Human beings, like plants, grow in the soil of acceptance, not in the atmosphere of rejection.
Sir John Powell
Being abused sexually, verbally, mentally, and emotionally as a child and teenager definitely left me afraid that no one would want me as an adult. Fear permeated the very atmosphere that I grew up in. I was afraid that someone, especially my mother, would find out what my dad was doing to me. I was simultaneously afraid that no one would ever find out and I would never be rescued. I was afraid that if they did find out they would blame me, and there was always the nagging fear that maybe the abuse was my fault. Perhaps there was something wrong with me!
I was afraid of my father’s intimidation and anger. I was afraid that I might make him angry, and yet when he was angry I couldn’t figure out what I did wrong. I was afraid to ask him for anything, not even a dime to get a Popsicle. Wanting things wasn’t very popular in our home, so usually I just didn’t ask because of fear of making my dad angry. I felt I had to take care of myself and not need very much; but I was only a little girl, and I was afraid I couldn’t or didn’t know how to do that. I felt a crushing sense of responsibility. I thought I needed to fix everything, but I was very afraid because I didn’t know how to do it.
My fears changed as I became an adult, but they were still present. I had the fear of failure, the fear of letting friends into my life—especially close friends—and the fear of being taken advantage of. There were many fears, both big and small, but the one we will deal with in this chapter was a big one for me.
I longed for the day I could leave home and be on my own, away from the abuse I was suffering, and yet I also lived with the fear that I would be alone and unwanted because I felt like damaged merchandise! The fear of not being wanted is experienced by thousands of people, and it fills us with a sadness that can only be known by one who has felt it. We are created for healthy connections, and there is always a part of us that craves it. We want to be loved! We want to be wanted!
We are created for healthy connections, and there is always a part of us that craves it.
My thoughts were, What man could love and want to marry someone who has been used by their father the way I have been? This became a fear in my life that eventually caused me to make a mistake and marry the first young man who seemed to have an interest in me. I did not feel peaceful about the union, but the fear of never having anyone and being alone and unwanted caused me to override wisdom and marry him anyway. Our five-year marriage was filled with more pain, rejection, abandonment, and betrayal. Exactly what I did not need after growing up the way I did. The marriage ended in divorce due to infidelity on his part. I existed under layers of pain that caused a great many problems in my life until I finally received the love and acceptance of Jesus and healing for my wounded soul.
In the last year of the marriage, I got pregnant, and while I was carrying his baby he left me and lived with another woman who happened to reside just two blocks from where he and I lived. Each day, when I drove to work, I drove by the apartment where they were living together and I vividly recall the painful feelings of being unwanted and rejected. Like most people do, I thought something was wrong with me and that I wasn’t good enough, otherwise he would not have left me for someone else. She probably wore a size 4 or 6, and she had long blond hair and blue eyes. I had never in my life worn a size 4 and I had ordinary brown hair and brown eyes. As I compared myself with her, I definitely felt lacking in most areas.
The more flaws we see in ourselves, the more we accept rejection as something we deserve. We begin to internalize it and believe there is something wrong with us that caused the rejection. Like most people in a similar situation, my emotional pain was so intense that I could not think rationally or realize that my husband had many problems and wrong behavior patterns that were not connected to me or anything I was, or anything I was not doing. He was that way when I married him, but I was so desperate and fearful of being unwanted that I refused to be honest with myself about him. I believe that literally thousands upon thousands of women and men make this same mistake. The fear of being alone and unwanted is intense and can motivate us to make unwise relationship decisions.
I am sure you can imagine the emotional pain I felt while driving past the apartment—where he was living with another woman—pregnant with his child, going to work to pay the bills that he created and walked away from.
My pregnancy was a terribly lonely time. I couldn’t receive any comfort from my parents, and I had no real friends. I was totally dependent upon being able to take care of myself and very fearful about how I was going to do that as I reached the end of my pregnancy. When I could no longer work, I had no money and no place to turn to for help, so the woman who fixed my hair at the beauty shop where I went invited me to live with her and her mom until after I had the baby.
