Rejection

I sang that song here before the message because Jesus was tempted in all points like as we are and yet without sin. And the world is full of temptation. And he has already gone down that road and has been tempted.

Any temptation that you're tempted with, we're told that he was tempted in all points. Yet he chose to not yield to that temptation. A lot of times I think in the Christian life as I sit here and prepare for the message here this morning, one of the real burdens I have and it comes across no doubt in teaching here is that it's oftentimes easy to to just accept Christianity as a form of outward things, outward observances.

It's nice in many ways because people see you outwardly and they can make a good judgment on you with regards to outward appearance. And so if you have the outsides looking good, it seems like an easy way just to get by and get through. And I look good and everyone thinks I'm great because of the way I appear.

And so there is a lot of emphasis in many settings on the outward appearance. But we miss a lot. And as we've been learning as you go through the Bible, the Lord deals a lot with the inward things and attitudes and attitudes of the heart and the fruits of the spirit are all attitudes.

They're all how you respond, how you react, love, joy, peace, long suffering, gentleness, meekness, temperance. These are all things that come out of the heart, things that as you walk in front of me today, I don't know what's in that heart. I can't see those things.

I can see maybe the way you're dressed and make an evaluation on who you are by the outward appearance. But I don't, unless I'm around you and experience your life, don't really know whether there is the fruits of the spirit coming out of your heart. And so oftentimes Christianity, it's an easy thing to just, let's just make the outward appearance, the big thing.

And we can just look at each other and say, well, I can see you're right with God or you're not right with God. Instead of saying, like Jesus, judge not according to appearance, but judge righteously, judge a righteous judgment. Find out what's in the heart of man and what's really going on on the inside.

Not to downplay the outside, but Jesus did say there are gnats, there are camels. And making sure that we address the camels. I'm going to address a subject here this morning that is an internal one.

And as I look out over all of you today, I have no idea, no idea how you do. I mean, I have experiences with some of you and I know where you're at and you will probably respond in a certain way in this area of life. So, but I also want to kind of do a front run here.

I've been trying to share messages that will help us in our ordination process here and just get ahead of things instead of coming behind and cleaning up, doing some preventative maintenance. And I've been through a number of ordinations, I've helped churches go through ordinations in different places. And one of the things that churches face, and my wife has sometimes said, oh boy, ordination time.

You know, we've had some experiences over the years. Brother Chris is over here smiling and he's had some experiences. But just to do a little bit of front running on the next couple of weeks and next couple of months to give us some understanding and make sure we know we're heading in the right direction.

I want to read a couple of verses. There's going to be a word in these verses that I'm going to talk about and you'll pick it up here. Once I get through two or three of them, I'm going to read three of them or have you turn to the third one.

Let me start out here. You don't have to turn there to Luke 17 in verse 22. It says, and he said unto his disciples, the days will come when you shall desire to see one of the days of the son of man and you shall not see it.

And they shall say to you, see here or see there, go not after them nor follow them for as the lightning that light lighted out of that one part of under heaven shineth unto the other part into heaven. So shall also the son of man be in his day. But first must he suffer many things and be rejected of this generation.

And our word that we want to talk about this morning is that word rejected. The son of man must suffer many things and be rejected in this generation. Matthew chapter 21 also uses that word.

By the way, this word is used in many different places in the scriptures. But in Matthew chapter 21, verse 42, we read these words. Jesus said unto them, did you never read in the scriptures, the stone, which the builders rejected the same as become the head of the corner.

This is the Lord's doing. And it is marvelous in our eyes, the stone, which the builder, the builders rejected. I want to talk this morning about rejection.

And I do so not only for the whole congregation, but also as we approach this time of ordination. I think there are six or seven names we're going to be voting on. And we've seen throughout the years that there seems to be a temptation for people to feel rejected.

And I know we're going through some things about who's voting and a number of things regarding the whole process. And sometimes people can feel left out and feel like I'm being rejected. And so I want to talk about that subject here.

So let's turn to Isaiah together, Isaiah chapter 53. And this is one of the things that I don't know that we hear a lot about. We don't maybe pay special attention to.

I know that if some of you young ladies would come in here with a bunch of makeup on and a mini skirt, we'd probably react to that right away. But if you come in here with a heart that is dealing with rejection, we won't even notice it probably. We don't pay attention or we're not searching in the heart for those type of things.

But the Lord is one who, as he is, I think in every area of temptation, he has gone before us. He is the one who has endured the most, the most difficult and direct temptation to his own heart. And here in Isaiah 53, a very familiar verse, starting in verse number one, it says this, who has believed our report and to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed, for he shall grow up before him as a tender plant and as a root out of the dry ground.

He has no form nor comeliness. And when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. You know, when Hollywood makes these movies about the Lord and all these, you know, the 10 commandments and the Lord's, his life, they always have some very handsome fella and, you know, stocky and just, but the scripture says that, that he was not that way.

He was very plain in his appearance. When we see him, there is no beauty. There is no handsomeness that we should say, wow, what a guy, what a good looking fella, no beauty that we should desire him.

