THE FREEDOM OF LIMITS - NOT MY YARD
"Whose Yard Are You Standing In?"
Most of us don't struggle to love the people closest to us. We struggle to know where our responsibility for them ends.
That was the question underneath this week's message at Osterville Baptist Church, as Pastor Rob Wheeler opened a new series called The Freedom of Limits — a look at what the Bible actually teaches about healthy boundaries. The sermon, titled "Not My Yard," began not with a Bible verse but with a story: a therapist named Dr. Henry Cloud once met with two exhausted parents who'd spent years managing their grown son's choices, his consequences, and his emotions. Cloud stopped them with one question: "Whose yard is this?"
It's a question that lands for anyone on Cape Cod who has ever loved someone whose decisions affect them — a spouse, an adult child, an aging parent, a friend walking through a hard season. Where does love end and over-responsibility begin?
The sermon anchored the answer in Galatians 6:2–5, where the apostle Paul holds together two truths that seem, at first, to be in tension. In verse 2, he writes, "Share each other's burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ." In verse 5, he writes, "For each one should carry their own load." Pastor Wheeler unpacked the difference using two pictures: boulders and backpacks.
A boulder, he explained, is something too heavy for one person to carry alone — grief, illness, a financial crisis, a broken marriage. When someone we love is under a boulder, the church doesn't stand on the other side of the fence and say, "not my problem." We carry it together. That's what Paul means by sharing burdens.
But not everything is a boulder. A backpack is what belongs to a person every ordinary day — their choices, their words, their attitudes, their obedience to God. And here is where boundaries matter: when we quietly pick up someone else's backpack — trying to manage their emotions, fix their choices, or prevent their consequences — we don't actually help them. We wear ourselves out, and we keep them from growing into the responsibility God intends for them to carry.
"Some of you aren't exhausted because your backpack is too heavy," Pastor Wheeler said. "You're exhausted because you've picked up backpacks God never asked you to carry."
The sermon closed by returning to the image of a yard with a property line — a picture of the difference between what's ours to tend and what belongs to someone else. "Love does not always remove consequences," he reminded the congregation, pointing to the story of the prodigal son as an example of a father who loved his son enough to let him experience the road he'd chosen.
The application was simple, and it's the question OBC is being asked to carry into this week: Whose yard am I standing in right now?
If you're new to Cape Cod or looking for a church home, we'd love to have you join us this Sunday at Osterville Baptist Church — services are at 8:30 and 10:30 AM, with infant and PreK care available at both, and Children's Sunday School during the 10:30 service. You can find service times, directions, and more about The Freedom of Limits series at www.ostervillebaptist.org.
