Shake Off The Dust Series

E. Shake off the dust of rejection

Jesus understands rejection. We read earlier in this chapter that Jesus had returned to His home synagogue in Nazareth. The people He had grown up with just couldn’t accept the fact that He was the Messiah. Instead, they forced Him out of Nazareth and tried to stone Him to death. The Bible says He walked through the crowd and they weren’t able to stone Him. I would have loved to see how He simply walked through a screaming mob ready to kill Him. I don’t know if He just stared them down, or if He pulled that effect from the Matrix movie where everything slowed down to super slow motion and He just walked through the crowd and the next thing they knew they looked up and Jesus was gone. But we do know Jesus simply shook the dust of their rejection off and moved on with His ministry. He didn’t curse them or call down fire on them; He just shook off their rejection and moved on.

Chances are you’ve suffered rejection in your past. Just as there were people who didn’t receive the disciples, there are people in your past who have held up a hand and said, “I don’t want you in my life.” Do what Jesus told the disciples to do. Shake off the dust and move on.

CONCLUSION

If you want to simplify your life, remember Jesus’ simple approach to ministry: Go out and tell people the Good News. Remember Jesus’ simple approach to possessions: Pack light for the journey of life. And most of all, the best way to recover from failure is to shake off the dust and move on. Like Clebe McClary said, “FIDO!”

Jay Strack has been my friend for decades. He’s an evangelist and the founder of Student Leadership University in Orlando, where our students have been several times. He has had a great impact on the Kingdom. Jay wrote Shake Off the Dust, a book about his life. He grew up in a wealthy home in South Florida where he experienced physical and emotional abuse as a child. He started doing drugs at age 13 and by the time he was 16 he was an addict and a drug dealer. He was busted and spent time in a juvenile facility as a junkie and a criminal. But someone told him about Jesus and he gave his heart to Christ. Even though he was a new creation in Christ, it took him a long time to shake off the dirt and dust from his troubled past.

He writes: “As long as you remain a prisoner to your past, you will never know the freedom of the future. You can’t spend the rest of your life sitting in the ashes of devastation, crying over what went wrong. You’d don’t have to carry around the dirt of your past mistakes. Get up, shake off the dust, and go on.”

You may be carrying around a load of dirt and dust from your past and God’s word for you today is to get up, shake off the dust, and move on. Have you failed morally? Shake off the dust and move on. Have you failed relationally? Shake off the dust and move on.

OUTLINE

I. A SIMPLE APPROACH TO MINISTRY: Go out preaching and healing in the authority of Jesus

Jesus said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matthew 28:18-20