The Gift of Rejection // Nona Jones

I'm ready for the word and I hope that you are too but before I get into the word I just want to take a minute to pray is that all right let's go before the Lord father God we are here tonight in your presence under your heaven and God we expect that we're not going to leave this place the same God we expect that we're going to have such an authentic and radical encounter with you tonight that every part of us God that is broken will be healed we believe God that every dream that has been unfulfilled shall be fulfilled tonight God because we are placing the full weight of our faith on our expectation and God I decrease in this moment God because we don't need a word from me we need a word from you and so God used me as your vessel tonight you can have your way Holy Spirit God you will be lifted up so that all of your daughters will be drawn unto you tonight and we will never be the same in Jesus name amen amen quick caveat before I get started y'all um how do I put this I'm a preacher and so what that means is I'm gonna talk loud I'm gonna talk fast y'all I may end up doing some cartwheels down either of these aisles but all I know is no matter what happens I need the assurance that this section right here is going to run with me amen we're in okay good good good as long as I know y'all are with me then then we'll be good no seriously y'all you can talk back to me all right if if something is said that blesses you it ministers to you you're not going to distract me so feel free to say Amen preach preacher whatever's on your heart I want you to be free tonight amen I came tonight to be free and I want you to be free as well my book Killing comparison I wrote it because I wanted to share the blueprint for how to get free from what I call self-rejection it's this idea that I am not enough because somebody else is more so I wrote this book to help people get free from self-rejection but after writing the book I realize that there's an equally important question that I want us to deal with tonight and that is how do I get free from others rejecting me because you see it's one thing to reject myself it's another thing when other people are rejecting me and what I've come to believe y'all is that the person that you are today and the person that you will be in the future entirely hinges on the question of how you deal with rejection for those who take notes I'm going to teach from what may seem to be a peculiar subject but it is the gift of rejection the gift of rejection you see I know that we think of gifts as good things we think of gifts as things that we're excited to receive but when I say that rejection is a gift you're probably thinking Nona how can you say rejection is a gift when my father hardly has a kind word to say to me or about me Nona how can you say that rejection is a gift when I gave the very best years of my life to a man who walked away from me Nona how is rejection a gift when I worked my butt off at that job and I was still denied a promotion and you may be thinking Nona how is rejection a gift when the person that I thought was my closest friend when the person that I I thought was my Confidant walked away from me how is rejection a gift when gifts are good gifts are supposed to bring happiness rejection is the opposite because rejection brings pain rejection brings discouragement well I need you to just stay with me for a little while longer because I believe that God is going to give us new eyes to see a familiar Bible story from a different vantage point and by seeing it from this different vantage point we're going to come to see rejection the way that God sees it and that is a gift the thing about rejection though is the reason why rejection hurts is because rejection doesn't just injure our pride rejection hinders our heart in order to even experience rejection we have to first have the hope that we were accepted and so when we are rejected it ends up shattering the hope that we were accepted but y'all God came tonight to restore some hope God came tonight to restore some Joy God came tonight to bring some peace and God came tonight to bring some love back to hearts that have been broken I'm going to be in the book of First Samuel chapter 16. again A Familiar Bible story first Samuel 16 familiar Bible story we're about to walk into a scene where the prophet Samuel is commissioned by God to go to a man named Jesse who had eight Sons he's commissioned to go to Jesse and choose a new king of Israel because Saul failed epically and so God did not tell Samuel which of Jesse's Sons he had chosen he just told Samuel to go to the house of Jesse and that he would reveal the new king once he was in his presence and so Samuel makes his way toward the town and the thing you have to know is that Samuel was a prophet he was a true prophet he was the kind of man that when he showed up on the scene he was usually bringing conviction and correction and so the Elders of the town they see Samuel making his way to the town and they get a little afraid because they're not sure why he's there and so in first Samuel 16 beginning at verse 5 the Bible tells us that the elders asked Samuel if he came in peace and he said yes in peace I have come to sacrifice to the Lord consecrate yourself elves and come to the sacrifice with me that he consecrated Jesse and his sons and invited them to the sacrifice when they arrived Samuel Saul eliab and he thought surely the Lord's anointed stands before the Lord but the Lord said to Samuel do not consider his appearance or his height for I have rejected him the Lord does not look at the things people look at people look at the outward appearance but the Lord looks at the heart then Jesse called to benadab and had him pass in front of Samuel but Samuel said the Lord has not chosen this one either Jesse had shama pass by but Samuel said nor has the Lord chosen this one Jesse had seven of his sons passed before Samuel but Samuel said to him the Lord has not chosen these so he asked Jesse are these all the sons you have there is still the youngest Jesse answered he is tending the Sheep Samuel said send for him we will not sit down until he arrives I need you to notice something I need you to realize that Jesse had seven of his sons passed before Samuel and after those seven sons passed by him he realized through God's revelation that none of them had been chosen and so he asks Jesse are these all of the sons you have without hesitation Jesse says oh well there is still the youngest he's in the field tending sheep so in other