Hey Tabi!

Resisting Without Becoming The Oppressor

• Tabitha • Season 2 • Episode 24

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When we’ve lived through abuse, or we spend our lives helping others heal from it, it’s shockingly easy to accidentally pick up the same tools, patterns, and power dynamics we’re trying to dismantle. In this deeply honest conversation, trauma therapist, Tabitha Westbrook, and biblical counselor that does not suck, Chelsey Gordon explore how survivors, advocates, and church leaders can resist becoming the very systems of oppression they’re fighting against.

Whether you’re a survivor learning to trust again, a ministry leader navigating influence, or someone passionate about justice and healing, this episode offers compassionate insight, spiritual grounding, and real-world practical guidance.

🔍 In This Episode, We Talk About:
• The hidden ways survivors may replicate abusive patterns without realizing it
• Why community, humility, and honest feedback are essential for healing
• What Scripture actually calls us to when we feel defensive, afraid, or justified
• How to hold truth, justice, compassion, and discernment together
• The “Voldemort effect”: why the pursuit of power will cost us our souls
• How to create relationships where accountability doesn’t feel like attack
• Practical wisdom for breaking cycles, in ourselves and in our churches

This is a tender conversation, grounded in compassion for survivors and clarity for leaders who want to do better. If you’ve ever wondered, “Am I responding from my wounds or my wisdom?”

Wanna say hi? Send a text!

At The Journey and The Process we strive to help you heal. Our therapists are trauma specialists who use evidence-based tools like EMDR, Brainspotting, Somatic Experiencing, and Internal Family Systems to help you heal - mind, soul, and body. Reach out today to start your healing journey. https://thejourneyandtheprocess.com/

 This book is for every Christian woman who has been harmed sexually, whether that happened in childhood, adulthood, or even within your coercive controlling marriage, and you're longing to feel safe in your body again. We talk about the hard stuff, shame, desire, faith, and even questions like, is this sin or is this trauma?

You don't have to untangle it alone. Body & Soul, Healed & Whole is for you. Get a copy here today - https://a.co/d/8Jo3Z4V

🎧 Subscribe to Hey Tabi for more expert conversations on trauma, faith, and healing.

Order Body & Soul, Healed & Whole: An Invitational Guide to Healthy Sexuality After Trauma, Abuse, and Coercive Control

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📩 Connect with Tabitha:
💻 Tabitha's Website - www.tabithawestbrook.com
📲 Tabitha's Instagram - www.instagram.com/tabithathecounselor
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👍 If this episode resonated with you, please like, subscribe, and share to help others who need this information!

🚨 Disclaimer: This podcast is not therapy and is intended for educational purposes only. If you're in crisis or need therapy, please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.

Need to know...

Tabitha Westbrook: [00:00:00] Welcome to Hey Tabi, the podcast where we talk about the hard things out loud with our actual lips. We'll cover all kinds of topics across the mental health spectrum, including how it intersects with the Christian faith. Nothing is off limits here, and we are not. Take two verses and call me in the morning.

I'm Tabitha Westbrook and I'm a licensed trauma therapist, but I'm not your trauma therapist. I'm an expert in domestic abuse and coercive control and how complex trauma impacts our health and wellbeing. Our focus here is knowledge and healing. Trauma doesn't have to eat your lunch forever. There is hope.

Now let's get going.

Welcome to this week's. Hey, Tabi, and I am super excited to have a very good friend here with me today. Not only is she a friend, but there's some other cool stuff that I am gonna tell you about her, but I wanna introduce you to Chelsey Gordon. Chelsey is a pastor's wife, a mom, a women's ministry leader, and a biblical counselor.

Who does not suck? Our favorite kind. [00:01:00] Mm-hmm. Chelsey works for PeaceWorks, which is an online domestic abuse prevention and intervention ministry, and she enjoys cooking, reading, and taking care of her plants. And man props to you on taking care of plants because I kill things that are green. So, good job.

Welcome Chelsey. 

Chelsey Gordon: Thank you. Thank you. It's so good to be here. I'm glad to be here with you. 

Tabitha Westbrook: I'm so excited to have you. We're gonna talk about something that I think is really important, and we talked about this. A little bit a few weeks ago and I said, I need to get you on the podcast and we are gonna talk about not becoming that witch we fight against.

Mm-hmm. Which is super important and mm-hmm. I think anytime that you do domestic abuse work or abuse work in general. Right. 'cause we also work with abuse in the church, abuse of power. Mm-hmm. Things like that. Mm-hmm. We have to be mindful not to become uhhuh, the system that we want to dismantle. Mm. So tell me your initial thoughts about that.

Chelsey Gordon: [00:02:00] Yeah, I think this is something that it's so easy to become blind to, that we don't even realize is happening because I think it's very much human nature that when weapons are used against us, we find them offensive. And understandably so, 'cause they hurt. But sometimes those same tools in our hands feel justifiable.

And they feel justifiable, right? We can use them in ways that we feel like are valuable or whether it's to protect ourselves to accomplish certain ends and we be become blind to the fact that these things that we've despised so much when used against us are becoming tools in our own toolbox of life.

And, I think I've seen it with church leaders. I've seen it in my own life. I've seen it with survivors. It's just really something that I think we're all prone to. So it's good to talk about, even though I think it can, hit some tender points in us. I think it's a conversation that we have to have.

