AMA: Are Boundaries Biblical? - Pastor Mike Houck | July 19, 2026

Is it okay for Christians to set healthy boundaries? When do personal boundaries go too far? In this message, Pastor Mike examines different types of boundaries and how they appear in the Bible. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

So let's uh take a look at boundaries. Boundaries are um kind of a tricky uh topic, kind of a hot topic uh for uh many people. Um so Merriam-Webster defines boundaries as a boundary is a real or imaginary line that marks the limits of an area or separates two things. It defines where something ends and something else begins. Whether this be a physical property line, a country's border, or a personal rule you set to protect your time and emotional well-being. And then we have uh border, which the border is sometimes used synonymously with the word boundaries, but they are different. The border is the part or edge of a surface or area that forms its outer boundary. And so uh quickly this morning, I'm just going to give you different types of boundaries. There may be others uh that I have not included here, uh, but I think these are the most common. The first one is uh physical. Physical. It has to do with your personal space, body, and physical touch comfort levels. We all know that person that likes to get too close when they talk to us. Uh, does anybody have a problem with that? Just a couple of you, the rest of you, you don't care? Okay, good, good. So we'll be, you know, close talkers uh sometimes um make people feel uncomfortable. Uh sometimes there are people that are um they're just huggers. They have to hug everybody. And some people, you know, they don't like that. And so you might set up a boundary and just um say, you know, uh three feet is close enough. Uh please don't touch me, whatever. Um, don't, you know, it may have to do with work where somebody's leaning over your shoulder, looking, reading your computer screen. It could be anything like that, where you establish a boundary and you say, okay, don't cross this. Physical boundaries. The second is emotional boundaries, protecting your feelings and energy, and deciding how much emotional weight you can take on from others. That is um uh probably uh a more difficult one because it's less clearly defined. Um, there are people that uh you will encounter in life that just want to suck the life out of you. I mean, they want you accessible to them 24-7. Um and they uh, you know, if you if they call, uh you should answer. No matter what time uh of the day or night. Um I know as a pastor early on in my ministry, I didn't I didn't know that I could learn, I could say no to people. And so um I just thought I had to be accessible to everybody all the time and do whatever anybody asked. And um, and it was later on that I learned to set uh boundaries with regard to my emotional space. Time, protecting your schedule and deciding how you spend your time. If you make yourself available, uh people will fill your time. And so it's important that you establish some boundaries with regard to your time. Number four is material, your comfort level with lending or giving money and personal belongings. That's pretty self-explanatory, I think. Number five is a big one: parental, protecting the physical, emotional, and developmental well-being of children and individuals in your care. This one is uh somewhat difficult because there are no universal boundaries, so to speak. I mean, there are there are some, but parents will have different rules for their kids. So one family uh may be hands-off, not care, whatever, and then you have another family that maybe seem to be overly protective. The issue is that it's up to the individual parents to decide how they best feel about their children and the relationship with others. And so it's important, especially for us as adults. Uh, we see somebody has a new baby. Uh, don't assume that the parents are just okay with you picking up that baby and holding it. Some parents might be okay with that, other parents may not. Um, that is not your property. And so uh you need to be polite, you need to ask. Uh, some uh some parents seem to have no boundaries with regard to their children. We've had issues here in the church where I've had to sit down uh up front, get grab a chair and put it up here and say, I'm gonna have a fatherly talk with you, and and tell them that, you know, some of you, when you come in this building, you you do not watch your children. You just assume that everybody else is gonna do that for you. So the children go to the bathroom, young kids go to the bathroom by themselves. And I would say to them, Do you know that somebody may have walked in and is waiting in the bathroom? You don't know that because you're facing front, but you let your kids run all over the building, run all over the parking lot. Um, there are no boundaries, and so sometimes I've had to talk to people to establish uh certain boundaries. Some of you may be a little