And then verse three says he is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid as it were our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed him not.

Now, when we talk about this subject of rejection, there is no person who, who has faced more rejection than the Lord Jesus himself. And as we sang some of those songs this morning, some of those songs dealt with this very thing. You know, what a friend we have in Jesus.

When our friends betray us, what a friend we have in Jesus. And, and sister Sandy's song that she suggested, you're safe in the arms of Jesus. You go down through that, the idea of dealing with rejection in life and being safe in the arms of Jesus.

And so before I even preached this message, the Lord was teaching us through songs and hymns and spiritual songs. Some of the things that I'm going to share with you here this morning, here is a, here is a man, the son of God, who, who had too many, as we went through the birth of Christ a month or so ago and an illegitimate birth, or he was, he was born illegitimately and he faced rejection from the moment he was born. He was called a bastard or an illegitimate child.

He was rejected by his family. It's interesting. We don't think about this, but in John chapter seven, Jesus grew up in a home.

And I won't say his mother, Mary was this way, but his home. It says his brethren did not believe in him in John chapter seven, you know, who you think you are, you know, goody two-shoes and all those things. They, they did not believe the testimony of who he was.

He was rejected by the entire nation. He came unto his own and his own received him not. Now, I don't know how you would respond and what kind of life you could live having all of these forms of rejection come your way.

He was rejected by the masses at the last day of his life, crucify him, you know, crucify him. And all the things that were thrown at him on the cross. And so here's someone who was tempted many times, many times with, with people rejecting him.

And nobody likes to be rejected. Does anybody like being rejected here? We don't like it. It hurts.

People reject us. And, and, and yet the Lord went through that. And as the scripture says in Hebrews, he is able to succor us or help us because he himself went through in his own physical body, these kinds of temptations.

So what is rejection? Rejection is the strong feeling you get from another individual or group of individuals of disproval, a strong feeling of disproval, being cast off or being repudiated. You know, you know, that's happening. You probably think of people already who have rejected you down through your life and the harm or the, the pain that comes to you when you're rejected.

It's something that we're not going to avoid in life. You know, somebody said, well, I'm just going to avoid it. It's very difficult to avoid it.

You're going to have to face it. It's, it's a part of life. It's a temptation that every one of us have to deal with sometimes.

And there are people here, maybe, you know, at birth, they start out just like the Lord did. They're rejected. And maybe father or mother doesn't want a baby or doesn't want a male or a female.

And, and there is this sense of rejection. I, as a young man, I remember, I grieve over some of the things I did as a young kid, but I was a young man and one of the children born into our home, my brother, we just kind of rejected him and, and made just bad comments about this child that's being born into our family and, and whether he sensed those things or not. But, but children can feel rejection.

And I thought about adoptions, you know, so the challenges, and we've been involved in some of those and talked to families who are involved with these, these adoptions, especially at a young age. Can you imagine this little baby in the womb of the mother? And this brain and this heart is just being formed. And there's nothing written on that little mind and that little, little heart.

And that little mind is hearing the voice of mother in the womb. And you can imagine if you ever closed your ears, you know, and talked, it just kind of reverberates, your voice reverberates down through your whole body. And that little baby, they're just hearing mother.

What a beautiful voice to hear mother for those nine months in the womb. And, and to have this, this person, this first person that you're familiar with. And then being born into this world and having a traumatic experience anyway, being born, but coming out and like many children, where's mother? Where is that voice? Where is, where is that one who, who has been etched into my mind these first nine months? And, and now, and the feelings even in the, as a womb, in a womb with rejection, what's happened? Where is that familiar, familiar voice? I was a young person.

Some of you young person, young people, you face this in public schools. Everybody wants to be in the group. Everybody wants to have a close group of friends.

There is something about us that we want to be sociable. We want to be a part of something. And yet when you're in those things, and it happened to me in school, oftentimes there are, there are friends that just reject you.

And you learn that life is full of, of rejection and difficulties. And then maybe as you get older, and this is one of the ones I had to face. You get older, you, you start putting your heart out to another person.

As a young man to a young lady, and as a young lady to a young man, and you start extending yourself. And, and, and there are times when those hearts get rejected. And it's very painful, very difficult situation in life.

Maybe your father, your mother, you know, maybe father divorced mom and, and left and mom divorced dad and left. And, and so there, there are many ways that, and you all have stories here of how you have had to deal with rejection. Then you, then you finally get married, you know, and our society is full of this.

And you, you, you get a divorce and there's just violent divorces and court cases. And, and just people having to deal with my spouse who I loved is rejecting me. And in divorcing, and that, you know, that's not an easy thing to deal with.

Very difficult. And then you become a Christian and you stand up for Christ in the world. Boy, they hate you.

They throw things at you. They spit on you and they, they tell you, we don't want you here and get out of here with your gospel. And, and just a lot of just animosity and rejection that the heart has to deal with.