words the youngest son wasn't there not because they didn't know where he was but because he was not invited you see the thing the thing so much about rejection is that it's not accidental rejection doesn't happen on its own rejection requires intentionality rejection happens on purpose and so just like it did to Jesse's son rejection will leave us feeling like we've been left out in a field by ourself have any of you ever felt that before maybe it was a friend who walked away maybe it was a co-worker who didn't invite you to the Gathering maybe it was someone that you loved and respected who walked away from you but you felt like you were left out in a field well y'all I want to tell you about me you see rejection has been like the oxygen that I have breathed my entire life I was born to a mother who did not want to have children she and my father had been married for 13 years before she found out that she was pregnant with me my father was elated because he always wanted to be a dad but my mother was angry to make matters worse halfway through the pregnancy my father started to have stomach pain and so he went to the doctor and he got diagnosed with terminal stomach cancer he fought as hard as he could and he lived until two months shy of my second birthday after which time my mother moved us to the other side of the country following behind a man she barely knew but who promised he would take care of her and take care of me and so when we arrived in Florida where we moved that relationship quickly disintegrated and my earliest memories are different men coming in and out of our life until she settled on a guy who became her living boyfriend and y'all I did not like him from the beginning there was just something about him that I did not like and I'm going to put a pin in this story for just a moment mothers when your children feel a little strange about somebody don't overlook that don't disregard that Don't force your children to hug somebody that they're not comfortable with because here's the thing children have a way of discerning when we want to be oblivious but shortly after we we moved to Florida she met this guy he moved in the house and I was about five and a half at the time and her sister passed away and she had to leave to go to the funeral and I begged my mother to take me with her but she said she could not afford the ticket and so she left me in his care and the very first night that she was gone he assaulted me and after it was over I remember he said to me he said you better not say anything to your mother because she doesn't want you and she'll get rid of you in my little mind had latched on to that lie and for two years he repeatedly abused me until I was about eight years old and I worked up the courage to tell my mother what he did and she had him arrested y'all and I thought it was over but on the day of his release from jail she took me with her to pick him up and brought him back home where the abuse resumed so in addition to being sexually abused I I was then be I would then be violently physically abused by my mother who has some mental illness she became verbally abusive and emotionally abusive y'all I don't have any memories with my mother where we were laughing and smiling and enjoying each other as a matter of fact when I think back on being in sporting events and doing plays at school I don't remember my mother ever being there as a matter of fact I had to get rides to those events with the parents of my classmates my mother was not there and for so many years I wondered what did I do that was so wrong what did I do that was so bad that my mother didn't want me she told me all the time that she wished she never had me all the time she reminded me that I was a burden that she should have never had me that she didn't want me she drilled all of these lies into my heart so much so that I wore the weight of rejection on my heart and and it it created this cavernous hole in my heart that I filled with friendships and relationships with people who could not have cared less about me I remember I would not make a demand on a friendship I would not make an Ask of a boyfriend because I was afraid that if I asked them to do anything that they would walk away from me because the rejection made me believe that I was the problem that I was defective that I was not worthy that I was not relevant you see I had wore the weight of this rejection on my heart to the point where I honestly believed that the world would have been better off without me I would carry the full weight of relationships y'all never making a demand on other people because I figured that they would walk away and in the rare instances that I did ask somebody for help the fact that they immediately walked away simply proved to me that I was disposable have any of you ever been there before you allowed people to stay in your life and you basically survive off of the crumbs of their attention but the attention that they give you is only to the direct benefit of themselves you see God sent me here tonight because that rejection will distort your perception of your value you know Aubrey said it earlier but I want to repeat it now and I want to take it a couple clicks deeper you see Jeremiah chapter one and five we quote that verse in order to uphold the sanctity of life and we talk about life beginning at conception and we talk about the sanctity of the womb but if you actually listen to what that verse says it says before I formed you in the womb I knew you I set you apart so in other words before the sperm met the egg you had purpose before the sperm met the egg you had value before the sperm met the egg God decided that you were necessary for creation and if the god of the universe can decide that you are necessary for creation how dare we give another person the ability to make us think that we don't matter [Applause] people who don't have a heaven or a hell to put us in and we're around here trying to contort ourselves to fit inside of their opinion of us it ends today it ends today I speak prophetically over this house that whoever walked in here carried the weight of rejection I am speaking prophetically that you are going to leave that rejection at the foot of the cross and you are going to stand boldly and firmly in who God created you to be see I need to take us back to the text because some of you hear me and you think I'm speaking abstractly oh but no no no no we're going to learn a little bit more about Jesse's youngest son you see the Bible tells us that Jesse's youngest son is a young man named David