Joyce Meyer - Rejecting Rejection - Part 2

Ginger Stache: Hey, everyone. Welcome to, "Enjoying everyday life". Yesterday, on the program, Joyce began sharing a podcast that we recorded with her and our friends, including Chris Caine, and it's been so powerful. Today, we finish that up. You see, we've all experienced rejection in our lives, at some point, and it's very difficult. But sometimes, there is a root of rejection, that digs down into our hearts, and God knows the right timing to deal with that. That could be today, for you. That's our prayer. So, as we continue with part two of Joyce Meyer's Talk It Out podcast, today, on rejection, we're praying for great things for you. Now, let's join Joyce, and all of our friends, as we talk about this challenging topic.

Joyce Meyer: I remember reading in a book years ago, and it really ministered to me at the time and it's kind of what you're talkin' about. It said, "Someday, you'll realize that what you thought was your greatest enemy was your best friend". And that's so true. You know, I look back now, and all the hard, so hard, hard, hard things that I went through that were rejection, they brought me closer to God. I mean, I was forced. It's either God or nobody. And I remember one day saying, "Well, God, I just don't have anybody but you". He said, "Oh, poor, Joyce, you're just stuck with God".

Ginger Stache: You're stuck with the Creator of the universe.

Joyce Meyer: "Poor me, I don't have anybody, but God, the king of the universe". And that doesn't mean that I don't want friends or need friends, I do. But I'm glad that I don't have to have that to function. And I think that's what you're talkin' about, and I think it's such a great point to bring out. Because so many things, they get started, especially, on social media, and they get started as... Yes, we do need people and it is great to have a group. But then, all of a sudden, now, if that goes too far and now, I have to have that to be happy, or if I don't have that because God's got some specialized purpose for me, I don't have that, then I feel like there's something wrong with me, then it's gotten out of balance.

Christine Caine: Oh, absolutely. And I think Jesus, throughout his life, like, I am really concerned about all this language about tribes and groups, and whatever, now. Because it's like we're trying to replace, it's just another form of replace, and those people, will inevitably let you down. I mean, every one of the disciples, where were they when Jesus was hanging on the cross? I don't think anyone was there.

Joyce Meyer: His tribe left.

Christine Caine: His tribe left.

Joyce Meyer: That's kind of what happened to me, my tribe all left.

Christine Caine: And so, even throughout his life, he constantly had, well, lots of times where he left his tribe to be just with the father, or took a couple from his tribe with him. So, there are always... We just got to be careful. And I know it takes time, because nobody wants to be rejected, that's the whole thing. But sometimes it's not even the other person's problem. It's that we were looking to them for something that we could only ever get from God. And I'm not saying this is easy. Like, I'm not saying this is easy. But you won't know that you're only going to get it from God until you don't get it from them. And there are two sides to that. Sometimes, you set yourself up, I think though, for unnecessary rejection. Because you don't need to put yourself out there. I think sometimes, what I watch on socials and I'm like, "Oh, man, you're just desperately trying to get on that account, or have that", and you're setting yourself up for a rejection because God actually never meant you to be in that place. Or sometimes, it reveals that we're chasing something that we were never meant to chase. If we go, "I feel rejected from: I didn't get that job, or I didn't get that promotion, or I didn't get that gig, I didn't get", whatever it might be: but maybe, you weren't actually rejected. You were not ever supposed to have that place. And so, it can all get like, a little bit messy is what I'm trying to say, in the midst of all of that. And unless, you have that place with the Lord, where ultimately, your acceptance is in him, and it sounds grandiose... And I'm thinking of people that would be listening to this now, that have gone through a marriage failure, or a friendship failure or their parent didn't want them: if we live in a world where we don't give people hope in Christ, and to say, you actually can be healed and whole, then we've got nothing more to offer than the world. Because in our current culture, and I am all about trauma therapy, and I'm all about things need to be called out, but I'm also all about Jesus can heal you, and Jesus can meet you in that place of brokenness, and Jesus can heal that place of rejection. But it's almost like we keep going around this cycle in current culture that almost says, "Okay, I can", I'll use my example, when my mother left me in a hospital, and then I was abused, and then I was rejected in my workplace, and then I was rejected by some people in my church, and then I didn't get that opportunity, and I could now be 55 not doing what God's called me to do, because I'm still sitting here blaming, all of those rejection. Were any of them, right? No. Could all of them taken me out? Yes. But what did my Savior come for? I mean, this is what I feel like the message to this generation is, is that we are so over-identifying, with some things that we go, "I can recognize it, but there is an enemy. At the end of the day, it really wasn't even that person, there is an enemy that wants to steal, kill, and destroy my purpose. Jesus came that I might have life, and life more abundantly, and to destroy the works of the enemy. So, I can walk in victory, despite the rejection that I encounter this side of eternity". And that's a message, thank God for you, 'cuz you're preaching it. But that's a message that's not being spoken about a lot. It's more like, "Let me list all the ways I've been rejected, let me blame that," and then it's almost like, "I can do nothing about it". That's destructive, I think.

