Discovering the Gift of Limits
4th message in our series: Putting the Pieces Together: a Journey toward mature discipleship*.
Rabbi Edwin Friedman tells the story of a man on a journey. As he hurried along toward his destination, he came to a bridge that crossed high over a dangerous river. After starting across the bridge, he noticed someone coming from the opposite direction. As the stranger came to greet him, the man realized that he had a rope wrapped many times around his waist. The stranger began to unwrap the rope as he walked. Just as the two were about to meet, the stranger said, "Pardon me, would you be so kind as to hold the end of the rope for me?"
The man agreed, and, without a thought, reached out and took it. "Thank you," said the stranger. Then he added, "Two hands now, and remember, hold on tight." At that, the stranger jumped off the bridge.
"What are you trying to do?" he shouted to the stranger. "Just hold tight," came the reply. "If you let go, I’ll be lost!" they bantered back and forth for a time. "What do you want?" "Just your help! Just keep hanging on." If I let go, all my life I’ll know that I let this man die. If I stay, I risk losing my goal. Either way, this will haunt me forever. "I don’t think I can hang on much longer," warned the man on the bridge. "You must try," appealed the stranger. "If you fail, I die."
"Listen," the man on the bridge said, "I have an idea of how to save you." He mapped out the idea wherein the stranger would climb up by wrapping the rope around himself. Loop by loop, the rope would become shorter. But the dangling man had no interest in the idea.
Suddenly a new idea struck the man on the bridge. It was different and even alien to his normal way of thinking. "I will not accept the position of choice for your life, only for my own. I hereby give back the position of choice for your own life to you." "What do you mean?" he asked. "I simply mean that it’s up to you; you decide how this ends. I’ll become the counterweight; you do the pulling and bring yourself up. I will even tug some." He unwound the rope from his waist and braced himself; he was ready to help as soon as the dangling man began to act.
"You would not be so selfish!" the other man shrieked. "I am your responsibility!" After a long pause, the man on the bridge at last uttered slowly, "I accept your choice." Upon saying that, he freed his hands and continued his journey over the bridge.
Many of us get involved in ministry because we want to help people who have fallen off the bridge. You might know the struggle; you’ve always been pulling people up, often at great personal expense emotionally and spiritually, only to find that they purposely would fall off (or jump off) another bridge the next month. For years you’ve reluctantly taken the rope, and once you had it and they were dangling, you felt guilty if you let go. How could I? I was being a Christian. Wouldn’t Jesus pull them up? If I didn’t pull them up, was I being selfish? For how long would I need to place my visions, dreams, desires, hopes, and plans on hold? Did they matter anyway since I was a servant of Christ? And where was everyone else?
Understanding and respecting our boundaries and limits is one of the most important character qualities and skills we need in order to be long-term lovers of God and others. We need to learn how to say "no" to some good things in order to say "yes" to the best thing. This is an important step along the journey to mature discipleship.
Face it; we’re busy people. I know that most of you are daily bombarded with opportunities to spend our time, energy, and resources. Some of those options are clearly bad options; I was once watching the Biggest Loser, and a competitor said, "I thought I didn’t have time to exercise, but I had time to watch 3-4 hours of TV a night." The problem is that many of the options are good things: jobs, volunteering, coaching your kids’ teams, and then we’re trying to squeeze in some daily time with God and our families! We are busy people!
Unfortunately, we tend to spiritualize busyness. If we say "no" to church things, we must be spiritually immature or selfish. We end up like one of those circus side-shows where the guy keeps spinning all those plates.
So how do we, as Christians, make decisions on how to spend our time, energy, and resources? We have a fantastic example to emulate: Jesus Christ Himself. In Mark 1:35-39, we find Jesus, who has been teaching in the synagogue, healing the sick, and driving out demons. After a late night of ministry, we see what Jesus did the next morning.
Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house, and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed.
Simon and his companions went to look for him and when they found him, they exclaimed: "Everyone is looking for you."