and many of us know of David because of his Valiant fight against the Philistine giant named Goliath it's one of the most famous bible stories in the world people who have never set foot in a church and people who have never read a word of scripture know the story of David and Goliath but there's something in this story that I need you to hear so that you can understand the power of the gift of rejection you see in first Samuel chapter 17 beginning at verse 32 we find that Jesse sent David to the battlefield where Israel was lined up to fight the Philistines and he sends him to the battlefield to take lunch to his brothers but while he's out there David starts to ask people what's going on and they find out that Goliath had been taunting the Israelites that Goliath had been speaking will of the Israelites and so the Bible says David said to Saul let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine your servant will go and fight him Saul turns to him and says we're not able to go out against this Philistine and fight him you are only a young man he has been a Warrior from his youth but David said to Saul she saw what you don't know about me your servant has been keeping his father's sheep when a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock I went after it struck it and rescued the sheep from its mouth when it turned on me I seized it by its hair I struck it and I killed it your servant hath killed both The Lion and the bear this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them because he has defied the armies of the Living God the Lord who rescued me from the Paw of The Lion and the Paw of the bear will rescue me from the hand of this Philistine so Sullivan said to David go and let the Lord be with you I have news for you when you are living your life to honor God even people's rejection of you will serve God's purpose for you see what you didn't catch what you did not catch is that you remember where David was when Samuel told Jesse to bring his sons he was out in the field by himself tending the Sheep but he was not out there just tending sheep David was out there getting prepared for Goliath you see David was not ready for Goliath in spite of being rejected he was ready for Goliath because of being rejected when David was out in that field he didn't have his father or his brothers protecting him all he had was the word of the Lord and because he had the word of the Lord he was able to stand boldly and fight those lions and fight those bears and I need you to stand boldly and know no matter who left you out in that field that is not to your detriment that is to your good rejection is the training ground for your purpose many of us are so focused on who walked away that we have forgotten who never left the word of God tells us that he will never leave you he will never forsake you as a matter of fact Jesus said that he will be with you to the end of the age and so it doesn't matter who walks away it doesn't matter who doesn't invite you who overlooks you it doesn't matter who discourages you because if God is for you who can be against you rejection is a gift but the thing you have to understand is that rejection is a gift that can make you better if you open it or make you bitter if you don't when I look back over the Ark of my life thank God for every rejection I've experienced because every rejection that I experienced was a training ground for the character and the skill that God needed me to build in order to walk in the purpose that God had for me it's a gift but you have to choose to open it there's four insights that I want to give you out of the life of David to help you open the gift of rejection so that every rejection that happens in your life will ultimately be for your good and for God's glory the first Insight that we learn out of David's life is this the gift of rejection positions you for purpose the gift of rejection positions you for purpose and you're saying I don't understand how that is don't know let me take you to the text in first Samuel chapter 16 verse 14. this is after David was anointed king the Bible says that the spirit of the Lord departed from Saul and an evil spirit from the Lord tormented him Saul's attendance said to him see an evil spirit from God is tormenting you let our Lord command his servants here to search for someone who can play the Leer he will play When the evil spirit from God comes on you and you will feel better so Saul said to his attendance find someone who plays well and bring him to me one of the servants answered I have seen a son of Jesse of Bethlehem who knows how to play the Leer he is a brave man and a warrior he speaks well and is fine looking and the Lord is with him then Saul sent Messengers to Jesse and said send me your son David who is where in the hand of God rejection positions you to be found by people that you don't even know are looking for you and you know what's amazing to me about this story many times we feel bad because we were rejected by the king we're rejected by the person with the platform we were rejected by the person who seemed to have the power but you see what we see in this story is that God did not just use the king God used a servant in the king's court you don't have to have the favor of anybody if you have the blessing of God will use the servant in the king's court to position you for what he has for you and this is why I have learned not to get all wound up when people who have a platform reject me I couldn't care less about how big a person's following is I couldn't care less about how well connected they are because I've seen too many times where God will place my name in rooms that I don't even have access to and so I stop being concerned about positioning myself because rejection will position you let me tell you a true story y'all God is so good many years ago I was working for a corporation and I wasn't hired as a spokesperson but the communications team they found out that I was a speaker and so they started to invite me to speak at conferences and events on behalf of the company well I apparently did a really good job and they started to invite me to do more and more they started to invite me to do media on behalf of the company and my manager started to feel some type of way she came to me one day and she said you know Nona all of these conferences and events aren't part of your core work I need you to focus on your core work so you're not doing those events anymore yo my performance evaluations were stellar but because of her jealousy she decided to shut that door but