Ginger Stache: That's why it really does come down to, you have to have that foundation, you have to have something to trust in, to hold onto that is outside of yourself, that's outside of people. We're talking about rejecting, rejection, right? How to not let it get those deep roots. But there are those people who have no familiarity with who they are in Christ, their value in Christ. They may even feel rejected by Christ. So, let's talk about that a little. How do we get that foundation, that no matter what somebody does to me, I can come back here where I'm accepted and loved and always, well, will never, ever be rejected. How about that?

Jai: In some of my darkest times, I honestly, I went real basic, right? Because I do have my people now, but I don't need them all the time. You know, I'll reach out and sometimes, I'll say, "Hey, pray". I don't necessarily need to tell them everything. And that's the thing, I've redefined what that relationship is and what I need. And I think that's the difference from when I was younger and just wanted besties to tell all my business with, and cackle with. Like, I don't need that anymore, I need folks that'll pray. Because my healing through this process has, I believe, has been almost hyper sped, because my people, point me to him. My people point me to Jesus. Like, and so, honestly, the simplest thing that I do, a lot of times when I feel that rejection, I just start singing the old song, "Yes, Jesus loves me". Because it's really, it's just so simple. It's so simple. But I'm like, "If they don't like me, if they don't love me, Jesus loves me". And that's hard because it hurts when you get rejected by people that you trusted, or people that you loved, or that you thought like, even the affair that happened was with a friend, you know, so it was a double betrayal for me. But I had to be like, "God, bless them. Jesus, you know you love me". But I do start singing that song, "Yes, Jesus, loves me". Back to the basics of what I learned in Sunday school. "Because the Bible tells me so". And so, it's simple, but it's away...

Christine Caine: And we've got jehra, now. We can sing that.

Jai: We can sing that.

Erin Cluley: : That's a good one. Last year, when I went through some rejection. I could feel myself, swooping down to that eighth-grade girl, I don't like where she goes. So, when I feel going to that place, my first thing too, is to run to my Bible. Like, I could not get there, faster. I put the kids to bed, and I went straight to the word and I cried, but I journaled, and I wrote down those same things. "I am fearfully and wonderfully made. I am chosen. I am loved. I am wanted". And looking up those scriptures. Basic, but I could not get to that word fast enough just to bury myself there.

Joyce Meyer: Well, and see, you've learned that through having to learn that.

Erin Cluley: : Yes, yeah, that's so true.

Joyce Meyer: And I think to answer your question, "How do we get there to where we have that foundation in Christ"? I don't mean to sound like I'm just, you know, all for pain, but I think sometimes, you have to come to a crisis point in your life. It's like, most of us are not gonna give it up until it's stripped away from us. And then you're at a crisis point. You have one, of two things to do: you're going to either go to Christ and make him your number one friend, or you're going to be bitter and resentful, and have a chip on your shoulder, all your life, and you're going to have a lousy, stinking, miserable life. It's up to you.