My soul was scarred from fear, abuse, and rejection, and at that time I did not know that God loved me, would never reject me, and actually wanted to restore my soul and make me whole again (see Psalm 23). If you can relate to how I felt during that time, I urge you to believe that God also wants to restore your life and make it something amazingly wonderful. He is knocking on the door of your heart, and all you need to do is say, “Jesus, come in.” God’s healing in our lives is not an instantaneous thing; it is a process, but it is definitely available to all who will receive it by faith.
God’s healing in our lives is not an instantaneous thing; it is a process, but it is definitely available to all who will receive it by faith.
Even if you are afraid to let anyone else into your life right now, you can begin by letting Jesus in, and He will enable you to eventually let others in also. You can enjoy healthy and safe relationships!
After I gave birth to my son alone in a clinic, my husband did show up and took me to live with him at his aunt’s house. That only lasted a few short weeks and he was gone again on another escapade with a different woman. I finally found the courage to divorce him, but my circumstances only worsened because I finally had no choice except to go back to my father’s house and try to avoid his sexual advances. I lived there for a few months with my son. I worked during the day while my son stayed with a neighborhood babysitter, and I was miserable all the time. Day and night I was haunted with fear and the pain of being lonely, rejected, and unwanted. I felt stuck in a place that I hated and saw no means of escape.
I had received Jesus as my Savior at the age of nine while visiting relatives, but I had no understanding of what was available to me through my relationship with Christ, so I kept all of my problems even though I had Jesus. I was like a millionaire, spiritually speaking, who never went to the bank to cash a check because I didn’t know what I had. However, I did pray what I am sure sounded like pathetic prayers, but God heard me. I asked that one day God would send someone to truly love me and take me to church, and eventually Dave Meyer pulled up in front of my parents’ house where I was washing my mother’s car and the rest is history. It is a story for another time, but he definitely was the answer to the prayers I had prayed in the midst of my pain.
No matter how bad you are hurting, I urge you to pray! Pour your heart out to God and don’t worry about sounding eloquent. Tell Him how you feel and be patient as He works in your life. I admit that it is difficult to be patient when you’re hurting, but God will comfort you as you remain steadfast in your faith.
I recently met a woman who expressed her gratitude for our television program. She said the Word of God that she received from it brought healing to her family. She went on to tell me that her son had developed a serious eating disorder that had required hospitalization. I asked if he had been insecure, and she said that he was in a band and began to admire the lead singer and compare himself to him. For no apparent reason he became afraid that the time might come when they would not want him in the band, and although he was not overweight at all and very handsome, he decided he should be as thin as the lead singer. He started down the path of eating and then forcing himself to vomit, so he did not retain the calories in the food. This eating disorder has some serious side effects if it is practiced over a long period of time, and it did have devastating effects on him. The stress from his problems ended up causing his mother to have a post-traumatic nerve disorder, and she needed counseling and medical help. All of these problems began with a young man’s fear of being unwanted and rejected. It wasn’t even a reality, just a fear! Although he didn’t know how to at the time, all he would have had to do was resist the fear in the very beginning and he could have avoided all the pain he had personally, as well as the pain caused to his family. Fear is indeed a formidable enemy and one that we must learn to confront.
We were designed and created by God for acceptance and not for rejection. Because it is an inherent need in us, we crave it, and we need to live in an atmosphere of acceptance in order to grow and make progress. What if we are rejected and unwanted by the people in our lives? Although it is painful, we can still choose to receive God’s acceptance and know that we are alive because He wants us. God wants you! God is the giver of life, and He has created each of us carefully and purposely. No matter who rejects us, God accepts us. And that is enough to enable us to be successful in life. Jesus was rejected and despised, but He focused on God’s love for Him. We should focus on God’s acceptance rather than people’s rejection. What we focus on becomes the largest thing in our life.
No matter who rejects us, God accepts us. And that is enough to enable us to be successful in life.
