Honor one another above yourselves. Romans 12:10 NIV
Boundaries are essentially limits.
A property line marks where one person’s land stops and another’s begins. We have personal boundaries too. A surveyor’s measurements make it easy to mark property lines.
Our personal space is a different matter.
We face frustration when someone doesn’t recognize our boundaries or we don’t know how to establish healthy boundaries.
If we can’t say “no” to overly aggressive personalities, we lose our sanity, becoming a mere bucket of resources for their self-aggrandizing goals.
Romans 12 is a great chapter of the Bible on boundaries. The Apostle Paul writes, “Honor one another above yourselves.”
The Greek word that Paul uses for “honor” can also be translated as “value.” Honoring our personal value and the individual value of others is key to developing and maintaining proper boundaries.
To serve God, we must set proper boundaries.
When God gives us a task, we honor ourselves and God by saying “no” to requests that would detract from our calling. Our time is limited and must be redeemed for His tasks.
We should also respect the boundaries others have set.
When considering making a request to another person, we should understand their calling. Asking or manipulating another person for our selfish purposes denigrates them as God’s servants and ultimately dishonors God.
As the Bible says, “We want to live honorably in everything we do!” (Hebrews 13:18)
We all have problems with boundaries. Too easily, we allow others to encroach on our time and resources or make it a habit of abusing others’ boundaries.
Building, maintaining, and respecting proper boundaries honors others (gives value to them) and is an act of worship (as we honor His purposes in their lives). At the core of healthy boundaries is valuing the resources God has given us and others.
One author I read used the following illustration:
If we know our task will require five dollars, we should set boundaries against spending the five dollars on anything else. But consider if someone requests to borrow two dollars from us.
We might feel guilty and give them two dollars.
Then another person comes and asks for two dollars, and not being able to say no, we give them two dollars. Finally, a third person asks to borrow two dollars and we say, “I can’t give you two dollars because I don’t have it.”
We wouldn’t feel guilty saying no to the third person because we literally don’t have the money.
When God assigns a task, He gives us the resources for success—but the resources are limited. Proper boundaries ensure that we can fulfill God’s calling.
Boundaries give honor to self, others, and God!