His Rejection is our Salvation!

 He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we would desire him.  He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering. Like one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.  Isaiah 53:2-3

Bonnie over at Faith Barista asked her readers if we would be real and post about rejection.  Wow, what a hard topic!  One that maybe hits too close to home for many of us...one that we would rather not think about.

My biggest battle with rejection comes in the form of abuse that I endured from a family member. When you are abused the whole goal of the abuser is to get you to be someone or do something that he or she wants you to do or be.  You ARE NOT accepted for who you are, and in many cases you will never be good enough for the abuser to accept you with open arms. In my case, not only did I feel rejected by the person that abused me, but also by God.  You see my abuser used God against me. (See this post.) So deep down inside I always felt like I wasn't good enough for God either.  I have spent a huge portion of my life trying to live up to what God and others wanted me to be.   But as we all know, we can't please everyone! For me, struggling to be accepted by God and others only led to deep, clinical depression.  I have since come out of that pit, but not without a fight.

God has shown me in the last few years that He doesn't reject me.  Regardless of what He allows in my life, I am loved and accepted by Him.  He has also brought me to the realization that He suffered rejection so that we wouldn't have to.  He was rejected by men enough to be put on a cross.  His rejection is our salvation! I know that I will never be rejected by Him even if I am rejected by others.  The irony is that in His rejection we can receive salvation, but only if we don't reject Him! Our acceptance of Him seals our fate...not our good works, good looks, or good thoughts and intentions.  All we have to do is accept Him...end of story... to create the ending to our story!