From Reject to Hall of Famer
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Hebrews 11:32 And what more shall I say? For time will fail me if I tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets,
Hebrews 11:33 who by faith conquered kingdoms, performed [acts of] righteousness, obtained promises, shut the mouths of lions...
How many of you have finished what you were doing on your computer, went to shut it down, and were greeted by a message from Microsoft, please don't shut your computer down, Microsoft is updating its files? Or had to wait while your computer was booting with a blue screen that said, update number 1 of 37?
No matter where you are or where you go they are hunting for you. They are everywhere, and they are always lurking. They search for the vulnerable, and even in the strongest of people they are looking for a way to get in and rob you of everything they can. Hackers, scammers, spammers. There are corporations whose sole purpose is to provide protection for us against those that would do us harm. There are hundreds of thousands of people employed in the never ending battle. In 2011 alone the US spent almost 79 billion dollars if the field of cyber security, and 1 man, 1 man - Edward Snowden, by himself, proved it was not enough.
The Chinese, the North Koreans, the Russians, are hacking into everything they can, and so are we. Our government is recording every phone call in some countries, and for all we know they are recording every call on the planet. The cold war was nothing compared to what is being played out all across the globe on a daily basis. World War III is already underway, not a war of bullets and guns but of hackers launching attacks at each other.
If Chinese soldiers came in person to the gates of one of our military complexes and tried to steal our equipment we would declare war on them, and that is exactly what is happening in the cyber realm, it is an undeclared, but very real war.
Google records and analyzes everything you do on their site as a tool to exploit that knowledge to sell it to advertisers, and who knows who else? Courts have ruled there is no fundamental right to privacy on Internet searches.
The same thing that is happening in the electronic world is also happening in the physical world. Virus's, pathogens, minuscule organisms are lurking everywhere and trying to get in your body and take over. When they see a wound they leap to action.
The same thing is also happening in the spiritual world. Wounds become access points for spiritual infection. There are beings who are hell bent on your destruction, and they also are looking for an opening, an access point, a way in, a place they can secretly multiply in the dark, with the hope of becoming dominant. Today I am going to talk about one area of attack but more importantly I am going to talk about its remedy.
I want to talk about rejection.
Hebrews 11 is called by many God's Hall of Fame, and it contains a partial list of God's heroes, I want to call your attention to one of them today, that you may have never heard of, and I want to preach on the topic of overcoming rejection.
Everybody faces rejection at some point in their life. It's influence on our behavior can be subtle or major. For example some people allow rejection to fester in them to the point that becomes the dominant aspect of their personality. Rejection will beat a person down, it will tell them no wants to hire them, no one cares about them, everyone thinks bad about them. That is one end of the spectrum of spiritual maladies rejection brings and just as dangerous as that is, so are the lengths people will go to, to avoid being rejected.
People will sometime compromise for acceptance, because of fear of rejection. They will abandon values and standards in order to gain or maintain acceptance in a group. Whether it is at school, work, or among friends. How many because of fear of rejection have compromised biblical sexual rules? How many have tried drugs or alcohol in order to be accepted. How many have become addicted to cigarettes and suffered a lifetime of consequences because they wanted to be accepted as a teen. Did anyone ever start smoking for a reason other than wanting to be cool, or act older, in other words to avoid rejection and increase acceptance?
Illus: Politician gets asked by a businessman, "can I count on your vote if I give you 1 million dollars?" Polotician says yes, busnessman than asks, "How about just 50 bucks?" Politician responds, "What kind of man do you think I am?" Businessman responds, "I already know what kind of man you are we are just haggling over the price." The fear of man brings a snare.
Everyone has to deal with rejection, from the womb to the tomb.
PPT 3 pic Look at pic and discuss! pic available online here: http://simonwchan.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Simon-Chan-network-marketing-training-rejection.jpg
I have always been one of the shorter boys in school, which meant I got picked last.
The one who is picked first is liked most. Isn't that they way it is. Remember I said that.
There are people (preachers, psychologists) who even try to make the point that rejection can begin in the womb, that unborn children somehow know when their parents didn't really want that pregnancy. I'm not going to go there for two reasons, first, you can't prove it, it is speculative, has anyone ever done an exit interview of a child being born? and more importantly I don't care what the cause of your feelings of rejections are, my focus is on overcoming them so that they don't negatively impact your faith, your enjoyment of life, your expectations for a good future, your ability to seek employment or further education, or your ability to grasp who you are in Christ.
