S05 Ep03: Why Do I Struggle to Receive God's Love?

one of the biggest struggles that most Christians and most people would say that they face is receiving and understanding how it is to receive God's love so today we want to talk about this topic with honesty and from the heart welcome to transformed you my name is Melissa - hey Suz with my awesome husband mark hi everybody yes and so today we've been on a several week journey of talking about the rejection mindset how this processes in your life what are some things that you can see that would help you say wow I have this operating but we want to get more to the core of why we even struggle with this and so the biggest biggest thing when it comes to understanding rejection and how its operating at us is understanding the foundation of love because rejection attacks all aspects of relationships wants to keep you isolated wants to keep you spinning wants to keep wants to attack every aspect of you interacting with people yourself those around you and what does that hit it hits love it hits how to give and receive love so let's dig into this today maybe talk about even how we've processed through understanding receiving God's love because if you say that you've arrived in it well I don't really believe you because there's so many aspects to God's love that we need to understand so we're all I think everybody take a step back and relax because we all struggle with us don't you think absolutely and I think that we need to first understand that we were made to be loved we were made to love and God designed that relationship to flow freely and so because of what sin and the enemy's camp has done and and and just really creating more and more brokenness in people's lives we all live with the sense of interference and God created an opportunity in Christ Jesus for us to be able to interact with him freely and isn't it interesting that the very gift he's given us to receive this undying expanding love it's the biggest struggle people have and so tells us a couple things it tells us one we've not been we have a lot of broken lenses and there's interference in the heavenlies warring against us being able to receive that so I think everyone couldn't relate to this subject if they're honest we you either struggle with connecting to God's love all the time or you have a he loves me he loves me not relationship which is when things are good and life is going great oh god you're awesome and when things aren't going great you feel distant from his love and that's that's what I find or you're going through hardship or things and now it's like where is that love so I think you want to start with maybe just you and I yeah I was just gonna ask you I think it would help people if we even talk this out about how we came to the understanding of that because I I've shared in a previous episode it was really hard for me to even come to terms with like understanding that I had rejection working there was some pride around it and I say that because we were in a very long journey of understanding God is our Father really getting to the heart of that you know with that lens and there was a lot of confusion over that for me in the kind of parents that I had because they were just functional enough with me that there was in a lot of ways I made them and understand the heart when I say this in some ways for me to function I had to make them kind of greater than they were I wasn't able to just see them as broken people and they gave me what they get like there was there was layers and steps to what I had to come to understanding how I processed love right does that make sense and so well a lot of people think that if we talk about brokenness regarding our parental figures it means your dishonouring them and and that doesn't mean it at all it doesn't mean that you're making them look bad we are if we start from the premise of we are all broken people working through various aspects of what that means then now there's a lot more safety to understand yes stuff happened references were skewed and it's tough to be able to really understand what the receptivity of it of his love means so that's good yeah and so we up that specific part of the aspect of love because we can't talk about our God lens unless we talk about where that was first established right and usually most of the time 99.9 percent of the time it is established in the home with your parents and how you see them how they parent you how they love you and if you could help just expound on that a little bit for people because I feel like we do need to start there before we can even address a little bit more on what it on receiving God's love well let's let's look at life in general your life following God is by faith right but we need references right we need references to hold on to that's why Jesus is so important because he's the reference when you see him like he said when you see me you've seen the father so when you look at Jesus you go oh that's what father is like that's what our dad is like by watching Jesus take that even further God took everything that we live in and that is the model of his kingdom the kingdom of God is a kingdom but it is a family so in the family of a father mother you have sisters brothers there's all these different models working in this to reflect his nature right so he designed primarily in the beginning father and mother that they helped instill the references of what it means to be loved and then be equipped to go out and carry that out with God ideal parenting is unconditional love approval acceptance validation and - you are equipped to engage a hostile difficult challenging world as an overcomer so some people will go well my you know my references we're great why were you equipped this doesn't sound like you were equipped well I'll get to that maybe maybe later but so God's given references of even brothers and sisters we are when we're born again we're brothers and sisters in the body of Christ even that's a broken lens because brought brothers what sister means is broken so we've gotta like how do we make sense of all this thing it starts with father what does father mean to you because the earthly father's role is not only to love you but to give you validation acceptance approval and also equip you transition walk with you teach you train you human beings are the only creatures that if you leave them alone they'll die you take a baby a baby skunk and leave it alone it'll figure it out you take a baby whale whatever that's come it's when they might get attacked to figure it out baby turtle my kitty and if they're not protected but left alone yeah animals figure it out God created humans of a higher order that we need to be trained you you you have to be trained now there are things in our genetics that that kick in but you need you're made to be loved to be equipped to have all these things so when it comes to God relating to God we carry with us not always very consciously we carry it many times in the recesses of our mind you could say the unconscious or you could say like no in the areas of your heart you carry certain references of how to relate to God that the broken ones often come up when you're struggling so when you're struggling if your father was a father who was not around much then when you're going through hard times God is a God who's not really there he doesn't pull in for you he's he's angry