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How Boundaries Set People Free

Forgive me if it feels like you have already read these same thoughts from me before…

I can’t help it.

The amount of self-discovery and shalom from the Lord in these past few years for me has just been breathtaking.

I used to think that I didn’t have the authority to make decisions for my own life…until I learned that God gave me that authority and entrusted it with me, as I respect, seek, and live for Him. He put me in this territory, to own it and fill it and enjoy it, to steward it well. There is a boundary, a good line, around what God chooses and does for us vs. what He has given us to choose and do. There is freedom in knowing His banner over me is love…not fear, not some tight schedule I better figure out how to fit into.

I used to think I wasn’t allowed to make mistakes and risk blame/shame…until I learned that this fixed way of thinking didn’t leave room for authenticity, humility, and grace! Instead, while there isn’t room for willfully sinning with no repentance in this equation, mistakes are how we learn. Mistakes are just one direction you won’t go again. This reframing creates a love for the precious self God created in each of us. That love is what helps us know the boundary around us, and what words and actions are simply not appropriate for others to throw our way and also not okay for us to slam ourselves with. We are allowed to have a boundary that says no or I’ll think about that to others’ (or our inner critic’s) accusations against us about our failures. God has made a way for redemption in every situation. It is within our proper boundaries to decide how we will view our mistakes, which allows us to get up and move on a lot faster. God’s banner over us is grace.

I used to think I had to serve everyone in every situation of need…until I learned that in the Body of Christ there is the boundary of doing what you are actually called, led, and gifted to do. Sure, there are times of just pitching in and getting work done…but this is where the 20% end up doing 80%. A boundary around me is the Lord saying don’t just do ministry, live in Spirit-led obedience, and you’ll never give from an empty cup again. God’s banner over us is wisdom!

I used to think if other people were distressed, I couldn’t be happy and healthy…until I learned that I am allowed to be separate from others. I will share in joy and I will definitely grieve with mourners, but I also have my own mind, body, heart, and soul and I am allowed to draw from my self, through the power of the Holy Spirit, to move into the season I need to be in. I can support without saving. I can listen without fixing. I can trust God to be there when they choose to call on Him, once again seeing the natural borders that God has around Himself, me, and every individual person. There are simply things we cannot choose or do for each other. God’s banner over us is freedom.

Lastly, not that this is all, but this is all I’ll share today: I used to think that if my adult loved ones weren’t making (what I deemed to be) good choices for their health and well-being that I was negligent if I did not try to get them to change…until the Lord showed me that I had been thinking their decisions, problems, and repercussions somehow meant I had failed at loving, inspiring, and taking care of them well. My concern for them was partly out of genuine concern that they were not experiencing victory…but also partly out of my own need to feel validated that I had been a good friend, spouse, or parent. That comes from my Enneagram #1, where I just want to know that I have done my personal best, I just want to be good and make a difference. But JESUS, dear understanding patient JESUS, is setting me free. He showed me I was reaching well past my borders and into theirs when I was more concerned about them taking steps to get better than they were. He is showing me how to give from correct motives without obligation, and to love while enjoying my separateness from how they are doing. He is showing me that while He has given us a beautiful connection -in families, the Church, and friend groups- we must maintain our responsibility of individuality, our God-given borders and boundaries in order to truly love one another. God’s banner over us is peace in His finished work on the cross and the identity He gave us when we were adopted into His family, through His grace and our faith.

I can love more freely because whatever happens as a result is not core to who I am.

Have any of these old ways of thinking affected your life?

How does your personality style create difficulties in knowing where you end and others begin?

More on this later…For Sure…Thanks for reading! Make sure you check out my new Shalom Studio Coaching page!

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What a Savior, What a Day!

I am going to keep this short and sweet (gasp! I know! Am I capable?) but I had to write a moment about today!

At church this morning, they did have Children’s Church but I felt led to keep my kids in church with us for worship and the baptisms. Our time worshipping together was so precious, so powerful! Gosh, I love to look to Jesus and sing His praise. He is WORTHY!! Sometimes, it is my only escape, my only way out of my worries, my fears, my mood, my SELF. As I was worshipping, I had these thoughts on my heart:

Words like grace, love, forgiveness…they are hard to explain, they aren’t concepts you could easily draw a picture of, but they took form and shape and being in the body of Jesus. In His day to day life. In His body being nailed to the cross for our sins. In who He was, because He was God…in skin and bones. I looked at the cross just steps away from me in the worship area, and saw grace, saw my rescue, saw all I would ever need. How can I not worship, how can I not raise my hands and sing my heart out?

Then I thought about how the body of Christ still today is to be the embodiment of these hard to define words. We, now, carry God…in skin and bones. He’s alive in us. His holiness abides in us…so when we have holy living, wise and kind living, it’s really just a matter of our selves–our skin–getting thinner and His light shining brighter. It’s a matter of Him increasing and us decreasing. It’s not us getting holier, ever. It’s us getting lesser and smaller and Him gaining more and more ground, more and more freedom, more and more invitation to take over and do what He wants to do in and through us. Loving and blessing the world as Jesus did won’t come through us trying to be better and do more, it’ll come through shriveling up and dying more and more each day to the old self, to the self-centered deserving-better wanting-more self…so that His life can take over in us.

Oh how I want this to be made manifest in me. All the time and not just for an hour or when I’m happy and “together” for goodness sake.

As I close I want to say, too, it was an incredibly special day for my family, because Yemi, my youngest (6 years old) decided to follow Jesus and was baptized! It was not planned, and I actually tried to keep her in her seat, but wow, I was reminded later of the verse where Jesus says, “Do not hinder the little children from coming to Me!” I’m very glad I didn’t force her to ignore that voice compelling her to go and be baptized, in her big fluffy new Easter dress and everything. So now both of my daughters have made public professions of their faith and you know, I don’t know all of what she will remember about this day (and the same for Selah who also asked Jesus into her heart at a young age) but I want to teach them something I didn’t realize until I was much older:

As believers, we are DAILY renewing our salvation! We are daily turning our faces back to Him, asking forgiveness, asking for His resurrection power to free us from the enemy’s clutches. This walk with God is not a one day thing…today Yemi just made the phone call. Now He’s on the line, not hanging up, until the day He sees her face to face in Heaven. As camp counselors, we used to joke about kids getting saved every summer or for the 27th time…Sure, they might not have completely gotten that right, but we sure didn’t either. What harm is it going to do to decide to follow Jesus every day, friends? What harm is it going to do to remember the cross, and thank Him and ask Him to come and take over yet again? He died once and for all, but nothing I, in my humanity, ever do is once and for all. Life is so daily. So is our salvation. We admit. We believe. We commit. I’m finding it’s an every day thing. We shouldn’t expect anything less. We shouldn’t expect a few landmarks in our timeline to guide our walk with Jesus…

I need Thee every hour. We need Him every hour. We need to plan on it…and guilt and confusion will melt away in just acknowledging our salvation is an active and living relationship, not a moment we prayed and hoped we got the words right. Jesus isn’t complicated, friends. He just says, “Come.”