Tabitha Westbrook: Absolutely. I think that it is. Such a challenging thing when you are confronted with [00:03:00] oppression over and over and it's frustrating, you know, it's frustrating. Like, how can we be here as the church? How can churches who read the actual Bible mm-hmm. Still be in this place? It feels so off, yet it's easy to see how people get there.

And I think this is a bit of tension that maybe we wanna lean into a little bit is mm-hmm. That many of these ministries do not intend wickedness. Mm-hmm. They're actually trying to follow God. 

Chelsey Gordon: Mm-hmm. 

Tabitha Westbrook: What would you say to that? 

Chelsey Gordon: Yeah, I think. There is a lot of tension here because especially I, I feel like in a conversation like this, we're speaking to multiple audiences, right?

And I wanna be like really tender, especially for victims and survivors that are listening. And I wanna be truthful and clear for people that maybe are listening with more of like a theological ear and they want to hear the right things, whatever they determine that right thing is. But I think in this world we have to realize that.

There is such thing as righteousness and unrighteousness [00:04:00] and there are things that are morally good and morally bad based on God's good design. But because of, I think, and I think this is what you're kind of asking, because of these paths that we end up taking, trying to accomplish certain things, we find ourselves picking up.

Certain tactics or tools along the way to get us where we wanna go. And I think a lot of people, I think most abusers probably don't set out from day one thinking that they want to become abusers. I don't think that's anyone's dream. I also think for a lot of church leaders, I say this like as a pastor's wife watching other people in ministry, being in ministry myself, when you're tasked with the weight of certain expectations, you start to be tempted to use certain means to accomplish them.

And so I think that's something we just all have to be more honest about, but it can kind of hit these tender points where. There's a lot of our culture that doesn't necessarily wanna talk about sin and righteousness, and I understand why, because those words have been used in such heavy handed ways.

[00:05:00] But I think if we go back to what God says is good and what God says is right, it's gonna help give us some clarity on not becoming the things that we hate, because we really want him to be determining what is good and true and beautiful and what isn't. I've seen that inconsistency and honestly hypocrisy from a lot of different parties surrounding these situations.

And I think it's because we often start to become the judge of right and wrong ourselves based on what we want in particular situations. And then that can really just lead us to all kinds of confusion. 

Tabitha Westbrook: Absolutely. And it is often my experience with it that. It's the system and you don't realize the power of the system.

Right? Like if you've done something a certain way mm-hmm. Your whole life and you've benefited from that thing and you don't realize like there are people that maybe don't benefit from the way this is done, or we maybe need to rethink it. Like, I think about purity culture. Mm-hmm. As an example. I don't think it [00:06:00] started off wicked.

It became wicked. It became oppression. Yeah. But it didn't start that way. It started with the, we want to walk in God's design for sex and sexuality. Yeah. But it became a means of control. Mm-hmm. It became a means of subjugation. It became a means of oppressing others. Mm-hmm. And that has done huge damage.

Mm-hmm. And so I know as someone who works in this arena, I don't want to think I have it right because I'm pushing against this system mm-hmm. And becoming mm-hmm. An oppressor myself accidentally in that space. 

Chelsey Gordon: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think, when we think about not becoming that which we're like resisting or that we're fighting against, it is just such a kind of a check of our moral compass and where we're getting these values.

I think a couple examples that I was thinking of in like preparing for this conversation is there's times where. I've seen cases where [00:07:00] church leaders or elders or pastors are not hearing clearly a victim's experience. They're not as concerned or troubled by what she's sharing because at this point it's not breaking outside of their expectations for headship and submission, you know, marriage, things like that.

It's not until the husband's abuse spills over into the church and moves against the church's leadership that then it becomes offensive because now that that perpetrator has done something that affronts their moral values, right? It didn't really matter what was happening with the wife. The problem is that now it's spilling over into the church and it's causing these issues against their authority, and now it's offensive, and now it needs to be disciplined.

It needs to be addressed, and there's this inconsistency. I've also seen situations where I've worked with women who are having concerns about things going on in their home. They think that their husband might be abusive, and I've had women say to me, well, I don't know that we should confront it. Like I could take it, I can tolerate it, I'm used to it, [00:08:00] and I've had to gently over time have conversations to say, even though we're gonna plan to confront, like with her, you know, with her consent, those kinds of things.

Important conversations to have. At the end of the day, what the husband is doing is wrong because it goes against God's design. It's not based on her tolerance level. If she could take more, it wouldn't make it more right? Right. It's based on, a morality that exists outside of even her tolerance level, same as it's outside of the pastor's tolerance level or what they're willing to put up with.

And so I think it's really important that we. Have these convictions that go deeper than just our preferences, our comfort level, our tolerance, because it has to be motivated for some, from something outside of ourselves, or we will not confront it, or we'll find ourselves taking on some of those same tools that we see because they do work like pragmatically.

They do get us where we want to go at times, but it always [00:09:00] comes at a really great cost. 

Tabitha Westbrook: Yes, it does. Absolutely. And I think the more. Chuck DeGroat wrote about this recently in his substack, and for people who don't know who he is, he's an author. He's fantastic. I've interviewed him on this podcast, so go back and listen.

But one of the things that he talked about were, was power. Mm-hmm. And how easy it is to slide into a place that we don't want to be. And tho some of the things in there that stood out to me with that. Was just the, when you have a platform, you begin to become protective and there's some appropriate protection, right, of like being careful with messaging and things like that.

