Church Boundaries: Healthy Relationships
My name is Kristen, and I’m a recovering serve-aholic
It’s taken me several years to be able to unravel the threads and get to the roots of my serving addiction, but I finally arrived at these core beliefs I’ve spent the last few years attempting to unlearn:
If I didn’t do it, who would do it?
If I didn’t do it, someone would be disappointed in me.
If I didn’t do it, it wouldn’t get done well.
If I didn’t do it, I would be letting people down.
If I didn’t do it, my church would suffer.
If I didn’t do it, God would be disappointed in me.
If I didn’t do it, God would punish me.
If I didn’t do it, I wasn’t being like Jesus.
If I didn’t do it, people would think I was lazy, not committed, and selfish.
Honestly, this list could go on and on.
As I think back over the years I spent killing myself through serving, it’s almost laughable to me now because, seriously, what the heck was I even thinking?
For several years, our church had the opportunity to run the concessions at a seasonal pumpkin patch that was open for 6 weeks of the year on Saturdays and Sundays–all day on Saturdays and Sundays.
Of course, that meant that someone had to organize the concessions and volunteers for this adventure.
Not surprisingly, no one really wanted to take on this monumental task because it meant working out a menu, purchasing all the supplies, organizing all the volunteers, and drum roll please committing to being at the pumpkin patch all day every Saturday and Sunday for 6 weeks in a row during prime pumpkin patch season.
Well, you’ve seen my list of the lies Satan told me, so, of course, I felt called to volunteer.
That’s a lie.
I didn’t feel called to volunteer.
God wasn’t telling me to volunteer.
I felt obligated to volunteer for this hellish obligation.
And, I did it for several years–and not with a very joyful heart, let me add!
I put on a happy face on the outside, but I was a whole lotta bitter on the inside!
It didn’t stop there for me, though.
I didn’t learn my lesson.
When a local group wanted to host Bluegrass Concerts at our church and we were asked to provide concessions…
Well, you get the point.
I had a terrible habit of volunteering or anything that needed to be done, working myself to complete exhaustion, and missing the boat completely on what God actually wanted me to do.
Why?
Because I had no boundaries when it came to church.
If it was put in front of me, I thought that meant that I was supposed to do it.
What I’ve learned in recent years is that busyness, overextension, and exhaustion are tools of the devil. He wants us to do everything and do nothing well because his primary goal for his existence is to lie, kill, steal, and destroy (John 10:10), and what better way to do that than to:
Lie to us about our obligations
Kill our spirits
Steal our joy
Destroy our hearts
Friend, God is not calling you to do it all. Most certainly, God is calling you to do something, but I can guarantee you He is not calling you to do everything.
Today, I want us to take a hard look at our church lives and think about the places in those areas we need to implement boundaries for our own peace and protection.
I know you might be sitting there wondering what implementing boundaries in the church has to do with healthy relationships.
Our lives need balance.
If we are overextending ourselves when it comes to church, we are not going to be present and available for our relationships at home or with our loved ones, and our relationships at church are going to be strained and stretched because of our overcommitments.
In a lot of ways, our boundaries at church are integral to the health of our relationships.
Our Gifts=Our Boundaries
I’ve already spent a good deal of time discussing why we need boundaries in our relationships and how boundaries are, in fact, biblical. If you’re still struggling with how or why you might need boundaries at church, though, let me remind you of how God designed our institutions to work. In Ephesians 4:11, Paul reminds us that:
He handed out gifts above and below, filled heaven with his gifts, filled earth with his gifts. He handed out gifts of apostle, prophet, evangelist, and pastor-teacher to train Christ’s followers in skilled servant work, working within Christ’s body, the church, until we’re all moving rhythmically and easily with each other, efficient and graceful in response to God’s Son, fully mature adults, fully developed within and without, fully alive like Christ.
Ephesians 4:11 (MSG)
My favorite part of this teaching is there toward the end where Paul talks about how the goal is that we’re all “moving rhythmically and easily with each other.”
We all have gifts.
We each have a purpose.
The beauty of this concept and plan is that when we all come together in the church, we all bring something different to the table.
Conversely, no one brings everything to the table.
The goal is not for one person, or a couple of people, to do everything.
The goal is for each of us to recognize the gift or gifts God has given us and use those gifts in the church.
Paul spoke about this again when he was writing to the Corinthians. After again talking about how God has gifted each of us differently, he explains that:
You can easily enough see how this kind of thing works by looking no further than your own body. Your body has many parts—limbs, organs, cells—but no matter how many parts you can name, you’re still one body.