more overprotective. That's okay. That's that's up to you. I do I do also want to say this um kind of a uh kind of a cautionary thing, it it bugs me a little bit. So if if parents and adults, you need to respect the boundaries of children. Okay, just don't assume that just because they're a child, um, that they should have to give you a hug. Don't do that. If a child so my granddaughter, sometimes she'll just run up and give me a great big hug. And then there's sometimes I'll say, Do you have a hug for papa? And she'll say, No. And that's okay. That is okay. Don't don't force your kids to give hugs to people because you don't want to hurt somebody's feelings. You're there to protect that child. If if a child is afraid of someone or senses something, then honor that. That's just me, okay? You can disagree and you can do with your children what you want to do with them, but don't don't assume that everybody's safe. Don't assume that everybody is okay just because they're an adult. So protect your kids and honor them. Teach them that it's okay, that if they don't want to sit on someone's lap, they don't have to. If they don't want to hug somebody, they don't have to. Teach them the significance of establishing boundaries and and honor them. And and I'll I'll I'll leave that alone and move on. Number six, there are legal boundaries. We know what they are. Um they are established by law for the good of its citizenry. There are certain uh laws you don't, you know, you don't break into a building. That's a boundary. It's a law established uh for the good of citizenry. Um you don't trespass, you don't, there's a number of things that you don't do because uh the the law, the legal system has established those boundaries. And then number seven, there are biblical boundaries, and those are precepts and laws given by God to protect and bless mankind. So there we have several different types of boundaries. And let me remind you again that a boundary is a real or imaginary line that marks the limits of an area and separates two things. So next we want to look at the enforcement of boundaries. Enforcement of boundaries. The first we want to consider is that some boundaries are what we would consider to be porous. Okay? Porous. You know what porous is? It's like there's holes in it. And some boundaries aren't aren't necessarily really solid, really, really fixed, um, not always enforced. I'll give you an example of that in in a moment. And then, second, some boundaries are strictly enforced. And I want you to understand this that boundaries are not request. Because when you when you make a request of something, the other party has to make a decision whether they're gonna honor that or not, or whether they're gonna enforce that for you or not. And so let me give you an example. So please don't call me after 9 p.m. That is a request. A number of years ago in the church, um, it seemed like for a while after church on a Sunday afternoon, I would get calls from people. They would, yeah, you know, they would talk about something that happened in children's ministry, or they would talk about this problem or that problem or something with the church. And so I had to say, stand up before the church and say, please don't call me on a Sunday afternoon. I I'm tired. I've I've worked, and Sunday afternoon is a day of rest. And uh, so I'm gonna take a nap. So don't call me. Let it wait till Monday morning or some other time during the week. But don't call, please, please don't call me on a Sunday afternoon because I'm gonna rest. That's my time to rest. And within a week, this woman called. I didn't answer, but back then we had answering machines, which tells you how long ago that was. Um she called, and the first words out of her mouth was, I know I'm not supposed to call you on a Sunday afternoon, but I thought you should know about this. And so what she was really communicating to me is I understand what your boundaries are, but I don't care. I don't care. And so I used to have that rule. I don't nobody calls me anymore. So that's great. And and please don't. Um, that's fine. I you know, call David Sunday afternoon, I'll give you his number, okay? Um a boundary would be um, or a request is please don't call me after 9 p.m. To make it a boundary, you would put your phone on do not disturb at 9 p.m. That's a boundary. You're you're you're controlling that. I'm gonna put my phone on do not disturb at 9 p.m. But I will check my phone after 9 p.m. to see who called and if I should call them back. That's a porous boundary. In other words, you decide whether you're going to enforce it or not. That's a very porous boundary. A strict boundary would be this: I will shut my phone off and put it away until morning. That's a strict boundary. The problem with porous boundaries is that while you're the one who makes the decision whether or not that boundary is fixed or not, it's very difficult for other people to know what the status of that boundary is. And so, number four, boundaries