied in the area of giving: the Bible commands us to give generously. This command can pose problems for the poor, but that fact does negate the responsibilities the rest of us have to give generously.)

Perhaps your question about submission and abuse was more practical- maybe you were really asking, "Does a battered wife need to submit to battering?" As I think about the discussion I see that I didn't answer that question clearly. My thought is that battered wives should not submit to being battered and if necessary, they need to leave the husband to protect themselves.

Maybe I'm contradicting myself here, but I don't think so. Since no person has the right to kill a spouse, then the same is true for battering, which is a form of "killing."

I hope this helps.