'cause sometimes it also is your livelihood and things like that. You can actually end up insular. Yeah. If you're not really careful. And one of the things I actually commented on that Substack was I have a friend who I told her if I ever like go off the [00:10:00] rails or do something terrible, like please body slam me.

Mm-hmm. Like actually body slammed me. And her response back to me in text was I absolutely will. And I know she would. Because like it's important to have people around us who aren't just gonna fluff us up, who aren't gonna be like, I'm so glad you're doing this. And look, the work we do is important and it absolutely matters.

Mm-hmm. But at the end of the day, I am gonna have to answer to God. Mm-hmm. And I wanna be careful that anytime I open my mouth mm-hmm. To the best of my ability, I am speaking real truth. That is God's truth. And if I don't that I apologize and I make it right. Mm-hmm. 

Chelsey Gordon: Yeah. Yeah. I have a good friend that she often just says, look for the fruit of the spirit.

And it's that simple. But it's so easy to start to move those things aside and to not let that be our, you know, rubric for how we're doing. Are we actually seeing fruit of the spirit? I've seen this in biblical counseling circles where speaking truth, not like what you were just saying, but speaking truth, regardless of love, regardless of compassion, regardless of knowing people, becomes [00:11:00] like the highest goal.

And. Fruit of the spirit seems to be out the window, right? Or maybe compassion, but without these other things, you know, there's always these things that we tend to hold high over something else in order to get where we wanna go. And I think we just have to be honest about that because there are going to be things that compel us when we do have positions of power, of influence.

I mean, that's just something that, that we're always going to be prone towards. I'm a nerdy person and I love to read and I love epic stories. And, one of those that I love is, Harry Potter. And, I think about Lord Vold more a lot, as someone who, I don't know if you're a Harry Potter nerd or not.

Might like isolate people who aren't in your listenership. But, I think it's fascinating that he goes through this really hard start to his life and he endures these really awful, painful things and. This desire for protection, this desire for to become impervious is something that really motivates him to become powerful.[00:12:00] 

And so he spends so much of his life trying to gain this power, this protection, and ultimately immortality, right? Because that's the ultimate power and protection. And he ultimately does that, but he only does so by killing and oppressing and piece by piece, tearing apart his soul. And when he finally reaches this point of.

Impervious power immortality. He becomes this subhuman creature that people don't look on with respect and awe. They look on him with pity and fear because he's so just subhuman. And it's really like that's this image that has really stuck with me through a lot of my adult years of realizing that there's so many things that we can go after because they promise something, but the cost of them, is often so much greater than we even realize. And so we might achieve the thing that we want at great cost. And I think that's the thing that kind of concerns my heart when I look at different groups of [00:13:00] people that are kind of, like you said, becoming the thing that we're resisting. Because for a time it seems like it's going to deliver and in the end they're gonna look back and realize they, they may have accomplished one thing, but at great cost.

Tabitha Westbrook: Yeah. Absolutely, and I think that is the perfect example from Harry Potter because even though it seemed like Lord Voldemort got all of the things that he wanted. The cost was his own soul. Mm-hmm. And that is so true in the spaces that we walk in, you know? And could be true for us if we're not watchful.

Mm-hmm. If we're not mindful, you know, I think of David who asked the Lord, search my heart and show me if there's any wicked way in me. Mm-hmm. And lead me in the way everlasting. Mm-hmm. And. I think sometimes we pray that prayer, but like, do we mean it? Do we really mean it? Yeah, because that matters.

Mm-hmm. As survivors, you know, I'm a survivor. I have to be careful because it sucks to be oppressed. Oh, do not love, do not [00:14:00] recommend. Mm-hmm. Yeah. But. What am I going to do with that? Mm-hmm. I don't want to become an oppressor. Mm-hmm. Because of what I've endured and because I'm fighting against oppressive systems.

Mm-hmm. Like ends do not justify the means when we are looking at it, God's economy is just different. Mm-hmm. And. I already have all of the acceptance I need. But it's hard when it's not as tangible. Right. I know. I know. Like we know that God says that, but gosh, it's so hard 

Chelsey Gordon: when we can't like touch it.

Right? Right. And there's so many things that we're dependent on the Lord for. I think when I think about this topic, I go back to Romans 12 a lot and it ends with this reminder that the vengeance comes from the Lord. And so I think one of those things that can compel us to become like the thing that we hate is that desire for justice, right?

We want to. Get as much justice as we can in this life. And there are good and right uh, ways to go about that. Absolutely. I'm very pro justice. But there are also very worldly ways that we can go about accomplishing [00:15:00] that. And it sometimes works temporarily, and so that's so attractive. But I also think about, like you said, acceptance, validation, that there's ways that we can feel validated in our own stories and in our own experiences.

By, you know, using some of the tools that have been used against us. And I think that prayer of, you know, asking the Lord to check our hearts is so, so critical because of those blind spots. It's really easy, at least for me, I can very quickly see other people's hypocrisy. I think I can look at politics or certain church cultures and see where they have co-opted the things of God for their own agendas.

And it's disgusting to me. Right. It just grinds against the things that I know and love about who Jesus is. And yet sometimes when my own heart is doing that in maybe smaller, more quieter ways, I'm much slower to recognize it and so I do think we need, obviously we need the Holy Spirit to change those affections in us, to change that part of who we are.

