Rejection
Have you ever experienced rejection? Perhaps you were rejected when you applied for a job or to do a certain course, maybe you have been rejected by friends and family. Rejection can be relatively trivial like not being chosen to play in a team or huge as when a spouse walks out saying they don’t love you anymore. Whether small or huge rejection can feel like a slap in the face. You can feel stunned and disorientated, weak, and helpless and your body may even begin to shut down making you feel paralyzed. It can be a bit like a bereavement leaving you numb. It is not a nice place to be and as human beings we do all sorts of things to avoid being rejected; moulding ourselves to others’ opinions, seeking to please, claiming to be someone we are not, keeping a low profile so we cannot be seen and therefore cannot be rejected. As human beings we have lots of mechanisms for avoiding rejection.
God knows all about rejection. We see it in our readings today. The people of Israel demand from Samuel a king like the nations around them and Samuel feels the rejection of the people. He may have taken it personally; after all he had been the person in charge of Israel for many years. But God says to him, “It is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me” 1 Samuel 8:7
Then in our gospel reading we see Jesus’ mother and brothers turn up to take him home because they thought he was out of his mind. Even his family rejected him and what he was doing!
And the teachers of the law rejected everything he was doing because they said he was from Beelzebul. They saw the amazing things he was doing and instead of giving God glory they rubbished and dismissed him.
Even Paul in his second letter to the Corinthians speaks of the rejection that could tempt him to lose heart.
The Bible is full of stories of rejection: the rejection of Hagar by Sarah & Abraham, the rejection of Esau by Jacob, the rejection of Joseph by his brothers, of David by Saul, leading to the greatest rejection of all – the death of Jesus the Messiah on the cross at Calvary. Even those words from the cross, “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?” echo in our hearts when we face rejection in our daily lives.
In Mark 3 Jesus addresses the issue of rejection. First he speaks to the teachers of the law and those who say he is possessed by Satan. These people have just seen Jesus cast out demons. The demons themselves had declared that Jesus was the Son of God, but these teachers of the law and “holy men” said that Jesus was possessed by the devil. Instead of acknowledging the Holy Spirit in Jesus they had blasphemed and said what was holy was of the devil. Jesus points out how ridiculous their comments were by saying that Satan would not drive out Satan. He proclaimed the truth of what had happened but then he went on to declare that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit would never be forgiven, that these people were guilty of an eternal sin.
Often people get worried and confused about this “sin against the Holy spirit” and wonder if they have committed it - if they might be condemned as Jesus condemns these people. We are anxious in case Jesus rejects us. Before I go further, I would like to address this question. These men had accused Jesus of being demon possessed and not filled with the Holy Spirit. They had in effect seen what was in Jesus and called it evil. This was blasphemy against the Holy Spirit. This cannot be duplicated today. The Pharisees were in a unique moment in history: they had the Law and the Prophets, they had the Holy Spirit stirring their hearts, they had the Son of God Himself standing right in front of them, and they saw with their own eyes the miracles he did. Never before in the history of the world (and never since) had so much light been granted to humankind; if anyone should have recognized Jesus for who He was, it was the teachers of the law. Yet they chose defiance. They purposely attributed the work of the Spirit to the devil, even though they knew the truth and had seen the proof. Jesus declared their wilful blindness to be unpardonable. Their blasphemy against the Holy Spirit was their final rejection of God’s grace. They had set their course; they had committed the eternal sin which could never be forgiven.
Today, people can sin against the Holy Spirit when they reject him. It is not the same sin as the teachers of the law in Mark 3 but unless we confess this sin, we face the same consequences as them. We read in John 16 that the Spirit convicts the unsaved world of sin, righteousness, and judgment. To resist that conviction and wilfully remain unrepentant is to “blaspheme” the Spirit. We can change our mind and respond to the Holy Spirit but if we continue to reject him then Jesus gives us what we want, separation from himself.
Rejection of Jesus leads to separation from him.
Next Jesus turns to the question of his family. They are embarrassed by him and want him to stop what he is doing and come home. They still love him, but they aren’t committed to his work. They want him on their terms. Mark does not say that Jesus rejected them, but he did have something to say about their relationship with him. He says, “Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother” Mark 3:35. In other words accepting Jesus and his ways makes us his family.
