Christians Don't Have to Be Doormats

My husband Daniel grew up in a Mennonite Brethren (MB) church tradition with all that entails: great German food, church potlucks, plaid button-down shirts tucked neatly into khakis, and old hearty hymns. 

The MB lifestyle is one of simplicity, of community, of peace. As I understand it, these are largely people who want to live non-violent lives in harmony with others. They’re pacifists, conscientious objectors to warfare. Their current statement of faith reads, “We believe that the evil and inhumane nature of violence is contrary to the gospel of love and peace. In times of national conscription or war, we believe we are called to give alternative service where possible.”

To look at my husband now, I have to laugh; he’s probably as bad at being a Mennonite as I am at being a Republican. He wears jeans and t-shirts to church. His arms are covered in tats. Our living room TV stand is a gun safe the size of a refrigerator. The man is a trained fighter, having earned several multi-level black belts in various martial arts practices. His paid profession requires him to be armed at all times. He’s got the heart of a lion, and his God-given identity is that of a protector. I love this about him. (It’s also pretty convenient to have a personal security guard in tow any time I’m called to speak out on contentious issues where mobs of angry men with megaphones are present.)

None of this jives with pacifism, but Daniel was also raised in a home where his grandfather was a WWII pilot, so some of the wrestling with the implications of pacifist theology had already been done on his behalf. He didn’t have to buck any deeply engrained family beliefs in order to arrive at his identity as a protector.

I myself never had to really wrestle with this at all. I grew up with heroic tales about Bonhoeffer and a theology that clearly named the Christian obligation to “drive spokes into the wheel of injustice,” which involved killing Nazis when necessary. It was a no-brainer for us. If a monster is hell-bent on destroying the lives of the innocent, good men and women stand up and fight. This was definitely encouraged in the physical sense.

But there’s a more subtle sort of ideological pacifism that permeates a lot of Christianity, and I feel like it needs to be unpacked a little bit. It’s a well-intended admonition to be longsuffering like Christ. It basically says that when people are mean to us, we should be like Jesus and not fight back. “Kill them with kindness,” they say. And there’s incredible value in this teaching. Don’t get me wrong. It IS both Biblical and wise to a degree. When transactivists tell me to gag on barbed wire, it absolutely blows their minds when I respond by wishing them peace, safety, and a blessed life. That’s not the reaction they were after. 

As my dad always used to say, “If you wrestle with pigs, you’re going to get dirty.” And the truth of the matter is that, while I am, unfortunately, capable of being extremely mean in the right circumstances, I’m never going to beat hateful people at their own game. I can’t out insult a person whose entire life is surrendered to the lordship of the prince of darkness. I’m just going to limp away from those exchanges with a wounded, discouraged spirit. The Bible says to bless those who persecute you, and as often as I am able, I try to make that my approach. I have a light inside me they can’t touch, and the best possible outcome of our interaction is for them to walk away questioning their commitment to the darkness that is affecting us both. They won’t do this if I’m a jerk to them.

But there’s also a point at which some Christians are tempted to believe that blessing those who persecute you means becoming a human doormat, never setting any boundaries, and rolling out a welcome mat for abuse and sin, and that’s the thinking I want to challenge here because, if we aren’t careful, this can lead to pretty significant harm. Perhaps the most commonly cited Scripture in this context comes from Matthew 5. 

“You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.” (Matthew 5:38-39)

I pause here to add the necessary disclaimer that I’m no great Bible scholar like Matthew Henry or NT Wright. I don’t claim to be able to dissect the Greek and Hebrew words of all the verses, so I hope that my explanations here invite readers to dig deeper into their own research and ask God to illuminate truth for them. Take the meat, spit out the bones. But at least think about it. Here’s what my personal research into this passage has led me to conclude: 

I think this is one of the most frequently misquoted and abused passages of Scripture, second to the passage that says “Judge not.”  I’m tired of seeing it used to champion the idea that Christians need to be silently passive in the face of injustice or that resisting abuse is somehow ungodly.  If you don’t work to understand the context of this passage of Scripture, you miss soooo much important nuance and, quite, possibly, miss the entire heart of the teaching. So humor me while I nerd out for just a minute. I promise it’s worth it.

In Jesus’ culture, everyone was basically forced to be right handed, as the left hand (the wiping hand) was considered unclean. To touch someone with the left hand would be to defile both of you.

A standard open palm strike on the cheek, though insulting, was reserved for people you considered peers or equals. In traditional Jewish interpretation of the law, an open palm strike carried a fine of 200 silver pieces. A backhanded strike, on the other hand, was the ultimate insult, reserved for people you considered less human than you. It carried a fine of 400 pieces of silver, the same fine as spitting on someone.

To properly understand this verse, you have to look at the specificity of Jesus’ words; it’s important to note that He specifically mentioned the scenario of being struck on the right cheek, which, in His culture, almost always meant you were being backhanded, the ultimate degradation and insult.

In Jesus’ equation, to turn the other cheek would leave the aggressor with limited options. He could no longer backhand you since your right cheek would be away from him. To strike you with his left hand would render you both unclean. But to strike you with an open palm would be to force him to humble himself by upgrading your status from that of dog to peer. In order to continue harming you, he would have to bump you up to a higher class citizen.

I know this may sound tedious, but bear with me: This really matters:

Jesus was NOT telling people to be doormats. He was telling them to flip the script, reclaim the driver’s seat, and reverse the power dynamic. This might not seem like such a victory, but it actually is. By turning the other cheek, you have asserted your humanity and clearly communicated that you are a dignified human, not an object to be mistreated or controlled.

Jesus never instructs us to enable sin. I’ve heard of so many wives that have broken under the weight of this badly applied verse as their pastors convince them it’s their Christian duty to allow their husbands to continue harming them or destroying their home with their raging porn addictions. This is wicked counsel, not God’s heart.

And on the political front, you don’t have to sit back, shut up, and let people who actively hate God run roughshod all over you and others. You can (and should) pray for their well-being and the blessing of repentance, but if they’re using a bully campaign to shame people into silence about things that matter in order to legislate human rights atrocities into law. 

His heart is dignity for all people. I don’t know who needs to hear this, but you don’t need to stand there while someone continually kicks you in the teeth or breaks your spirit. You’re instructed to do what you can to flip the power dynamic, insist on dignity, and confront (not enable) sin. 

Boundaries are a form of love. It’s okay to set them.

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