can become a form of passive aggression if they are porous. And by that I mean that we enforce them as a form of punishment after ignoring them for a while. This happens a lot. And this this really makes uh uh creates a difficult situation in relationships, especially parents with your kids. Um, if you s if you sit a rule and they know that they're allowed to push on that, they will. If that boundary is porous, if it's, you know, you you you need to um you need to go to bed by nine o'clock, or you need to brush your teeth at 8 30 or whatever. And they learn that if that's a porous boundary, what are they gonna do? They're gonna push it. They're gonna, they're gonna they're gonna keep pushing past that boundary. And then it gets to be, you know, 8 50, 9 o'clock, you've had it up to here with them, and then you yell at them and you say, uh, you know, I've had it, you gotta do this. Well, that creates a sense of insecurity because they've been pushing the boundary and getting away with it, and now all of a sudden you've exploded. I worked at a uh a halfway house uh for uh men with addictions, and I used to see this all the time in the enforcement of rules. Um, for example, there was a rule issued by New York State that there would be no smoking on the grounds. No smoking. We actually created a smoking area, but there was to be no smoking on the grounds. And it was a rule that often wasn't enforced until one of the directors got mad or somebody did something really stupid, and then we'd come out and say, There's no smoking. If you're caught smoking, you're gonna be discharged. And it was very passive aggressive. Um guys didn't, you know, can I smoke? I mean, I see other people smoking. Am I supposed to smoke? Or or can I smoke? Shouldn't I smoke? Whatever. And if it was used as a as a weapon, because if somebody was not performing well, um, they could create a reason for discharge and use that as a you know, as an added reason for discharge. Well, they violate the smoking law. Well, so doesn't everybody else. But we're gonna enforce it with you because we want you to leave because of your behavior. It becomes very passive aggressive, and it's hard for people to understand um where the limits of those boundaries are. Number five, boundaries may change and may not be established equally for everybody. Example, different boundaries for family, friends, and strangers. That happens. I mean, I may I may establish a boundary that I don't want people to hug me. That's not true, but let's use that for an example. Well, that shouldn't apply to my wife, right? So I'm, you know, I have uh different boundaries for different people, and that's okay as long as you can articulate that, as long as you can uh communicate that. Uh as a pastor a number of years ago, I had to speak to a gentleman who uh was very huggy, especially with all of the women in the church. And some of them came to me and and complained, so I had to take them aside and talk to them. And I said, Um, you know, it's come to my attention that um you you you seem to want to hug everybody in the church, yeah, all the women in the church. And I said, It makes people uncomfortable, so I'm gonna ask you not to do that. And I remember his answer was, Well, I want you to understand it's not sexual. And I said, Oh, so then if it's not sexual, why do you only hug women and not men? And he didn't have an answer. And I said, Stop. You have to stop. No more hugs. Well, what if they want one? I said, Well, who's determining whether they want one or not? You know, so just stop. I don't want to see it. Um, you have different rules for for different people, different situations, um example, um, etc. All right. Let me dive into some biblical examples of setting boundaries. The first one is guarding our time for rest and renewal. We have an illustration from the Gospel of Luke, Luke chapter 5, verse 16. But now, even more the report about him went abroad, and great crowds gathered to hear him and to be healed of their infirmities. But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray. Jesus understood. I mean, he was here um to minister for a really a short time, three years, but he understood the importance of getting away from people during that um three-year period of time. My wife and I have a phrase. Um, I I in my pastoral ministry a number of years ago, um, I was just feeling burnt out and overwhelmed, and and so uh I was receiving some counseling from another pastor, and he said, You have a people quota. In other words, there, you know, you have a limit to how much time you want to spend with people. And that's okay. And it's important for you to understand that. Um, because when you go beyond that, that's when you begin to uh be a little sharp with people, uh, get irritated easily, et cetera. So I have a people quota. I've you know, and and my wife and I will say to each other, yeah, I've reached my people quota. What does that mean? It means I need to withdraw, I need to be quiet, I need to