In the last blog I left you with John 15:3-5 which says, “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing.”
In order for us to understand boundaries and the importance of staying within them, we have to understand this verse. When I think about a vine and its branches I think about the importance of the branch being connected to the vine in order for it to grow. If you cut the branch off it is impossible for it to continue growing. This understanding enabled me to redefine boundaries and to embrace them as a life giving nutrient that will cause me to grow and to live an abundant, fruit filled life, in all of my relationships!
Here is something I want you to understand before we go any further. When God formed you in your mother’s womb, He loved every part of you. He loved the good, the bad, and the ugly! He chose to love you knowing that you would walk in sin, hurt yourself and others, and knowing you would cross His boundaries of protection. His knowing these things did not cause him falter in His love for you. In fact, his knowledge of these things caused Him to pursue you even more. Your inability to live in relationship with God and man on your own was the reason He sent Christ to die on the Cross for you. It is also the reason He set boundaries of protection in place along the road of your life.
When I used to travel across country I traveled many windy mountain roads. Along those roads were guard rails. Those guard rails were placed there so that I would not go over the edge of the mountain. There were also speed limit signs along the road that told me the safe speed to travel for that section of road. Not one time when I traveled those roads did I question the validity of those guard rails or road signs. I accepted the reality that the road engineers did their homework. They calculated the safe guards that needed to be in place, to ensure my safety when I traveled those roads. Staying within those boundaries never seemed to be an issue for me.
When I started to investigate God’s boundaries I brought these experiences to mind because they gave me a new way of seeing God’s boundaries of protection for my life. I began to understand Proverbs 3:5,6, “Trust in the LORD with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths.” I also began to understand Jeremiah 29:11, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.”
I began to see God as the engineer of the roads in my life. I began to reframe my past and asked God to show me the truth about the importance of staying within His boundaries. I asked Him to help me trust in Him the same way I trusted the men who created the guard rails and speed limit signs. This is when my vision of God’s boundaries became clear. This is when I started to realize that living by the principles of God’s Word instead of trying to keep the Law of His Word was my responsibility. If I allowed Christ to be the Lord of my life, then I would be able to stay within God’s boundaries. And if I crossed a boundary for whatever reason, God had a rescue team in place with a perfect plan of rescue for me! The rescue team consists of Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, the Bible, and the body of Christ. The rescue plan consists of God’s grace, mercy, truth, and deliverance. This understanding was liberating! It freed me from all of the shame and condemnation. Whenever I crossed a boundary it allowed me to see the opportunity to overcome and be victorious no matter what I did wrong.
In my relationships with people I began to see the importance of having boundaries. I made a list of the toxic and healthy people in my life. From those lists I began to weed out the people who were on the toxic side and I started cultivating the relationships with the healthy people. I began to look for people who would enhance my life by speaking truth, encouraging me, and loving me the way God loved me, warts and all. Today I am surrounded by people who I am grateful to have in my life.
In the area of choices I began to see toxic and healthy choices. I made a list of those as well. Instead of seeing the boundaries of God as inhibiting me from fun, I began to see them as protecting me from possible disaster. This is when I stopped drinking alcohol to get drunk. I have to admit that I used to love getting drunk! I loved the feeling and my mood when I was drunk. I did think that getting drunk displeased God and I somehow thought that He would punish me if I did it, but again, I had a skewed view of God and I didn’t understand why I shouldn’t drink for the purpose of getting drunk.
After reframing God’s boundaries in my mind, I realized that God wasn’t sitting on His throne watching me get drunk and setting up a team of disciplinarians to come down and punish me for my sin. I realized that my view of God was completely different than the truth about Him. I reframed the scenario in my mind first about the event of getting drunk and how God viewed me when I did. Here is how I did that.
I began to envision God sitting on His throne having a meeting with Jesus and the Holy Spirit. They were brain storming on a plan of redemption for my sinful behavior. (For those of you who have a problem with me separating the Godhead for this, don’t let your mind go there. None of us will really know the truth about it until we get to Heaven so there is no need arguing over it on earth. Whatever you believe, believe it wholeheartedly, and walk in the power of your belief.) This is how I viewed it and that view delivered me from a dark lifestyle and produced the lasting fruit of the Holy Spirit operating in my life!
This is the picture I got of God. I saw Him having that meeting and I could almost hear Him saying something like this, “Okay, my precious and beautiful daughter Holly has crossed a boundary and this may cause her great harm. I need you to be in place at the exact moment when she will be in a quiet place so I can talk to her through you. When she gets there and is ready to listen I want you to tell her how much I love her and tell her that I have forgiven her through your blood at Calvary. Remind her that nothing she can do can separate her from my love. Tell her that my grace has been set in place for her and that when she wakes up in the morning my mercies will be new for her. Then I want you to bring a person or event in her life that will remind her of her worth and value to me. I want my people to go to her and help her get restored and healed from her false beliefs about me. Put angels of protection around her so the enemy can’t hit her with his fiery darts of shame and condemnation about her behavior. Alright its time! Go!”
I know that may seem like an odd thought to some of you but I believe that God communicates to us in this way because the Word says the Holy Spirit convicts the believer of their righteousness. God is constantly reminding us of our righteousness through Christ Jesus. I just believe we choose to listen to the enemy’s voice more than we listen to God’s and that is why it is so hard for many people to walk inside of the boundaries of God.
Here’s what God knew to be true about me getting drunk. God foreknew that getting drunk caused me to act in ways that would hurt me or others. He knew that it could cause me to die or cause me to drive drunk and kill another person. He knew alcohol caused me to gain weight and gave me bad headaches the day after I drank. He knew that when I got drunk I tended to put myself in risky situations that oftentimes I felt powerless to get out of. In His knowing, He loved me and pursued me anyway! He knew that one day my reality would catch up with His truth and I would gain wisdom and understanding about His boundaries in the area of drinking because He knew my heart. He never looked at the outside of my life. He only looked within. So He knew it was just a matter of time before I had a desire to live within His boundaries. He was right! When the day came when I gave my life completely over to Him in all areas, the desire to get drunk went away.
God knows every boundary that needs to be in place to ensure that we get to the destination of the desires of our hearts. Begin today and ask God to help you reframe his boundaries in your mind. He is faithful and He promises that when you seek Him you will find Him, when you seek Him with all your heart. Jeremiah 29:13. Seek wisdom and understanding and you will begin to see understand God’s boundaries!
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