But we also [00:16:00] need people around us, like your good friend that would body slam you if necessary. We need those people who can lovingly say to us. You know, this doesn't seem to be consistent with what you say you want and with what you, you know, you say you wanna be and what Christ is. Being what he has been.

And so, yeah, I think those people who can speak to us in loving and gentle ways is really important. 

Tabitha Westbrook: And I think too, you know, I can hear the voices of some people going, but they don't get it. You know, they don't understand really where you are. Maybe it's not their story or they haven't been oppressed in the same way, or, you know, they're stuck in a religious system or whatever.

And you know, I would stay, the important thing is to learn to have good conversation. So the same friend that I asked to body slam me, if I was really off the rails, we had to work through something because I had said something about like the church, the Big C Church as a whole, and some concerns that I had, and it really bothered her.

Yeah. And she and I sat there together and figured it out. And part of it was. [00:17:00] Part of her own story, and it sounded similar to an abuser in her own life, just the languaging I had used. Mm-hmm. And so we had to work through that and she was like, okay, like say more words, tell me more things. Yeah. And so as we worked through it and talked it out and she was like, oh, I see where you're coming from here.

Okay. This makes more sense to me. Hey, let's think about this. And like when you said it this way, this is how I heard it. And I went, oh, I would never would've known that. And so maybe I will change my languaging around how I'm expressing this. Because what I don't wanna do is trip people up. Yeah. And so that was an important conversation for us to work out and to understand each other's perspective. But if we hadn't sat there and talked, if she had just gone away and said, I can't talk to you about this anymore, or if I had just been resistant to hearing anything, we wouldn't have gotten to a very, very good place.

Mm-hmm. And that's important. So the people that are around you. That are leaning in that do have a voice in your life. The important ones, like we [00:18:00] look man, if somebody on the internet has something to say about me and they don't know me personally, that's not super helpful. I mean like please state your case.

'cause I do want feedback, but for the love, like if you're like, you know, I just don't like your hair, like I don't care. Like, I'm sorry, go look. Don't listen to the podcast, don't watch it, whatever. But you know, for somebody that knows me. They are worthy of relationship with me. Mm-hmm. To sit with. Mm-hmm.

And to wrestle with even when it's really hard. Yeah. And that is something I think that as society, we aren't doing super well as a whole and not in the church. There's so much siloing. 

Chelsey Gordon: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I think we live in a really interesting, and I think dangerous age with like the internet age, you know, being what it is.

Even you were just sharing, you know, kind of a why we don't want the feedback of other people that are, that we don't know, don't have community with, don't have, you didn't say you didn't want it, but you know, it's lower on the priority scale. It's not as, I'm not gonna take [00:19:00] it as seriously. Right, right.

And, and rightfully so. But I think we can also do the reverse where we can silo ourselves from people that we do have community with. And look for that echo chamber of people. 'cause we can find an online community that will repeat back to us the things that we care about. And in some ways, that's really life giving, especially if we feel isolated and we need other people with like experiences and like values to, to reinforce the things that we're learning and seeing.

But at the same time, real people in real time, in real relationships can be real uncomfortable. And it is worth having those conversations to have longevity in those relationships and to actually love real people nearby. But it does, it does take a significant amount of work and something that it's easy for us to avoid and it'd be easier to stand at a distance and just.

Make judgment calls and move on. But to sit with someone and to really try to understand them and to allow them, to shape you and for you to shape them is [00:20:00] something that's really beautiful and I think really important to the discipleship process because that humility, you know, that fruit of the spirit.

We should be growing in that humility. And I think that's something that we really lack and that can keep us in that place of having blind spots when we don't check that. And in our own self-righteousness, our own pride, often we can feel very justified with where we are and what we're doing. Our cause or our values are so important to us, and, but we need that humility to be able to hear from other people and to receive that feedback and ultimately from the Lord too.

We may pray the prayers we talked about earlier, but if we don't have humble hearts, we're not gonna be able to receive what the Holy Spirit wants to reveal in the work that he wants to do. 

Tabitha Westbrook: Yeah. Absolutely, and I think for survivors it can be tough. Mm-hmm. To learn to accept feedback because if all you've gotten, or the majority of what you've gotten is critical and unfounded and abusive, then.

It can be hard when somebody who genuinely [00:21:00] loves you says, I see something that might be off. Mm-hmm. I, I wanna talk with you about it. I, we need to be careful because especially if you've had those experiences, your body might read it as you're not a safe person. Right. Right. And I think that's part of the stretching and healing process for all of us.

Mm. You know, if we have been through some things to go who is trustworthy, and it might take a hot minute mm-hmm. To figure out your people picker. Yeah. Realistically. Yeah. And, and there may be some fits and starts, and I think that's a piece of it that is hard for people. I know. It would, it was hard for me at the beginning of, you know, learning too.

Not get it right. And there's a lot of fear for someone who's a survivor mm-hmm. Of failure because any perceived failure was weaponized. Mm-hmm. And it may have been weaponized by your pastor, or your spouse or a friend, or a boss, anyone who was oppressive over you. And so to feel like I might get it wrong, might keep you very siloed and.