at you he's hostile maybe an alcoholic father so you never know who you're approaching when you approach God because that's what alcoholism does to children it makes them feel like all over the place right so I spent a lot of time helping people to clear up their father lens to then help them to understand how that relates because that's where rejection comes in too trained you on on how you approach God so you either go on on like two pathways with God that rejection teaches you you either like perform do things live busy you become a perfectionist high achiever you're busy body one or all of those you know kind of just like I gotta read my Bible I got to do these things so I can feel closer to God that's definitely where I lived in the other area is and why bother is I'm not that employee you self reject and so the you're constantly living at a lower potential and maybe you swing back and forth between the two a lot of people swing back and forth between the two and you feel like you're you're you're manic depressive bipolar all the time because you don't know where to land with God so in my journey I didn't know it at the time but looking back as I discovered rejection how it works Wow I would wake up in the morning and I would feel far from God that's how I started the day so I would go I am far from God because I need to read my Bible reading my Bible right I'd sit there and read and read like okay got some good stuff and I've maybe feel like a little bit of sense of religious accomplishment so it's like this is good this is good feel good I did my thing the problem is is if I miss that time oh the rest of my day I'm beating myself up that's just one aspect and then any battle I struggled with I always felt God's not hearing me so I've got to do more things to get his attention I've got to try more I got to do more I've got it I've got to go through all these spiritual calisthenics you know jumping jacks you know all these different things to try to get him to listen to me I sadly spent most of my life growing up feeling that God was not really listening to me yeah he the things I liked to do this is work it's crazy and other pee relate to this I thought I was nuts until I started sharing this and other people like yeah that's my life I thought that all the things I liked doing like I was passionate about a certain pursuit if I liked a girl you know in high school or whatever if I liked a Avenue that brought me enjoyment God was not for that it's like no no because I didn't I didn't equate God's love with enjoyment right you equated it more with religious right perfectionism so it's like no if I liked I got to give it up I got to give it up and if if if I made the wrong decision boy God was gonna really I'm really gonna miss God that's that whole like you don't want to miss God right that kind of talk like scares people you don't wanna miss God and we're like I did you're right I don't want to miss God so then it's like this stuff isn't even gonna work out anyways cuz God's not even in it right and I'm just I'm just left always feeling like I'm gonna land in some dreadful place so no wonder I was susceptible to fear and anxiety most of my life because and and and um it's not that my parents taught me that but the religious culture mm-hmm that they lived in that was cultivated the speakers I listen to they kept reinforcing that like undercurrent of like disobedience you don't want to disobey God partial disobedience is full disobedience and I'm like oh my goodness I just felt this constant straitjacket and there were concepts that were taught in the church outside of the foundation of his love now I listen to that preaching and I go no no you can't you can't tell that to people they don't know the love of God can't give that unless the love of God is in the context that thing you just taught is out of context so now it doesn't land it's putting a burden a shackle on people so I wept and ride all the time just God please I want to love you and I want to serve you I was always like I want to love you God and it was like this like to explain it so in helping people understand you do have a relationship with your dad but what was the thing that helps you to understand okay wow I didn't hear my dad's voice it what did you then how to have to recognize that where the open door came in for the religious voice to talk and give you the lens of God how did you recognize to help people understand wow my dad was like this and this is why I see God like this yeah well my dad grew up in a large family in Puerto Rico he was one of sixteen kids and that's a lot of mouths to feed they were on a farm they were broke a lot they didn't have a lot of money and he was he dropped out of school very early in elementary school yeah and so not a high education and worked the farm and his dad his own dad committed suicide I mean your dad was like 11 or 12 is like the best we can get you know as were you know we've pulled up memories over the years that he's had of it it was horrific and and so in the stage of that just to tell you a little bit of my dad's journey he then as a teenager his mother my grandmother remarries that's not really going well and he bails comes to the comes to the mainland United States and comes to Connecticut and lives a life of a thief drug addict I mean you know constant thievery you know high amounts of you know drug use and drug selling and in the process goes to jail gets its gets caught in his in his drug-dealing aspects goes to jail in jail in prison accepts Jesus Christ ministry that was ministering to inmates preach the gospel to him he receives it the light bulb turns on and he goes through a program rehabilitation program called the Teen Challenge program goes through that and gets like very very ingrained in the word and it's interesting because he had so many challenges learning in so many areas but he had the ability to retain the scriptures right so growing up as a kid I was very aware of his background and aware of there were certain things that were hard for him to give to me I wasn't sitting there like you know my dad has a hard time telling me he loves me because I wasn't like equating that but there was a sense of like wow what he came from so I was grateful that I got the the foundation of salvation because I inherited the ability to very easy I was four years old I was like as soon as I could talk and comprehend I was like yes I want that right so I'm reading the Bible as a young kid all these things so in understanding his story now looking back he didn't have the ability to give those next level things it's like a miracle that he's out where he's at right so in the process so he wasn't like verbally abusive he was very like patient certain circumstances yeah that I've I've told some of the stories about what I've learned in some of those moments right but he didn't have that abilities like equip or to be emotionally present I don't know that our parents generation had any idea many many of our listeners fit into my parents generation they had no tools of like figuring out how to process pain so what they did was is they got saved and they went my past is under the blood yes which is true right but it then meant we're not talking about right ever right I think a lot of people can relate to this say it's never really gonna be talked about and there's nothing to process and I think that's the thing God's