Jesus replied, "Let us go somewhere else – to the nearby villages – so I can preach there also. That is why I have come."
So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons.
Even Jesus had to say "no" to good things in order to say "yes" to the best thing! Think about it; none of us is Jesus, and if even He had to say "no", how much more do we have to? As Jesus’ followers, we need to follow His example: we can do so by first Receiving the Gift of Limitations. I started out this series by talking about Bob Pierce, whose tireless ministry, starting World Vision, was at the utter expense of his family. Have you ever heard someone described as having a "Messiah complex"? The implication is that they think they have to do it all or save someone, kind of like the guy on the bridge. But when we look at Jesus, who was the Messiah, even He didn’t have a complex like that! He was aware of His limitations: He didn’t heal everyone, and he didn’t stay in the same city until everyone followed him. He pulled away from the crowds who only wanted to see his miraculous signs. He took time alone with God in prayer. He spent time teaching his 12 disciples (especially Peter, James, and John) when he could be preaching to multitudes and healing the sick. Jesus, the Messiah, didn’t try to do it all, and we would all be healthier people and better followers of Jesus if our "Messiah complexes" looked more like Him.
You see, Jesus fully embraced human limitations. I remember seeing some people get competitive over spiritual gift inventories; one was bragging on how many spiritual gifts he "had." Someone else was ashamed because she only had a couple. The burden on the one with many is too great; I came to believe that most of them weren’t really his gifts; it was just his justification to be in power. When you’ve only got a few talents and gifts, it is a blessing, because then you can more easily discern how to use them wisely.
Many of our parents reinforced that we could be anything we wanted to be. I found out that no matter how much hoops I shoot, my dreams of the NBA are silly. Realistically, it is a myth that I can be anything I want. And if we want to be more like Jesus, our limitations are gifts; they can help us understand our unique callings and can help us say "no" to good things in order to say "yes" to the best thing.
In his book The Emotionally Healthy Church, Peter Scazzero gives us a list of some limitations to consider when deciding what to say "yes" to: personality, season of life, life situation, emotional, physical, intellectual capacities, negative emotions, and scars and wounds from your past.
In my current season of life, I have a wife and two small children; my family creates some God-given limitations. I can resent that I need to spend time with them, or I can celebrate it. Some of you are in the sandwich generation, caring for your children and your parents. For me, public speaking isn’t a problem, but for others of you, that would be the last thing you’d volunteer to do. Maybe you’re going through a season of transition at work or are searching for a job. There is no need to be ashamed or frustrated by your unique situation! These life circumstances aren’t good or bad, they just are. Don’t apologize for your unique limitations. In fact, they can help you be more aware that, as my friend Blaine Keene says, "there is a God, and we are not him!" And we can be assured that God is at work through other people who are not us.
If we’re aware of our limitations, it can be easier to follow Jesus’ example in this next principle: Do what God asks YOU to do. In Mark 1:37, the disciples came to Jesus to tell him, "Everyone is looking for you!" Meaning, "it’s time to get back to town to heal, teach, and preach! Now get back to work!" Everyone had their own expectations of what Jesus was supposed to do, but He wasn’t swayed by the pressure. He was living in full obedience to God the Father.
We are only responsible to do what God asks us to do. Everyone else has expectations of how we should spend our time, energy, and resources. This is true for all of us, but I’ve found that it’s especially true for me as a pastor. Each and every one of you has expectations of what I should do as your pastor. It’s not wrong for you to have those expectations; it’s just a natural outgrowth of your experience in and out of the church. The problem is that if we compiled all of those expectations and added in the Book of Discipline’s requirements of an Elder, we’d have a job description that even Jesus Himself couldn’t live up to.
