As Christians we are called to show up in this world with a servant’s heart.  We genuinely want to help.  We want to show compassion to others and we want to please our heavenly Father by doing unto others.  Somewhere along the way we confused this with constantly saying “yes”, doing more, and giving more. These good intentions can, and often do, lead to anger, resentment and burnout.

Here’s the scoop.  Even Jesus had boundaries.  He withdrew from crowds to spend quiet time with his Father.  He left towns where he was rejected or threatened, he rested, and he sometimes said “no”. 

He still says “no”.  Sometimes he answers our prayers and sometimes he doesn’t.  Sometimes he tells us to wait and sometimes the answer is simply “no”. 

Two things can be true and Galatians 6 paints us a picture of that.  We are called to help carry one another’s burdens AND to carry our own load.  The tricky part is discerning what is ours to carry and what is not ours to pick up. 

We are called to protect what God has entrusted us with.  We are to be good stewards of our time, our energy, our family, our physical and emotional health, and our money.  It’s impossible to be good stewards if we are consistently carrying loads that don’t belong us.  When we say “yes” to everything we can’t say “yes” to what God assigned to us.

To be honest, I’ve spent a lot of time working on boundaries, codependency, and the negative emotions that come along like guilt, fear, resentment, etc.  Boundaries are not selfish.  They are biblical.  Many great books and resources are available on the topic with a quick Google search.  Of course, our ultimate resource is our heavenly Father, so this is your permission to grab a coffee and have a chat with God.