put in my life in my healing journey to take generationally to the next level of what that was laid for me now the next level is know there's healing God wants in those areas and it's not about it's not about him accusing you of your sin it's not you being guilty of things that he's I will they get over your over your you know like like like he's like he's water torturing your head and he's about to push you in it it's more of there are things that happened to you that are reoccurring patterns and they're keeping you in broken patterns and you're not dealing with those areas of pain yeah so um when I was praying with with a gentleman who had come into my life who was was kind of helping me I'm with all this anxiety and stuff and having this you know mental breakdown and and he pointed out this father you know rejection he pointed out you think about this rejection thing and that's you know I told the story what kind of blew up and and and and I began to discover it well in that moment my openness he says I want to pray something over you and he spoke the words of a father's love yeah and I began weeping and I hit the floor it's one of those like you don't have time to get back in your head and block it mm-hmm right that's the problem with Americans we have time to like all our all our things stay in our head and don't just go I'm just a mess I'm just broken I'm angry I'm afraid I'm insecure you know we don't we lose that ability it takes like all these things for God to light finally couldn't get to the heart so he says I dropped to the floor and in that moment I realized my dad gave me what he could but there were those aspects I needed to go deeper that I didn't get of hearing you're loved and proud of you you know the same was like many say I knew he was proud of me interestingly enough as I shared this transformation with him because I've preached the subject with him in the audience right many times and I've shared this with him and they're still even aspects he's uncomfortable with but it's opened up in some ways for there to be better dialogue where even the exchange of love I love you is became more comfortable right and can I go a little further oh please I think that this is helping and blessing a lot of people so yeah so my parents were both highly they were like ninjas with the scriptures like highly trained which a lot Jedi's right salvation from that generation for a lot of people this I think and you can help me but I think the last maybe 10 to 15 years this real revelation of grace and love has poured out even more on God's people so coming from your parents time of their salvation it was you get the word in you it's under the blood you're done soldier on yeah it was like they there was an amazing work of God's grace in the sense that like people are like oh my goodness my sins can be forgiven right like this is incredible and then now people are getting married they're having children there was no like okay you got to work on your issues now but but it's not God condemning you and that's the problem is that any discussion like what we're talking about often it would hit resistance of that it's under the blood and you know it's like this isn't about this isn't about that God's received you in Christ Jesus this is about now going hey that thing that happened that's probably affecting how I shut down like most Christians numb out and shut down stuff happens they shut it down right and really this piece of the scriptures of like you know in the light of relationship bringing everything into the light is where you're truly healed we didn't really get that revelation until ok so just the statement that you said right there growing up that would scare the living poopoo right out of me in the light it was the light of exposure was that bad thought I had oh there's all to be brought into the light mm-hmm and see that's where it that's not it it's the light of love it's the light of fellowship God is light so he can't operate out of who he is but he also is love so he's bringing you into a healing light not to expose you to shame you to cast you away but to draw you close but this also speaks to our own brokenness of because when you say light and love in relationship that comes to one word safety and so even with salvation and all that stuff if you don't have a revelation of understanding you're safe in relationship so it speaks to them not being able to share their brokenness and a lot of ways just having to about-face and turn in the other direction from their own families because you were never truly safe in relationship because when you're safe you can share you can share what you've done wrong you can come and say please forgive me and there's love there it brings up a whole big thing of what love should really be yeah and I think that a lot of Christian parents just say this in general struggled with talking about their own broken decisions and their own things right because they weren't safe to share it with their parents correct and even though their own kids are about to walk into the same ditches which I believe I believe the most powerful place of parenting as far as equipping is going hey I understand that battle I've had that same kind of struggle maybe a little bit different than you but I've had the same kind of let's sit down and talk about that's powerful transformation generationally you know so anyways so I going back to them being biblical Jedi's that guy would sit there as a kid and I would try to trip them up I would try to find something in the scripture that I would trip them up on and I could never do it like I would research something and come up with like the most art you know like like hidden thing and they'd be like yep that's the and I'm like so I'm very grateful for that but I will say there was a thread of condemnation that came about it because I wasn't equipped in that unconditional love there was a there was a performance it wasn't just in my family it was in the culture it was if you went to a church pastor and shared the battles that I had Isaac as a kid he'd be like well you you know you probably ought to get yeah we could read the scriptures you know you know it's kind of thing it's like no perfect love casts out fear that is the issue you have a love problem son let's work through that why does it mean to feel loved you know those kind of things so um that has then now I'm in my 20s and I'm having severe panic attacks daily anxiety off-the-charts obsessive-compulsive disorder I would say looking back the major problem was OCD I didn't discover the OCD till later I thought it was just anxiety because that's what you're feeling and I had OCD and knew it and thought it was a good thing me and you are just a great match right the devil is like let me take these two she can organize pencils and put away paper like nobodies it was great for a job so I um so my relationship with God went like this if I was doing my devotions praying even though nothing not a lot came out of it I should say nothing but not a lot you know what I mean just not a lot of did my duty then I was okay with God there was never a relational just man I am so loved that was never even there and then the second thing was how was my sin if I had any sin in my life no that's an interesting statement because everybody has sin issues so it's like we make this statement do you is there sin in your life what we're meaning