He was despised and rejected and forsaken by men, a Man of sorrows and pains, and acquainted with grief and sickness; and like One from Whom men hide their faces He was despised, and we did not appreciate His worth or have any esteem for Him.
Isaiah 53:3
Jesus came to help people, yet they hated Him without a cause. Was it painful to Him? I imagine it was because He had emotions just as we do. But He did not let the rejection derail Him from the purpose for which He was sent. Satan launches attacks of rejection against us in the hope that the pain of it will weaken us to the point that we will give up, isolate ourselves, and be so afraid of being unwanted that we end up emotionally crippled and unable to maintain healthy relationships or be successful in life. However, knowledge is power, and when we understand what Satan is trying to do and why, then we can more aggressively resist him and have victory instead of being the victim.
We can trust God to give us the acceptance that we crave instead of compromising our values and making unwise choices in order to get it. I have experienced what seems like more than my fair share of rejection in my life: in my childhood from people I trusted and loved, and later as a woman being used by God in ministry. Some of my most intense pain has come from those rejections, but I have recovered by applying the very same principles that I am sharing with you.
God has already provided the total acceptance we crave, and all we need to do is receive it by faith. Are you afraid to believe it might be true? I know that I was for a long, long time. I thought, What if I believe that God loves me and I am only deceiving myself? What if I believe I am totally accepted by God and it is really just my imagination? It almost seemed too good to really be true. But we find our proof in God’s Word. Even after we decide to believe we are accepted and wanted by God, our feelings don’t always agree. We must learn to believe what God says more than we believe how we feel.
We are made acceptable to God through Christ (see Ephesians 2:6). God doesn’t love us because we deserve it, but because He is kind and gracious and wants to love us (see Ephesians 2:4–5). The craving we feel for acceptance can be truly met only in Jesus. He doesn’t give it only when we are good and withdraw it when we are not. God accepts us because we believe in His Son Jesus Christ, and not because of what we do or don’t do (see John 3:18). You are loved, accepted, and wanted!
We have been chosen by God, picked out as His own in Christ before the foundation of the world (see Ephesians 1:4). Before we had an opportunity to do anything right or wrong, God decided that He wanted us! I want to encourage you to really think about that and not just merely read over it. You have been chosen by God!
I wrote the following in my Everyday Life study Bible on page 1,929:
One of the strongest desires human beings have is to be loved, to be accepted, and to feel that they belong. We want a sense of connection and belonging to something or someone. We want to feel valuable. We cannot be guaranteed of always getting that in our dealings with people, but we can get it from God. Even though God knows everything about us—and I do mean everything—He still chooses us on purpose. According to Ephesians 1:4, He actually picked us out on purpose to be His very own and to belong to Him. I encourage you to say aloud right now, “I belong to God.”
God set us apart for Himself and made provision in Jesus for us to be holy, blameless, and consecrated. We can live before Him in love without reproach. That means we do not have to feel guilty and bad about all of our weaknesses and faults. You and I are no surprise to God. He knew exactly what He was getting when He chose us. God did not choose us and then become disappointed because of our inabilities. God has hope for us, and He believes in us and is working to help us be all that He has in His plan for us.
I encourage you to relax in God’s love. Learn to receive God’s love. Think about it, thank Him for it, and watch for the manifestation of it in your daily life. God shows His love for us in many ways, but we are often unaware of it. He loves us first so we can love Him and other people. God never expects us to give away something that He has not first given us. His love is poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit and He wants us to live before Him in love.
Let love in and let it out. You are destined to be a channel for God to flow through, not a reservoir that merely sits and collects blessings from God. He blesses us and makes us a blessing. Blessings come in and blessings go out. You are special and God has a special and unique plan for you. Get excited about that and rejoice!
