If He Leaves Me and Why I Left Complementarianism

Though this may result in more than half of the people in my life writing me off as heretical, thereby negating their ability to glean anything of use from this post, I want to ensure that I communicate a couple of things. One, I identify as egalitarian if pressed to choose between mutuality and complementarianism. Two, I am LGBTQIA+ affirming. I no longer want to erase those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual, non-binary, gender non-conforming, and more, which I once did within evangelicalism as evidenced by the remainder of this post. I don’t feel the need to explain myself further, so please don’t inquire unless you actually want to listen and learn.

In therapy, I've been interrogating the belief burdens I carry, trying to figure out where I picked them up along the way. The heaviest belief burden I've unloaded is the one I heard through church that told me I needed to stay a certain size, look a certain way, and not neglect Stephen in any way, even while rearing littles, lest he find attention elsewhere. And should he leave me, I would inevitably have played a part in the pushing him into the arms of someone else.

Well, I'm calling BS. 

There are plenty of evangelical Christian women more attractive by societies' arbitrary standards than me who did all they were told they needed to do to keep their husbands satisfied, yet none of it prevented an affair or a divorce. If a husband who claims to follow Christ implicitly or explicitly leads his wife to believe his commitment to her hinges on her maintenance of her pre-marriage figure, adherence to damaging ideologies that reduce women to objects rather than whole humans with bodies that change as we age, and catering to him at the expense of herself and everyone else in her life, then he is acting as nothing more than an entitled, immature, and misogynistic sexist. And listen, I’m not here to shame anyone. I want to point to a better way.

You see, when Stephen and I were engaged, the advice and counsel we received from various leaders, which was deemed biblical, fueled anxiety, self-doubt, and division in our relationship. This isn’t the fruit of walking in healing and wholeness. We were instructed that I should always be eager and ready to please Stephen sexually. I was told that I could not say no to sex because my options were either to respond, "Yes" or "Convince me." We were taught that we should be suspicious of other women. Modesty was drilled into me, coupled with judgment for women who didn’t dress like me. Women were portrayed as temptresses and adulteresses, the beauty of women as useful for pranks to lure unsuspecting men, and outgoing women as threats. We were told that Stephen shouldn’t even talk to other women if it made me uncomfortable. Stephen had given me no reason to be nervous about him conversing with women, but the teaching gave me innumerable reasons. Rather than helping me to unburden my insecurity and replace lies with truth, these teachers acted like instability and continual second-guessing were normal in healthy partnerships. They acted like the departure of a man whose wife didn’t prioritize him was inevitable if she persisted in neglecting him too long, regardless of other responsibilities she was juggling, and it would be normal for her to shoulder some of the blame for the abandonment and infidelity. None of this is normal.

I no longer consider myself an evangelical, but my context has always been evangelical Christianity. When I became involved with reformed theology, roles as defined by complementarianism were the ideal for a marriage. If you are unfamiliar with this, the mantra within this ideology is that men and women are equal in dignity, value, and worth but differ in their roles. Unfortunately, the fruit I have seen come from this poor substitute for intimacy and equal partnership is rotten.

Here’s what I mean.

“Abundant Life is Incompatible with Complementarian Theology”

An overemphasis on Ephesians 5:22

To the neglect of 5:21

Means bondage for everyone

If I am expected

To submit to Stephen

Forfeit my voice

Left with no choice

In all situations except

A narrow exception

Of if he asks me to sin

Then this is intruding

On my calling to exercise dominion

No wonder the fruit 

Of complementarian theology

Is rotten and death inducing

As it's producing

Prideful narcissists

Who from the third

Chapter of Genesis

Simply can't resist

Ruling over women

By their interpretation

They are practicing biblical manhood

Not sinful patriarchy

Men running things

Is just God's good design

These guys think they can't be operating

From sexist assumptions

About the wombs from which they

Or their offspring come

What did you think would happen?

The depression

Suppression

Suspicion

The bruised bodies

Black eyes

And broken bones

Are no surprise

Sin begets sin

Sucking out all hope

What does it mean

For a husband to love his wife 

As Christ loves His Bride?