And then even here in church life, and I've been challenged through my ministry here with rejection. Jesus said, my own familiar friend has lifted up his heel against me. My own brother that for these three years, Jesus said, we walk together.

We fellowship together. We were intimate together and did everything together. And that familiar friend has lifted up his heel and, and it's a part of life.

You know, when you say I'm going to follow Jesus, I'm going to follow Jesus. Well, one of the things you're going to fall into is suffering rejection, even by the people that are the closest in your close group of, of friends. And so rejection is a part of life.

You're not going to get away from it. But I want to be here this morning to try to help you to function through it. Because I've also seen in ordinations, people, people feel rejected at times.

You know, we got six or seven names. Not all of them are going to be ordained. And there's going to be others who are going to say, well, what happened to me? And, you know, I've experienced this.

Sometimes we say, Lord, why are you rejecting me? You know, what are you rejecting me about? But I do want to throw this out before we go on here talking about rejection. The ultimate rejection in life is going to be that day when Jesus says, depart from me, you cursed into everlasting fire. I mean, you think about how maybe a divorce or a breakup that you've really got your heart entangled with someone, how painful it is.

Can you imagine the God who made you and the God who redeemed you and the God who has given everything that God saying to you, depart from me, you cursed. Into everlasting fire, that's a painful experience. There's nothing even close to that.

That's so painful. And I, you know, I think of that passage in Revelation, they should go away and be tormented day and night forever and ever. That that has to be a difficult, difficult eternity.

Just to have to deal with that rejection by the God of heaven who made you. And so I just want to caution all of us this morning to work out your own salvation with fear and trembling and to make your calling and election sure. You know, we want to make sure that you don't hear those words because that's going to be a painful experience and one that you can't over, you can't recover from.

And the heart's going to be there for all eternity. Those words depart from me, depart from me, depart from me. And so I just encourage you here this morning, this is not a gospel message, but I encourage you to get yourself to the place where you're at peace with God through the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Well, the natural response here to rejection, you see it in human nature, but we respond to rejection in usually two ways. We start out by saying, I'm not going to go down that route anymore. I'm going to avoid people.

I'm going to avoid relationships. I'm going to avoid all the things that bring about rejection. I'm going to be a loner.

Just let me alone. I don't want to deal with relationships. I don't want to feel the pain of being rejected.

We don't establish meaningful relationships. And, you know, sometimes you go back in life and you realize, well, I went through a difficult situation and I was rejected, hurt. And it's affected me in the sense that, you know, touch that fire, you get burned, you're hesitant to touch it again.

And you say, well, I'm going to keep my relationships at a distance. And it affects us. You know, you don't just jump into a relationship and get burned and get rejected and say, I'm just going to jump into another one.

You learn as you go through life. And you adjust and sometimes maybe avoid meaningful relationships. Sometimes people don't marry.

I went through a difficult situation at age 21 and I didn't get married until I was 35. You know, shame me once, shame on you. Shame me twice, shame on me, is the old saying.

It took me a while to get over. That and for eight, nine, 10 years, I'm not going down that road again. I'm just going to serve God.

And I did. I went to Bible school and just served God. And so it's real.

I've experienced it. You've experienced it. The idea of people rejecting you and hurting you.

And so we avoid relationships. We avoid people. And many, many people have shallow relationships.

You look at your life and you wonder, why don't I have deep relationships with people? It's possibly because you've went through some difficult times in the area of rejection. And you are a little leery of people. And I'll tell you what, in the ministry, we need to truly get over rejection.

Because it's going to happen a lot. Thomas, you were in the ministry for many years. And it's just a part of the ministry.

It's a part of what Jesus faced on a regular basis, day to day. People were rejecting him. The second way that people respond to rejection, I'm just kind of laying a foundation here, is that they immediately reject you.

If you reject them, they will immediately reject you. You remember this in school, when I was in grade school, and it was the boyfriend-girlfriend thing going back and forth. And maybe the girl would say, I don't like you anymore.

And the boy would immediately say, well, I never liked you. You know, that was a heart saying, I'm going to reject you. And not only that, I'm going to reject you before you reject me.

I never did like you anyway. And just the heart of rejecting people that reject you. And that's one of the things that I think we see a lot of, even in church life.

Someone rejects us and we reject them back. It's just a natural response. It's not a spiritual response.

So we need to be mindful of that. And some of the ordinations that we've gone through in the past, I've seen some of those things that there's a sense maybe that the church rejected me. I didn't get ordained.

Therefore, I will reject them. And I've seen that a couple of times here in our church over the years. Not a good response to those kinds of things.

I'd like to read here an example. And this is not an example of rejection, but an example where rejection is possible here in Acts chapter one. It says, and they appointed to Joseph called Barsibas, who was surnamed Justice and Matthias.

And they prayed and said, thou Lord, which knowest the hearts of all men, show whether of these two thou has chosen, that they may take part of the ministry and apostleship from which Judas by transgression fell, that he might go to his own place. And they gave forth their lots and the lot fell upon Matthias. And he was numbered with the 11 apostles.

