Scripture Reading: “Matthew 21:33-46
Message: “He was Rejected”
Text: “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering” (Isaiah 53:3).
What is rejection?
The American Heritage Dictionary defines the word reject as follows: to refuse to accept, recognize, or make use of.
Have you ever been rejected or has there ever been a time in your life when you were not accepted or recognized?
I believe every person has the basic human need of acceptance. Every person wants to have the feeling of belonging; belonging to a loving family, belonging to a church family, belonging to the group of people they work with, belonging to a club or social group, or belonging to the neighborhood in which they live.
As nice as we try to be, as good as we are, as loving as we are, as compassionate as we are, as accepting as we are probably will not make us immune to rejection. We will face rejection everyday in some manner. Someone may say ugly things about us for no apparent reason. Maybe something upsetting has happened in their life so they lash out against us because we happen to be at the wrong place at the right time.
There are times when children are rejected by their parents because they now interfere with life of the parents. A new father may reject a child because now the wife’s love has to be shared with the child. The father becomes jealous and makes life miserable for the mother and the child. The mother and the child are now victims of rejection. They feel unloved, unworthy, useless and insignificant and it is nothing they have done.
Rejection is something that we have no control over. We cannot control the way people feel about us. We cannot control the thoughts the people have toward us. We cannot control the way people talk about us, but we can control how we accept rejection.
Rejection is in the Eye of the Beholder
A young salesman became discouraged because he had been rejected by so many customers he approached. He asked a more experienced salesman for some advice.
“Why is it that every time I make a call on someone I get rejected?”
“I just don’t understand that,” answered the older salesman. “I’ve been hit on the head, called dirty names, and thrown out the door, but I’ve never been rejected.”
Rejection isn’t what happens to us but how we interpret what happens to us.
(Kent Crockett, I Once Was Blind But Now I Squint, Chattanooga, TN: AMG Publishers, 2004, 44)
Rejection is difficult to accept. When you are rejected by someone for something, you can let the devil take over your life and retaliate with harsh unkind words, throw a temper tantrum, feel sorry for yourself, become emotional to the point of crying, contemplate taking your life, hurting someone else, physically or mentally or just going off the deep end.
Each of us has been created in the image of God and each of us is important to God. God did not create worthless, useless, or unimportant people. He loves us with an unconditional love. He loves us so much that he sent his Son into the world to pay for our sins; sins committed in the past, sins committed in the now, and sins that we may commit in the future. We will continue to commit sins because we do not live the way he expects us to live and we don’t always treat people with kind, considerate, understanding love. We use words that we should not use when we let the devil control our emotions.
God will never reject us. He may not always agree with our actions, thoughts or words, but he will never reject us. During his walk upon the face of the earth, Jesus never rejected anyone. For example, when Jesus went into the temple courts and found men selling and buying cattle, sheep and doves he made a whip and drove them from the temple area. He did not reject the people, but he rejected what they were doing. Jesus considered the act of using the temple courts as a market place offensive to God the Father. He considered this practice to be disrespectful.
When Jesus met the Samaritan woman at the well, he did not show her any signs of rejection. He knew that she was a Samaritan and the Jews did not associate with or talk to the Samaritans (John 4:9). Jesus knew her back ground; the fact that she had five husbands and lived with a man who was not her husband (John 4:18). He did not reject the woman for who she was or what she was. Jesus was kind, considerate and understanding and in return, the woman was a witness to the Messiah. “And many of the Samaritans of that city believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, ‘He told me all that I ever did’” (John 4:39).
Rejection has been around since the beginning of time. For example, when Samuel grew old, he appointed his sons as judges for Israel, but they turned out to be very dishonest. The elders asked him to appoint a king to lead the people but Samuel was displeased and prayed to the LORD. And the LORD told him (Samuel): “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king” (I Samuel 8:7). The LORD brought them out of Egypt, but they failed to praise him and give him the glory. Instead, they turned to other gods and were disobedient to Almighty God. If obedience had been their priority, their blessings would have been beyond their highest expectations.
