Boundaries with Kids: A Book Review

It was nearly four years ago that I first read Boundaries by Drs. Henry Cloud and John Townsend.

I can honestly say that it was one of the most practical and useful books I have ever read about relationships.  I found that what I read impacted the way I encouraged leaders in ministry, communicated with my family, and saw the way I engaged in conflict with Jason. 

For a long time afterwards, I could be found running about town saying over and over again in different situations, “I have boundary issues” or “That sounds like a boundary issue to me.”  I’m like this when it comes to things I have enjoyed, find stretching, and want to put into practice—moving information from my head to my heart. 

So when my Little Love arrived late last spring, one of the books I knew I wanted to read was Boundaries with Kids.*  I borrowed it from the library and finished it this week.  It is a book I plan to order and keep on my shelf so I am able to return to it again and again and again.

The guiding principles of this book are 10 Biblical boundaries that help us live healthy lives in relationship with others.  These are the same boundaries as in the Boundaries book; however, the focus in this book is how parents help their children to develop boundaries as they grow.  In this way, they begin to take control of their lives in ways that are appropriate for their stage of development—from infancy all the way through adolescence and beyond.

As I read, I found myself thinking about my boundary issues once again.  It was a good reminder that I still have boundary issues and I still need to work on them.  I thought about how some of my boundary issues developed as I considered my parents and their own boundary issues, alongside their parenting challenges with me and my siblings.  It was fascinating and left me feeling compassionate toward them as I realized that many of their own boundary issues have much to do with their own upbringing as well.  In the midst of this, I thought a lot about the many years ahead of me with my Little Love and parenting with boundaries.  I can’t recommend a book more highly.

There were many concepts that I found interesting, but there are two that I want to take hold of and begin to put into practice as I parent my baby right now.  

First, it is a child’s job to test boundaries.  It is my job, as the parent, to keep them in place.  This may seem very obvious, but I can already tell that this will be difficult to practice.  In reflecting, I realize that I have lived and still often live trying to have others like me.  That mode of operation does not really work here all of the time.  I will have to deal with disappointment.  I will have to deal with anger and frustration.  I will have to remind myself that this is okay, because sometimes doing the right thing will not be what my Little Love wants. In the midst of this, I will be helping her to learn to deal with the emotions that we all feel sometimes.

Still being an infant, most of my parenting up to this point has involved creating a safe and loving home and redirecting my baby, not dealing with boundary issues.  However, I have seen this principle at play with nap time over the last three months.  It has taken time to train her, but now my Little Love goes down awake for most of her naps.  The journey to get to this point was painfully hard, trying to decide if her fussing was crying and if she was crying because she wanted me to come back into the room or because she really needed something.  Persevering has been worth it.  Now she fusses and sometimes cries a little when it takes her a little while to fall asleep, but then she sleeps well and wakes up happy.  

I want to remember this small success when we have moved on to more difficult types of boundary issues! 

The second thing I want to hang onto is the need to be surrounded with community.  Sometimes putting boundaries into action is hard.  Sticking to boundaries can be hard.  It can be really hard and still be the right thing to do.  Community is there to encourage me when I need to vent, to cry, to be frustrated with and still love my child. 

I have some wonderful friends who have done life with me.  They have been a source of much needed wisdom and encouragement when I have needed it.  However, I am reminded I need to be intentional in this season of life where our paths do not cross as often anymore to seek out support so that my parenting is not done in a vacuum.  I need to be surrounded by other moms who want to seek Christ as they parent and lift one another and our children up before Him and give thanks and plead for mercy as we walk through the trials of the moment.

***

I thought of all this when I heard two young girls pushing their mama’s buttons at Kroger yesterday in the checkout lane next to mine, I listened as she tried to juggle their energy and a conveyor of groceries.  I watched them leave the store knocking one another about, one falling in front of my cart, and I saw this mama get frustrated.  My heart went out to her as I remembered being that child to my own mother. 

