I {Lindsey} am writing this in response to a question asked by of one of my Deliberate Women team members. Two and a half years ago I wrote the blog post Divorce, Forgiveness & Reconciliation. We're still receiving a steady flow of comments from our readers today. Each has their own heart-wrenching story. We've had both men and women comment. Mothers and grandmothers have commented. The crippling effects of divorce send forth a ripple of destruction wherever they go. So, one of the women on the team asked, "What can we do to try to uplift and encourage marriages before posts like this?" She went on to say that as a young married woman herself she wants to avoid that sad ending, but how?

I don't think I have all the answers, but I do have some thoughts I'd like to share. Less than a year ago I was asking the same thing. I was watching as a friend went through trials in her marriage that were hurtful betrayals of her trust as well as avoidable and preventable issues. It seemed that it was only in her desperation, in their desperation really, that anyone seemed to take notice or to want to do something to help. I then looked at my own marriage. A marriage that, while not facing the same trials, was undergoing some shaky episodes. Then I sat back and thought to myself time and time again, "I don't want to get to where they are before Christian men form a relationship with my husband to help hold him accountable. I don't want to be falling apart before Christian women take interest in building me up to be the best wife I can be. I want some iron to sharpen my iron before it's so dull I can't cut through the forest of darkness in front of me. Why is no one doing anything?"

It was many months before I would find a place and a group of people who were saying the same things that I'd been thinking. It was in my first leadership meeting with our new church that I began to truly grasp what was so different. These people, who I was now communing with, were discussing God's design for communion. They talked about how even in and of Himself, God has community. He is three-in-one, and there is such a beautiful story of community that is told through the Trinity. Then we talked about the Garden, and how even when everything God had made was good, one thing was missing: Man was never intended to be alone. He was never meant to be an island. Man was, in his nature, and in the image of God, designed for community.

Later on in the New Testament we can see many references to the Church, the people of God, being His body. We are the earthly representation of Christ until his second coming. Yet, so often, we act alone. We distance ourselves and isolate in some way or another. We make ourselves islands. If together, we are the body, then we must work together as the body. My finger cannot function effectively all by itself.  My eye is useless if it's not set in its proper space. In just the same way, the body of Christ cannot function properly without the rest of its members. We are in desperate need for one another. Our effective functioning is fully dependent on the functioning of all other parts of the body.

It's time that we start recognizing this. We need to create community. We need accountability now, not just when everything is falling apart. Maybe, just maybe, if each person chooses communion, and the pursuit of servant-hood toward our brothers and sisters in Christ, we will begin to see the body function the way it was intended.

Last year, my husband and I {Toi} had to establish boundaries with some love ones in our life who weren't respecting how we were doing life as a family.  We love them but we couldn't keep giving them easy access into our lives.   We knew that to follow Jesus and live the life He has for us, boundaries had to be put in place.  It didn't seem natural at first until I read Matthew 21:12-14 in The Message.

"Jesus went straight to the Temple and threw out everyone who had set up shop, buying and selling. He kicked over the tables of loan sharks and the stalls of dove merchants. He quoted this text:

My house was designated a house of prayer; You have made it a hangout for thieves.
Now there was room for the blind and crippled to get in. They came to Jesus and he healed them."  

Jesus was establishing boundaries. He knew He couldn't successfully do His Father's business without first establishing boundaries on what could and couldn't be allowed in the Temple.  Once Jesus cleared the Temple out of all the thieves and their junk, He was able to make room for those needing healing. 

​Boundaries are what allow us to keep out the stuff we don't want in our lives to make room for the good things we do want in our lives. Boundaries are for us and our lives what fences are to our yards. They keep people and critters from having easy access to our yards (life.)  

I'm not going to lie, maintaining our established boundaries is hard at times. People like to try to climb your fences/boundaries or throw things over at you (which only goes to confirm why you need the boundaries in the first place.)  Hold fast and press into the Lord, for He is our strength. (Psalm 28:7)