How do you think justice felt there? I mean, this is the early church. This is the original 12. And here you are, you're with another brother and you're a dear brother and you know, you're before the Lord.

And I don't know how all this worked out here or whether it was the way God wanted them to do it, but they cast lots and they prayed, Lord, show us which one of these two. And the lots came and Matthias, the Lord wants you. And Justice, what about me? Was there something wrong with me? You know, do the brothers not like me or is God displeased with me, you know? And so all those kinds of things can come to the heart and can cause people to be discouraged and also to have maybe some issues like I don't measure up or, you know, God doesn't accept me or I'm outside the group and I just can't find a group or be a part of the group.

And here's something I want you to realize that the devil just loves this kind of stuff and he runs with you on that one. It's called a familiar spirit. And he has been rejected, the demonic world has been rejected and they are in the same spirit and they've already been cursed.

And so when you take upon yourself the feeling of, or maybe self-pity or you're offended and you're gonna get back, they can understand your feelings exactly. They understand that. We've been rejected too and we're a familiar spirit.

And so it's not unusual for people to have real troubles if they're not careful, if they don't respond well to being rejected. Most of the issues we face regarding rejection come from our youth. You know, how we are brought up, patterns of thoughts and behavior, established by our own responses to rejection that were not proper.

You know, you can go back to your youth and I know where that started. And I know where I was first hurt and I never got over that. And I began to establish a pattern of behavior.

Whenever someone rejected me, I'd respond the same way over and over and over again. And I just became basically in bondage to rejection. And of course that's not God's will.

We're to rise up above those things and have a renewing of our mind and be responding in a Christ-like way. And so we want to be overcomers. Brother Chad read here this morning about the churches and the church at Ephesus, but every one of those churches, at the end of the letters, the Lord reminded them, I want you to be an overcomer.

He that overcometh shall inherit all things. He that overcometh shall sit with me on my throne at the right hand. He that overcometh.

It is not the will of God for us to be avoiders, to try to get away from these things, but it's his will that we would face them and that we would overcome them. And especially in this area. 1 John 5, verse 4 says, whoever is born of God overcometh the world.

That's what we're called to be, overcomers. And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. He even tells us how to do it.

It's faith that will overcome. It's not your own grit. It's not your own determination.

It's faith. It's looking to the word of God. How does faith come? Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God.

The answers to your dilemma and my dilemma are found in the word of God. And as we look to the word of God and believe it by faith and accept the truth, then we can walk in an overcoming way and be an overcomer, believing the scriptures, renewing the mind, saying, I cannot think this way anymore. This is a lie.

This is something I cannot allow into my heart. Now, overcoming rejection comes by finding out that you're accepted. It's the opposite of rejection.

It comes by embracing the truth by faith that I am accepted. You will never, never overcome and walk through life victoriously over those who are rejecting you on a regular basis unless your heart embraces the acceptance that God offers you. And here's what happens to most people.

You see it everywhere. They have not acceptance from God. Rejection hurts them.

And so they go out through their whole life trying to be men pleasers, trying to find ways to please men. I want to find acceptance from men, from people. And there's, the Bible warns oftentimes of not being a men pleaser.

So we look for acceptance in the lives of other people. And that's a bad situation because those people then control your life. Because the only way I get pleasure out of life is if I'm accepted by this person.

So I try to please them and then they're not happy with me. And so my life is in shambles. And so I look for other places where I can please people.

And so we come under the control of those people and it becomes a bondage and a slavery, acceptance. So I want to read to you here. And you're all familiar with this verse.

Ephesians chapter one says that God has predestinated us under the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will to the praise of the glory of his grace wherein he has made us accepted in the beloved in whom we have redemption through his blood the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of his grace. Now we are accepted and we have to understand this. We're accepted not on the basis of our merit.

We're accepted on the basis of his grace. That's why just sitting here this morning and I think it was brother John who mentioned the verse. Do you realize this morning, you know, Jesus came in the door.

He would look at you and say, hi friend. He said that to Judas. Hi friend, are you that accepted? Are you that accepted? I mean, do you understand that? Yeah, but I'm not perfect.

I'm not living, you know, up to the standard that the Lord has called me to. Hi friend, accepted by grace, by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. The basis for his acceptance of me is his son and what he's done for me.

And I can say amen to that. And I can find comfort in that acceptance. A few weeks ago, I read to you and taught in Romans 8. If God before us, who can be against us, right? If God has accepted you, who can reject you? Isn't that true? If God has accepted you, if the creator of everything has said, you are accepted in my family, in the beloved by the death, burial and resurrection of my son, who in the world can reject you? And that's where we all ought to be right there.

I am accepted. And all this rejection, I believe the Lord was that way. You know, Lord, how do you deal with all these people who are trying to kill you? They just try to throw you over the cliff.

You went back to your hometown in Nazareth. They wanted to kill you back there. Even your hometown is rejecting you.

How do you deal with this? How do you have joy? How do you function? Oh, he told you, I'm accepted. My father, he loves me and it's good. And we need to be there.

