Right now, I am in a situation where another person wants to take me down. No matter what I do, everything is skewed, slandered, and gossiped. I am defamed. My reputation is tarnished. What once were simple conversational exchanges are now only opportunities to give this person what they perceive as ammunition to use against me. It feels like a well calculated plan to extinguish the truth. Honestly, I am really struggling here. I want to respond without fear. I want to show that I truly depend on God to defend me. But after this kind of abuse, I find myself, more often than not, trying to take control from the Lord and defending myself. Relational sabotage, a form of abuse, is an act of deliberately destroying, damaging, or obstructing something for personal gain. This is a word used to describe war-like effort to take an opponent down. Certainly, I feel like I am in a war. But as I study how to respond to this assault biblically, I am learning that this battle, like all others, belongs to the Lord.
My reputation is not as important as my testimony of Christ Jesus.
My desire to defend myself against these accusations and manipulative attacks is prideful. I have never been able to defend against them successfully. I do not know why I consider that I should take first line of defense when it comes to this kind of situation. It is silly for me to think that I am powerful enough to defend against this kind of evil toward me. I am not. But God is! God is my Defender! This is a paramount change of thinking which has brought me tremendous peace from the moment I said it out loud, "God is my Defender!"
Psalm 18:1-3 reminds me of the fortress I have in the Lord. That He protects me. That He upholds me. That He is my refuge. It is clear that I am not to fight in this battle. In the rest of the passage, David reveals that in a dark and trying time, when he was surely attacked, God met his every need. He scattered his enemy and kept David save under his protection. He saved David from the destruction that seemed to nearly overtake him. He protected him from the sabotage all around him. David was restful under the protection of the Lord.
Defending myself is only a means of clearing my good name. Who I am outside of Christ is not who I want people to see. I want them to see Christ in me and that will only happen if I am letting Christ fight this battle for me. Then His testimony will be seen!
It is okay to retreat when we are being sabotaged.
Boundaries only work if we enforce them. This may seem similar to prideful self-defense in a sabotage. But it is not the same as defending one's self. Rather, moving into the protection of God's Mighty Fortress while He fights for you! The rationale for this is that a self-defense only draws out the situation and may even intensify it. Proverbs 19:19 says, "A man of great anger will bear the penalty, For if you rescue him, you will only have to do it again." Meaning, if your defense works, you will not have won an angry person over, you will have prolonged the inevitable. Anger is a heart issue. It cannot be fought my human rationality. This is a spiritual issue, which your saboteur, must reconcile on his or her own unto the Lord. This is logical to the principle of retreat. I good friend reminded me that when I engage the person sabotaging me, I am only helping them dig deeper hole for both of us. I need to lay down my shovel and walk away. While this is a strange metaphor, I helped me visualize the damage I can do when I try to defend or explain myself. It really does only worsen the assault campaign.
Saying only what needs to be said is a fruit of the Spirit--self-control.
I am a naturally wordy person. But God's Word has shown me the value of self-control in this situation. "But let your statement be, 'Yes, yes' or 'No, no': anything beyond these is of evil." (Matthew 5:37) This is a beautiful example of the importance of saying only what is needed to be said in the moment (Ephesians 4:29). I need to say 'yes' or 'no' without apology or explanation. This effectively eliminates the opportunity for an argumentative or accusatory response from others. I had been told that was unreasonable by the person who is sabotaging me now. However, I realize that my explanation is often only fodder which fuels the attack. I trust the Lord fully that if my reasons for saying 'yes' or 'no' are truly righteous, I do not need to follow yes or no statements with any explanation.
As I sit closely with the Lord helplessly watching sabotage carried out, I need to forgive each attack.
Continual forgiveness will help soften our hearts even during a sabotage attack. There is peace in forgiveness toward our enemies. There is peace even when the relational harm is continual. If I am truly trusting the Lord to fight for me in this battle, I must wait upon him and offer forgiveness for each weapon used against me as I do. I need to lay down my earthly weapons and gird myself with the Armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18). No weapon of my humanness will be effective. But Truth will. Keeping my heart immersed in the Truth and trusting and obeying the Lord while I seek Him and forgive others will.
Honestly, I feel very vulnerable right now. I struggle against grief and tremendous heart pain. If I were counseling myself, I would say to myself much of what I have written here. I have been guilty of being caught up in the chaos of the sabotage and not fully depending on God to do the work for me. I have repented of this. God has been faithful to forgive. God is still here. He will still do as He says He will. And hiding out in His mighty fortress means I don't have to poke my head out and see how the battle is going or holler this or that at my attacker. (I pictured Monty Python's, The Holy Grail, as the castlemen are picked off when they stick their heads out to see what is going on or to an an unsavory comment to the battle below.) I am safe in God's protection and I need to stay within it while I trust that He is doing what I have asked Him to do, let the Truth prevail. I need to change my thinking from vulnerability and self-defense to biblically thinking and believing with my whole heart that God is my Savior, who saved me even from death! Therefore, He can certainly deliver me from this trial too. As the grief and fear comes in waves, I can still be comforted knowing that God is really here and I am safe even though I am in a minefield.
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