Three

Today I started off with a thankful heart. Things I am thankful for: (in no particular order)
1. Waking up this morning at home.
2. Love
3. Baby Girl
4. Friends
5. Clean clothes
6. Telephones
7. Eggs for breakfast
8. Asthma Inhalers
9. Running
10. Prayer
Of course this list could go on, and it will in the days to come. Today I am thinking about a single word, rejection. At some time of our lives every one of us has been rejected by something. Maybe it was an application for employment, or an invitation for a date didn’t happen, or a spouse decided they didn’t want to spend the rest of their life with you; your credit card might have been rejected due to lack of payment. In my extraordinary life I will not always like rejection, but I will try my best to seek God and his wisdom in why I was rejected.
This morning I am going to attend Logos Church with Pastor David Anderson. Pastor Anderson had experienced a big rejection a few weeks ago at Southside Baptist Church. I had been visiting there. Southside Baptist was the church I attended when I first moved back to Dothan. They had a wonderful singles group under the direction of June Kilgore.
I grew in that singles group, and they were my support group. I am not divorced, so joining the singles group was not what I intended, I just wanted to be in a place that felt like home. Home for me is where there are people who love you. I needed some love so I went to visit Jesus, in his house and that house at the time was Southside Baptist Church. I have a membership with another church, but I woke up late and I wouldn’t have made it to the church where I have a membership and so instead I pulled into the parking lot at Southside and I sang praises to the Lord, I read bible passages with a congregation (the same passages I had been reading alone in the book of Psalms) I
visited with friends I have not seen in a long time. I head the pastor, David Anderson give a message and I experienced God not rejecting me while I was there. Over the next few weeks I returned for services.
Two Sundays ago I went to Southside and there was not a choir, there was not a pastor, there was not an assistant pastor, in fact the bulletin printed did not have a single staff member listed. I looked into the congregation for some of the familiar faces that had been in the choir, and many were missing. Service only lasted about 30 minutes.

Remember I was only visiting, but during the time we greet one another, I was informed that Pastor Anderson was voted out of the church as pastor. The whole staff resigned.
Extraordinary

Monday morning I got on Facebook (the social networking website) and sent a message to Trent, (he and his wife Robyn had been in the choir) He replied and told me where they has service and the times for the next meeting.
A pastor rejected? I know pastors come and go through churches, but to be voted out by the congregation is scandalous.

Rejection. I have been experiencing rejection in my personal life with my daughter and my husband. I too, relocated; I too am seeking that place of higher ground. Sometimes God is the one that put that big “rejection” stamp on some area of our lives.
1 Peter 2:11
“Dear friends, I urge you, as aliens and strangers in the world, to abstain from sinful desires, which wage war against your soul.”

1 John 5:4 “For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even in our faith.” God is working in my life to put me a trust in me for me to go where he is pointing. Can God use this pain from rejection? Yes, this pain will be something I will never forget, I think that God won’t let me forget it, life will not be pain free, but when you are removed from a person or circumstance that pain is there for a reason. It is to keep us from being tempted to go back.
I’m not saying that relationships can’t be repaired; I am saying that God wants whatever happened for the rejection to happen is what God wants to change.
I am seeking God for knowledge I admit I am displaced in my life right now. A pastor and a whole group of people that chose to follow him are displaced. I am going to be a part of that group of people.
Psalm 40:8 “ I desire to do your will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”
Pastor Anderson preached last Sunday about his direction for the new Logos church to be a New Testament church. He said the whole New Testament in the bible is about Faith.
The book of Romans has a lot of guidelines about faith.
Romans 10:17
“Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.”
I am going to hear Pastor Anderson preach the word this morning. I need to be in bible study. I am going to follow God’s call to witness. Jesus Christ wants us to confess.
Eph. 6: 19-20
“Pray also for me, that whenever I open my mouth, words may be given me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel. For which I am an ambassador in chains. Pray that I may declare it fearlessly, as I should.”

Paul didn’t ask for a change of circumstances, he asked to be used right where he was. I want to have a heart like Paul. I’m seeking God’s will to accomplish his plan in any and all circumstances of my extraordinary life.
I am to put myself in a position to trust God. Yesterday I spent the day with a friend that experienced rejection. I hope that I was there for her and we had some laughs about her rejection (she got stood up) She is in a lot of pain because of the relationship she is in. I pray for God to be at work in her life and that she can seek God and corner her faith.
Matthew 4 Jesus was in the desert. He was there to establish his stronghold to God.
It is times when the Devil is near taunting us that we follow Jesus’ example and when those crazy times of rejection, despair, temptation, defeat, and all those negative things that the devil can bring, that is when we look, seek and find God.

Mathew 4:10
Jesus said unto him, Away from me Satan! For it is written, “worship the Lord your God and serve him only.”

I am going to have a heart for thanksgiving today. I am going to Logos Baptist Church and worship with a group of rejected believers and hear the word of God.

I pray for Logos Baptist church, Pastor Anderson, my friend and others that have recently experienced rejection, I pray for them to feel a calling to the Lord and all of us can be on this journey of faith.

Is there some area that you are struggling with? Is there a problem you need resolved? Were you rejected and don’t know which direction to go in? Answers will not just appear, but if you and I were sitting together and I listened to your problem, as in the case of my friend I do not know how to change the circumstances of her situation, but if she was here right now, I would say to her, “I know of your circumstance, I am your friend, you asked for closure for the situation in your life that is causing you pain, and think we can believe God for that.”

Sometimes we cannot stay in that low place that rejection puts us.
Psalm 61:2
“From the ends of the Earth I call to you, I call as my heart grows faint; lead me to the rock that is higher than I.”

Amen