In the last few weeks I have met a couple of women who claim they are submissives in what is called a Dominant/submissive lifestyle. When I first met them, my immediate reaction to them was, oh you poor thing. How did you get trapped in this deviant lifestyle? And so I began to witness to them. One of the ladies I talked to claimed to be a Christian and gave me a couple of URLs to a couple of websites calling themselves Christian D/s sites. My first thoughts as I perused these sites were that on the surface this does not look so bad. One site explains that D/s is the same kind of submission that we are supposed to have for Elohim (God). They claim that it is the submission that women are supposed to have towards their husbands, the difference being the punishment aspect if rules are broken.

Ok lets talk about that a bit. I am well aware that there may be many varying opinions about punishment in marriage but I am sure that all will agree that any form of punishment should not be pleasurable or something to be sought. This would defeat the whole purpose of punishment, as the idea is supposed to be to correct undesired behaviour through negative feedback. In D/s in most cases the submissives find sexual arousal from the punishment inflicted by their “masters”. This practice and attitude turns punishment into sexual perversion, it would seem. At the very least, it defeats the purpose of punishment. If someone likes to be spanked, for instance, it does not make sense to use spanking as a form of punishment. Any psychologist will tell you that.

In the second place, I would question the validity of physical punishment for adults in the first place, and to call such practice Christian is hardly apt. Everything we are taught as Christians teaches us that Christ attracts, He does not compel. What that tells me is that He is not a brutal disciplinarian waiting with a cat-o-nine-tails to fray us after every little mistake we make. While He no doubt will punish those who are disobedient, most usually the goal is redemptive, not punitive. I would think that would be the way it should be in our marriage relationships as well. Any correction should be aimed at redemption. I don’t think anything redemptive comes from degradation and humiliation, which are hallmarks of D/s. I have heard submissives state this lifestyle requires great trust to which I say no doubt. At this point I would like to offer some excerpts from the sites I have visited describing so-called Christian D/s.

D/sBDSM stands for Domination and submission, bondage and discipline, sadism and masochism. It does NOT mean abuse. Not physical abuse, not emotional abuse.

So what about the rest of it? To me, the bondage and SM is primarily physical and sexual. All of the sexual sins addressed in the Bible are about WHO you do it with, not WHAT you do with your spouse. And you can't take the Golden Rule literally... or else I would have to treat my husband like a lady! LOL! I can, however, strive to treat him like he wants to be treated, and vice versa. Isn't it nice that God made a man who likes to tie me up and spank me just the way I want to be tied and spanked? : grin: To sum it up, I believe that at worst, God has no problem with what we're doing, and at best, it is exactly how he intended for spouses to relate before feminism was invented

This is an excerpt from a short story on one site.

Trembling, I bend over the bed, in "paddling position". This wasn't FAIR! I hadn't done anything! (Not yet, anyway.) He proceeded to paddle me, firmly, but not excessively, somewhere between 5 and 10 licks. Just enough to change my attitude. He pulled me into his arms then and let me cry on his shoulder. He asked quietly, "Who am I, sparkle?"

"You're my Master. I belong to you, heart, soul, mind, and body."

"I hate having to punish you, sweetheart. It usually means that I've fallen down on my job somewhere. This spanking was not a punishment... it was a disciplinary action intended to remind you who you are, who I am, and encourage a good attitude. Did it work? How do you feel right now?"

I thought a minute, then nodded. It HAD worked. My resentment and self-centeredness had drained away with each stroke, and I had gotten a little bit into subspace. "Yes, Master, it worked. I feel good!

Kinda subby, calm and cheerful, and full of love for you. I'm so glad that you want to fix my badness instead of just nagging or punishing. Thank you!"

Does anyone but me see a problem with the central theme here? Besides the abhorrence I feel at the physical violence as an abuse survivor, there is the underlying theme of the submissive belonging to the dominant heart, soul, mind and body. That is simply idolatrous. It can be nothing else. While a Christian wife is certainly to submit righteously to her husband’s authority, and while he certainly has a responsibility to wield that authority in a responsible manner, there is no doubt that the primary loyalty and submission of either must be to Christ. For me to say that I belong to my husband heart, soul, mind and body supplants that relationship and is spiritually a very hazardous attitude. It places the submissive party in the position of putting a person before Elohim (God).

I have read on one site that with the use of painful stimuli, it is necessary to begin at a light intensity and gradually increase the intensity which then causes the stimuli to be experienced to be perceived not as painful but as pleasurable. Now I have a slight problem with that. Elohim (God) knew what He was doing when He designed our bodies. Aversion to painful stimuli serves a survival purpose. It either keeps us out of physically damaging situations or makes us remove ourselves quickly when we are in them. It would seem that a practice that purposefully subverts a protective agency that Elohim (God) has built into our bodies would have to be against His will. Further, the risk of significant damage being done dramatically increases with the decrease in the perception of pain. It would have to, the protective agency has been sidestepped, and anytime you make a practice in sidestepping safety devices, you are asking for a disaster.

I have also read on a site about the utilization of painful stimuli lifting the recipient to “subspace”. Now while I have no idea what exactly that is, it smacks of the other-dimension experiences I have read about in reference to other occultic practices and raises an alarm bell in my mind.

Now the argument that I have heard supporting D/s as a valid Christian lifestyle that I had the most trouble refuting was the assertion that, as Christian theology demands that women submit righteously to their husbands, D/s is in actual fact just another facet of this idea. I had to think about this and pray about it for a while. What strikes me as the most glaring fault in this thinking is that the submissive in a D/s relationship abrogates all responsibility for independent thinking.

This is not in keeping with any portion of Christian/Messianic theology. A Christian wife, spiritually sound and well founded in scripture, willingly and lovingly submits to the authority of her husband. This in no regard means that she ceases to be responsible for her behaviour or has no choices in her life. Elohim (God) never meant for any of His children to mindless automatons, nor brainless slaves. The whole idea is knowledgeable, willing, and loving submission in obedience to Yahweh’s commands. Willing being the operative word here. God has never forced any person to love or obey Him. He attracts, He does not compel. He does not use humiliation or degradation to hold His children and I refuse to believe that He sanctions His children using these methods to hold others. Women who submit in this kind of life are not being scripturally obedient; they are abrogating all responsibility for making their own choices in life. This is not sanctioned in scripture anywhere that I can determine.

In conclusion, I do not see any way that the practice of a D/s lifestyle could be perceived as an acceptable Christian lifestyle. It has been demonstrated that there are idolatrous elements, occultic elements, potential for bodily harm, and vacating of God-given responsibilities to determine our own paths. These are just the impressions I have received after cursory examination of relevant information. Frankly I do not care to delve into it deeply, but I pray this information will give someone witnessing to someone in this life style some useful tips.

And very lastly of all, Yahweh never intended any of His daughters to live in an environment of humiliation and degradation. If He had, He would not have taken such elaborate measures to assure that we live in environments where we are cherished and protected. I pray that women caught in this lifestyle come to realize that they are worth far more than that to Elohim (God).

Author: SBK