I also may have just begun talking about this book on boundaries and how it is the kids job to test them with the person was walking nearby as I wheeled my own Little Love to the car.  She told me that she was so glad her kids were grown and I hoped as I was putting groceries into the back seat that at the end of this season with my baby girl that I will be glad I embraced the challenge of raising her with boundaries.

***

Grace and peace be yours in abundance as you pursue healthy relationships.  May God guide you in the midst of frustration to a place of health in the midst of the loving encouragement of community.

Jessica :)

*I discovered that there is an updated version of the book as I was writing this post.  It was put out three years after the version I read.  

For Always

Inspiration came as I was doing the dishes while listening to Matt Maher’s Alive Again album a couple of weeks ago.  I sat down during ‘Garden’ and began writing this.  I love it.  I can just imagine Jesus’ words to me in the midst of this season of resurrection.  I think of the story from fall to eternity and I am amazed at the love of God for man, for me.  Enjoy!

Redemption, Love.

Restoration, Love.

That is where we’re headed, Love.

We've traveled a painful road, Love.

But there’s beauty ahead, Love.

We’ll replace the ashes with fruit from the trees

And be full, Love.

Ever what I’ve wanted;

It’s what you’ve been made for all along.

Together, Love.

For always

  

***

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we receive the gift of love we have been offered in Christ and respond to it.  May we find that we live abundantly a quality of LIFE we’ve been made for all along as we trust God in the midst of all things.

Jessica :)

Heart Cries and His Responses

Another prayer story close to my heart.  Prayer is relationship with God.  We pour out the cries of our hearts and God changes us through it.  This is a story of how I cried out and God met me this weekend as I was at Allume.  I wonder where are you calling out and where God might be trying to meet you in ways you didn't expect.

***

This weekend I attended Allume. 

I left, Thursday, unsure of why I was going and what God would do in the midst of this bloggers conference.

Sunday, I returned home with my wonderings satisfied.

In between, was a lot of silliness, good conversation, learning, and blessed moments. 

It was toward the end of the newbie meet up.  I was standing on the edge of the hotel lobby, in a group that was conversing around me, lost in the middle of the loud din that hundreds of women talking around hard surfaces cannot help but make.  I began to zone out in all the noise wondering inside, “God what do you have for me here?”  

Silence seemed to follow the cry of my heart. 

I went through the rest of the evening overwhelmed and tired, finally heading back to my hotel room to sleep.

It was early Friday morning when I woke, unable to fall back to sleep.  I lay in bed trying to sleep and instead tossed over the words that crossed my mind.  They were words from Crossroads, a week ago, and Phil Vischer and Sarah Mae, the night before. 

The longer I wrestled with the thoughts and the more the ideas rose, I began to sense that God was answering my prayer in a very tangible way.  In this realization, I began to tuck away the ideas that were surfacing and was able to fall back to sleep for a few more hours before breakfast.

The themes that I became aware of in the wee hours of the morning continued to jump out at me in the sessions all through the weekend:

Where is your identity, Jessica?  What is most important to you in all of this?  Is it Me?

Where are the priorities in your life, Jessica?  Are they in finishing your next post or in loving the neighbor who is next to you in real life? 

I found God saying “I need to be most important.  And if you go through the day and find yourself drifting, drift towards real life not a virtual one.”

Over and over again, as speakers spoke, this was the message I needed to hear.

I have been taking these thoughts to heart and plan to be making a few changes around the way I blog. 

So, if you find that I’m not posting quite as regularly as I have been, know that I’m probably investing in the real life relationships around me—the new neighbors I have, family, friends, and our Crossroads community.  Know that I’m probably investing more quality time in my relationship with God.  Know that I am enjoying the gifts that He has given me in different ways, like enjoying writing for writing’s sake not just to get something posted tomorrow.  Know that I may just need to use my energy differently as change in life and my family is happening.

I still plan to share here in this space.  There has been much good that has come from obedience in beginning A Becoming Life.  For this reason, I believe by heeding God’s voice much good will happen in this time too, both on the blog and in real life too.