is we're meaning are you like in a pattern that you know is wrong but you're staying in it anyways right it's it's ridiculous how we say certain things like the Bible says if you say you have no sin you're a liar like all of us have issues and when you understand whatever is not a faith is sin you'd go well fear anxiety all that doubt number of that stuff of sin too so man we got a lot of sin in our lives don't we thank God they got for His grace why do you have the song in my head fear is a liar yeah so you know I thought so if I had a unholy thought a sexual thought if I had done something in my work that I was like I mean that person's mad at me or like there's this whole package of things that would just cause unease and I do this incessant it was actually the beginning stages of OCD patterns in my life where I was incessantly doing these things to what what was the goal to feel better yeah but and don't you think it goes back to my word the safety word because aren't we doing all of those things because we don't feel safe only don't know where to land which then goes back to the the point of how love and relationship is established in your life and do you feel safe in relationship with everyone around you beginning with your family your parents your brothers and sisters to be goofy to process out stuff to be told when you walk in a room oh you look so beautiful today I love you so much which washes safety over you it goes back to all of that safety God is the safest right and we can't there ever is but we our references are messed up and really bad and that's and that's not allowing us so then okay so rejection gets in that place yep causes you to perform cause you do these things then it gets on you to put a straitjacket on you to then live out a certain way to then try to feel validated and loved so interestingly and interestingly enough I in my early days because my dad had a language barrier and some things like that I had to like you know sometimes help him with forms or certain things like that and he has a very thick accent and sometimes I would like you know translate and things like that translate for you sometimes so the interesting thing is that I became like a consult meaning like like a go-between what am i doing now for ministry right so it is interesting how your brokenness can for where you go so and and this is why I tell people it's important that you process your brokenness with honor where you reckon if you're gonna if you're gonna like beat up on all the issues your parents messed up on you better bring out all the amazing things they did bring into your life right so let's do both let's be brutally honest about everything we're grateful for everything we received and then brutally honest about what wasn't there because it's not about them fixing it your parents are not gonna fix that most likely they'll never change and don't even don't even go there cuz its idolatry anyways you're just looking for a person to become what you need it's going nope this is why I didn't get now that is what I'm gonna learn to receive from My Father in heaven so that one prayer that guy did was a divine intervention of a whole new direction because then it was like wait a second what does my day look like if I'm really loved by God like I don't have to stress and worry you there's no pressure like who cares if this thing doesn't work out I'm loved by him right right and and there's still thinks to this day that follow me that want to rejection wants to pull me back to in difficult times take the pressure on to you know be perfectionistic get all up in my head all those things it goes back to my early days so the more God heals my foundation the better I begin to process even in my 40s now of knowing his love and knowing that what does it look like today to be fully loved and accepted by him what does that look like so I recognize the brokenness I'm still processing through some of the areas that as a dad now with Max and some things or that I'm that I'm working through you just have to know that rejection pitches a fit and so here's my problem I start really seeing that rejection is in everybody yeah and it's in the culture and I was working at a church that was a high performance gogogo kind of church and I realized III can't operate like this anymore and that was the struggle and it's one of the reasons I began to tune in to God was leading me in new directions because people would even say to me mark are you okay yeah I'm great I'm doing it you don't seem anxious right now and normally you're anxious and that gives us comfort because when you're worried that means that you're you're you've got everything taken care of out of my the anxiety I had it's like you talking about your OCD made me perform well and your boss would go that's awesome right my anxiety was favored because I'd sit there and worry about every flippin thing that could go wrong right and great because it achieves things but I'm not at peace and I'm not able to settle so I'm like I'm more like laid-back still still like checking on everything but not in worry and I'm now more at peace and now that's becoming a conflict that's weird yes I bet I get it though I get I'm just saying um I'm not saying it's weird to make them look bad I'm saying it's a weird it's a weird paradigm to be in when you're like not stressed out about work anymore because you're like my dad's got me in this now I had to face this at other levels and other layers where man this rejection wanted to eat me for lunch still to this day it wants to clot me and the more I break agreement with it though the happier I am and you get the best mark - hey sis you've ever seen in your life just by really uprooting this so I had to change my posture from slavery to sonship and and and because I'm a person that I imagine concepts I see concepts in my in my in my mind I imagined like a house during the civil wars days where there was like slavery in America and I'll think about somebody who was an actual slave there and I was thinking about somebody who was a son sitting next to the father at the table and I was like I'm that slave and gods at the table the Father the Lord Jesus is there the Holy Spirit's there and I just come and I just serve and I'd leave and when dinner is over I go because sitting with him is scary I don't have that access and and and I got to make sure when I serve I do it just right so I don't get a bad look from him I hope he gives me a pat on the back but if you know but if he doesn't I'm gonna lose my you know and and wow what a that's where most people live I'm sorry that's where most Christians live it's had to go into sonship sonship is I'm already at the table he's there I didn't do anything to get there I just said yes to the invitation to be his child now his child and there's nothing I did to earn it and now I get to be with him and I get to enjoy him and I get to now receive when you sit at a table you receive so I had to make the transition from doing doing doing to learning to receive so the key to risk - to receiving God's love is learning how to actively receive what's already there rejection doesn't want you to have it and that was a game changer for me because it was like if I feel that sense of being far from God if I feel that sense of not feeling great about myself the the the solution is stop and just receive don't do don't do 100 jumping jacks don't run