I am not one who writes a regular blog, in fact, this would be my first official one. I do write things down that the Lord impresses on me, notes, thoughts, words from God etc. I did however feel that this word should be shared in a broader context, so, I do pray that you will be encouraged.

I have truly felt like the Lord has been speaking to me to be real, to be authentic...that is difficult to do when you don’t know how you will be received. When someone is truly being raw and vulnerable before others, purposefully choosing to expose their core inner struggles, it is normal to have apprehension, even fear of being rejected. I am no different. In fact, one of my struggles is the fear of being rejected.

I am beginning to believe that perhaps all of us (to some degree or another) carry a belief system that is rooted in rejection. Where does a root of rejection come from and how does it affect us? Well, the root of rejection often, but not always, begins in childhood, when there is neglect, abuse, or a broken home where one or both parents are not present either physically or emotionally. Many events can cause us to have a root of rejection, a rejection mindset. What I am learning is that this rejection mindset has caused me difficulties in many of my relationships. We all experience life and look at life through a lens.

As I am living my life out as one who chooses to believe in Christ, who is allowing Christ to be my sufficiency, to be my healer, I’m learning about myself and how these root feelings of rejection become a dirty lens for my life...not only do they affect how I see myself, but also how I see others. This lens affects how I deal with life, my expectations of others, my relationships with friends & family, and even how I view God. From a perspective through the lens dirtied by a rejection mindset things can get really ugly.

I can have such a distorted view when I come from a place of rejection. It’s like I really cannot see life or the situation or the person clearly...and so much gets turned upside down in my mind and in my heart. When I allow myself to look at life through this lens of rejection, I’m left so confused and in a world of turmoil. I don’t see situations or relationships clearly. It appears that life just isn’t going the way I think it should go.

When you see life through the lens of rejection, you can see almost every situation in life as a new rejection. Whenever something doesn’t go your way, it deepens your belief that you are being rejected, that you are unlovable, unworthy.

I’m grateful we have a patient loving God. If I were God, I would have given up on me a long time ago! Not Him...He loves me in a way I don’t fully understand ...but I’m learning little by little that His love is pretty awesome. I am allowing Him into the middle of my pain...begging Him to take it all away and pleading with Him to make me whole and healed. I can hear Him say to me “My Grace is Sufficient for you." I am in a process of healing, of being healed. I have not arrived yet, but God is showing me the areas He wants me to trust Him in, He is showing me how He wants to heal me, He is walking me through a healing from a rejection mindset. He is continually telling me that I am accepted, that I am loved, that I am enough, that He will never leave me, He will never forsake me. In other words, He will never reject me.

I felt like I needed to share with you that I, like you, am in a process where I am growing and going from glory to glory. God wants to take you on this journey as well. Sometimes the process is long and painful, and sometimes it comes quickly. Either way we are all still in a process. The Bible says that we are working out our salvation, it teaches us that sanctification is both instant and a process. I was saved when I came to faith, I am being saved now, and I will be saved completely one day.

I hope you hear me: being real is not being weak. Being real is not weakness. Honestly, it takes a lot of strength to be real, to be authentic. As we become real with others, it gives someone else the opportunity to say to themselves, “I’m not alone; someone else struggles the way I do, I am not so very different from others.”

I’m truly finding that healing and growth does take the risk of being real and vulnerable. You have to learn to be real regardless of how you might be received.

The spirit of the Lord is calling to us, He desires to speak His truth about us. That is what needs to win out in our lives over and over again! The truth of how God sees us, of what God thinks of us. We need to hear it, believe it, and receive it for our own selves. I cannot receive it for you, I cannot believe it for you. You have to hear it from God, you have to believe it, you have to live it. We have to stand on the truth, God’s truth, clinging, grabbing, hanging on for dear life sometimes, because He is the One who speaks to us that we are deeply loved, completely forgiven, fully pleasing, totally accepted, and absolutely complete in Christ. We lack nothing, Ephesians chapter 2 says we are God’s masterpiece…His poem…You are God’s masterpiece…hear it, receive it…You are God’s work of art, not a mistake, you are loved, you are precious! To change our thinking, to be healed from a rejection mindset to live in God’s truth…it’s a process for sure, and though we are all on the same journey, it looks different for each one of us. So as we are extended grace by God for our lives, let us also extend grace to one another.