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Michael explores the power of the will on its own terms, the difference between good/evil and righteousness/wickedness, the nature of divine righteousness, the location of the self, and various disorders of the will.
Since listening to this episode, I’ve been meditating on boundaries. It is easy to see how making boundaries for one’s own behavior might align with righteousness. What is harder for me to figure out is how and when making boundaries in relation to other people accords with God’s standard of righteousness. In part of the episode you were encouraging the passive to create more boundaries with reference to strong-willed, domineering people. That discussion made me think about other things I’ve read and heard that reference making boundaries, usually in the context of creating firm expectations or modes of interaction with another person to avoid getting hurt by that person. This may not really be what you were talking about, but it is a thing that I have tried to think about in a godly way without much success. On the one hand, there are biblical exhortations to turn the other cheek and forgive 70×7 and let love cover a multitude of sins. On the other hand, most people acknowledge some sort of limit to how much harm you should let a person do to you in your efforts to love and forgive. I haven’t found, either in others, or in my own thinking, a standard that would help me draw that boundary with confidence. And I think the type of relationship probably complicates the boundary drawing. For instance, if a coworker stole from me, I would likely never invite that person over for dinner; but if my child steals from me, I’ll probably still feed him. If a stranger insults me, I can probably ignore him and never speak to him again. But if my mom insults me I still have a command to honor her. I would like to know what standard you see for setting boundaries against being harmed by others. I’m especially interested in what to do about a close relationship with a pattern of harm.
These are good questions. I’ve appreciated the Boundaries books by Henry Cloud and John Townsend on this. A fundamental idea they talk about is that boundaries are not to control others, but to establish boundaries for oneself. In other words, boundaries are not coercive by definition. They have to do with communicating clearly what we will do or how we will react in various situations, not in telling another person what they are or are not “allowed” to do. Boundary-setting still preserves the agency and choice of others. As far as setting those boundaries, I think considering to the best of our knowledge what has a chance of “doing good” for another must be at the foundation of our boundary-setting. In other words, it is not necessarily redemptive suffering to allow another person to hurt you. Sometimes the best thing even for them is to say, “I will not stay here while you treat me like this. I will remove myself from this situation. It is not good for you that I continue to allow this.” Cloud and Townsend talk about the difference between the two kinds of suffering for others (redemptive and non-redemptive), and I think their advice is helpful on this. The Bible does not say that suffering in itself should be pursued. Jesus talks about suffering for His sake and the sake of the Gospel. I know this does not give you a standardized or uncomplicated rule, but it does help. If you think your suffering could be redemptive or useful toward the forgiveness or good of another, perhaps, if you can maintain love in it, you pursue that. But, if suffering will likely or actually only produce resentment in you and recalcitrance or further malice in another, it might actually be the worst thing you could do, even in terms of the benefit to another.
So, first, set boundaries on your own behavior (how you will respond or react to various forms of harm). Second, set those boundaries so that, if you choose voluntarily to suffer, it is actually oriented toward the other person’s ultimate good (forgiveness and redemption). With that in mind, it is often impossible (because of the other person’s stubbornness or malice) for suffering to even have a minimal hope of being redemptive. In these cases, I would consider continuing in that suffering to be something akin to “casting pearls before swine.” Not only is it not in keeping with the righteous goals of God, it might be counter to those aims. Suffering, in other words, is not the ultimate goal for the Christian. We do not suffer for the sake of evil. That is not righteous. We suffer evil for the sake of good (of others first). Boundaries should be set according to our best conception of the “use” of our suffering toward sanctification (for ourselves and others). I hope that helps. There is far more specific conversation on this in the Boundaries books, and Boundaries in Marriage focuses particularly on the marital relationship. That helps to differentiate between boundary-setting between friends (where obligations are obviously not as all-encompassing) and between spouses (which relationship entails a greater amount of mutual suffering).
Hope that helps, and thanks again for your thoughtful engagement. This is definitely a large and difficult topic requiring wisdom, discernment, and careful and adaptive application.
Thank you for the book suggestions and the response. I didn’t expect you’d have an easy to follow standard, but asking the question about whether, to the best of my knowledge, my vulnerability is likely to help is useful for thinking about each situation. I also appreciate the caveat that I need to be confident I can act in love if the potential harm is realized. This is an important dimension I didn’t bring up, and which might change from instance to instance. Thanks for thinking about it with me.
I’m right there with you, Lisa. I struggle with setting boundaries as well, and it gets even more muddled when my limits are long overrun, and any urge to change the situation already has resentment behind it, which leads to feeling like I’m wrong for setting the boundary with that attitude, which leads me to not set it at all because I feel like all my emotions will just flood out if I do and then I’ll be accused to selfishness or pettiness. It’s hard to know where to start if, like me, you’ve ever been told to “be nice” for most of your youth but no one ever took the time to tell you that it’s okay (in kid language: “not mean”) to tell someone to stop hurting you; that it’s not a denial of Christian suffering or a form of retaliation…even if the authorities in your life falsely accuse you of such the few times you attempt to stand up.
I wish more resources were out there for Christians like us, the ones who tried to obey the message to “be kind” but just ended up as fearful people-pleasers with an overactive conscience. Really, trying to overcome the internal guilt about taking a stand has been my largest hurdle. This podcast has definitely helped me clarify a lot of my own psychology and decisions, but the road ahead looks long and rocky.