“Family First”, I have often heard it said. But according to Jesus this is wrong. Of course, we are called to love our families as we are called to love our neighbours but according to Jesus our first priority is to do the will of our Father as Jesus did.
There is a danger that as Christians we put lots of things before our relationship with Jesus. We don’t reject him as the teachers of the law did, but we may behave as his family did. We want to mould him in our own image, we want him to do things our way instead of seeking to do things his way. It is not unusual in church for people to believe in all that Jesus has done for them but still not seek to live as his obedient followers. Sadly, Christians often don’t look very different to other people, our values are like that of the society around us. We don’t ask Jesus what we can do for him or even how he would like us to live our lives, instead we ask him to do what we want and seek a church, friends and even a way of life that suits us and gives us what we want. It is a bit like putting the saucer on the cup rather than the other way round. It isn’t the way we were designed to work.
I want to challenge you today
- Are you a believer or a disciple? A believer acknowledges who Jesus is but a disciple seeks to live their life in obedience to him.
- Are you more interested in your biological family or in being part of the family of Christ? Jesus left home and made a new family with his disciples as he set about doing the will of his Father.
- Do you care more what others think of you than what Jesus thinks? Are you embarrassed by Jesus? Jesus’ mother and brothers were embarrassed by him.
- Do you want to look like the people around you or stand out as different because you belong to God? The people of Israel rejected God because they wanted to fit in with the people around.
Rejection is really painful. None of us enjoy being rejected and yet every day we find ourselves rejecting God in small ways. I believe that this hurts God just as much as the rejections we face hurt us.
When the people of Israel rejected God and asked for a king, God gave them a king. When the teachers of the law rejected the work of the Holy Spirit and turned their back on Jesus, he walked away and left them behind. And when his family rejected his ministry, Jesus sought others who would support him.
Rejection never starts with God.
Rejection, separation and condemnation come from the enemy. God always seeks relationship, restoration and forgiveness. He wants that with us, with you and with me. He wants us to walk closely with him, not to be embarrassed by him. He wants us to live life his way and not to be swayed by the attitudes of the people around us. And he wants us to recognise the work of the Holy Spirit and respond to him.
Some of you will like me have experienced being the last one chosen to play on a sports team. It feels like a rejection – no one wants you. Those who are going to help the team win are chosen first, then the friends of the person doing the choosing and finally the dregs (that is me). You feel unwanted, useless and rejected. I wonder if you were choosing a team in life, where Jesus would be in the line up? Is he first? Somewhere in the middle? Or an after thought just to make up the numbers?
In life we will all face rejection, whether it is in a romantic relationship, redundancy, after a job application, because we are different, or when a friendship breaks down. Some people feel rejected all their life, especially if when they are born their birth mother abandons them. But God our Father never abandons us. When we face those moments of rejection, we can turn to him. He has promised he will never leave us or forsake us. The world will let us down, turn its back on us or simply be too busy to give us any attention.
We have a choice. To reject God as the people of Israel and the teachers of the law did or to commit ourselves to following him, to doing his will and thus knowing his deep love. When life is challenging and we feel like we do not belong Paul suggests in 2 Corinthians 4:18 that We fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
I sense that there are people listening who feel distant from God. Perhaps you once felt close and you knew yourself loved by him, accepted, forgiven and part of his plan, or perhaps you have always felt this distance. I want to encourage you to examine yourself and see if there are moments where you are more interested in being liked and accepted by those around you, where you have dismissed God’s work in your life, where you have been embarrassed to be known as a Christian, where you have placed Christ at the bottom of your priorities, or where you have refused to do his will. If this is the case you may not have rejected God but you have certainly been holding him at a distance. It we repent of these things we may know the truth of James 4:8 Come near to God and he will come near to you.
- God knows all about rejection.
- Rejection of Jesus leads to separation from God.
- Rejection never starts with God.
- Jesus was rejected by men so we could be accepted by God.
- We have a choice to draw near to God or to hold him at arm’s length.
I am going to leave a brief silence for you to think about what you have heard and then I will pray the prayer of Richard of Chichester.
Thanks be to you, our Lord Jesus Christ,
for all the benefits which you have given us,
for all the pains and insults which you have borne for us.
Most merciful Redeemer, Friend and Brother,
may we know you more clearly,
love you more dearly,
and follow you more nearly,
day by day.
Amen.