Chelsey Gordon: [00:22:00] Even some of the things we were looking at earlier, you know, you're talking about it when it comes to like with human relationships and that's so true. But I think even with the Lord, some of these things that being a Christ follower calls us to like ideas of loving our enemies, of not taking vengeance into our own hands of, and you know, you can have a hundred conversations about what that looks like, right?

And, but even those calls come with a certain element of vulnerability. It is vulnerable to not take vengeance into your own hands. It is hard to figure out a way to do good towards an enemy. God's good, ultimate good, not. You know, ignoring sin, oh, or covering sin or all those things. We know those things, but even doing good in the face of evil so that we don't become overcome by evil, which was something Roman 12 calls us to, that comes at personal cost.

And so there is vulnerability, there is weakness inherent in those positions, and so I think that's [00:23:00] especially difficult for someone like. As a survivor myself, knowing that there are things that in God's economy he sees as valuable, and that learning to trust him with that positional weakness of not having to be the top dog, of not having to have the last word, of not having to defend myself.

That I can know on one hand that that's good and right, and that's something he's calling me to. And also be terrified by it at the same time because doing those things means that someone else gets the last word. Sometimes someone else is the one in power, not me. Someone else gets the upper hand, and that's terrifying.

And learning to depend on the Lord for the things that he promises to be and how he promises to provide. Also has fits and starts, like you said, and I think it's just really important, especially we're walking with survivors or we're going through this ourselves to expect a lot of patience and a lot of grace because this is a [00:24:00] long part of the Christian life and it's not hard just for survivors, but I think it's particularly hard.

We've seen what life has to throw at us. We're not naive. Right. I know there's people I was talking recently with my husband and he said a lot of people. Go into relationships saying, you know, I'll trust you unless you prove untrustworthy. And he was like, that's not how life goes for me or for someone else who's a survivor.

We don't go in trusting until proven otherwise. We go in not trusting until someone proves because we've seen, right. We're not naive. We know that with vulnerability often comes harm. And so we don't want to make ourselves vulnerable. And so that's why it is so tempting to pick up those weapons that were used against us, because at least we have them in our toolbox.

And it's been a long, slow process in my own life of the Lord slowly showing me, why his ways are better, even if they don't always and rarely put me in a position of being on top. They usually keep me in a [00:25:00] place of vulnerability and weakness, but I've found in my own life that. That also keeps me near to other vulnerable and weak people and that is something that I think is very much like Jesus and a position I've been very grateful to be in.

But it can feel incredibly, it just feels scary a lot of the time. 

Tabitha Westbrook: Yeah. It does. And it is tempting to go into those places of us, against them, whoever them are in any given point in time. Mm-hmm. Right? And yes, there is like, we have to fight against oppression. We have to fight against the systems that are broken.

Absolutely. Right? Because Jesus died for people, not for systems, as Diane Lang Bur says. Mm-hmm. And that's really important. So we're holding this tension in this episode of we're doing. Both. Mm-hmm. We're doing the work of trying to bring justice and trying to bring health and fighting against harm [00:26:00] while not becoming an us against them, ourselves.

Right. Because we're, we're all really them. We're all us. Yes. And. It's hard when you see someone causing deep harm. Mm-hmm. To see them as an image bearer of the living God who is broken in ways, you know? Yeah. And maybe wicked in ways. Yep. But still an image bearer. So how do I want. To be be. When I stand before the Lord, what do I want to be able to say about how I lived my life and dealt with others when I stand before the Lord?

That's something I think about a lot because you know both you and I as counselors, as leaders in various ways we speak. The word of God to people. Mm-hmm. And James says, not many of you should want to be teachers 'cause like you're held to a higher standard. And like, I feel that in my body I am terrified.

I'm like, I wanna hold this so well, and if I mess it up, I wanna say I'm sorry, because I do believe I'm gonna have to stand before the [00:27:00] Lord. Mm-hmm. And I do believe I'm gonna have to give an account and again, his mercy and his grace cover all of my stupid, you know? Mm-hmm. All of the things that I will mess up and have messed up.

I am sure. But I want to be humble enough to go, Ooh, that one, that one was not, not helpful. Did not do well here. 

Chelsey Gordon: Yeah, and I think we just have to become more comfortable with naming those things. I mean, first John one talks about like that being a believer, a big mark of being a believer is walking in the light, right?

That we don't act as if we don't have sin when we all know that we do. And I think especially for survivors who have had these ideas of sin and unrighteousness used against them to label everything that was inconvenient about them as sin and unrighteousness. It's really important to spend time slowly, carefully, in God's word, reading it for yourself.

I'm so passionate about teaching the Bible in my own local church to women 'cause I want them to be empowered to know what God says for themselves. And it's something that I often get emotional about because I [00:28:00] just, I've seen God's word used against people so much and it was used against me so much in times in my life.

And. I want people to be able to hear from the Lord directly so that they can know and have clarity in their own conscience of what is and isn't unrighteousness, what is good, what is evil, what is wicked, what isn't. And then with that clarity, and again, this happens over so much time, right? This is not a weekend event.

This is something that happens slowly by the work of the spirit. But then once we have that clarity, we can just be honest. You know what? I got that wrong today. I really wanted to win that argument and I was so tired of singing that person, their smug fakes, they self-righteous tone. I was tired of it, and I just had to get that thing in.