around you know the merry-go-round don't pass go collect 200 ollars just receive right now come into agreement with who he is and his love that he already has for you and I think I think that that that's it's really beautiful I think a lot of people really have a hard time with that they struggle with that and I want to read you something I get it that I said in either last week's episode of the week before that I was reading a book and there was a statement in the book that said every child deserves to walk into a room and be exuberantly loved and had to separate emotions about it I wanted to weep because I don't know what that feels like but I also felt disconnected from it because I don't know what that feels like and that explains my relationship with God and so we're awkward so when even you're saying the word just receive from him people I think go bonkers with that they can't connect to that at all because if you're to think about what you have in place with your family and how love has been established love does not flow freely it's usually given in food or you hey we're having a party on Tuesday because it's the second Tuesday of the month and everybody come over and we're Johnny's birthday or this and you all feel like you have family so there's a misconception is not the word but like a mirage over what we think love is so now we're going through hard times were needing we're really needing to feel God's love and it's like the car that won't start and we're kicking the car and kicking the car because we're like I put gas in there the car should be running what the heck's going on and there's something deep down in the engine in our hearts that really really needs to be examined or we're going yeah he loves me but I got to pay my bill right now right I have no money no one's there for me and he loves me that's great but I've got bills to pay I've got stuff that I need him right now well why don't we go to like yeah there's a element that I've accepted Jesus I understand what he did for me I get it all but we stop there we stop there and we don't go deeper and I think we're really in this time where we need to take that invitation of going deeper and understanding what it is to receive his love because that's what Jesus came to do he came to show you the father to heal the brokenhearted he wants to show you that and so you know we're hoping that with this conversation that we're having that we can help lead you to going deeper to understanding what it means to really be established in his love so that we can start getting this stuff out of our relationships right we need to we need to because we are all super duper goofy with each other it's it's not good there's relationship breaches everywhere absolutely everywhere and if you were sitting there watching this going oh I'm good like I'm good with everybody you are a liar okay because we all have areas where where love has not been established properly and I know for me like a big one is when I get in relationships I feel so uncomfortable most of time with myself that I over talk everything then I end up walking away and I'm that that could be a whole other show that we talk about just you spin Effie I'm spinning afterwards cuz I wasn't comfortable enough in myself why wasn't I comfortable or not why wasn't I sure enough in myself why because I don't know what it's like to truly love myself and receive that love so can i address that whole receiving part because please do because I kind of wanted when people when people talk about that it's it's it's it's legit it's it's a real problem because I just wanted to to shift the posture that's what I wanted to do by saying receive like just stop take a deep breath receive now I know that right there can make some people angry because they're like I'm trying to receive right now that's happening I get it then they're I under I totally understand what that feels like first let's let's say this everybody's going through something right now right you're going through something in your family your marriage is difficult you're having problems with your kids you're struggling with mental health issues you're having major financial battles or all the above right the the thing that I would want to encourage you is all those things are opportunities for you to stop and say I've got it I've got to go to the foundation and I got to learn what it means to be loved by God because I can't keep going on like this because love is the foundation by which you can then deal with all those things and and and and invite God into them we're trying to we're still living as slaves so what we're doing is we're like talking to God buck shotting our problems God I've got this thing over here can you just take care of that this thing over here can you take care of that this thing and that's fine it's fine to pray those things but then we're asking God to rescue our problems without us knowing how to meet him he says this in Psalm 23 he's David said this he said you set a table before me in the presence of my enemies that says something about God in our panic God I need you to do something about this I want to receive the good things you have to solve these problems and God goes one cheeseburger and we're like wow this is crazy right and if you're if you don't eat meat would you like salad what he's he's going I am a god that in your battle grounds the enemy's calling for steal kill destroy I'm calling intimacy yeah connection communion I want to draw I want to teach you what it means to draw nearer so I often find my biggest struggle is if I look back at the struggles I had as a kid and my young adult life married and now the battles I have all of them are a call to deeper intimacy not to do oh I got better fast that's a piece of people go I got it fast I got to do this I got to give up this maybe no you don't know how to receive love mm-hmm so I think that that's the start is realizing I don't know how to receive love right but I'll learn see that's that's the difference a lot of people go I don't know how to receive and they just they just bail out and die I but I'm a believer you take every problem you're going through you be honest about it but turn it into an empowering question and it very simple I said to God I don't know you as a father would you teach me I don't know your love I've lived all my life as a kid growing up and I did not know just how to be loved do you know how much of a game changer that would have been for him for my whole life to just know that I'm loved in my weaknesses in everything I'm loved and continually loved and can experience that right so I made it empowering I made it like would you show me would you teach me and so that led me into the next step which is you need to learn what a good father is start with that does a good father I just do when you walk in a room does a good father does it can give you correction but still love you and talk to you after you've been correct does a good father come around every now and then and take you and fill you up with ice cream and junk food as much as you want that's an interesting thing right because some people that's what they experience he did show up every now and then but then he stuffed you with food and now you have an eating disorder and because that was your only connection to relationship right there's all these things that like form out of it right so it's learning that