Rejection

Verse of the Week:

“I have loved you with an everlasting love;

    I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. Jeremiah 31:3b

Rejection

To be honest, my freshman year and junior year of high school was one of the hardest times of my life.  I can still remember as a freshman trying to find a place to sit at lunch. Apparently the popular kids sat together in a cluster on our long benched tables. As hard as I tried, I couldn't ever seem to sit with them.  I would try to sit near the center to be close to people, but apparently, anyone I sat with had a friend they wanted to sit with them, so they would ask me to move over so that their friend could sit with them.  Then that person I was sitting with would ask me to scoot over for their friend to sit with.  The process continued until I was at the end of the table, the losers section.  I sat with the class nerd and by myself. The pain of being brushed aside so easily, and the fact that I was considered of no importance, was hard to bear.  I eventually sat alone in a classroom to eat my lunch because no one wanted to sit with me.  Basketball, my lifeline, ended that year when I was benched and did not get to play in any games unless we were winning by a lot or losing by a lot.  My teammates thought I was not talented, and I began to believe the same. I was considered a teachers pet because I tried to make all the right decisions. Apparently, I found out from my peers that you are not supposed to do that. My hearing loss made things worse; kids felt they could treat me like I was dumb because I couldn't hear.  One girl in particular told me I talked like Forest Gump, and when I mispronounced words because I couldn't hear them right, kids would laugh at me.  Life was pathetic, nobody cared about me but my family. Thank goodness I at least had my family; some children in this world do not even have that. Life felt hopeless, and I couldn't see far enough into the future to know that there was a world beyond high school that could be better.  I wanted to die, and thoughts of suicide would fill my mind. No one would miss me except my family.  No one would care if I died, I just might as well be done with it.  I occasionally went to the kitchen by myself and put a knife to my belly wondering if I would ever have the guts to thrust it in me. I was depressed and life seemed bleak.  REJECTION is incredibly powerful.

 However, I knew that someone didn't want me to give up.  There was an unseen battle going on for my life that I wasn't aware of at the time, but can see so clearly now.  I would arrive home from school in pain over the events that had happened that day, and when I would open my Bible, there would be a verse right there personally for me to give me comfort.  Ironically, during the time I considered taking my life, my relationship with God began to bloom into something deep.  He was my comfortor and encourager throughout that year.  "Don't give up, Katrina," He seemed to say, "Fight the good fight.  I am there with you.You are worth something."   So I hanged in there and looked to Him through it all.  My parents, seeing how much I struggled, realized that I needed a change.  My mom who was trying to help me through those thoughts of suicide during our long night talks knew it was time for me to move on.  So we decided that I would go to a new school next year.  A glimmer of hope...maybe I wouldn't be rejected by a new group of kids in a new environment.

We moved right before my Sophomore year, and I was able to start fresh in a brand new school.  However, fear of being rejected consumed me.  I asked my Mom if I could buy new stylish clothes, wear my skirts a little shorter, and look like everyone else around me.  I was so scared that I would make an idiot of myself talking to others because of my hearing loss, that I didn't talk at all.   No matter how hard I tried, my Junior year became the same nightmare as my freshman year.  People ignored me again.  When I tried to sit with my peers at the round table at lunch, I noticed that they all crammed between each other on one half of the table leaving me alone on the other half.  When I had to go on student council bus trips, I sat alone while others crammed into groups of three on bus seats that only seated two.  Life was hard. No one wanted to be around me.  REJECTION is harsh!

Looking back at the situation as an adult, I realized that even though I was being rejected by my peers, I learned that they rejected me so that they would not be rejected by others themselves.  Everyone wanted to feel accepted, and they did it the only way they knew.  Don't hang out with the ones deemed unacceptable.

Everyone has this innermost desire to feel loved and accepted.  A child whose parents ignore her on a daily basis only wants to feel loved and accepted.  A wife who is shunned by her in-laws only wants to fit in with her husband's family.  A man  commits adultery because he felt rejected by his wife.  A divorce couple feels pain because they could not feel loved and accepted in their marriage.  A boy who joins a gang and gets involved in drugs does so to feel like he belongs somewhere.  A woman, who messes up and finds that no one forgives her, feels pain as people shun her for her mistakes. I believe rejection is a huge fear in the lives of people.  While being considered unacceptable in high school was hard to take, it also taught me so much.  I learned that we cannot depend on humans for our happiness.  Even the best of humans will mess up and make us feel unacceptable at times.  The reality is that people will find themselves feeling unacceptable in other people eyes.

People, including myself, do so much to try to make themselves look acceptable to others.  Take facebook, people are always either posting pics of their wonderful lifestyle on facebook with everyone smiling and laughing and looking picture perfect, or sometimes a person  will do the opposite and talk about their pathetic life in hopes of receiving comfort and acceptance from sympathizers.  A family driving to church may have just been arguing and screaming at each other, but when they get out of the car and approach church, they plaster smiles on their faces and give a greeting to appear as the amazing family people think they are.  Some people do a lot of serving and giving in order to gain approval.  Others will try to wear stylish outfits or buy a beautiful home and car to feel accepted by others.  Wives sometimes change how they act in order to please their husbands and vice versa.  I am not saying all of these things are right or wrong, but I am just pointing out that people do things with the hidden motive of wanting acceptance.

I learned a hard lesson in high school....since no one accepted me who did?  I get tears in my eyes when I think of how God has accepted me with wide open arms.

I have said, "I look weird and have a hearing loss."  God says, " You are fearfully and wonderfully made by Me!  You are a masterpiece." (Psalms 139:13-14, Ephesians 2:10)

I have said, "I mess up so much. I sin and hurt others.  No one will forgive me."  God says, "I FORGIVE you, and love you anyway." (1 John 1:9)

I have said, "My life is meaningless.  Why am I even here?  No one cares."  God says, "You life is precious and I have PLANS for you!" (Jeremiah 29:11)

I have said, "I wish that people liked me."  God says, "I LOVE YOU!"  (John 3:16, Romans 5:8)

I have said, "Some people stop loving me."  God says, "I will NEVER stop loving you.  My love is unconditional and knows no bounds." (Romans 8:37-39)

God finds me acceptable!  Because of Jesus, I am now declared righteous and pure in His eyes!

I read something a few weeks back that brought tears to my eyes. It dealt with during the time when God was putting the New Covenant into place.  In the Old Covenant, the Jews were not supposed to associate with unclean people, the Gentiles, but in the New Covenant that changed.  In Acts 10, the apostle Peter, a Jew, was commanded by God to go to a house of Gentiles in which Peter said the following upon his arrival: "He said to them: 'You are well aware that it is against our law for a Jew to associate with a Gentile or visit him.  But God has shown me that I should NOT CALL ANY MAN IMPURE OR UNCLEAN!'"[emphasis mine]  God had said prior to that in verse 15, "Do not call anything impure that God has made CLEAN." [emphasis mine]  I am clean in God's eyes.  I am not dirt, scum of the earth, a reject, or junk.  I got to see how God viewed me and every person on this earth, clean through the blood of Jesus.  Because of Jesus we are acceptable in God's eyes and we are so beautiful to Him!  All we have to do is ask Jesus into our heart and approach God boldly and He will welcome us with open arms.

In God's eyes, I am ACCEPTABLE, and nothing else matters.

“I have loved you with an everlasting love;
    I have drawn you with unfailing kindness. Jeremiah 31:3b