God's acceptance is a strong tower. The book of Psalms talks about a strong tower. The righteous can run into it when tempted with being rejected by others.

Oh, I wish we could all in this situation, you know, when we feel rejected by someone that we could respond in a Christ-like way and not either avoid or reject them back and just respond. And we'll talk about a Christ-like response here in just a little bit. Let's turn to Isaiah 53 again, if you haven't, if you've moved off that location.

Isaiah 53, it says here in verse three, he is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And we hid as it were our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed him not.

Now this whole chapter here is talking about the Lord himself, how he was rejected and how he gave up his life. And offered himself up as a sacrifice. And then you come to chapter 54.

It's a beautiful thing. If you wanna read, if you wanna get over rejection, read chapters 53 and 54, because 54 then turns to us. And because of what the Lord has done, Isaiah the prophet talks about the blessing that we have in his work.

And starting here in verse number one, he says, sing, O barren, thou that didst not bear, break forth into singing and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child. For more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, saith the Lord. And so this is a picture here of Abraham's wife, Sarah.

She was desolate. She had no children. And of course, Hagar brought a child to Abraham through an unholy means.

But God is talking here about these children, children of faith. These children are children of faith, Abraham's seed. And that's you and me, amen.

Children of faith. We have come to God through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse two, enlarge the place of thy tent and let them stretch forth the curtains of thy habitations.

You're gonna have a big family. Now, Hagar's descendants was a large group of people, but Isaac's descendants, the children of promise, that's us. It's gonna be a big family.

Enlarge the tents. Enlarge the stake of your habitation. I'm going to give you, Sarah, a big family, a spiritual family, children through Isaac.

And verse three, for thou shalt break forth on the right hand and on the left and thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles. Now here's something very important. The Gentiles and make the desolate cities to be inhabited.

The Gentiles. Now think about this for a minute. The Gentiles, they were the rejected.

You know, if you were a Gentile in the Old Testament, you have to feel rejection. God, you have chosen these Jews. And here we are, Philistines, Canaanites, all of us Gentiles, and we don't have an open door.

We are being rejected. And that's the way the Lord represents it here. Thy seed shall inherit the Gentiles and make the desolate cities to be inhabited.

Verse four, fear not, for thou shalt not be ashamed. By the way, people who struggle with rejection have a lot of fear. There's a lot of fear in their hearts.

If you have a lot of fear, the root cause of that fear may be just your feelings of rejection. You have not embraced being accepted in the beloved. And there's shame associated with it too.

For thou shalt be put to shame, for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth and shall not remember the reproach of thy widowhood anymore. Verse five, for thy maker is thy husband, the Lord of hosts is his name, and thy redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, the God of the whole earth, shall he be called. I'm going to, those of you who've been rejected, those of you who've been forsaken, I'm going to spread out my tents and I'm going to welcome you in.

And he likens it unto a wife here in verse six, for the Lord hath called thee as a woman forsaken, rejected, and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth when thou was refused, when thou was rejected. Verse seven, for a small moment have I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. And you and I actually are in the midst of that very thing right there.

Gentiles, which were rejected and felt the pain of that, are now a blessed people. We're a blessed people as Gentiles, and especially those who have come to the Lord by faith in Jesus Christ. And I'm not going to read down through this whole thing, but look down to verse 11 here.

O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest. There are people like that, probably some even here, who have not found acceptance and not comforted. Behold, I will lay thy stones with fair colors and lay thy foundations with sapphires.

And I will make thy windows of agates and thy gates of carbuncles and all the borders of pleasant stone. And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord and great shall be the peace of thy children. In righteousness shalt thou be established.

Thou shalt not be far from oppression, for thou shalt not fear. And from terror, for it shall not come near thee. Ah, there's nothing better than delivering us from fears than to know that you're accepted in the beloved.

Look down here, this is a verse that we often quote. Verse 17, no weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper. And every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn.

This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord. And so you have these Gentiles. And the Lord is saying, I know you've been rejected, but I'm going to receive you.

And I'm going to give you the sure mercies of David. And I'm going to bless you. This acceptance and faith in it is what sets us free.

It's what sets us free. I think of those early disciples, you know, it's amazing. Those disciples, if you read the book of Acts, there's a lot of things that even when we entered the book of Acts, we didn't really cover.

But in the book of Acts, these disciples, who many of them were fearful. Many of them, like Peter, had denied the Lord and in fear had shrunk before a little maiden girl who accused him of being one of the disciples of the Lord. But these individuals, when they were blessed with the Holy Spirit of God, and they found themselves in a place of acceptance with the Lord, they went forth with great courage and boldness and faced incredible rejection, just like Jesus.

I mean, they were chased everywhere and they were not liked and yet God had blessed them. No more fears, no more terrors. And all the things that was formed against them to stop them, just like the scripture says, no weapon is going to stop you.

And you look at that, the book of Acts and nothing did stop them. And they went forth with such courage and boldness because they knew they were accepted in the beloved. Let's go back here and turn to Genesis chapter four.