Unless you think Jesus expects us

To "go to another place"

While He uses us

For selfish purposes

Uncontrolled

Then a husband has no right

To expect his wife

To please him sexually

When she doesn't desire to

She shouldn't have to

Go somewhere else mentally

She should

And she does

Have the power to simply say, "No"

Further, it's incompatible to say Christ

Came so that we might have abundant life

Then to say it's just part of living under the curse

That men would have to shoulder a heavy burden

All their days in leading us

And that women will just have to live burdened

Thinking the worst

Wary of themselves

Maybe men struggle with passivity

Because they were never meant to be

The only ones to lead

After all, your Bibles indicate

The task of dominion

Was expressly and directly given

To the woman and the man

The very reason both were created

Was for it to be demonstrated

That humanity is to steward together

An overemphasis on Ephesians 5:22

To the neglect of 5:21

Means bondage for everyone

I’m not here to bash complementarians or their theology. To reiterate, I want to point to a better way. I think many of these pastors and their wives and other church leaders who are peddling this message of complementarian marriages as the model provided by the Bible are well-intentioned, but their good intentions mean very little when the fruit is odious and has harmful repercussions for generations to come. There’s no getting away from this truth. As I stated in the blog post “Dear Sisters, I’m Sorry,” I cannot distance myself from the Christians who make statements that are clearly sexist. I cannot call those who are openly misogynistic “hyper complementarians,” for that would then absolve me of further exploration of the ways in which I, too, am part of the problem. In addition to these more noticeable negative implications of a theology that props up a hierarchy, hindered women who either don’t know what their gifts are or who don’t know how to use those gifts in the church and the erasure of those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual, non-binary, gender non-conforming, and more are other byproducts.

Years after first hearing complementarian teaching explained, before we were egalitarian but were beginning to break free from the toxicity, we tried to speak with the pastor who first shared this view with us. We still considered ourselves complementarian, but we wanted to see men and women in our local church partnering together more to advance the gospel and had some ideas for how to help. We told him the detrimental impact his advice had on our relationship and ways we had made progress. He offered that though his counsel may have been bad for us, it’s been great for his marriage. 

I just cannot wrap my head around the belief that the advice given to us is great for any marriage. All I’ve seen from this advice is wives who engage in sexual intercourse more out of duty than euphoric delight, wives who repeatedly state that they don’t want any more children, wives who weep as they fear dying in childbirth as they prepare for another baby that their husbands wanted to have, husbands who voice that vasectomies turn a man from a lion into a kitten (as if masculinity is wrapped up in sexual prowess and dominance), husbands who hide behind the excuse that talking to other women makes their wives feel insecure so that’s why they simply avoid women (even if he’s a pastor, thereby ignoring at least half of the church), and wives who remain terrified, no matter how long they’ve been married, that one day their husbands will leave them. I’m sorry but if you have been told that there is a way to set your wife free from her insecurity and have a marriage with more warmth and intimacy but you choose to continue on your path to destruction, you will have no one to blame but yourself because you were warned.

I’m through with this advice and with complementarian teaching, the roots, the tree, the branches, and every piece of fruit. It’s a theology that allows for the objectification of women as it blots out our full humanity, fuels anxiety, self-doubt, and insecurity in women, promotes division as extrabiblical lines are drawn, and excludes those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual, non-binary, gender non-conforming, and more. I've found my partnership with Stephen is much better now that I can say, "I trust you to not objectify women." And if he chooses to objectify women, that's not my fault. The objectification would not be evidence of a deficiency in me. I’ve found that my partnership with Stephen is much better now that I am not riddled with anxiety, self-doubt, and insecurity, wary of both myself and other women. I’ve found that my partnership with Stephen is much better now that he can say, “We’re on the same team, and I want you to exercise the fullness of your gifts so we can offer our best selves to one another so we can live lives that benefit everything and everyone around us.” I’ve found that my life is fuller now that I am not concerned with maintaining any system of oppression within the institutional church. As Rachel Held Evans said, “What makes the gospel offensive isn't who it keeps out, but who it lets in.”

Together, Stephen and I have experienced depths of grief and groaning we weren't prepared for, but we were strengthened through them. We've been untangling ourselves from damaging ideology we were taught about women, modesty, sex, sexuality, and gender. We've learned about boundaries and practiced establishing them. Even in the midst of residual suffering, we are free and we are flourishing, and we won’t stop inviting others to join us.

#freedom #flourishing #boundaries #therapy #mentalhealth #healing #selfcare #faith #evolvingfaith #deconstruction #faithreconstruction #exvangelical #mutuality #egalitarian #affirming #challengethenarrative #broadeningthenarrative