I Corinthians 12: 12 (MSG)
This is one of my favorite object lessons!
We all have different functions in the church, just like each of our body parts has a different function. Our hands can’t function as our heads. Our legs can’t function as our hearts.
In the same way, the church is made up of multiple people with a variety of gifts, and we are called to work together as one unit.
If we aren’t careful, we can find ourselves in the church trying to make a head act like legs or hands act like vocal cords.
That was never God’s plan for the church.
God’s plan for the church was for us each to bring our gifts to the table and use them to function rhythmically as one.
Our Boundaries in the Church
Setting a boundary in a church setting can be one of the most challenging boundaries to implement because we find ourselves feeling guilty for saying “no” and we feel like we’re letting God down when we don’t do something in the church–after all, the purpose of the church is to serve God and people, right?
I get it.
Too often, though, we shift into auto-pilot when it comes to church service and we serve because we feel like it’s the right thing to do instead of discerning if it is what God is nudging us to do.
If you’re a reliable human being who shows up and fulfills your commitments, you probably have an even harder time with this because people are constantly asking you to do things.
Let this be your permission to practice the pause today.
Before you automatically commit to something, pause and ask God if this is truly how He wants you to serve.
As someone who has a terrible habit of overcommitting myself and volunteering to do things I know I don’t really want to do and definitely aren’t being nudged by God to do, I cannot emphasize how valuable this pause is.
When someone asks you to do something or there’s a screen up asking for volunteers and you feel guilty for not responding, listen to your gut and listen to God.
If you feel sick in your gut at the thought of serving in that capacity, that’s probably the holy spirit telling you it’s not what you’re supposed to do.
If you dread serving in that capacity, it’s probably not what God is nudging you to do.
If you’re already overextended and are only responding out of guilt, that’s probably not what God is nudging you to do.
If you’re only saying yes because you’re afraid of disappointing someone, that’s probably not God nudging you.
If you’re only committing to serving because you’re afraid no one else will do it, that’s probably not a good reason to do it.
If this opportunity is not something you are gifted to do, it might be better suited to someone else.
If this commitment is going to overextend you even more and cause you to be a worse spouse, parent, or friend, it’s probably not God pushing you to do it.
And, guess what?
That’s okay.
Communicating your Boundaries
Boundaries can be exceptionally difficult to communicate if you have spent your life saying “yes” to most things and “no” to hardly anything.
Those of us who have lived that life tend to overcommunicate and overexplain our boundaries when we try to implement them.
Let me encourage you today friend–If God is nudging you to say “no” and implement a boundary, trust Him in that no.
You don’t have to overexplain your reasoning.
The fact that God is nudging you to say no, that this opportunity you’re turning down is not aligned with your gifts, or you know it will damage your relationships is more than enough of a reason to decline.
Anyone who loves you and is listening to God will understand that.
If they don’t understand or accept that, let me encourage you to examine that relationship and that church very closely.
There are situations as well where your boundary might not be an all-out no, but something else that is situational.
Maybe you are in charge of the nursery and your volunteers have a habit of not showing up, leaving you with 10 babies to watch all by yourself. Your boundary might be that if your volunteers don’t show up, the nursery will be closed that Sunday.
Or, maybe you pick up the doughnuts and make the coffee every other week, but the other people who are supposed to do the other weeks always call you and ask you to fill in.
That’s unreasonable.
Your boundary could be that you have committed to every other week and are not filling in anymore on the days that someone else has committed to.
Remember, boundaries are for your peace and protection, not punishment. In these cases, you have made a commitment to serve, but you are being taken advantage of, and that is a threat to your peace.
It’s perfectly okay and absolutely healthy to implement a boundary in these situations for the sake of your peace!
A Final Note on Boundaries in the Church
Implementing a boundary in a church setting should not be an excuse for you to get out of serving or using the gifts God has given you.
Implementing boundaries should be a way to protect your peace and better allow you to listen to God and how he is nudging you to serve in the church.
That’s important here.
We all have different seasons in our lives, though. During some of those seasons, God might be nudging you to step back from roles and responsibilities to focus on something else–even if it means stepping out of a role you are gifted for, just like in some seasons, God might be nudging you to jump into service with both feet!
Whatever the nudge God is giving you, lean into that nudge friend.
Reflections:
When have you been overextended by service in the church?
What are some boundaries you need to implement in your own service?
What are some conversations you need to have related to these boundaries?