There's another example of this. I like the idea of, it's called the law of first mention when you study your Bible. When God mentioned something the first time, that's very important.

That's a foundation. For example, he mentions marriage. If you wanna go back and know what marriage really, his heart is, go back to Adam and Eve in Genesis.

One man, one woman for life, it's right there. But here in Genesis chapter four, you have a situation here where Adam and Eve have a couple of children. And I'm gonna start reading in verse number one.

It says, and Adam knew Eve, his wife, and she conceived and bear Cain and said, I've gotten a man from the Lord. And she again bear his brother Abel and Abel was a keeper of the sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground. And in the process of time, it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord.

And Abel, he also brought of the first things of the flock and of the fat thereof. And the Lord had respect unto Abel and to his offering, but unto Cain and to his offering, he had not respect. And Cain was very raw and his countenance fell.

Now, Cain here is not accepted. Abel has found acceptance. And here's why Cain is not accepted because he's coming to God the wrong way.

He is not coming to God on the basis of the land and the blood sacrifice, which is what the Lord desired for them. He is coming to the Lord on the basis of his own works, his own effort. And so, you know, Abel is feeling good.

In his heart, God is accepting him. Cain, like many people in the world today, and even some here this morning, maybe I just am not accepted with God. You know, I just don't have peace and acceptance.

And he's coming to the Lord here in the wrong way. Now look at verse number seven. This is the first time the word accepted is used here to a human being in the Bible.

Verse seven, if thou doest well, if you come to me on the basis of the blood sacrifice, shalt thou not be accepted? You know, Cain, I'll accept you, but you need to come to me in the right way with a blood offering. If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted. And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door.

Now you probably read that. What does that mean? Well, sin is right around the corner. Sin is just outside the door.

If we talk about that here today, if I say something is just outside the door, it means as soon as I walk out there, it's gonna get me. It's just outside the door. And the Lord is saying, listen, in your condition, sin is lying outside the door.

And then look what happens. Verse eight, and Cain talked with Abel, his brother, and it came to pass when they were in the field that Cain rose up against Abel, his brother, and slew him. Sin is just around the corner, isn't it? And in that condition, feeling rejection, not being accepted by God, bringing the wrong offering, it opened Cain wide up to sin.

And it wasn't long, probably that day or the next day, that murder, murder took place. Why did murder take place? Because Cain was not accepted by the Lord. And that brought temptation.

I read that, we sang that song here this morning, Yield Not to Temptation. And he definitely yielded to temptation, but it was because he was rejected. He was rejected.

Now, this story would have had a totally different ending if he would have found acceptance, just like Abel. I accept you. Oh, there wouldn't have been no murder.

But God knew that because his heart was in this place and he had just been rejected, he said, you better watch it. Cain, sin is right outside the door. And maybe Cain didn't believe him, but in short order, he found himself committing a horrifying sin.

And what happens with, I've seen this in my own heart and in other people's hearts, when they feel rejected, sin is lying at the door and, you know, people who are rejected are dangerous people. They're dangerous. Brother Chad mentioned it a little bit.

This morning, slander, slander. They may not murder you with a bat or a knife, but slander, sin is lying at the door. They will reject you.

They will become angry. They will separate from you. It's important to find acceptance by faith so that you can deal with feelings of rejection that will come to you in the natural course of life.

And it's a beautiful thing to be a Christian here and to understand the acceptance of the Lord and then go through life and have people reject you and reject you and reject you, and you respond in a beautiful way, beautiful way. And we'll see that here in just a little bit. But if you don't have that acceptance, your response is going to be a sinful one.

When someone rejects you, then you're going to, as God told Cain, sin is right around the corner. And in church life, I've seen that, you know, people are rejected, watch out. Here we go.

There's gonna be something happen. And I wanna get ahead of those things. I wanna get ahead of our temptations and just to remind us that let's just rejoice in the acceptance of the Lord Jesus and let him take control and the will of the Lord be done.

I wanna look at another example here. And there's a lot we could talk about there, but maybe you haven't seen this story in this light, but turn to Matthew chapter 27 once. Matthew chapter 27 is a story here of Judas.

And, you know, Cain, when he felt rejected there, he murdered his brother, Judas. Maybe you've never seen it this way, but Judas is gonna feel some deep rejections too. And he's gonna murder himself.

He's gonna kill himself here. And I'd like to look at this story and look at it maybe in a little different light here in Matthew chapter 27. It says, when the morning was come and the chief priest, verse one, and the elders of the people took counsel against Jesus to put him to death.

And when they had bound him, they led him away and delivered him to Pontius Pilate, the governor, then Judas, which had betrayed him when he saw that he was condemned. And I think in his heart, you know, he knew that Jesus was escaping all these times. He'd escaped from these people that he would just make some quick money, betray him and he'd escape.

He's seen it over and over again. And so that night he brought those people. He's gonna get out of this thing.