so that's what I learned and and I I didn't I didn't I didn't catch it and then I caught it word the father spoke over Jesus Wow Jesus the Son of God who's perfect and sinless needed to hear his dad say I love you right without think he wouldn't need that like I'm sinless like hey let's do this right no he actually needed to hear it to to to set the foundation for his ministry for his for his three years of effective ministry on this planet right and so I had to learn what does it mean to be approved by God so then that led me next into reading the scriptures to the lens of what is a good father what is God the Father alike I went into first John I went into Romans I went into John I went into Romans eight went into those areas and I just said I just want to learn who you are as an Abba as a dad I want to this so then it led me to like realizing the interrupter 'he's the interference the things that like i realized i can't receive love from people yeah okay that's a problem so I'm going to now here's like a simple thing back when I was a worship leader get off the stage people in the backstage like hey man that was really great my head would go down my eyes would look at my shoes and I'd be like yeah and one day it's like I realized I don't know how to receive love so I did a simple thing I look at them back in the eyes and just genuinely say thank you I received that I appreciate that now I'm letting love from a brother or sister that's genuinely being delivered to me be received so even to this day people say hey I appreciate your podcast or I appreciate this or thank you this I genuinely take a look at that and I just I'm grateful right I'm grateful because that's an opportunity to learn more about God's love with interaction with people so you have to start looking at your relationship interactions with people differently you have to start establishing and cultivating relationship interactions that are real now where there's there's a true giving of exchanging of love so then I started giving out what I didn't get telling people they're loved telling people they're approved validating them telling them they're appreciated pointing out things you love about them right that starts to get the make the the the mechanisms of your heart moving right so then can I go back to the receiving yeah so then it's like when I say stop and learning to receive I'll explain that very practically I literally just stopped my physical body I kind of halt my mind I take some deep breaths to just call my nervous system down and I focus on the fact that right now he he loves me unconditionally and so what I'm doing is I'm bringing my thoughts into alignment and agreement with that because a lot of our thoughts are not aligned with it right our thoughts are like yeah he loves me but like I said I got bills to pay yeah he loves me but there's some gall I'm a kid where are you in that there's all this like stuff I'm struggling and and you're not listen take Anu and this is where second Corinthians says take every thought captive every thought captive to the obedience of Christ right right so I'm kinda like taking them and like putting them in this like like funnel mm-hmm where I'm going this is who you are God because we must know who God is is at war mm-hmm we watch the news right right look at all the things that are of God that are at war in our culture right so of course we're gonna be battling these things the enemies at us so I'm taking these thoughts know you love me unconditionally right now and I take these thoughts I give them to you and I bring my thought into alignment and I say yes and amen see that's what it is it's it's allowing my belief system to come in alignment with what His Word says about him because it's not just gonna happen and I think this is a this is a mistake that I think people fall into we it goes back to the slavery kind of thing we want we'll go okay I want to receive your love and we kind of sit there and we we think God is gonna like jump on you right I love you like and I'm like in a movie or something or like you know the Rays of heaven come over us and and it just sets people up for disappointment disappointment disappointment when really although that could happen and I need to leave room for him for that rain the core place is we live this walk by faith if God comes and speaks now and opens up a hole in the studio and speaks that doesn't require faith so now it's wonderful but it's it's shortcutting the faith journey that's why people who usually have they usually have a harder life because they got like the Apostles had these revelations while those guys were shipwrecked stoned every every which way they were dealing with stuff right so you know beware of what you pray for but anyway at the end of the day it's it's a faith so what is faith it's a substance of things hoped for I've got to align the divine vision of my heart how I see things how I perceive things with his love for me and most of it is his love going it's okay peace be still because that's what a good father does when the kids freaking out they're making they made fun of me you know me he may need to step in and there's other times where he goes you know what Johnny it's alright let's go get a milkshake and let's sit down here alright you're saying is he is the father avoiding the problem no as a grownup you look and you go you don't have to worry about that right now and most of the stuff we battle God's looking at his kids and going you ten years from now this is really not a big issue but I get that you're struggling with it and it's okay it's my love coming to my love right and rest in that and I had no idea how to do that so I think one of the advantages that I have is I'm more I'm ready to admit I don't know how to do that but I'll learn yeah that's the only advantage I had I'm not smarter than anyone I'm not you know I I didn't have like an advantage over everyone all I had was that I'm honest about the situation and I'm like I'm willing to learn and I had no idea how to how to be loved how to receive love how to walk in that love continually and so I've been a student of that now for like the past 15 years of just I just want to keep knowing what it means to be loved keep loving others it's hard work at times because you get challenged your brokenness gets hit people are messy many times you help people and they strike you back with their brokenness you know I've had many many rounds of that and but but I still want to let love have it to work because yeah it'll win in the end God's love will overthrow anything so does that help kind of talk about the receptivity part in the frustration because I I don't want to it drives me nuts when I hear people talking cliches just receive or just this and I get what they're trying to do but it's like people are like there's a deeper understanding to it than just throwing out right that statement sometimes Christians feel like remember the Kevin James joke where he says he goes with his wife to the movies and he's looking at the screen and he jokes about his wife going watch this part watch this part he's like I am he's like how do i watch more mmm he like takes his eyeballs and he does this right and she's like watch what's honey he's like I am I have been watching the movie the whole time I feel like a lot of Christians feel that way yeah it's like believe and you're like I am what else do I have to