Rejection

Rejection. Something I really never have thought a lot about...until the past couple of months. I have had rejection in my life. Mainly at the hand of friends in my pre-teen and teen years. It was hurtful at the time, and in that moment may have felt like the end of the world. But it was not the deep rejection that I have found myself wrestling with over the past little bit. In dealing with adopted children over the past 9 years, I have come to learn a very important lesson: they do not come into your home appreciating all you have rescued them from! That may sound like a "duh" statement, but really, I have seen so many parents who bring children home - especially older children - expecting them to be grateful on some level for what they are doing for them. I knew not to expect gratitude. But in the day to day life of living out parenting a new-teen that has a history of major rejection and pain, I find myself falling into this thought pattern! Why do you not appreciate what you have knowing what you came from? Why do you not love us for what we are giving you? Why do you not just lap up my love instead of fighting against it? As God always does, He is using the parenting of my newest daughter to teach me more about Him and refine me! As I parent her and love her in my flesh, God is revealing a LOT of FLESH that is in me! I don't like it! Parenting my newest daughter has brought out rejection in my own life. It has brought to light a signifcant relationship that I have hit a road block in because of the rejection it has brought. In some ways I am thankful because it is giving me a glimpse of what my daughter is having to go through. It is showing me some of the pain and fear that she is having to overcome to love me. The same fear I have of letting this person into my heart and trusting this person to not break my heart is the same fear and pain she feels as she struggles to allow herself to love me and accept my love. This really came to light this morning as I sought out guidance in the area of rejection. One of my favorite tools for fighting spiritual battles in my life is Beth Moore's Praying God's Word. I've used it alot lately! Concerning rejection, she says, "Rejection in and of itself is not a stronghold. Our reaction to rejection determines whether we become bound by it...How do you overcome rejection? By applying large doses of God's love to your wounded heart daily and by allowing Him to renew your mind until the rejected thinks like the accepted." So that's what I am doing! As I prayed through the scripture prayers Beth has in this section, a certain scripture pierced my heart. Isaiah 49: 15 says, "Can a woman foget her nursing cihld and have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may foget, but I will not forget you." It hit me two ways. First, I have children who I birthed and nursed. That is a bond that is like none other! No wonder God uses it to speak to His people! Yet there are women in this world because we live in a fallen world who because of their own hurts or circumstances do not have that bond! I am parenting some of those children. It creates a spiritual and emotional void, a pain like no other. While I have four children who might fall into this category, my oldest experienced it on a level the others did not for a time frame they did not. The wound is deep. The rejection real. The pain almost unbearable. Her mother forgot her. She forgot her long before she was removed from her. "Forgot" in the sense of not caring for, not loving, not nurturing, not making feel like the precious gift of God she is! Rejected. Fast forward 15 years. Now this new woman wears the title "mother". Guess what?! It's not a warm fuzzy title for this wounded child! It is a name associated with pain, hurt, despair, failure: REJECTION. Over the past few weeks, it has become evident that the feelings of my daughter for her birth mother are being projected onto me in a huge way! It hurts! I wish I could say I have responded with love and grace and mercy. Sometimes I have, but most of the time, I have recoiled. I have not lashed out, but I have withdrawn. Why? Well, because I am dealing with my own feelings of rejection in another relationship in my life. Her rejection hurts. I don't want to hurt. So my defense mechanism goes into play...withdraw. Oh what a mess! The enemy says I wasn't stable enough to adopt this precious one. The enemy says I should have gotten my act together first. The enemy says I made a mistake. The enemy says give her back. But God says, I want to use her rejection to bring yours to light and your rejection to heal hers! How do I figure that? Because Psalm 118 tells me that the stone the builders rejected became the chief corner stone! What the enemy means for evil, God will not only use for good, but will build a whole new life, a whole new work of God on it! Just like He did Jesus! In fact, this verse from Psalm 118 is repeated 7 (the perfect number!) in the New Testament as reference to Jesus and in Ephesians 2:20, it spells it out for us in case we have missed the inference: "Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone." Does this diminish my pain of the rejection in my significant relationship? No. Does it diminish the pain of the rejection of my precious daughter by her first mother? No. But what it does is give hope! It tells the enemy to SHUT UP! It tells me and my precious daughter that there is healing. BUT (and here is where so many adoptive parents get stuck) it does mean I have to keep my focus on Christ! I have to walk through this! I have to deal with MY issue of rejection in order to help walk her through hers. If I don't choose to do that, then the rejection I feel from my daughter will continue to make me recoil. It will continue to make me withdraw never allowing me to be the picture of Christ and His reconciliation for my daughter that He offers her and me! I am called to be light in darkness....and for now that means right here in my own home! I am called to tell the next generation of His goodness...and that starts with my children! God did not place this child of His in my home to put a roof over her head and food in her tummy...she had that where she was! He brought her here to teach her of His love and His goodness. He brought her here to teach her of His ways so that she will be ready for the good works He has prepared in advance for her to do. He brought her here because He needs us to train her up in the way she should go....unfortunatly for her and us, we are in serious boot camp since we got a late start! But God will redeem that! He promises He will! So what now? Great revelation, but what does it mean for day to day life and getting to the other side of rejection? For me, it means acknowleding my feelings of rejection instead of stuffing them down and pretending they don't exist. Then taking those feelings and applying Romans 8 - I am an heir of God and fellow heir with Christ! Romans goes on to say that I suffer with Him (He suffered the ultimate rejection on every level!) so that I may also be glorified with Him. And even more exciting, Paul goes on to say that the sufferings of my today are not worthy to be compared to the glory that is to be revealed to us! If I will get a kingdom perspective instead of getting bogged down in feelings, emotions, circumstances, then I will push through this, learn even more about the character of God and in the mean time walk my daughter through her rejection and hopefully teach her something more about the character of God as well! Even as I write it, the battle in my mind rages. Choosing the kingdom perspective means letting go of my "right" to my pain that has been caused me by another. I don't want to do that. Period. But if I am going to call myself a Chrsitian and walk this path God has laid out for me, I must. Just like Christ laid down all His rights to go to the cross for me, I must now lay down my rights and walk the kingdom road for Him! The practicality of that is going to mean a daily if not hourly battle of putting on my armor. I have started writing scriptures that speak to me about God's love for me, my position in Him, my abilities in Him on index cards. I will have to keep those with me. I will have to be disciplined to pull them out when the rejection creeps back in. I will have to read them and let the balm of God's word heal my wounds as I walk this path. I am just in a season where I literally rely on God and His word for every breath that I take! The pain of this relationship threatans to overtake me just about every hour of every day. The enemy would love nothing more! But I can't let that happen! My prayer is that God returns to me the joy of my salvation and renews a steadfast spirit with in me! I have been a boat on a wave tossed back and forth for the past few weeks, maybe even months. I am looking to the one who spoke and the waves stopped to calm my sea and set my boat on His course - making me steadfast! And I am having to trust that not only is He able, but that He will! I was there once! I know the feeling of "walking on water" in the sense of seeing the circumstances around me but believing God and walking by faith instead of what I see around me. I lost that somewhere. I'm ready to get it back! My children require that I get it back! My life requires that I get it back! Here we go! One breath at a time...breathing in and breathing out...

