Rejection.

We’ve all experienced rejection at some point in our lives.  Whether it be with friends,  family,  or someone who you thought you could trust, rejection is a sin that humans encounter throughout life. The spirit of rejection is real and severs the relationships that we once thought were near and dear before we thought we were accepted in this world. For me, it was with my family.

I have certain family members who condemn me for my faith in Jesus. Whenever I mention anything having to do with Jesus, they react out in meanness, rejecting my Jesus who lives inside of me and in turn rejecting me.  This causes me to feel alone even though I know this is not true. They continue to mock me just as Jesus was mocked and reject me just as Jesus was rejected. One of my family members even told me more than once, “I don’t have to love you.” These words may have put me down in the moment, but as a follower of Jesus Christ, I know that when the world hates me for my faith that only makes me stronger, giving me the strength to press forward and even handle rejection with love as Jesus did. “I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me” (Philippians 4:13).

I love my family with a love like Jesus’ love. It is a love that is so strong that I continue to pursue my family despite their ongoing rejection of me. It is what I, as a Christian, am called to do out of love. “The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee” (Jeremiah 31:3).

God’s compassion and mercy are infinite and I pray that all of my family will be open to experiencing it. “It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. But though He cause grief, yet will He have compassion according to the multitude of His mercies” (Lamentations 3:22, 32).

When the world and its people reject you, Jesus will never reject you. He has always loved you and I know this to be true for myself because I experience God’s love everyday, even when my own flesh fights to reject it.  “My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever” (Psalm 73:26).

I will not give up on my family because God never gave up on them. I will continue to pray and pursue them as God does, hoping that God will transform their hearts to accept and not reject Jesus one day. “Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God,  God dwelleth in him, and he in God” (1 John 4:15).