While serving as an elder we had a sister who was moving to another congregation in conjunction with separating from her husband.
Another brother and I had been working with them for many weeks and were asked to send a letter to the new congregation, commenting on the situation and scriptural validity of the separation.
The situation was that she claimed he was endangering her and cited one physical incident where she hid behind a door and playfully jumped out to scare him, he reacted by striking out with his arm and hit her in the shoulder. She admitted he was very sorry about the incident, but she suspected he somewhat did it on purpose. She also brought up several situations in there marriage of him not taking the lead and weird behavior. She also accused him of drunkenness, but there was no proof and she was accused of the same by him.
We spend several sessions with them and directed about 90% of our counsel toward him and did a pretty good job of keeping in contact with him otherwise, having man to man chats, as to how he was improving etc etc.
But she decided to leave him and go to another congregation. We composed as letter to the new congregation explaining the situation, very sympathetic toward her, but according to all the latest publications she didn't seem to have scriptural reason for separation. We cited all of the publications.
Upon arriving to the new congregation the elders met with her and told her that we didn’t' think she had scriptural reasons to separate and she wrote the society telling her reasons.
The society wrote us and gave us a pretty good scolding (boy do I wish I had a copy of the letter) and I was pissed! Not that she had written and not that they had agreed with her side (she wasn't particularly forthright about all the facts, but hey), but that we had done just what Amateur Lawyers (elders) should have done!
I wrote back a scathing letter, which the elders made me tone down, and the topic was "What else would you expect us to do other than research the publications and follow them?" , I told them that had we authorized her separation he could have written and the letter to us from the society would have been to cite those very publications and to tell us to "stick with what the Faithful and Discreet Slave had directed"
She was right, he was a weirdo, but that's not what their publications say is grounds for separation. In the letter I wrote I quoted the publications and then what her situation was to show they were very different from their written word. The publication says this:
*** w83 3/15 pp. 28-29 Honor Godly Marriage! ***
In some cases there may be verbal and physical abuse, threats and beatings. But does this mean that the Christian marriage mate should leave the unbeliever? The apostle Paul counsels: "A wife should not depart from her husband; but if she should actually depart, let her remain unmarried or else make up again with her husband; and a husband should not leave his wife." As Paul points out, preserving the marriage will be to the spiritual benefit of any children. In a practical way, also, it may be to the material benefit of the believing parent and children. Still, in the event that abuse becomes unbearable, or life itself is endangered, the believing mate may choose to "depart." But the endeavor should be to "make up again" in due course. (1 Corinthians 7:10-16) However, ‘departing’ does not of itself provide Scriptural grounds for divorce and remarriage; still, a legal divorce or a legal separation may provide a measure of protection from further abuse.
I don't recall them writing us back on the matter.
So for whatever it's worth we followed the societies counsel directly and cited it, acting like perfect little Amateur Lawyers and they scolded us for following it.
I've wondered about the brother who wrote us the letter since he was definately "Thinking outside of the box" or perhaps following the advice of lawyers there, I don't know.
Mind you I think she was better off leaving him, but we didn't have the authority to say so.
What do you think they were thinking? Why the more liberal / sympathetic / uncharacteristic position?