Biblical Boundaries Part 3: Intervention
This is my favourite part in the book The White Picket Fence from the chapter 9 instructions. When we think of intervention we break out into a sweat just thinking about our family coming together for that cause. I don’t know if that has happened to you but it has never happened to me. If it needs to happen maybe it should but perish the thought. In this instruction, we go from being a victim of our circumstances to the knowledge that we can be an overcomer in our circumstances. I do not know about you but that is such a good feeling.
You have now become aware, not only of how much this transgression has affected you every day, but also what sparks a fire under you to do it. We cannot do anything about this behaviour if we never attempt to stop it. [Kathleen Derbyshire, The White Picket Fence (Chapter 9)]. The awesome thing about our God is He always provides a way out (1 Corinthians 10:13) but that way out is useless if you do not think you are doing anything wrong. The way will be provided but you will not take it. In the third week of this instruction you are looking for His way out. You are looking to save yourself and be saved. This round-about you are travelling on has got to stop and it will begin on this third week.
Prevention is key and you will learn that eventually but for now intervention will work. This week we will intervene on our own behalf plus we will allow Jesus to intervene too. If you love Jesus He will have put His two cents in already. If you weren’t listening I want you to learn how to hear Jesus speaking to you and listen to what He says. He will point you to a direction then you have to take it. You have to take the exit from the round-about He shows you. This is yours and His intervention. You must set your mind to making the change and He just walks right in to show you which exit to take. You need to listen and do what you are told.
Let us imagine your boundary is NO sweets, and you have already defined what that means, how Jesus would speak regarding this. I have to say from experience this one is very difficult because our body gets addicted to the sweets we used to eat. If this is your boundary don’t worry if you fail daily until you get strong. There are many boundaries we might fail at daily because we are very weak with that thing (we wouldn’t need a boundary if we were strong) and the product is very prevalent, especially this time of year. You can modify your boundary by limiting that thing until you can actually get through one day without the thing. Jesus will go after you in a manner that you will understand and feel. He might put someone else in charge of you on that boundary too. You might go after a tart and someone you don’t know will make a comment about them being fattening – that is Jesus. Thank Him for it and just back away from the tart.
I think our biggest problem with this is we don’t think Jesus cares about these little things but He care deeply about these things otherwise He would not have said this; He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much; and he who is unjust in what is least is unjust also in much. (Luke 16:10) If we are out of control in the little things we will be out of control in the big things. We all know this to be true just by looking at our own lives. If we eat a candy we will eat a pie. If we will eat a little chocolate we will eat a double sized chocolate bar. Give us a foot we will take a mile. Jesus cares about how far we will go to get what we want. He knows how far we will go. We go that distance without Him but when we see where we have taken ourselves on our quest to fulfill our need He is there waiting to show us the way back. We call out to Him and He answers. He shows us the way of exit from our round-about.
The value of intervening for ourselves and letting Jesus intervene is the knowledge we gain from the intervention. As we continue to intervene we discover why you get yourself into trouble in the first place. You will see if your first course of action to intervene actually worked or if you need to take another exit. How hard is it to intervene on your own behalf? How hard is it to let Jesus intervene? You will learn a lot this week. That thing became a habit for a reason. We do them without thinking. Now we have to learn to NOT do them without thinking. This week intervene as much as you can to stop that thing Jesus has asked you to stop. Document the results and look at them each day. You will discover you are getting better at exiting rather than entering the round-about of sin.
If you need help learning how to set Biblical boundaries The White Picket Fence, Crown for Life Pursues Biblical Boundaries will be available for purchase beginning in December. The last chapter is an instruction for you but I recommend you read the whole book first because our need to feel as if we are not alone will be met with abundance.