Erin Cluley: : I think some of the most beautiful moments I've ever had with Jesus is because of the pain, I experienced. Because of that rejection, in that moment, I chose him. And so, I have never had such a sweeter time than in those moments with him, where he spoke to me in a way that only he knew what I was experiencing. And had I gone the other way: I would have missed it.

Joyce Meyer: Okay, this is really going to sound crazy. When God was dealing with me so strongly for, I don't know, it was probably five or six years. I mean, I just felt like it was just one thing, after another, after another, after another, I just felt like I was hurting all the time. When God got done with some of the stuff he was doing, and I didn't have that so much anymore, I actually missed that pain.

Erin Cluley: : I totally get that.

Joyce Meyer: Because that...

Ginger Stache: It seemed normal?

Joyce Meyer: Well, no, I think it became like something, I knew it was God working in me, and it just became something that I loved knowing that he cared enough about me to not leave me the way I was.

Erin Cluley: : And you experienced the nearness of God so much.

Joyce Meyer: Yeah, but to work, yeah, and I actually got to the point where I missed it. It's like, "Isn't there anything wrong with me anymore"? Oh yeah, plenty. But...

Ginger Stache: No, that's huge. That says so much.

Joyce Meyer: Probably some people are at home going, "What is she talking about"?

Ginger Stache: It says so much about who God is and how much he loves you, that he can do that in our life, because you're right on the surface, uh-uh, nobody wants that. I've made the mistake of feeling rejected by God at times because of the things that have happened in my life. You know, blaming him for it, and thinking, "Why are you letting this happen? Do you not love me"? And even through that pushing through it and realizing that he's still there, waiting for me to come back after I threw a little childish fit at him. But he's still there, loving me. So, then, you realize, "Okay, even when I thought these things that were so wrong, that God is still right there. I can come back, I can turn to him, and he still wants to put his hand on the back of my hair, and say, 'i love you, lay your head down right here. I'm not mad at you'". That's been huge for me.

Christine Caine: And I would say that's huge for a lot of people that in many, many ways, our whole view of God, and you don't know, you've got it. But you hold this offense at God because say someone betrayed you, or someone did something. You've so... And I think, I often think back to when I was being abused, you kind of think, "Well, if you are a good God, you could have stopped that". And so the same with rejection. "If you are a good God, my husband wouldn't of had an affair, or you know, you could have stopped those things". And I think people listening to this, sometimes we don't want to say it out loud, because, I mean, it's a serious thing. But we've all been there. So, this might help set someone free. And I went through a season, as I was going through, yet another layer of healing through rejection, where I had to go, "Okay, Chris what is it that you believe about God"? And I had to own the fact that I thought, "I do believe you love everyone else. I just don't think you must really love... There must be something wrong with me because you allowed these things to happen". And there's several scriptures. But I would write them down. But not about even God's love for me, but about the nature of God. So, you know, where it says that "God is light. And in him, there is no darkness". Now, I had to sit with that for months until I got it into my heart, "God has no dark side". So he's not up there, letting people reject me or hurt me, because, you know, somehow there's something so fundamentally wrong with me, that I need to be abused, or hurt, or rejected. But to even work on that and go, "Okay, no matter what that person did to me, or said about me, or did, Christine, you've gotta believe that God is light, and in him, God has no dark side. So, there's nothing in him. That's gonna want to hurt you". Or Psalm 119, "God is good, and God does good". And I would write these things down and go, "So Chris, what is it that you believe about God"? And I had to untangle some of my... And I don't know whether it was rejection at birth, or abuse, or just life, or social media where you believe a bunch of lies. You act them out through people, like you take it out, "You rejected me, you hurt me," but this is the bottom, because you're not gonna go to a God to get acceptance, if you don't believe that God is actually good, or if you don't believe that... Do you know what I'm saying?