do stand on my head and flip over three times and yeah or even when they said receive you're like okay my hands higher maybe if I put my hands in the shape of a fountain that's it you know yeah you know no I think this is good and I think this thank you for sharing all that stuff because I think that really helps a lot of people in understanding what your journey has been in with that you talked about it really beautifully so I think it I really think that everybody got blessed from hearing that today and so what would would you say would be some takeaways because I think there's a couple things in everything that we talked about and you shared that we first need to understand that you haven't arrived in in love that we all need to grow in it number two is that there's an area of not taking a microscope to it but going are a I need some work on receiving God's love I I need I need to understand what this feels like more so what was my love relationship like with my parents what was the foundation kind of look at it the matically and look at what what is the the mode of operation your family when it comes to love and then go okay let me look over here how do I operate with God is it how I look at my parents with my dad silent but yet he was in the room so I think okay I get God's here I just don't know how to hear from him you know what what are the themes that you are sensing around this area of the foundation of love in relationship to your parents and how you then relate to God and there's other aspects of this too that maybe we can even continue next week as far as the mother lens nurture interacting with the Holy Spirit like those kinds of areas that can also help heal this rejection lens but what other things would you give us a takeaway for people in in processing this area of love I'd turn it back to you and say how do you receive how did you receive and how do you continue to receive God's love you want to get into that now well I think that most of the feedback I get from listeners is the stuff that you share well so for me it's been I won't go too long say no we've we've gone a little bit longer in this in the show but who cares oh okay for me it's been a very very long journey in understanding God's love and the example that I kind of gave in the in the beginning about my family um in kind of some pride in walking through yeah I'm good like even when you and I met and you can answer this like I kind of had some pride when it came to the Father's love like I didn't really need it so the pride said I'm good I'm good you know yeah I'm good and I think I felt like I was I had gotten myself to a place of a protective mechanism because I think I was afraid of it I was afraid of what it would open up in hindsight I was afraid of what it could tap into but my dad had his areas of brokenness but he would always say to me I love you so I really fall into that category of like I thought I was good because he said it to me yeah so that so when the ministry or the the like concept of receiving the Father's love came about you're like well I I've I've heard I love in a very basic category God's love means him saying I love you and my dad said it to me I have all these other issues cuz I'm broken it's me I made bad choices it's all on me that's pretty much how and it wasn't like switching my lens to blame my parents but I had a very hard time coming to terms with like the generational dysfunction that came down the lane and how things went in our house and how things were established are not established that then produced me right so I had a very hard time with that so in this aspect of rejection it was me on the problem I rejected myself out of every scenario so now when it came to interacting with God's love so you couldn't even get to the subject of rejection dealing with mom and dad because you were rejecting yourself begin with so you can't even see it cuz it's like I'm just it's just all the the lack of Worth and lack of stuff I can't get it together pretty much it was all about me in every way so it came in I don't know I'm the screw-up yeah I'm uncut like I never would look at a situation and think you know what no that's not really good for me to be a part of no I'm the problem I shouldn't go no one loves me like it the rejection focus would always look at me as being the problem right which is what the enemy wants to do right give you a thought get you to come an agreement with a thought then accuse you over it and then make you one with it this is you your and then shame and all that stuff so in my journey of I remember the day that we were actually at church and it was you and a couple of safe men that we knew that were ministering the Father's love and a very good friend of ours ministered to me now you had kind of laid a lot of foundation for me but it was probably good that it wasn't you right and so right we were dating at the time weren't we dating no I don't think no we were engaged yet yeah so he he very in a such a safe way spoke love to me but the things that I needed like with you the things that I needed to hear that opened up and I it was I cracked like it was it was this Dodger wait like what no no and I still feel like there's parts of me that would kind of fight it because no I'm good like I'm good it's I'm just the problem I need to make better decisions and if I would just treat myself better and be okay with myself and then we'll be okay mm-hmm like I've been in a very long journey of this in and out with God and I think a lot of it that that foundation was laid because things would be like yucky in our house but my father would come back you know I love you guys all right so we should just all be okay and but we would blow them away all the other problems you're left to just blame yourself yes or you not deal with it at all you talk about the back and forth in and out I like that so what would what would that look like what would cause it what would okay so what causes the movement in like a way towards because of the household that I grew up in if you had a burst you could all interact well so we're all good we could interact good so if I'm feeling good I'm like I'm good with God I can oh thank you Father I can flow if I'm not good nope can't happen can't happen it was a very manic relationship that I had with God if I'm feeling good for the day or in a moment and I had a burst well I could interact with God I would be like I'm gonna get out my Bible I'm gonna get in that word I'm and I get something from it but as soon as that feeling went away I could not maintain it I couldn't maintain that it was always an in-and-out its which then in the out would go to oh okay well if I could maybe like be a good person then maybe God will like it if I pray to him later like very weird like really weird things would come into my mind that's not weird at all because I could tell you the Honeywell that I talked to that same thing or if I like really weird things like if I was in the grocery store and they forgot to like charge me for an item and I was like no they should charge me for the item so I would let them know like you need to charge me for it so I would feel like oh my gosh like I'm a really good person right now I could talk to like really shallow dumb things that kept my relationship with God at a very shallow level really going in deeper and understanding his love but you don't think you don't think