He has delivered us from the dominion of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son. Colossians 1:13

Lately I have had a few conversations that revolve around boundaries and what is healthy and what is not healthy. Of course, this kind of language is secular and psychological sounding. I am not a psychologist, but I see something in all this that is really, at it’s root, spiritual.

You may remember awhile back that I wrote about what is in your circle of authority. For me as a wife and mother, I have authority in my household, over my minor children, and in my work space and area of work. This is where I have dominion.

There is something I see, particularly among Catholics, where the waters of authority can seem to get muddled. We often over empathize or feel guilty about something and can be manipulated into situations that end up being harmful, emotionally draining, and honestly sinful. We also sometimes feel bad or like we are being mean if we stand up for our dominion. Conversely, sometimes we have so many walls that we have no relationship and can become isolated. We let no one into our dominion. And while the secular world has lots of terms for these things, I like to view things through the lens of the Gospel and what I see is spiritually happening.

Scripture tells us that Satan came to, “steal, kill and destroy (John 10:10)”. One of the things he comes to steal is our dominion. If he can steal our dominion, he can kill our charisms and destroy our identity. How does he steal our dominion? By convincing us to sin. When we sin, we hand our dominion to Satan. Therefore, it is always helpful, in all our relationships to examine where sin is taking place. By doing this we maintain the dominion God gave us and thereby we are kept in the will of God – something the secular world would call “healthy”.

Other people will often, with the help of the enemy who throws fiery darts of suggestion, try to steal your dominion. Additionally, they will often try to hand you their dominion as well. When you examine the situations for where the sin is taking place and ask the Lord to help keep you from sin, it keeps you in God’s grace and helps you to know how best to navigate the situation. Knowing where the sin is taking place is not meant for you to use as judgement against another person but is meant to keep you in the grace of God, which you also want for others as well.

I want to try to give you a concrete example of what I am speaking about. When I was in high school, I tried to sneak behind my mom’s back to take a party bus that another parent had rented to a high school dance. There’s really only one reason we wanted to rent a party bus and not drive ourselves, and that was our desire to drink underage. There are multiple sins happening here which means these are areas of dominion stealing. First was my sin of lying to my mom. I was trying to assert authority over my life at an age where it was not yet mine to fully do, grasping at the fruit that God would have given me as gift later in my life. My mom and dad still had authority over me. They had been tasked by God Himself with my care and protection. Having been convinced by the enemy that my parents, and not Satan, were my enemy, I fell into the sin trap of dominion stealing, thinking I was my own master, not knowing I was actually handing my dominion to Satan himself. Second, the other parents who rented the bus and did not speak to my mom about it were also stepping into dominion that wasn’t theirs and therefore was sinful. My mom, who had radar detection for when I lied, caught me and man did she assert her dominion. And she did not feel bad about it one single lick, even as she called the other parent and let them have it. Order was restored and I believe I was protected even though I suffered consequences of being made fun of for having the overprotective parents. Who knows what pain and suffering we avoided when mom walked in the authority God gave her.

Many today would find this difficult to do. We don’t want to hurt another’s feelings by setting a boundary (walking in dominion) of what our child can and cannot do. People mistake hurting another’s feelings as the sin, rather than the stealing of dominion as the sin. It is important to understand that, when we assert our authority the intent is not to hurt feelings, the intent is to avoid sin. There are many diplomatic ways to assert the authority you were given to walk in. But we should always walk in the authority God gave us rather than sinning and losing our dominion just to spare someone’s feelings. Love is the way to do this. Love stands for what is true, good, and beautiful.

People will also try to hand you their authority. This is another probably more sinister form of dominion stealing because it comes in the form of being “helpful.” I want to distinguish here between helping through intercession, and “helping” by taking on what is another’s to do. Because in the past I have sometimes had the courage to fight what is evil, I have often had people call me and want me to fight their fight for them. If I do this, I am sinning by taking on what does not belong to me and they are sinning by being derelict with the gift that was given to them. If I fight their fight, I will take on their demons because I am walking in a space that does not belongs to me. This doesn’t mean we never fight alongside someone. It means we don’t take over.

For example, when we think of those who are poor and marginalized, we are absolutely supposed to help, but that help should not involve usurping their dominion but rather helping to restore them to their own dominion. We are not to take over another’s life decisions, but we can help, through intercession steer them in the right direction. This looks like a building up of community, a growth of charisms and a cooperation with one another. It doesn’t judge the souls of the people who need help but instead sees each person as a child of God and intercedes for a time with the goal of their full restoration. It looks like working together. When we totally take over, we see division, discord and strife.

As a society, I think we have no idea of dominion, or even sin. Sin is a breaking of the relationship with God. It squanders what God gives and steals what God has not yet given. There are multiple examples I am seeing in the news every single day.

When this starts to happen on a Global scale, I think it looks much where we are as a society now. When we have people and systems that take over what isn’t theirs, Choas ensues. There are two results when improper view of dominion and sin happen. One is hyper-individualism where we are walled off and think we don’t need anyone or anything and we don’t want to help others. The other is Communism, an authoritarian government that usurps the dominion of the people. It is an abject evil and plays right into the hands of Satan.

Jesus came for us to have life and life abundantly. In order to receive this gift, we must have a proper view of our dominion and of what sin actually is. I believe the time is coming when God will make very transparent His dominion over everything. I just hope and pray that to the best of my ability, I have stayed in the Will of God and stewarded well the dominion I have been given.

Keep my steps steady according to your promise,
    and never let iniquity have dominion over me. Psalm 119:133