I started out in full-time ministry as an associate pastor, which meant that not only did I have to live with my expectations and the expectations of the entire congregation, but also those of the senior pastor, who usually expected 60+ hours a week of work, plus doing whatever they didn’t particularly want to do themselves. I felt like my job description should have been handled by three people. Incidentally, it is now. I felt like I was an A student getting Cs because I was stretched too thin. And speaking of thin, I gained weight because I was stressed out. I was burned out, depressed, and miserable. And the mandate I got? Keep on doing it. It was killing me. We were doing that to Rudy, especially before he came on full-time, when our requirements and expectations, coupled with his other job, which was necessary for him to make ends meet, would not allow him to take a Sabbath. And we’re doing it to Chad, expecting him to do what amounts to a full-time job, all the while being paid part-time.
My priority is to put God first, then my family, and then the church. So if I don’t meet all of your expectations, it isn’t because I don’t care (I struggle with being a people-pleaser); it’s because I can’t meet them. And I shouldn’t. At the end of the day, God won’t ask me if I lived up to others’ expectations. God will ask me if I did everything He asked me to do. And I’m working hard to be able to say "yes" to that question.
Shortly before He was arrested, Jesus prayed this prayer (John 17:4): I have brought you glory on earth by completing the work you gave me to do. Did you get that: he brought God glory by completing the work God gave him to do. Not by healing everyone. Not by preaching to everyone. Not by meeting everyone’s expectations. But by completing the work God gave Him. Likewise for us; our job isn’t to do everything. It is simply to do what God called each of us to do, to be who God made us to be.
For some of us, this means setting boundaries and making limits; saying "no" to good things in order to say "yes" to the best thing. Having clear boundaries is a good thing. It may feel hard when you’re approached to serve in yet one more ministry area, but maybe recognition that it’ll take precious time from your family will help you. One way we can become more emotionally healthy as a church is by giving the gift of limits and by respecting that in others. I have had this kind of conversation with a couple of you, the kind where I’ve told you that I would rather you not take on another area of service. It’s generally not because you would not do well in that area; it’s because it would stretch you too thin. When you’re stretched that thin, you can’t do well in any area; everything suffers.
Let me tell you something: self care is never a selfish act. It is simply good stewardship of the only gift I have, the gift I was put on earth to offer to others. Anytime we can listen to true self and give it the care it requires, we do so not only for ourselves, but for the many others whose lives we touch. (Parker Palmer Let Your Life Speak).
Now, before you say, "Pastor Brian has given me permission to say no to everything, so I’m going to quit all my activities and sit back and watch TV" remember that emotionally and spiritually healthy people are those who serve others sacrificially… while caring for themselves. Truly there is no way to follow Jesus without personal sacrifice, but we can only love and serve others out of the overflow that is within us.
If all we ever do is give, never taking time to refuel ourselves, the outcome will be disastrous for us and those around us. An example I encountered was a volunteer who had been working with junior high youth. For nine years, she led junior high youth meetings and taught a confirmation class, and in that time, she had no time for her own spiritual growth. What happened? Besides getting burned out, she didn’t have anything left in her own spiritual tank to give the kids. All they got was spiritual leftovers.
Walking in obedience to God is the way to discern the right balance. Spend time in God’s word. Allow God to shape and mold our values and priorities. Listen to God’s voice in prayer and worship. Consider our spiritual gifts, passions, skills, and life experiences. Allow our cell groups to help us discern. Verbalize the struggle between good things and the best things that God has for us. And then we simply do only those things that we sense God is asking us to do.
The truth is, rejoicing in limits requires faith in God’s goodness. It requires faith that God can actually work through someone else – someone that is not you! And if we believe God is God and we’re not, then receive the gift of limits – and let God do His job.
As we close, here is how we can each apply this: Find some blank space on one of your bulletin inserts and write the answers to the following three questions:
- What are my personal limitations?
- What is God asking ME to do? (the say "Yes" list)
- What do I need to give up? (the say "No" list)
*Note: this message, along with others in this series, has been adapted from Peter Scazzero's book The Emotionally Healthy Church.
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