We've all experienced rejection at some point. Rejection can come in so many ways — breaking off a relationship, being turned down for a job, losing a job, being denied access into a facility and many other ways.
No matter what size or form rejection comes in, rejection is rejection. It hurts us emotionally and can sometimes even leave marks on the soul. Rejection can bring fear and anxiety to a level that makes it hard to see a life outside of it.
But that is not the ultimate goal God has for you.
If there's one thing we can't control in this lifetime, it's the rejection that the world offers over and over again. But amid the chaotic mess of rejections that we are bombarded with, there remains a constant desire for reaffirming our faith.
If there is anyone who knew rejection best, He is no other than Jesus. He was rejected by religious and political leaders. When presented as a criminal, He was even rejected by the same crowds that praised Him like a king only days before.
But He eventually overcame all the rejections He experienced. In John 15:18, Jesus says, "If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you."
Jesus knows the pain of rejection and therefore can relate with us in facing rejection.
Moreover, Jesus does not just relate with our pain. He has also found a way to conquer it with His undivided and unconditional acceptance.
The world may reject you — girlfriends and boyfriends will break up with you, job providers might turn you down, facilities might deny you entry, schools may drop your applications.
But God will never reject you.
Ironically, it was through Christ's rejection that we are now assured an eternity of full acceptance from God through Christ. Isaiah 53:3-4 says, "He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted."
Because Jesus was rejected, we are no longer rejected. That's because the rejection Jesus took upon Himself was never meant to be His. It was our rejection. Jesus took every ounce of rejection we could ever receive in one lifetime and bore it upon Himself so that we would never have to be brought down by it. He took our sin and shame and imputed upon us His righteousness so that now when the Father looks at us, He doesn't see our guilt but Jesus' righteousness.
The world may reject us for who we are, but God will never reject us whoever we are. All this is made possible only through the work on the cross.