I had to say it. I had to throw the insult. I had to, you know, whatever it is, right? Be honest about that. We can be honest to other believers. We can be honest before the Lord because there's no. Danger or [00:29:00] risk for us as believers and being honest when we've fallen short. And I think in one of your recent episodes with Jacque Escue, you talked about the difference between following Jesus in a performative way and following Jesus in an authentic way.

And I. I think something I fall back on a lot is just remembering the truth of the gospel. That it is not me getting this right that's achieving anything between me and the Lord. I remember early on as I was working through, some of my past abuse and trying to figure out what does it look like to relate to my abuser.

I had a mentor, that I was talking to, and I said, I just, I feel like I just can't get it right and I feel like I'm either, you know, too hard or I give too much grace. And then I don't know if it's really grace or if I'm just overlooking sin and I can't sort it out. And he reminded me that there's only one person ever loved their enemies perfectly.

There's only one person who ever has been fully truth and fully grace, and that was Christ and. As a believer, [00:30:00] I have his track record, which means I have nothing to lose at this point. I, Jesus cannot love me more or less than he loves me right now. And I think for me, that's given me a lot of freedom to, to try and mess up.

And sometimes I do, I mess up, but I go, you know, I was a lot more hard-nosed about that thing than I needed to be. I probably could loosen up that boundary a little bit or, you know what? I was not clear enough and I really need to come in stronger next time and I need to be more clear. Because I'm not trying to perform, I'm not trying to gain anything with God or others.

Ultimately, I have to remind myself of that a lot. Yeah. Knowing that's true and like living it out is not always the same thing, but I think that. Those are some things that people do need to wrestle with because when we have conversations about not becoming the thing that we hate, I think it can easily become this list of what to do and not to do, and [00:31:00] immediately gets covered over with shame and judgment and condemnation.

And if that's where we're starting and ending, I think we're really missing the gospel and we're really missing how patient and kind the Lord is as he disciples his people. If I've learned anything in my own life, it's that God has been so patient with me. And so if we're walking alongside other people that are showing parts of their lives that are looking a lot like the thing that they hate, it's worth addressing and talking with and having those conversations.

But it's not something that we have to come down with, you know, all the weight of all the scriptures all at once. It's something that we can slowly and compassionately, um, and patiently work towards 'cause that's how the Lord is with us. 

Tabitha Westbrook: Absolutely. And I love that you talked about shame and not making it a checklist.

'cause that's the temptation. Yeah. Yeah. Right. I don't wanna be like this. So now I need a checklist. It's so much more organic than that. The fruit of the spirit is more organic than that [00:32:00] overall. Yeah. It's really a resting, when we look at John 15, we hear Abide. Mm-hmm. And I always think of how I sign that in American Sign Language, which is the sign for rest.

Right. When I think of Abide, that's what it is to me. And it's a leaning into rest and trusting that God's got this. And, and that can be really hard. Right. And we all have a need, a real need for belonging. Mm-hmm. And so if we feel like I need to belong to a tribe, especially if we were thrown out of another tribe, right?

So if we lost our church family, our church home in our abuse situations. You know, we want to belong. So if we find a group that brings us in, you know, that can be so powerful. Yeah. Like I think about when I was 12 years old, my family moved to North Carolina in the middle of the school year. And man, that's a hard time for a 12-year-old to move.

Right? I was in seventh grade and it was so tough and it was such a culture shift. 'cause we had moved out of very [00:33:00] urban Florida with a very big city to small town in North Carolina. And I remember thinking, I will be loved. No matter what and I ended up finding the group that would accept me and they weren't exactly the kids doing it right.

I'll just be honest. They were, you know, it it back in the day, 'cause I am old it, they were called the head bangers. You might have at some point called them emo or go, depends on when you grew up. They were the kids who really weren't hitting it out of the park. Right. Yeah. These weren't the athletes, these were.

Mm-hmm. I mean, I had a lot of Metallica t-shirts. Let's just be straight and not there's anything wrong with that. I do still love Metallica, but you know, it was that darkness, but they accepted me. Yeah. And so even though at that point I did know the Lord, I walked into a lot of things because I was desperate for belonging.

Right, right. And I think that that is a very natural and normal. Need and desire that the Lord has placed in us. We are part of a collective, right? We were [00:34:00] made for people, but finding the right tribe and the tribe that, you know, even if it's a little bit messy, wants to look like Jesus. Yeah, that's important.

And so like, I wanna just. Dispel the shame for people who are like, but I found people that love me. Mm-hmm. Yes, a hundred percent. If these people love you, that's amazing. And also, you know, are they pulling you toward. The Lord or away from the Lord or standing still or what have you. And that doesn't mean they're bad people.

It just might mean that there's some refining that needs to be done. There's so much nuance, right? Because we can't literally cover every situation. Yeah. But to know that, like if you are looking at your life as we're talking about this and you're like, oh golly, I have maybe become in some ways something I don't want to be.

Mm-hmm. That there is. Transformation and shift in that. And there's an opportunity to say, I don't wanna go in that direction anymore. Let me try something different. And [00:35:00] to maybe look at who you're surrounding yourself with or what things that you're doing to self protect. You know, maybe you have amazing people around you, but you've so self protected that you haven't told them these things.

You know, there's a lot of nuance to that. Like, and I can't cover everything. I'm like, I'm so nervous about. Like not leaning into the right places. I know, I'll be honest, because I, I'm so tender to the heart. Yeah. And to the desire and to the want to heal that. I just wanna be so careful with that. Well, and so there's a million thoughts.