Joyce Meyer: Oh yeah, I know exactly what you're saying. So, now you want me to finish what you're saying.

Ginger Stache: Tag team.

Joyce Meyer: I think one of the biggest mistakes that people make, and this relates to what you're saying is we always equate pain as being bad. And it's not. You know, many times it's an act of love. Now, God doesn't make people mean so they'll hurt us, but he will use them to make you better. So, that's why as stupid as it sounds, I can say, now, "I'm not really sorry that I was sexually abused by my dad. Because it's made me who I am". And so, I realize now, I mean, I prayed for my dad to die. I prayed for my mother to leave him. I mean, I prayed for God to get me out of that situation. And of course, I had to come to the point of saying, "Well, why didn't you"? You know, "You could have". You know, "Why do you let somebody that mean, live that long and hurt that many people"? You know, well, God didn't get me out of it. But actually, he did something greater, he brought me through it, and a strong person, that could do what I've done all these years. And I think, what I've I realized even with my own kids, I had a hard time letting my kids suffer, because I went through so much. And so, I'm very guilty of having delivered them from things that I should have backed off, and let them go through. And we think love is to always deliver people from anything that hurts. But it really, it's not. I mean, I was listening to a preacher this morning and he said, "If you love me, and you see me sliding in the wrong direction, and you don't get in my face and confront me, then you do not love me". You know, we have to be willing sometimes, to let people go through things, or they'll never get free. We just keep enabling them to do the same thing over, and over, and over. So, the thing is, I think an answer to your question, "God, why do you let this happen, why do you let this happen"? All pain is not bad. I mean, some of the pain that you went through even in situations that I'm aware of, that I went through similar situations and, you know, we think, "God, why after what I went through as a kid, why are you letting this happen to me now". But like you said before, we're trying to get something from those people that only God can give us. And so, I remember a situation, and to me, this explains it. A woman that used to come to my meetings, somebody told me that she was really hurt because I never spoke to her. And I went to God, and I said, "I don't want to hurt her. Well, I don't even remember seeing her". And God said, "I hid her from you because I didn't want her to get from you, what she needed to come to me and get".

Ladies: wow.

Joyce Meyer: And so, how many times is God, you know, we want somebody, "Do this for me, be nice to me, tell me what to do, show me what to do". And God's saying, "Nope, they're gonna have to go through this in order to get it from me". So, we're going a little deep here, I don't know...

Ginger Stache: This is good stuff.

Joyce Meyer: If people are losing us or staying with us.

Ginger Stache: This is such good stuff. You gotta go deep to fix this. You know, you have to go deep to pull those roots of rejection out.

Joyce Meyer: And like Chris said, you have to know, I mean that, you know that you know, that God is good and that he loves you. And I trust him and he's not gonna let anything happen to me, that is gonna ultimately, be to my detriment. I may hurt and go through some things, but if he's allowing that, it's for the purpose of getting to something in my life, that I am totally blind to that he wants to get in there and heal and make well.

Jai: I remember feeling so rejected by God during the beginning stages of what I was going through. And I was like, "God how could you allow that to happen"? And he really went through a whole scenario like, "Didn't you allow your daughter to do something that you really didn't agree with, but you allowed her to do something"? And I was like, "I did". He's like, "I have free will for him and I can't go against that for him as well". And so then, I saw this vision of God like, almost pulling my ex-husband's shirt when he was going. Like, I got this like, visual of him, like, pulling his shirt, like, to not go certain places. And he's like, "I wanted him to stop". And that just blessed me. And then, immediately, following that I listened to a sermon about when the disciples were in the boat and it was rocking, and they were going through the storm. And they were upset with Jesus because they were like, "You're on a pillow". I don't know where he got the pillow from. He was on a pillow.

Ginger Stache: It was a boat pillow.