He probably said, yeah, see, they all fell backwards when he spoke. And I'm gonna get my money and we're gonna keep going on. Well, he was taken.

It's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, what happened here? I wasn't planning on that. And then he sees him on the cross. It's like, oh, he was condemned.

He says he repented himself. These are all good things. You know, oh, I shouldn't have done that.

I was wrong on what I did. And he brought again the 30 pieces of silver to the chief priest. That's a noble thing, wasn't it? This money, I'm gonna take it back and I'm gonna give it back to them.

I've done wrong and, you know, I've sinned. He says, I've sinned. Well, I'm gonna give it back to them.

Most of the time we see that this is great. And it is, in a sense, there's only one problem. He never found acceptance with God through Jesus Christ.

Now, look what it says in verse four, saying, I have sinned and that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, oh, we have compassion on you. We see that you're, you know, convicted and let us counsel with you and let us pray together.

They said, what is that to us? See thou to that. Now, I like to try to put myself in these people's places in a sense of it. Here, Judas has got his own little group, the disciples and Jesus.

He's been with them for three years. He's accepted in that group. He's been walking with them these three years.

And now he has done something that has caused him to be cast out of that group. And he has gone, it says here, if you look here at Matthew chapter 26, jump back to Matthew chapter 26, once in verse 14, it says, then one of the 12 called Judas Iscariot went unto the chief priests and said unto them, what will you give me? And I will deliver him unto you. And they covenanted with him for 30 pieces of silver.

Now, there's a good chance that Judas, he wanted to be a men pleaser. I want to please these chief priests and elders. They've been trying to get this individual and I can be a men pleaser.

And he went to them and said, hey, I'll do it for you. I'll deliver him up. And yes, there was some covetousness in there too.

But he's looking for ways to maybe get in with the group. Well, they reject him. And notice what it says here in chapter 27, in verse five, it says, and he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple and departed and went out and hanged himself.

Now, a lot of people think, and you may be true here, a lot of people think that he was so condemned that Jesus had died and he was a part of it that he went out and hung himself. I tend to believe that he was looking for acceptance. He came back with a broken heart and a sorrowful heart.

And when they said to him, what is that to us? You know what he did? His frustration. He says, threw those pieces of silver on the ground, and he went out and hung himself. And I truly believe that they would respond differently and not rejected him.

It may have been a different story, but he got angry and frustrated. It says he threw them. He cast down the pieces of silver in the temple and he went out and hung himself.

I don't sense as he comes to these chief priests and elders that he's thinking about maybe hanging himself. He seems to be repentant. He seems to have a sorrowful heart and maybe wants to do the right thing, but their rejection of him drove him to just throw it down and go out and end his life.

Rejection can be a dangerous thing if it's not handled properly, amen? And it certainly was in Cain's life. He murdered his brother, and it certainly was here in the life of Judas. Judas, listen to me.

If I could have talked to Judas, Judas, listen. Great, you're repenting. You want to bring this money back.

That's great. I have no doubt he was going to hand it to them. I want to bring it back.

I'm so sorry I did what I did. But Judas, listen, if you don't have acceptance with God, and if you come back there and you face rejection, Judas, your sin's lying at the door. Judas, that's a dangerous place to put yourself.

And he came back, and exactly what happened? They rejected him. What do we have to do with you? And he responded with a murder. But it wasn't his brother.

It was himself. And by the way, we just sorted it out. Suicide is murder.

It's self-murder. We shouldn't think about it or take part in anything like that. By the way, God is the one who has the power of life and death.

And when he wants you to go, he'll be able to take you himself. So he casts down these pieces in frustration. And I just want to share that with you.

I think sometimes in life, when we feel like we've been rejected, we need to be very, very careful because the Lord maybe could whisper in your ear, sin lies at the door. Sin lies at the door. And I'm not thinking we're going to commit suicide or we're going to kill somebody, but we can do other things that are damaging.

So I have no doubt in my own heart, you can disagree with me, but I feel like feelings that is rejection could have driven him to end his life. So we need to work on good responses when we face rejection. I won't draw it on the board, but if you take God's acceptance and value it at a hundred points, you got a hundred points.

That's how we ought to evaluate, probably a million points. And then over here, we have man's acceptance as one point. That's the way it ought to be in our hearts.

God's acceptance gives me a hundred points. Man's acceptance gives me one. And so when man rejects me, oh, that's okay, I've got this a hundred.

What's one, right? What's one? In the midst of this beautiful thing that I have with the Lord, I am accepted in the beloved. Needless to say, rejection ought not to. Bother us or cause us difficulty.

And that's the will of God. Jesus was so satisfied in God's acceptance that the rejection he faced had very little effect upon him. In Isaiah 53, it says this, he is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows.

This is interesting, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Oh, see Jesus, when he was rejected, he felt so sorrowful when he had such a pity party and everything was about himself. No, that's not the sorrow and the grief that he felt.

He did not feel sorrow and grief for himself, but he felt sorrow for those who rejected him. That's how his sorrow was. Oh, Jerusalem, Jerusalem.