God's Perspective of Pain and Death

Thank you for all the encouraging comments and e-mails about the struggles with my family on our adoption! It really helps just to know others understand! I wish it wasn't so common a problem, but it is.

I had a great time with God this morning on just this issue. I am doing a Bible study that has a lot of self-reflection in it....YUCK! But it is good to dig up my issues and deal with them! This Bible study talks a lot about life and death..not literally, but more emotionally and physically. Death being the things that we see in our lives that cause pain and life being the things in our lives that bring happiness and joy. Of course, our human nature is to avoid all things that bring pain! But as I read in Romans this morning (a scripture I have read many times), I saw that God has such a different perspective of pain and death than I do! Melissa Haas says, "Love may be the universal language, but pain is the universal motivator.....Pain can be a good teacher and a tool in the Redeemer's hands for our good."

Let me make a distinction here. There are two kinds of pain and death as a Christian. One is a pain and death that I experience when I sin. When I turn my back to God and walk in a way that is not pleasing to him, then I will experience pain. The Bible clearly states that sin is death. The pain I experience in these times is a result of something I have done and is meant to turn me around and walk the other way....towards God. This is the same concept I use to discipline my children. If they do not follow my directions, there is a consequence that I hope is painful (not necessarily physically!) enough to keep them from doing that action again. But there is another pain in my Christian walk. There is a pain that God allows to refine who I am. To teach me to lean on Him more and more. It is the result of no negligence or ill doing of my own. This type of pain is the most difficult for me. Coming from a legalistic background, I have a core belief (a false belief by the way) that all pain is a result of my negligence in some way or another. If I am hurting it is because I did something that God disagreed with. If I am happy, then I must be right in the middle of God's will. Romans 6:14 dispels this false belief: "for you are not under the law but under grace."

As I have gone through life over the past 10 years, I have tried to avoid pain/death at all costs..natural, right? Yet not possible in the life of a Christ follower seeking to grow. God makes it clear in Romans 6 that death/pain brought about in the pursuit of God is in fact LIFE! .....therefore we have been buried...in order that as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we might walk in newness of life.....if we become united with Him in death, certainly we will also be in the likeness of His resurrection....if we have died with Christ, we believe that we should also live with him.... so to there is no way to avoid pain altogether. The only pain/death I should purposely avoid is that caused by sin.

My problem with that is my core belief that pain means I have done something wrong. So when I decide to adopt a little boy from Africa and my family and even some friends make it clear they believe this is a irresponsible, plain stupid thing to do, I immediately question my own motives and start thinking I must be doing something wrong! But according to those scriptures in Romans, I am just experiencing death with Christ in order to share in His life! The life that this world will NEVER understand....they can't! I must realize at these times that the pain is not from my own actions, but from God refining me and run to Him to hide under His wings and to cling to Him just like my kids cling to me when they are scared! To align myself with Him...to find my security, satisfaction, joy in Him.

Boy that is so easy to see and to type, but oh so hard to do! When my parents react the way they do to me leaving my three to go get the one, I immediately feel like a worthless parent, I questions all my motives and fear raises up in me that the three will have to suffer way too much for the one. But the truth is that Matthew 18:12 says that a good shepherd will leave the 99 on the hill to go find the ONE that wandered off. And the truth is I would leave any number of my children to go find whichever ONE needs me! And that is what makes a good parent.

So this has to mean that the pain of my parent's/friends reactions is a pain that God is using to motivate me to draw closer to Him, to know Him more, to find rest, peace and joy in HIM! More of Him and less of me!

So my prayer this morning is that God would give me HIS perspective on pain and death! That I would willingly be crucified so that I can be raised with Him. That he would give me the wisdom to know when pain is a result of sin and when pain is just a result of Him growing me.