Rejection
I remember writing this inside Lysa TerKeurst’s book “Uninvited”:
Whatever you do, don’t let a romantic relationship define you. Don’t get too entrenched. Appreciate the good times but always guard your heart. Even the nicest person still has selfish motives. You can love them but not trust them. Trust no one. They will always let you down. The only [one] who I believe won’t is Jesus. Take time to know Him.
This is something, isn’t it? If you could only read between the lines, I think you would come to the conclusion that there are some deep hurts within these lines. And you’d be correct.
Between losing a job because of not meeting a company’s standards and losing a serious romantic relationship due largely in part of my OCD, I’ve had my hopes crumble in my hands. There’s nothing like flat-out rejection to make you feel unstable and insecure.
Interestingly, Jesus faced rejection. Talk about someone who understood rejection. Judas turned Him in for money, Peter denied Him three times, people spat on His face, the crowd cheered on His death, and then Thomas even doubted His resurrection. People turned on Jesus!
And here I am sitting sorry for myself, the girl who got rejected from a job and a boyfriend. Not that my emotions don’t matter, but they have significantly less value when placed alongside other real, catastrophic rejections.
And what did Jesus do in the midst of a major rejection? He forgave them.
“Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.’" Luke 23:34
Forgiveness is a beautiful thing. In fact, I don’t even know how to begin to talk about forgiveness. It is such an area of work that I now see I need to work on in my own life.
I realize something when I begin to forgive in my heart. Like the words of Jesus, the same point sticks out in my mind: they do not know what they are doing. When people reject us, they often don’t understand us. They don’t understand the battles we face every day. They don’t realize that we’ve been hurt before and this is going to rub salt in the wound. They may not even know what the effect of rejection is going to have on us.
I think in understanding forgiveness, we need to look at how Jesus forgives us so we can extend that to others. I like this quote from Kirk Cameron:
“I could see that it was God’s forgiveness and His mercy that I needed, and that was provided through Christ on the Cross for those who will receive Him as Lord and Savior. That is how I came to Christ.”
This makes me look at my own life. Have I accepted the forgiveness Jesus offers? Maybe I need to start there first.
So, again, I offer you this solution that I believe can combat the ugly word known as rejection: Forgiveness.