be by myself because it's it's best for me, and it's best for the people that I come in contact with and I minister to. Jesus understood that. He needed to get away, he needed to rest, he needed to pray. You need that as well. So it's okay to say no to people. It's okay to take time uh to get away and to uh rest and to relax. I've been uh coaching my son in ministry, and my coaching of him basically uh comes down to this. Uh, hey David, these are all the mistakes I made. I'm gonna tell you this so you so you don't make the same mistakes I made. But I told him it's very important for you to schedule times away, time time away. Just get away. Maybe you need a day or a weekend to get away and just read and just study, or get away and not do anything, just spend time with your family. It's really important. I didn't do that. Uh, I didn't know any better. I thought I had anytime anybody asked me to do something, I thought I had to say yes. So I did every wedding, I did every funeral, I did, I performed everything that people uh ask of me and burnt myself out and um was not really um there in the younger years for my family as I should have been. Um so it's important. Another example that we have is Exodus 18, 17 through 18. Uh, this story is a great story. It's where Moses is leading the the Israelites uh out of Egypt. And um his father-in-law, Jethro, comes to visit him. And one of the things he notices is that Joe uh Moses would set himself up as judge, and all the people would come to him to sort out their problems. And from early in the morning to late at night, he would just sit there and he would kind of judge over people and counsel them with regard to their problems. And uh Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, said to him, What you are doing is not good. You and the people uh with you will certainly wear yourselves out, for the thing is too heavy for you. You are not able to do it alone. And so essentially he was being overworked. And what Jethro said to him was, you need to delegate, um, you need to share some of this responsibility because you need time uh for yourself. Um, it's not healthy for you to be doing this. And so uh one of the boundaries, um, biblical examples of boundaries is guarding your time for rest and renewal. Number two, leaving hostile and toxic people slash environments. Matthew 10, 14, Jesus is speaking, he says, and if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave the house, excuse me, or town. Later on, he said, or actually earlier he said, uh, do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs, lest they trample them underfoot and turn to attack you. What is being communicated here is that there are times when it's just good for you to leave. There are some people you need to avoid. Um, people get themselves uh caught up in toxic situations and they don't know how to uh get out of them. Uh people will do this in our arguments. People do this on Facebook. Uh let me let me tell you something. This is a biblical concept, okay? You do not have to respond to everything you see on Facebook, okay? That's in the Word of God, I'm telling you right now. You do not have to respond. Even if you disagree with it, you don't have to respond. Just scroll past it. Because I promise you, if you respond, if you disagree, then there's gonna become this whole thread of conversation and interchange about whatever that topic is, and it's not gonna change anybody's mind, and the only thing it's gonna do is frustrate you. Leave it alone. Leave it alone. There are stupid people out there, there's a lot of them. You don't need to respond to all of them. I heard a saying, a phrase, I don't know where it originated, but it's great. It's and the the phrase is this do not wrestle with a pig, because the pig will like it, and you both will end up dirty. And I apply that to there are kind of I don't I just don't need, I just don't need to respond. There are situations, I worked with a guy who loved to argue, and I would even argue a point with him to where he was backed into a corner, and there was no way for him to get out without admitting that he was wrong, but he wouldn't do it, and he would just continue arguing, and I'd be like, we we already covered that, we already discussed that. So his desk was next to mine, and he would constantly, you know, want to bait me with certain arguments, and uh and I would just say, Yeah, okay, you're right. They're like, What? I mean, he would even do say some things that were absurd just to bait me into an argument, and I'd be like, Yeah, you're right. He'd be like, What do you mean I'm right? And I'd say, I just don't want to argue the point. It's not gonna go anywhere, it's just gonna frustrate me. So, whatever. And I would let it go. Um that's okay. Can I tell you, sometimes, even in sharing the gospel, it's okay to stop. It's okay. I mean, if an individual knows how you feel, knows where you stand on things, they know you're a believer, you don't have to browbeat them