I will talk about some of the tributaries of rejection, but my main thrust will be about overcoming such feelings.
OK so let's look at an Old Testament fellow who went from reject to Hall of Famer, his name is in the list right after Samson, and it is Jephthah. How many of you know from your bible the story of Jephthah?
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Judges 11:1 Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a valiant warrior, but he was the son of a harlot. And Gilead was the father of Jephthah.
11:2 And Gilead's wife bore him sons; and when his wife's sons grew up, they drove Jephthah out and said to him, "You shall not have an inheritance in our father's house, for you are the son of another woman."
11:3 So Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob; and worthless fellows gathered themselves about Jephthah, and they went out with him.
11:4 And it came about after a while that the sons of Ammon fought against Israel.
Judges 11:5 And it happened when the sons of Ammon fought against Israel that the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob;
11:6 and they said to Jephthah, "Come and be our chief that we may fight against the sons of Ammon."
11:7 Then Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, "Did you not hate me and drive me from my father's house? So why have you come to me now when you are in trouble?"
11:8 And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, "For this reason we have now returned to you, that you may go with us and fight with the sons of Ammon and become head over all the inhabitants of Gilead."
Judges 11:9 So Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, "If you take me back to fight against the sons of Ammon and the LORD gives them up to me, will I become your head?"
11:10 And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, "The LORD is witness between us; surely we will do as you have said."
11:11 Then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and chief over them; and Jephthah spoke all his words before the LORD at Mizpah.
The background to this story is that it happened in the period of Jewish history known as the time of the Judges. This book covers a span of almost 350 years. During that period of time the Jewish people lived in what seemed like an endless loop, they kept repeating the same scenario over and over. They would backslide and God would allow their enemies to oppress and overcome them. They would repent and God would raise up a man and sometimes a woman whom He would use to rescue them. They would serve God for a few years and then the pattern would repeat itself all over again.
In the previous chapter there is for me a wonderful verse of scripture, let's read it in context:
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Judges 10:10 Then the sons of Israel cried out to the LORD, saying, "We have sinned against Thee, for indeed, we have forsaken our God and served the Baals."
10:11 And the LORD said to the sons of Israel, "[Did I] not [deliver you] from the Egyptians, the Amorites, the sons of Ammon, and the Philistines?
10:12 "Also when the Sidonians, the Amalekites and the Maonites oppressed you, you cried out to Me, and I delivered you from their hands.
Judges 10:13 "Yet you have forsaken Me and served other gods; therefore I will deliver you no more.
Jud 10:14 "Go and cry out to the gods which you have chosen; let them deliver you in the time of your distress."
Jud 10:15 And the sons of Israel said to the LORD, "We have sinned, do to us whatever seems good to Thee; only please deliver us this day."
Jud 10:16 So they put away the foreign gods from among them, and served the LORD; and He could bear the misery of Israel no longer.
This text comes in at the end of one of those cycles, and illustrates the love of God even for children He is disciplining. "He could bear the misery of Israel no longer!" What a wonderful passage of scripture. Even though God sometimes may chastise His people, they are still His people and because of His great love He suffers when they suffer.
When I read the story of Jephthah I am reminded of two biblical characters the first is Joseph and the second is David.
As we go on I will show the parallels.
Jephthah was the son of a harlot. His mother was a hooker. That has never been a good thing for the other kids at school to know about you. Kids are always looking for reasons to make fun of other kids. I am not sure for all the reasons for that, one is that it is just a fact of fallen human nature, another might be that if we engage everyone in making fun of others, than others will be too busy to make fun of us.
That has always been a bad thing to be known about you, but it was far worse in Jewish culture and in Jewish life.
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Deuteronomy 23:2 - One of illegitimate birth shall not enter the assembly of the Lord; even to the tenth generation none of his descendants shall enter the assembly of the Lord.
So not only was Jephthah going to be ridiculed just because of human nature, in his case there was a law in the bible that not only authorized but required his ostracization, and not only his but the next 10 generations which would have been 3 - 7 hundred years worth of ostracization. (Actually it probably implied in perpituity!)
People are mean, but do you know how mean religious people can be when they think God has told them to ostracize you?