in the moment you're living shop you don't you're just living by what you know that's all I knew to do I didn't know any depths of his love I didn't know deeper parts of what it was like to follow Christ I just I didn't know those things right and so I mean my we can go into my history about another you know when I was saved and what that looked like I wasn't like in church all the time so I didn't have a great foundation like you did so my faith walk was just very simple and so it would take these weird tangents of what and I think a lot of people do this you kind of create what your faith looks like or how you're gonna like how you're gonna walk through it mine was just really shallow a lot of us do that so you come in to does that make sense yeah you come in to discovery of the father's love in deeper ways you had to kind of I don't want to put words in your mouth you should kind of lower those walls yes and and really love needed to penetrate those areas where it was like okay you're safe to be vulnerable so gone through that we've gone through many things many different transitions we've experienced many hurts many pains many things you're a mom of two kids one of them on the autism spectrum they're both very energetic you homeschool we have a lot go on how do you receive God's love to break through the rejection barriers that want to come up for me I have to be very intentional about it if I kind of just go along in willy-nilly but for me intentionality is more my inner thought life and then I'll share with you like oh hey for the past couple weeks I have been nice to know ya like mark is definitely you process out very well I do both I do both you do but you process out very well in oh I can do both but I have more of like an internal worlds that will go on inside of me but then I'll share oh hey I have this major breakthrough because I kind of more like I want to see it play out - right if you can understand that so I have to be intentional and sometimes it I still have the patterns of where I have the burse where okay I feel I feel like I could receive his love right now but I go with it not in condemnation like before I would kind of recognize how immature my relationship was with God and then beat myself up for after now I'm just okay with it in that moment where you're it's not the best posture but you're like I'm gonna go with this anyways cuz he's gonna meet me in the regard right and I pick intentional things if I'm sitting out being a mom and having Max and our life I I do have to be intentional about it right now so if I'm sitting on the back porch and the kids are playing down in the creek and I feel the warmth of the Sun of my face I intentionally say okay I'm gonna Lord I want to receive and feel from you right now how you love me yep that's right now how I have to be very intentional and I think that the more I do that the more I create reference points of what his love feels like that's been a very big thing for me in you know the statement that I brought up about how a child is celebrated and loved when they walk in a room I needed to know what that felt like and God gave me a picture of that early on in our marriage you and I had gone to a seminar and I had a very beautiful encounter with God's love and I think that that's really important for people to get a reference point that you can point back to right cuz that's really what we do is when we're drawing from our childhood and we're drawing from how love was established you have reference points for what love is my needed to be reframed so yes I had the benefit of my dad saying he loved me but I didn't know what the follow-up like I didn't know what that felt like for that to stay with me right so it was easy when someone said God loves you I'm like thank you I know it was the afterwards of not keeping it with me but I didn't know how to do and for me that's been very very incremental and honestly I haven't arrived in it I'm really in a process I'm establishing that more in my life yeah you take advantage of those moments I do because the life of a mom with young kids and and homeschooling it's like the the regimented this is gonna be this this and this and and I think sometimes god shakes it up where it's like even for me where it's like there's been times where it's like we're gonna scrap this routine you have because it's keeping you some in some ditches and some of those seasons led me like I discovered connecting to God I don't want to sound like like fruity weird but this is just true connecting to God in nature and and the Bible you know confers this so that you know all creation you know declares the glory of God that like just stopping pausing listening to the birds hearing the wind feeling the Sun breathing in the air connecting to gratitude which that I find opens up to love like nothing else yeah because the gratitude focuses my attention on His goodness I'm just grateful and and and I don't have to feel grateful I connect to the gratitude I allow it to like get into my physiology I'm a big believer in like processing thought then it gets in your physiology then 15 minutes later you're like charged with it right so or whatever you have five minutes two minutes whatever even like God will to show you different aspects where he'll get a hold of your heart it's about getting out of like the busy walled up rejection world brain that we've been conditioned in and get down into our heart and just experience the love from a father we've we've never had before yeah so it's good so this was an extended episode but I don't kind of took a trail I didn't realize we were gonna go today no I think it was good but if you want some references um you want to go further I've been getting great feedback about exposing the rejection mindset and you can actually get experiencing God's love as your father which this really starts it it starts the journey off it's a short read it's available in hardcover in audio and in you can get a free download of it but the book is a great gift because it's a nice hardcover it's a fantastic gift yes you can give somebody and we designed it that way so that it be a great gift to give someone and there is a online course that accompanies it to kind of help you process it to help you process some of the beginning stages then the rejection mindset goes further and goes all right now let's let's get some of those patterns out of your life so take advantage of that and and utilize it in your life please if you've enjoyed this episode consider becoming a donor either one time or a monthly partner subscribe to our show on YouTube on iTunes all places podcasts are just get on our mailing list and get behind this because we're passionate about this and we want people to understand the nuts and bolts of what it means to really walk a more healed and free life and just experience that transformation so thanks hun for sharing yeah taking the time and share your comments of areas that have been helpful for you and maybe some areas that we could cover in future episodes that would help you unlock experiencing God's love in your life so thank you so much god bless you until next time take care [Music] you

Channel: Mark DeJesus

Views: 13,828

Rating: 4.9688716 out of 5

Keywords: God's Love, Rejection, Rejection Mindset, Recieving Love

Id: PqCta9pCTSw

Length: 68min 55sec (4135 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 20 2019