How long would I have gathered thee together under my wings? But you would not. Says he was weeping. When he spoke those words, he looked over the city.

I have not rejected you. You have rejected me and I grieve. Oh, I wish we as Christians could be that way, amen.

Someone rejects you and it's not, poor me, poor me. But rather, I'm gonna pray for you. I love you.

I want you to be a part of my fellowship. I grieve over you. That's a Christ-like response, amen.

Someone rejects you and you ought to say, I feel for that person. Of course, truthfully, you're dead and dead people aren't affected by those things. And I feel for that person.

There's something not right in their heart. They're struggling. They responded to me that way.

I can grieve for them. You don't have to turn there. There's a number of examples of this and this is the life of Jesus.

But on the way up to the cross, you remember he was asked, Simon was asked to carry the cross. And in Luke 23, this is the account. It says, and there followed him a great company of people and of women, which also bewailed and lamented him.

But Jesus turning unto them said, daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me. Wow. Most of us would say, thank you.

Have a pity party. Don't weep for me, but weep for yourselves and your children. You know, here's a person, here's someone in our example, who though people were offending him, rejecting him, he was heading to the cross.

He still was focused on their knee and was concerned about them. Even at the last minute, father, forgive who? Them. Them.

I'm going through great difficulty and struggle, but my mind is on them. And that's a challenge for all of us. I've been hurt.

I've been offended. I've been rejected. But that's not the issue.

The issue is, how can I help them? Father, forgive them. That'd be a good place to start. Forgive them for how they have treated me.

I'm weeping, not that I've been rejected, but for what that rejection is going to bring to you. Let me close with a couple of things here. Three things to ponder regarding rejection, and I'll finish.

Number one, we must find acceptance with God. We must meditate and renew our mind and realize that, and by faith, I am accepted in the beloved. I'm accepted.

By the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, I am accepted just like Abel was when he brought the proper offering. So when you come to the Lord and say, Lord, here's the offering that I'm going to bring you, it's your son, the Lord Jesus Christ. God says, you're accepted.

Something else I want to leave with us here is this. Realize that responding to rejection well will exalt you. By the way, there's a lot of these things in the Bible, but responding to rejection well will exalt you.

Of course, Jesus is a good example of that, but how about Joseph? I love that story. Joseph, here's a man that was rejected tremendously, and he just kept smooth sailing. He had a good spirit.

Remember, they put him in jail. One of the things about Joseph, he had a good spirit. He had a good spirit about him.

He wasn't bitter. He wasn't vengeance against these people. He wasn't anything.

He was a good spirit. He gave it to the Lord, and he waited a long time, but God exalted him through that experience of rejection. And maybe, you know, as we go through the ordination and even years to come and different parts of your life, you're going to go through rejection.

You're going to face it. But like Joseph, learn to receive it because God wants to exalt you and give you a place. Did he do that with his son, Jesus Christ? Yes, he did.

He set out the right hand. Rejection is a part of the Christian experience. Learn how to deal with it.

And especially as an elder or a deacon, you know, we need to learn to say, be like Ronald Reagan was a Teflon president. You know, he'd be a Teflon elder, and people reject and reject, and it just slides off. It slides off.

And finally, realize the reward in rejection. Now, maybe we haven't thought about this. The reward that comes from rejection.

Now, this rejection has to do with us doing the right thing, but blessed are they which are persecuted for righteous sake. Blessed are you and then shall revile you and persecute you. Ah, they're rejecting you and say, oh, man, I'm going to go to hell.

Rejoice and be exceeding glad for great is your reward in heaven. For so persecuted are the prophets. Don't those prophets, you read those prophets, they were rejected.

Get out of here. We don't want to hear your preaching in Israel. They were thrown in dungeons.

Great is your reward. When people reject you, consider it a privilege. You know, I think of those disciples there in Acts.

They got a beating. They were rejected and they went away rejoicing. They were counted worthy to suffer shame for his name.

I think they had a real faith that this is the thing that Jesus had to endure. And I'm following in his steps and God is going to reward me. I know that's kind of a different way of looking about reject, looking on rejection, but when you're doing right and people are rejecting you, great is your reward in heaven.

Being rejected for Jesus' sake. And so all of us here have gone through situations. Even young people have faced this feeling of disapproval.

We don't want you around anymore. Cast you out. And how your heart responds to that is very important.

Yes, we want you to look good on the outside and dress right. But more importantly, we want you to respond right on the inside. Because those things on the inside, as you just saw with Cain and Judas, can bring some real devastation if you don't handle it well and do right.

And so as we consider here, and I didn't bring this message solely for that purpose, but as we consider ordination, I know that there will probably be feelings like, why not me? Why not our family? There'll be time, there'll be a place for you in God's work and already has a place in time for you. So let's make sure that the enemy doesn't harm any of us. Weasel himself in and give you thoughts and temptations that cause you a problem in your response.

Amen to that? So let's front run, let's get ahead of things. Just let it in the Lord's hands. And praise God for however...