In all honesty I can only guess the reason for this law is to make the point that you can't get to heaven unless you are born again. If you are just born of this earth, you are illegitimate. I don't have time to explain it, you can ask me later. But I also don't think that God Himself followed the rule that closely, the major trunk of the lineage of Jesus includes the child of incest born to Judah and his daughter in law Tamar. David was (depending on how you count) the 9th or 10th, generation from that incestuous birth. The letter kills. If you go by the letter neither, Boaz David's great-grandfather or his father Jesses could have entered the congregation of the Lord. Also David's great-grandmother, Ruth, was a Moabite and Deut. 23:3 says a Moabite would never be able to enter the congregation of the Lord. It is unfathomable that Ruth the woman of such sterling character would be excluded, there is no hint of such in the Bible. The law is there but as 1 Cor. 10:11 explains many of these literal things were there to teach spiritual truths. The spiritual truth is that you must be born again or you are excluded from the Kingdom.
Back to Jephthah. He was born to a prostitute, and yet he was raised by his father and step mother. His father was a scoundrel for committing adultery, but an honorable man for raising the boy. His father got old, or perhaps died and all his brothers threw him out of the family home saying you are not getting a dime of his inheritance. From the reading of the story it appears that Jephthah brought his case to the city elders and they ruled against him.
So tarred and feathered he was thrown out of town.
This story shows rejection at its worst. It also shows that most rejection in life is based on things you have no control over. In this case parentage. But we are also rejected on height, looks, intellect, things we have very little control over.
Jephthah is like Joseph for two reasons 1 is he was hated and thrust out by his brothers. The other is that God had a plan to use that rejection for good, just like he did in Joseph's life. The reject will wind up in God's hall of fame.
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Ps 105:16 Moreover he called for a famine upon the land: he brake the whole staff of bread.
Ps 105:17 He sent a man before them, [even] Joseph, [who] was sold for a servant:
Before God called for the famine, he sent Joseph to Egypt. Both men were rejected by their families and both men were used by God to save their families.
In Jephthah's case he was thrust out of Israel likewise and had to fight to survive because he went from rejection by one group to rejection by another. The Caaninites, and the Amonites hated the Jews. No one was going to give him anything, he had to fight to survive. His life reminds me of the Johnny Cash song, a boy named Sue. Dad wasn't going to be around so he called him Sue because he knew it would force him to toughen up.
Rejection will toughen you up if you let it, or it will drag you down. You are the one who decides in the courtroom of your mind which philosophy you will let take root and dominate.
Jephthah is also like David because when David was kicked out by King Saul, everyone who was in debt and distress and trouble found a hero and leader in David. Jephthah did the same thing, and they became a band of mighty men of valor that was used to deliver Israel in their time of need. David organized the low lifes of his day and age and they became one of the fiercest fighting forces in the world. This is exactly the same thing God used Jephtha to do.
Jephthah's name means God will open, he breaks free. He broke free of the spirit of rejection and used it as a stepping stone. He broke the power of the Ammonites and became ruler over the people who threw him out of town.
God chooses what men reject. The stone the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone.
Rejection can spur you on, or plow you under. You decide its effect on you.
Its up to you.
Let's talk about Jesus. If He let rejection hold Him back where would we be? Was anyone every rejected as much as He was?
He came unto His own and His own received Him not.
He cast the devil out of a guy who had tormented a community for years in response they besought Him that He would depart out of their coasts!
He tried to tell the Jews who He was. Before Abraham was I Am. They reacted this way:
Joh 8:59 Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.
Another time similar type situation:
Lu 4:28 And all they in the synagogue, when they heard these things, were filled with wrath,
Lu 4:29 And rose up, and thrust him out of the city, and led him unto the brow of the hill whereon their city was built, that they might cast him down headlong.
Finally there was the scene in front of Pilate. He was there to save them and they said, "Away with this man, give us Barabbas."
Isa 53:3 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.
So how did Jesus overcome all that rejection?
Because He was filled with more acceptance than rejection.
This is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.
The key to overcoming feelings of rejection is to evict them. And to understand that, all that really matters is, if God accepts you.
Remember I said the one who is picked first is like the most?
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Eph 1:4 just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love
2Th 2:13 But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and faith in the truth.
We were picked first! That helps us to realize:
1Pe 2:4 And coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected by men, but choice and precious in the sight of God,...
Last verse for today, and I saved the best for last.
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Joh 17:23 I in them and you in me. May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
You have loved them even as you have loved me. If you can grasp that you will never be overcome by rejection, because acceptance overcomes rejection even as light overcomes darkness.
Close: Prayer for those who struggle with feelings of rejection