Chelsey Gordon: Yes. Yes. And it is one of those things where you wish you could just caveat, caveat, caveat. And you can't. But I, and I also know that when we have gone through abuse, a a part of, you know, walking with the effects of trauma is kind of a black or white, all or nothing thinking. And so it can vary. I think that's one of the ways that we have to heal and we have to move through that. Because if we stay there, this is gonna really compound the problem. And so sometimes we do find people that will accept us and they'll love us. [00:36:00] And there is some, there's some community in that, whether they're believers or not believers or, or they are believers, but maybe they don't, you know?

I've talked with people who, maybe they've come from like a high control church environment where the scriptures were held up really high, and so they went to a completely, a different, maybe more liberal church where the scriptures weren't weaponized. And then that's really a blessing to not have the scripture used against you.

But after some time they've noticed, you know, I actually. I do wanna know what the scriptures say, and I don't feel like they're taking them seriously enough. What do I do? Or, you know, we tend to kind of swing to these extremes, and I think it's just really important that we do have the ability to slow down, to think with some layered complexity in these relationships, in these environments, because there is no one perfect environment, whether it's a group of friends or a family, or a church, or a neighborhood or a school, what have you.

But we do need to be honest about what looks like Jesus and what doesn't in those particular environments. And [00:37:00] so I think when we are growing or refining, you know, our people picker, you know, as you, as you say, I think one of the ways that we do that is by, even in. You know, maybe a friendship or a group of friends that we find that there are certain things that aren't pointing us towards what God wants for us.

They may still be willing to have conversations or they may still be willing to support you in certain ways. And so it doesn't mean that you have to cut that relationship off and try, you know, start from zero with someone else. But it does mean that we might need to use some wisdom and grow in wisdom in how we engage with these relationships.

What we look to them for and what we don't look to them for. Where their opinions get, you know, top priority and where they don't. And that's true in churches too, right? There might be a place that someone has found where they feel like they can rest. They can be revived and cared for in certain ways, but there's also certain things that are lacking.

And that might mean it's time to change churches. Again. It might mean that we need to just kind of supplement some resources, and I think. [00:38:00] Those are just really difficult wisdom decisions that often I think it's helpful to make in community. If you could find at least one other person that you do trust to talk through those things that can help kind of sort out the significance of certain factors is really helpful.

But it is, yeah, it's hard 'cause we can't address everything that everyone is listening to, this episode with their experience in their mind. But, I think again. For me, it was so important over the course of my healing process, which, you know, not to say it's over, but being a little ways in learning to grow in comfort with the scriptures and to hear from the Lord through the scriptures has been really helpful because.

Everyone's voice tends to be loud at different times, and some people want their voice to be loud. They don't want you to listen to other voices. And it's just so important that we can hear from the Lord himself. And sometimes the Lord speaks in quiet, steady ways, and we have to be able to hear that through the [00:39:00] chaos of all the other voices around us and that just takes time.

And continually returning to the Lord that abiding that you were talking about earlier, just resting in him and showing up and saying, I'm gonna continue to look to you for that clarity, for the direction, for the compass that I need when everything else around you feels maybe in flux or unreliable.

'cause often it is. 

Tabitha Westbrook: Absolutely. And I'll give a couple of practical tips for folks. One is go out into nature. Mm-hmm. You know, whether it is a local park or the woods or whatever, you know. I know. Not everyone loves to hike. I am. I love to hike. I'm just team sloth. I'll get there when I get there. I'll get there and but sometimes just going out into nature, into a quiet space, so a park or the woods or by a lake or something like that, and just turning off all of the outside noise.

Mm-hmm. Which it can be really uncomfortable at first. Mm-hmm. If you've never done something like this. Yeah. So build yourself. To it. I talked about this [00:40:00] a few episodes ago when I talked with Dr. Jenny Bayless and we talked about being able to hear the voice of the Lord and being able to hear what our bodies are telling us, so mm-hmm.

Sometimes stepping away and getting into that place is something, and then anytime you have a really strong reaction to something mm-hmm. Asking yourself a curious question. 'cause the reaction might be very reasonable. Absolutely. And very appropriate. Absolutely. And sometimes it might be out of. The normal space for what it should have been in that moment.

And you're like, what's happening here? Yeah. You know one thing, I was at a conference earlier this year and it was a conference for people who had been hurt in the church, and it was so wonderful and so good. So hard to hear all the pain. Mm-hmm. Well, one thing that I noticed, I was standing outside at lunch and I was chatting with some people, made some new friends, as I often do, and one of the women I was standing with said, how can anybody be a complimentarian understanding abuse?

And I thought for a second and I thought, gosh, I [00:41:00] see where she's coming from. Mm-hmm. And I see why that would be concerning when all you've ever seen is someone that says, I believe in complementarian theology. And then they're a terrible human and they're oppressing like everybody. So like Yes. And we're full of like a literal, there are like 500 people there that have had that experience.

Right? Yeah. And then I was thinking in terms of, but that's not everybody. Mm-hmm. And I know people who would say that they are complimentarian and they are not power over at all. Mm-hmm. They're power under and that is what they believe. And so I thought about it and I said, well, I'm curious. You know about the folks that I see that don't Lord over but say they're complimentarian.

