Drawing the Line: Why Wise Boundaries Are Not the Same as Bitterness

There is a version of the call to forgiveness that, when applied without nuance, ends up doing harm. It goes something like this: If you have truly forgiven someone, you will restore the relationship to exactly what it was before. Any hesitation to do so, any distance you maintain, any limit you place on the access that person has to you is evidence that forgiveness has not really taken place. You are still bitter. You have not truly let go.

This version of forgiveness sounds spiritual. It appeals to generosity and grace. But it is mistaken, and in certain situations it is not merely mistaken but dangerous. Scripture gives us a more honest and more careful account, which distinguishes between the bitterness that must be surrendered and the wisdom that must be retained.

Bitterness is a spiritual condition. It is what happens when a grievance is held onto, nursed, and allowed to shape the way we see a person and relate to them. The New Testament is unambiguous about its destructiveness. Hebrews warns that a root of bitterness, allowed to grow, causes trouble and defiles many (12:15). Paul instructs the Ephesians to put away all bitterness, along with anger and malice. Bitterness is corrosive—to the one who holds it, to the relationships around them, and to their witness as a follower of Christ.

But discernment is something else entirely. Discernment is the capacity to read a situation honestly, to learn from what has happened, and to make wise decisions about how to proceed. Discernment does not wish the other person harm. It does not rehearse the grievance or look for opportunities to retaliate. It simply takes seriously what has been revealed about a person or a pattern of behaviour, and responds accordingly.

These two things—bitterness and discernment—can look similar from the outside. Both may result in a changed relationship, maintained distance, and a limit on what is shared or how close the parties remain. But their interior logic is entirely different. One is driven by resentment. The other is driven by wisdom. And the difference matters enormously.

The relationship between David and Saul in the Old Testament is one of the most instructive case studies Scripture offers on this question. Saul, tormented by jealousy over David’s growing favour with the people of Israel, raises a spear against him—not once, but repeatedly. On at least two occasions, David found himself in a position where he could take Saul’s life but chose not to do so. His refusal was not weakness. It was a profound expression of trust in God and respect for the one the Lord had anointed.

But David also, at a certain point, stopped returning to Saul’s court. He reached a conclusion that proximity to Saul was no longer wise—not because he had given up on forgiveness, not because he was harbouring malice, but because the pattern had become clear. Saul had a temper that led to violence. Returning to the same situation again and again would not be faith; it would be folly.

What David did was place a boundary. He created distance. He removed himself from the environment in which the harm kept recurring. And this was not bitterness. There is no evidence in the text that David was consumed by resentment toward Saul. When he had Saul at his mercy, he let him go. When Saul died, David mourns him genuinely. The distance David maintained was not the distance of a bitter man—it was the distance of a wise one.

A boundary, in this sense, is a limit placed on a relationship for the sake of protecting what is good within it—and sometimes for the sake of protecting oneself from further harm. It is not a punishment inflicted on the other person. It is not a declaration that reconciliation is impossible. It is a realistic and honest response to what has been revealed.

Consider a situation where someone has betrayed a confidence—taken something shared in vulnerability and spoken of it carelessly to others. Forgiveness is offered. Reconciliation, in a genuine sense, occurs. But going forward, it would be unwise to share with that person at the same level of openness as before. Not because forgiveness has not happened, but because trust is rebuilt slowly, and because wisdom takes seriously what has been demonstrated about how that person handles what is entrusted to them.

This boundary need not necessarily be announced or explained. It can simply be a quiet, internal adjustment—a decision about what is shared and what is not, made not out of spite but out of care for the relationship and oneself. The other person may not even be aware that any limit has been placed. What matters is that the boundary is drawn from a place of wisdom and not a place of wounded pride or resentment.

The question worth asking honestly, when we find ourselves maintaining distance from someone who has wronged us, is this: What is driving this? Is it wisdom or bitterness? Am I keeping this person at arm’s length because I have honestly assessed the situation and concluded that closer proximity would be unwise, or am I doing it because I am still angry, still nursing the wound, still wanting them to feel the weight of what they have done?

Both can produce the same outward behaviour. But only one of them is consistent with a genuine posture of forgiveness. If the distance is driven by bitterness, then the work of forgiveness is not yet complete, and the right place to take that is to God in prayer—to bring the honest, raw feelings before him and ask him to do what only he can do in a human heart.

If the distance is driven by wisdom, however, it need not produce guilt. Wisdom is not a failure of grace. It is grace applied to a real situation with honest eyes.

The call to forgive as God has forgiven us is not a call to pretend that people are different from what they have shown themselves to be. Love, the New Testament tells us, rejoices in truth. It does not rejoice in falsehood, and it is not served by wilful blindness to patterns of behaviour that have caused real harm.

What forgiveness requires is that we release the bitterness, hold the door open to reconciliation, refuse to use what has happened as a weapon, and genuinely wish the other person well. It does not require that we place ourselves repeatedly in situations where harm is likely to recur. It does not require that we pretend a breach of trust did not happen. It does not require that we surrender the wisdom God has given us in the name of a generosity that is, in the end, more sentimental than biblical.

Boundaries, rooted in wisdom rather than resentment, are not a contradiction of forgiveness. They are, in many cases, what faithful forgiveness actually looks like in a fallen world.