Rejected Mind_Set
Mind_Sets Series
Rejection
Healing a Wounded Heart
by June Hunt
Nothing can ravage your heart like rejection. The most penetrating wound is the painful rejection of a loved one. Even death itself does not pierce your heart as deeply as when you know you have been abandoned. You feel devastated when someone dear to your heart deserts you. Rejection chips away at your self-image … chisels down your confidence … and challenges your hope. Meanwhile, the memory of your loved one lingers on and on in the recesses of your mind, repeating—through whispers and shouts—those haunting messages: “You are unwelcome.… You are unworthy.”
Is your heart broken? Is your spirit crushed? Nothing is more healing than to know that the Lord loves you unconditionally.… He accepts you eternally. When your pain seems endless and your heart is tender to the touch, continue to put yourself into His compassionate hands. He will hold you with His heart of love until there is true healing … for,
• Rejection is the act of refusing to accept or consider a person or thing that is not wanted or not approved.1
— When you experience rejection, you feel unloved, unwanted, unacceptable.
— The Greek verb apodokimazo means “to reject as the result of examination and disapproval.”2 (apo = away from, dokimazo = to approve)
— Jesus felt the pain of rejection. The Bible refers to Christ as the “Cornerstone”—the vital, the most essential stone of a major structure—yet He was the cornerstone (or capstone) the builders rejected.
“The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone.”
• To be rejected is to be cast aside, cast off, cast away—to be thrown away as having no value.3
— When you are rejected, you can feel useless, abandoned, worthless.
— The Greek verb atheteo means “to do away with, to set aside, to cast or throw away as useless or unsatisfactory.”4
Jesus challenged the Pharisees and teachers of the law because they were rejecting the laws of God.
• To reject someone means to despise, refuse, shun, turn away from.5
— If you reject others, you use your attitudes and actions to reveal the condition of your heart.
— The Hebrew word maas means “to reject, refuse, despise.”6
— Because God has given each of us free will, we may choose to reject the Word of God and even God Himself.
Q “My father died six years ago, but I’m still having trouble dealing with the anger I’ve had toward him. He was partial to my brother, but treated my sister, my mother, and me like second-class citizens. I tried to please him with my achievements, but we never communicated and he never recognized my accomplishments. How can I stop being so controlled by my anger?”