Jai: He had a boat pillow and he was knocked out during the storm. And the thing that got me, that it just resonated with me, they were just like, "Do you care about us"? Like, they actually ask him like, "Do you even care"? And so, I just remember that feeling of rejection that I had with God. 'cuz I was like, "Me and God, we beefing right now," like, my friends would ask me. Like, "We're going through it". But then, he loved me, his kindness and he loved me so much through it that, that tension, that moment of me being honest with him, has just drawn me so much closer to him. And because I needed that isolation, and that's why 2020 was actually, kind of good for me. And at the time, I even, I resigned from my ministry job. I just stepped away for a minute just because I needed to not do all the time. I didn't need to like, lead people into worship. Honey, I need to worship my own bathroom, and cry, you know? And just connect with God. And so, 2020 was bad in a lot of ways, but it was good for me because it isolated me spiritually, too. So, that I can reconnect with God and not rely on community groups, small groups, this group, that group. I'm not saying those are bad because I love 'em. But I'm saying, I didn't thrive off of running things through them. I had to go connect to God.

Joyce Meyer: You said something that's really important. I want to make sure that our viewing audience doesn't miss. You said that God wouldn't go against his free will, your husband's free will. Even though what he was doing was wrong and bad and you were praying for it to change, and something that has really helped me is to learn that anytime we're praying for somebody else, to do or not to do something, we have to remember that God's not gonna go against their free will to answer our prayer.

Jai: Yeah, that's what he said, yeah.

Joyce Meyer: And so, you know, just because I pray for this person to change and they don't change, or I pray for them to do something and they don't do it, that doesn't mean that God's not God. It doesn't mean he wants me to keep going through that. But it just means he's not gonna make that person, make me feel good. That's why you got to know how to... And you know, I mean, I know, that I know, that I know, Jai, even though what you went through, was pure hell, you will be a much better person when you come out on the other side of this. And you're just about there. But you're gonna be stronger. You'll be better. You'll be more sensitive to other people's pain. You know, you're gonna know things about God you didn't know before. And God doesn't do bad things, but he does work all things out for our good, if we love him and trust him.

Ginger Stache: I think there are so many people, right now, who are going to have a complete change in their life, a revelation, through something that was said, through what Joyce, just said to Jai, whatever it may be, but I really believe some of those roots are coming out today. So, thank you all so much.

Joyce Meyer: Well, we need to pray for people.

Ginger Stache: I love that, absolutely.

Joyce Meyer: Father, we pray for everybody watching today and, yes, they can be helped by what we've said, but you're the only one now, that can take them and take this, and do what you want to do with it in their life. And so, I pray that every person would be really open to you, and just pray that prayer, "God, do whatever you need to do in my life, even if it hurts, and change me, and make me what you want me to be". And I pray that nobody who's hearing or watching this, who is convicted by it and knows that there's something they need to deal with, will just push it down one more time, and try to ignore it: let this be the time that they say, "No more trips around the mountain, God. I want to be free," in Jesus' name, amen.

Ginger Stache: Thank you all very much. And today, you've been hurt, you've been rejected, but hold on to that loving hand, that God is holding out to you. He will never leave you: he will never reject you: he will never turn his back on you. And if you can just give a little bit motion toward him, then he's right there waiting to meet you part way. So, that is our hope and our prayer for you. And we love you all so much. We have a free resource available for you 'cuz it's getting into God's word that really helps make all this real in our life and helps us to change the way that we're thinking about things. So, we have a free booklet that you can download called, "Overcoming Rejection". You can get it at joycemeyer.org/talkitout. And while you're there, you might as well go ahead and sign up for our friend's list. That way you can get all the fun things that are happening here on the podcast, and you can catch up on other podcasts as well. Chris, thanks a lot for being here with us, too!

Christine Caine: Man, this is an honor. We've gotta do this again.

Ginger Stache: It's been so fun. We would love to: we'll take you up on it. And we will see you all next time. Bye, bye.

Joyce Meyer: Bye.