Isaiah said, “He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering” (Isaiah 53:3). The Son of God was rejected long before he made his entrance upon the face of the earth. There are many people still waiting for the coming of the Messiah. They have not accepted Jesus as the Messiah, but they accept him just as another prophet.
Hosea 8:2-3 says, “Israel cries out to me, ‘O our God, we acknowledge you!’ But Israel has rejected what is good…” Many people cry out to God when they find themselves in a difficult situation. Maybe they have borrowed and it led into stealing. Maybe they have formed a friendly relationship with another person and it became a deep personal relationship. Maybe they have eyed another male or female and now the marriage is on shaky ground. These people cry out to God for help, God answers them, but they are like Israel, they do not want to give up their old ways. They want God to fix the problem, get them out of the mess, but they do want to change their behavior. These people have rejected God’s word.
When Moses and Aaron were sent to Pharaoh to deliver the Israelites from bondage, Pharaoh rejected them ten times before the people were allowed to leave Egypt (Exodus 7-12). Man rejects man and God, but God never rejects man.
Listen to the words of Rick Thompson:
G. Campbell Morgan was one of 150 young men who sought entrance to the Wesleyan ministry in 1888. He passed the doctrinal examinations, but then faced the trial sermon. In a cavernous auditorium that could seat more than 1,000 sat three ministers and 75 others who came to listen.
When Morgan stepped into the pulpit, the vast room and the searching, critical eyes caught him up short. Two weeks later Morgan’s name appeared among the 105 REJECTED for the ministry that year.
Jill Morgan, his daughter-in-law, wrote in her book, A MAN OF THE WORD, “He wired to his father the one word, ‘Rejected,’ and sat down to write in his diary: ‘Very dark everything seems. Still, He knoweth best.’ Quickly came the reply: ‘Rejected on earth. Accepted in heaven. Dad.’”
In later years, Morgan said: “God said to me, in the weeks of loneliness and darkness that followed, ‘I want you to cease making plans for yourself, and let Me plan your life.’”
Rejection is rarely permanent; as Morgan went on to prove. Even in this life, circumstances change, and ultimately, there is no rejection of those accepted by Christ.
I have applied to do various tasks or jobs, for which I knew I possessed the qualifications. Unfortunately or fortunately, depending on how you look at it, I was not accepted. Yes, at the time I felt bad, but I also knew that when one door closes, another door opens. I knew that God had other plans for me. I am just like you, I face rejection on a daily basis, but I can accept it because I know I am a child of God and if I am a child of God, “He who is in me is greater than who is in the world” (I John 4:4).
Conclusion:
Jesus said, “The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the LORD’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes” (Matthew 21:42).
Jesus is saying that he is the stone the builders rejected. As you well know, the cornerstone unites two sides of an arch and holds it together. Without the cornerstone, there would be no arch, because it would not be able to stand. Jesus is the cornerstone that holds the Christian church together. He was rejected by many of his own people, and is still rejected by many of the Jews. You and I are members of the Christian church held together by our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
He was and is rejected by many, but Jesus will never reject us because of our relationship with him. John says, “He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him , to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name; who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:11-13).
I want to close with this little story which ends with words that many people who reject the cornerstone will eventually hear.
Evangelist Gypsy Smith said that once, when a group of gypsies were forced to cross a swollen stream, a great number of men were drowned. One young man made a desperate attempt to save his mother who kept clinging to him. Several times he pushed her away, saying, "Let go, Mother, and I can save you." But she would not heed him and was lost. At the funeral, the son stood by his mother’s grave and said over and over, "How hard I tried to save you, Mother, but you wouldn’t let me!" These are the tragic words that we shall hear Jesus Christ say to many in eternity one day, "How hard I tried to save you, but you wouldn’t let me. Your will was the great hindrance."
Amen.