Babe Ruth was once baseball’s all-time home run king. But did you know that he was also the all-time strikeout champion? He struck out almost twice as often as he hit home runs. He knew that he had to risk striking out in order to hit those home runs. When asked for the secret of his success, Ruth replied, “I just keep on swingin’ at ’em!”1
I can just imagine that the fans cheered when Babe hit a home run, but it is likely that they didn’t cheer when he struck out. It is the nature of people to cheer only when we are giving them what they want, but I believe Jesus is still cheering for us when we strike out in life. Why? Not because He is glad that we made a mistake, but simply because He knows that if He cheers when we are down, His encouragement will help us get back up. He is with us for the long haul in life and not merely for the times when we hit home runs. Isn’t it comforting and empowering to know that God loves you just as much when you strike out as He does when you hit a home run? I know it is to me.
Every day won’t be a home-run day for us, but we can be secure in the knowledge that God loves us with a perfect and everlasting love.
I have noticed among people who are great sports fans how much they love and cheer for their favorite players when they are doing well, and how quickly they begin to criticize when the players get into a slump and don’t perform well for a period of time.
I am glad that when I am in a slump God cheers me on and tells me that I can have a comeback instead of rejecting me and leaving me alone, giving up on me. All of our days are not home-run days, but we will always come back and hit home runs again if we have the proper encouragement. If you cannot get the encouragement you need from people, then start listening to God because His Word is filled with one encouraging love letter after another written directly to you.
In my book titled Confidence, which is about the freedom to be yourself, I said, “A lack of confidence equals a lack of revelation concerning who you are in Christ.” Although I wrote this book many years ago, I still feel the same way, only stronger than ever before. I found no healing for my soul until I received love and right standing with God through faith in Jesus. As I did, I grew in confidence. Our confidence must be deeply rooted in Christ and His love and commitment to us. As we learn to feel good about ourselves and safe in our relationship with God, we are able to step out and do amazing things in life, even if we have to initially do them afraid. This is possible because we know it is permissible if we strike out occasionally, as long as we keep getting up to bat.
A lack of confidence equals a lack of revelation concerning who you are in Christ.
We keep going back, stronger, not weaker, because we will not allow rejection to beat us down. It will only strengthen our resolve. To be successful there is no other way.
Earl G. Graves (author and publisher)
I think that anyone who has experienced rejection and the feelings of being unwanted and then recovers is actually stronger than someone who has never experienced those feelings at all. Being knocked down in life and getting back up help us build a resolve that is vital for success. Author Paul Sweeney put it this way: “True success is overcoming the fear of being unsuccessful.”2
Fear of rejection is a deep-rooted fear that affects many. When a person lives afraid that someone might disapprove of or reject them, this fear seeps into the very pores of who they are. They hesitate to trust others or engage in relationships because they doubt they will be accepted.
Past hurts keep many from opening up and living in freedom. Rather than dealing with the pain of the past and moving on in God, they rehearse the pain and live captive to a fear that it will happen again.
But the Bible gives great hope to the person who has been rejected and unwanted: Jesus understands that pain because He experienced it Himself. He understands the feelings that come when people push you away and make you feel devalued. Perhaps that is why Jesus used the final verse in the book of Matthew to tell His disciples:… And behold, I am with you all the days (perpetually, uniformly, and on every occasion), to the [very] close and consummation of the age.
In His final moments on Earth, Jesus wanted these men to know that they are never alone. Though others might reject them, though others might abandon them, He never would. Jesus would be with them in every situation, on every day, no matter what.
And just as Jesus was with the disciples, He is with you too. You need not fear the rejection of man because you have a friend in Jesus. You may have been turned away in the past. You may have suffered abuse and pain from those who were supposed to protect you. You may be hesitant to open your heart and be vulnerable again, but don’t allow fear to rob you of the life Jesus came to give.
He accepts you! He delights in you! He is with you always!
Knowing that you have complete acceptance from Jesus will give you confidence to do anything you need or want to do in life. You can live a free, full, and exciting life if you will refuse to settle for anything less. You have tremendous potential just waiting to be developed, but remember that you must be willing to strike out sometimes in order to hit home runs.