***

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we pursue God in wonder.  May we discover when we come to Him longing to see Him work it may happen in unexpected ways.  May we respond in obedience trusting that His way and His call is truly best.

Jessica :)

P.S.  The photos are from the Allume photobooth with my friends from Hearts Undaunted and Favored One. 

A Long Obedience

On Thursdays, I’ve been sharing a little bit of what I have been learning as I read through 1 John. 

John has been writing to the believers in Asia Minor, where he served at one time.  He has talked about the message that he proclaimed to them.  He has presented two camps that a person can choose to walk in—darkness apart from God or light with God.  He has talked about sin and forgiveness that comes from Christ, and the way Jesus is our advocate before the Father.

He now begins to talk about love:

“We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands.   Those who say, “I know him,” but do not do what he commands are liars, and the truth is not in them. But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.”  1 John 2:3-6 TNIV

It is helpful to understand the meaning of the word “know” in this passage. 

In Greek, the word is ginōskō. 

It means “to be taking in knowledge, to come to understand completely.”  On a deeper level it signifies “a relation between the person knowing and the object known.”  That which is known is valued.  It is also used to convey the idea of connection between a husband and wife (VINES).

When you see "know" here, think relationship and intimacy.

So, if we have a relationship with God, one of value or intimate connection, “we keep his commands.”  And those who say they know him, “but do not do what he commands are liars and the truth is not in them” (v.4).

Does this sound familiar to you?  It does to me. 

Take a look back at John’s language in 1 John 1:5-7.  It is very similar, isn’t it? 

The language contrasts truth and lies.  Here, it does the same. 

The one whose actions match what he says tells the truth.  The one whose actions are inconsistent with what he says is a liar.

If we know God, we keep His commands. 

It sounds so simple.  

Too often, I don’t.  Yet, this is the goal.

I want to live consistent.  I want to live truthful.  I want to live obedient, because it is living in this way that “love for God is truly made complete” in us (v.5).

When I first read this verse, it kept rattling around in my head for days.  It made me consider what obedience looked like moment by moment.  It also kept me praying that God would make His love complete in me.  There was an awareness that what I did mattered.  The choices I made mattered.  They mattered, because they said something about who I was and where my allegiance really was.

There is a post of Shaun Groves’ I read awhile back that quoted from Eugene Peterson’s book A Long Obedience in the Same Direction.  The title of the book captured my attention. 

A long obedience in the same direction, isn’t that what we are called to? 

Isn’t that what John is describing here?

 

And isn’t this what Jesus did?  He kept God’s commands.  He lived obedient.  He lived a long obedience in the same direction.

Is it any wonder, then, that John would point to Christ as our example?  “This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did” (v. 6).

Not only is Jesus, God.  He lived, on earth, as man showing us how to live in relationship with God.

He lived obedient. 

And when we live obedient, love for God is truly made complete in us. 

Isn’t that something?  Love is made complete through obedience. 

Yet, let’s be honest, obedience can be difficult. 

It is hard to choose the right thing when what you really want is something different.  Yet, when we’re authentic about how we’re feeling, I think that we can trust that God is doing something in us when we do the right thing, even when we don’t feel like it.

 

In Shaun Groves’ post, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, he shares this Eugene Peterson quote:

 “We think that if we don’t feel something there can be no authenticity in doing it. But the wisdom of God says something different: that we can act ourselves into a new way of feeling much quicker than we can feel ourselves into a new way of acting.”

This life of discipleship takes diligent discipline.

As we persevere we can trust that in our obedience “God’s love is truly taking root and filling us” (1 John 2:5, my adaptation of the Voice). 

And for that we can give thanks. 

*** 

Grace and peace be ours in abundance as we live obedient to His commands, whether they be from the words of the Bible or the ones from the Holy Spirit.  May we trust that in living obedient His love is taking root in us and filling us to overflowing.  May we discover that we follow in the steps of Jesus becoming more like him each day as we live a long obedience in the same direction.

Jessica :)