Mm-hmm. You know, I wanna know them more. And that's all I said. Yeah. And, and so I think, and look for those of my listeners that are saying Complimentarian and egalitarian are not in the Bible. Yes. And amen. That's why I'm neither, but Right. You know, like, I'm just like, we're not going there. [00:42:00] Like I go with scriptural theology.

Chelsey Gordon: Yes. 

Tabitha Westbrook: But for people where that is part of how they sift through things and understand things and whatnot. We can be curious, how does the fruit in their life show up? Yeah. You know, and so if I have a really strong reaction because all I've ever experienced was harm mm-hmm. Then I wanna look at that and go, is there a piece of me that still needs some healing?

Mm-hmm. Is there a piece of me that maybe wants to push against what we hear? Hear is complementary theology, maybe. Absolutely. But why? And then how? Right. So, Hmm. Always starting with curious questions is my favorite. That is way easier said than done when we're very emotionally activated. Right? Yeah. So sometimes we have to like lean into that a hair more, but to do that and to be curious with it and to gentle, gentle, gentle with ourselves.

Mm-hmm. Because we are all still learning and I mm-hmm. I know that for me, when I have those big reactions come up, I'm like, okay. Yeah. What am I leaning into? What am I curious about? Am I seeing big oppression? Am I [00:43:00] having a trigger from my own past? What's happening here? 

Chelsey Gordon: Right. Yeah, absolutely.

And I love, I love that you brought up nature because I also love to hike. I am by no means like a capital H hiker, but I love to do it a. A couple years ago, my husband and I were on a hike and we, it was in the winter and we were in Hawking Hills, Ohio. And it was just silent. And you know, it's snow, there's icicles everywhere and there's no sound.

'cause the snow's kind of like absorbing all the sound. And it was really beautiful And it was in a season of my life where, personally and as a helper, I was just so bogged down by the injustice that I was seeing around me, and I was spending a lot of time in the laments of scripture. There was a lot of How long, oh Lord.

And when are you going to intervene and when are you going to make things right? And, and why are you allowing this to continue and those kinds of prayers. And so the Lord and I were having a lot of words in that season and, I was trying to figure out what does it look like to walk in these kind of Romans 12 [00:44:00] ideas, and yet I'm seeing, I'm not seeing the Lord, at least from my perspective, deliver certain ways that I was really hoping that he would and really struggling with some of those things.

And we are hiking and being out there in the silence. And my husband and I, sometimes we stay together. Sometimes we kind of go off separately and just kind of be alone and. I was just so overcome by the beauty and thinking about that idea of natural revelation of general revelation, the way that God reveals certain parts of his character through the creation he is made.

And I was just overwhelmed by the thought that beauty and goodness and purity were things that originated with the Lord that were, they were his idea and. We know that sin and the fall corrupted all of that. But I realized by being out there that day, I was so convicted that sometimes I think that I am the one calling God to be [00:45:00] convicted, to act right, like he needs to care more about goodness and truth and beauty and what's right, and if he would just care as much as I care.

Then we could get this thing sorted out, and it was by being outside in his creation and being quiet and being able to listen that I felt like the Holy Spirit was just so kind to remind me that this came from me. Right now it is broken and we are waiting, but this is something that God knows and sees and cares about even more deeply than I do.

So I always think about, especially in the winter, I think about that hike, especially in advent time. That's a big part of the advent season is right. We're longing. We're hoping for these things that God has promised to finally come into to fruition and I think that's something, as we talk about these tensions in this conversation.

We just have to name that because the tensions are what they are. We're in this in-between part of wanting to follow Jesus. Wanting to live life as he [00:46:00] intended it, to live this good life that scripture talks about. And yet we're doing it in the messy spaces that we're living in, and we're doing it as messy people.

And so we're bringing our own problems to the table as we're interacting with all these other problems outside of ourselves. And. There's just a lot of ways that that makes it hard. And so kind of leaning into that tension and knowing that Jesus is both our example of what it looks like to respond to the things that he hated.

'cause Jesus did hate, I mean, he hated evil, hated wickedness. He saw it for what it was. He's both our example, but he is also already lived that on our behalf. And he is the one that's coming again to make it all right. And I think that just. At least for me, reorients, my heart when looking at the face of injustice can feel so personal and so heavy on my shoulders.

And we do all have our part to play, right? We all get to live part of that justice story, for ourselves and for other people. But [00:47:00] ultimately. We're looking to Christ for these things that we need. And just going back again to that idea of abiding, I think that's where we have to have to settle our hearts.

Yes, 

Tabitha Westbrook: yes, yes. And I think that is such a great place to end because that is beautiful and that's really the key is reorienting ourselves. To God's goodness and to know that he is a God of justice. And one day he'll bring it, right? Mm-hmm. One day we will have all that is broken, made unbroken through his power, so, mm-hmm.

Chelsey, you're amazing. Thank you so much for being here. Been such lovely, thank you for having lovely person to have on. Hey, Tabi, and we are so glad for the listeners that joined us, and we will see you again on the next episode.

Thanks for joining me for today's episode of Hey Tabi. If you're looking for a resource that I mentioned in the show and you wanna check out the show notes, head on over to tabitha westbrook.com/hey Tabi, that's [00:48:00] H-E-Y-T-A-B-I, and you can grab it there. I look forward to seeing you next time.

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