Rejected Again

The sting of rejection is inescapable. Rejection shows up daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly. It does not have a preference in who it affects. If you have breath, then you are a great candidate for rejection. Not only are you an excellent candidate for rejection it is guaranteed to visit you in your daily life, unless you are in total isolation, locked away from the world. However, even in isolation, the psychological effects of rejection will still dance around in your mind. So how do we escape the inescapable?

Run?

Avoid?

Ignore?

Fight?

All of those would be nice. But how do you run when your family rejects you? How do you avoid social rejection when you have to have some form of socialism to maintain life? How do you ignore the pain that comes when rejected in relationships?

I can hear it now the religious people are saying, “Be like Jesus,” “Be like Mary,” “Be like Allah,” “Be like Buddha”. The psychologist is saying, “It is in your mind, let me show you how to become mentally stronger.” The fitness gurus are saying, “Just get tougher.” While each one has a significant claim, just like a team cannot be successful when the people are not working together, neither can religion, psychology, and fitness. Rejection must be conquered holistically. Still, with every holistic approach, there must be a core that keeps it all together.  

I don’t know about you, but for something to be the core in my life, it will have to prove itself to be rock hard tough. Being a single mom of two while getting an education, building a career, and ensuring the foundation in my kids’ life is one that they can build on needs a limitless core that will not break under pressure. Not only that, I also need a visual display of what I am to mimic so when the stressors in life show up, that picture can pop up in my mind to remind me of what I am to mirror instead of what I feel like.

After searching and trying many things while locating what the core of my life would be, I ran across Jesus. As a sinner full of pride, my eyesight rejected the One that created me. You know the One that the world was created through. (John 1:10-11) Can you imagine going up to your child or a loved one in a desperate time, and due to a form of blindness in their eyes, they would not even recognize you? The one you created or a person you invested your life in. Talk about rejection! I might choose to escape that rejection with a fight. But that same rejection is the rejection God’s children give Jesus. 

Do you know how He responds? It goes something like, “Child, I will hold you until you are able to see Me. I will feed you until you recognize Me. I will provide for you until you understand I am the One that sustains you.”

Jesus did not run, avoid, ignore, or fight. He continued to pour out His love.

Maybe you are thinking, well, that is because He sees us as His children, you know, like the analogy you used. But the truth is Jesus experience every type of psychological rejection.

• Family – His own brothers rejected Him. (John 7:5)

• Social – The Jews, His own people. He was right there, and they were still waiting for the Messiah. (Evans, The Tony Evans Bible Commentary, 2019)

• Relationship – His disciple Peter, that Jesus allowed close to Him denied Him three times when Jesus’ fate was being determined by the people. (Luke 22:54-62)

Through the rejection, Jesus used the Word of God to:

• Acknowledge and admitted the emotions He was going through instead of suppressing, ignoring, or denying the pain.

• Living life to the fullest by viewing rejection as evidence of pushing the limits.

• Have compassion on himself by responding to negative self-talk with a kinder, more affirming message.

• Jesus used wisdom, not generalizations, in rejection. Therefore, He refused to let the rejection define Him.

• Jesus learned from the rejection and turned it into an opportunity for self-growth, then He taught others.

(Morin, 2015)

At this time, you might be saying, okay, how does this work? Well, the good news is Jesus sees you as a unique individual person. He sees how rejection affects you personally. So He sits waiting for you to come to Him for Him to show you that story in the Bible or that scripture that speaks to your pain so you can take His Word and get stronger by fighting through the mental and emotional battles that come when rejection makes an appearance in your life.

There is no rapid formula or a step-by-step program. The Jesus core of the holistic approach yearns to strengthen by the relationship built through the transformation that takes place in the workout of replacing your ways with His.

References

Evans, T. (2019). The Tony Evans Bible Commentary. Nashville, Tennessee: Holman Bible Publishers

Evans, T. (2019). The Tony Evans Study Bible (Vol. Christian Standard Bible). Nashville, TN: Holman Bible Publishers.

Morin, A. (2015, November 11). 5 Ways Mentally Strong People Deal With Rejection: Rejection hurts, but it doesn’t have to hold you back. Retrieved from Inc.: https://www.inc.com/amy-morin/5-ways-mentally-strong-people-deal-with-rejection.html