into the kingdom of God. Just let it go. You've you've you've done your part. Live your life in such a way that it glorifies God. But don't keep arguing the point with them. Because there's there's no you there's there's no value in that. You're just gonna be extremely frustrated, and as it says in scripture, they may turn around and attack you. Your your conversation may lead to antagonism or even escalate to some form of violence. Just let it go. Let it go. Can I tell you something? Jesus didn't go to every person to preach the gospel. Jesus didn't convert everybody. It's okay. It's not our job. We live our lives, we communicate the message of the gospel, and we allow the Holy Spirit to work. And let me say this to you: that there comes a point in an individual's life, it's a scary point, but there comes a point in an individual's life where they continue to resist the Holy Spirit, and even the Holy Spirit knows when to say, okay, you've resisted me enough, you've hardened your heart, and the Holy Spirit just moves on. It's okay for you to do the same. Number three, guarding your inner life. Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it. This has really become my uh, I think my life verse, especially since having a heart attack a couple years ago. Um, realizing that, hey, I don't have to do everything. Um, I don't have to be there for everybody. Uh I was running a um Shadowhaven Ministries, uh kind of a halfway house for addicts, and it was okay for me to step back and not do that. It was okay for me to step back from the church and not be not remain the senior pastor. And thankfully, my son was a lot um able to step up and fill that role. Um, that was okay. I needed to guard my heart. Um, and not just your physical heart, but spiritually as well. Paul wrote in Philippians 4, 6 through 9: Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. We need to guard our inner life. We anxiety is um at epidemic levels in the United States. Uh, anxiety and depression and so on and so forth. I think some of that has to do with the fact that we're exposed to social media 24-7. I also think it has to do with the fact that we're exposed to news 24-7. Um we just we just know everything that's wrong in the world. And you know what? It's okay to turn the news off and not listen. It's okay. You know what? If you read the Bible and you read the book of Revelations, um, the revelation of Jesus Christ, um God wins in the end. Um, all the little details in between. Um, you don't necessarily know need to know about. You don't necessarily need to fight every battle. Um, there's some battles you're just not going to win. So protect your heart, guard yourself. Um, be careful of what you listen to, be careful of what you uh expose yourself to, be careful of what you allow into your home, into your heart. And number four, learning to say no. Paul wrote in Galatians 1.10, for am I now seeking the approval of man or of God, or am I trying to please man? If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ. And in Nehemiah 6.3, I love this passage. Nehemiah's working on the wall, and there are some people who want to stop progress. Um, and so they create this ruse that they need to talk to him. They need to have him come down from the wall and from what he's doing and have a meeting, had it have a conference with them. And he responds, and I sent messengers to them saying, I am doing a great work and I cannot come down. Why should the work stop while I leave it and come down to you? No is a great word. It's and it's permissible for us to say. Uh took me a long time to learn that. Um, we don't need to do everything people ask us to do. One of the things that I learned from having my heart attack and being so busy and running in so many different directions. And don't get me wrong, I was doing a lot of good things. A lot of good things. But what I came to realize was I need to say no to some good things so that I could do the best things. And there's a lot of good things. There's a lot of good causes, there's a lot of good ministries, there's a lot of good things. You cannot do them all. Uh, you are not God's answer to every problem. I am not God's answer to every problem that exists. It's okay to say no. It's okay to understand uh my limits. Um the Apostle Paul was emphasizing that uh serving Christ requires letting go of the need for human approval, making it easier to say no to unreasonable demands. In our weekly discussion that we began, um the invaluable, 15 invaluable laws of of leadership, uh, we talked about fears that we have that keep us from becoming the leader that we should. And one of the fears that was pretty common with almost everyone is the disapproval of other people. Uh, we we live our lives wondering how people or what people are going to think about what we do, what we say, who we are. Um Paul's saying you need to let that go. Because in the end, what matters is what Christ thinks of you. And let me tell you what he thinks of you. He loved you so much that he died. Um, there is no other person on earth that can claim that. And so make sure that you seek to please him first and above all else. And then number five, I'll close with this speaking the truth. As a boundary we need to establish. This is a difficult one. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head into Christ. Proverbs 27, 6 says, faithful are the wounds of a friend, profuse are the kisses of an enemy. What does that mean? That means if you're truly a friend to someone, you will, in love, tell them things they don't want to hear. We're instructed to do that. It's it's almost unheard of in our society, and particularly in the church. We don't want to offend anyone. So we don't tell them the truth. We don't talk about sin because it might offend someone. We don't tell our friends that unless they give their lives to Christ, they're gonna spend eternity in hell. We don't talk about that because we don't want to offend anybody, we don't want to hurt anybody's feelings, and so we will be nice to people all the way into hell and not tell them the truth. There are people who have come to the church and even are in the church who when they hear something, they get offended. And well, the pastor shouldn't talk about that. Well, it's in scripture. If it's in scripture, it is it is meant for people to know and to understand. And so you may think you're being nice, but scripture would say rather you're an enemy. If the bridge in Phoenix were out, a boat hit it or whatever, took it out. We would tell people, wouldn't we? I mean, we say, hey, if you're going into Phoenix, you may want to uh go a different route because the bridge is out. But can you imagine not doing that because you don't want to hurt somebody's feelings? Because you know, well, they want to go that way. I know they want to go, they got plans over there. I don't want to tell them. So we let them go and either get stuck in traffic or drive into the river. And we think we're being nice. The Christian church is too nice. It's too nice. We want people in our pews so we don't tell them the truth. We we tell them what they want to hear. We tickle their ears, and then we get upset if we say something that offends them and they leave. And then we talk to Pastor David and say, Well, you should have said it differently, or whatever. And we're upset when people get offended by the truth. Jesus offended people with the truth, a lot of people, and yet he held to the truth. And so you need to establish, and we as a church, and next week I'm gonna talk about the boundaries of the church, need to establish boundaries that say, I'm gonna speak the truth. I'm gonna speak the truth. I'm not gonna lie to spare another person's feelings, especially when it comes to spiritual matters and matters of eternity. You know, there are times when it's okay to maybe not tell the truth. I mean, you know, if somebody comes up to you after church and says, What do you think? Does this dress make me look fat? Um, you might want to hold your tongue on that one, okay? Um learn to say something different, okay? But I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about serious life-altering issues. We don't like to say that homosexuality is a sin because we don't want to hurt somebody's feelings. And we think that somehow by being nice to them and avoiding that topic, they're gonna like us so much that eventually they'll come to Jesus. You cannot come to Jesus without first embracing the truth. You cannot, it's impossible. You cannot lie someone into heaven. Speak the truth in love. David, do we have a final song? I've gone three minutes over.

unknown 41:43

We have a final song.

SPEAKER_00 41:44

We have a final song? All right. Let me pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you for these truths. We thank you that you have established boundaries in your word for us to live by so that we might be blessed and we might be protected and we might maintain a proper relationship with you and with everyone else. We know that boundaries are a very difficult topic. People have different boundaries for different reasons, and sometimes it's it's hard to understand. But we know that you have created us that way so that we might have proper relationships with each other. But what's really important, Father, is that in our relationships, we reflect the love of Jesus Christ, we reflect our faith, and we respect uh all that we come in contact with. We pray, God, that um we might speak the truth and love, that we might not alter it to spare someone's feelings or to spare our own embarrassment. Uh we pray, Father, that we would learn how to develop proper relationships uh with each other that are beneficial to us and to those that we come in contact with. We thank you that your word, even though it is ancient, that it is still relevant today and that we can find application in it if we would just choose to obey what we have heard. We praise you, we love you in Christ's name. Amen.