see what she didn't know is I was covered by the blood of Jesus and in the hands of God rejection is just redirection let me tell you what happened so she said I couldn't speak on behalf of the company people started to reach out to me and they said hey we want you to speak at this event and I said to them I said listen I can't speak on behalf of the company so I have to turn it down they said oh no no that's okay we want you here's the thing when I was speaking on behalf of the company I couldn't get paid but when I started to speak on behalf of me to the point y'all that I was making as much in speaking fees as my corporate salary and here's where we know the overwhelming goodness of God that manager ended up getting demoted and I was appointed to her job rejection positions you for purpose I am standing here tonight because of the door that she closed those many years ago I never thought of myself as a speaker ever never desired a platform never desired to do any of this but God knew the plans that he had for me and he caused that door to close so I could get positioned for what he wanted me to ultimately do the second thing we learn out of David's life is that the gift of rejection reveals people's role in your destiny I love this one because many of us in this room right now are nursing feelings of being unworthy because somebody walked away from you but honey hear me when a person walks away from you they only reveal that they are not meant to be part of what God has for you you see there are two types of people in the world there are those who are attached and those who are assigned when a person is attached to you they are connected to you for as long as the relationship benefits them but the moment you make a demand on the relationship the moment you stop channeling benefits in their Direction they will detach from you but then there are people who are assigned to you when a person is assigned to you they're not in the relationship for what they can get out of it they are in the relationship for what they can contribute to it and the mistake that we make is when an attached person starts to detach it triggers insecurity within us and so we begin to shift our energy away from the people who are assigned to us to try to keep the people attached to us and that's one of the worst mistakes that we can make is to give assignment energy to an attached person thank you see if you go back to our text and we read first Samuel 16 verse 10. the Bible tells us that after the seven sons passed before Samuel and after Jesse told Samuel that David was with the Sheep it says that when David showed up he was glowing with health he had a fine appearance and handsome features and the Lord said rise and anoint him this is the one listen to this so Samuel took the Horn of oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers and from that day on the spirit of the Lord Came powerfully Upon David I believe that the reason why Samuel anointed David in the presence of his brothers was to prove to David that what God has for you is for you it doesn't matter who left you in that field it doesn't matter who did not invite you they will be the audience for God's blessing of you you know we love to read the 23rd psalm but verse 5 says this it says you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies you anoint my head with oil my cup overflows the problem with some of us is we're trying to make enemies Frenemies when God wants to make your enemies your audience stop trying to make the people who walk away stay in your circle because sometimes God just wants them to be an audience for what he plans to do in your life there is nothing that God has for you that is trapped in a person who walked away from you hear me when somebody walks away from you all that means is baby that wasn't it that wasn't it stop trying to convince them to stay stop trying to to persuade them and and try to go back to doing things the way that they like them know you have to let them go because rejection reveals people's roles in your destiny the third thing we learn out of David's life and I feel like this is what that creative piece was was speaking to me the third thing that we learned is that the gift of rejection anchors your identity you see many of us believe that something is wrong with wrong and so what we do is we try to contort ourselves so that we fit inside of the two small box of their opinions we change our personalities we change the way that we look we even change the desires that we have in our heart out of a desire to keep them in our life but when you accept the gift of Rejection it will anchor your identity because you will realize that you can do everything they asked you to do and they will still walk away [Music] so you might as well be who God created you to be I feel like in this story in first Samuel chapter 17 beginning at verse 28 we see what happens when you anchor your identity in spite of rejection the Bible tells us that when David showed up to give lunch to his brothers it says that when eliab heard him speaking with the men he burned with anger at him and he asked why have you come down here and with whom did you leave those few sheep in the wilderness I know how conceited you are and how Wicked your heart is you came down only to watch the battle David said now what have I done can't I even speak he then turned away to someone else and brought up the same matter and the men answered him as before what David said was overheard and reported to Saul and Saul sent for him the thing you have to catch in this scene is that David became accustomed to the rejection so much so that when his brother spoke ill toward him he simply turned and kept doing what he was doing and it was because David kept doing what he was doing that's all overheard him and said you come here when you allow rejection to Anchor your identity you will keep doing what God has called you to do no matter what somebody has to say about it too many of us have made Idols out of people's approval we hear the voice of God calling us left but the Applause of the people is calling us right but the thing you have to understand my sisters I said Applause is fickle one day people love you the next they don't even act like they know who you are if you let it rejection will anchor your identity so that you will be exactly who God has called you to be this is why you have to stop feeling bad about yourself because your friend walked away you have to stop feeling bad about yourself because that boyfriend or that husband walked away you have to stop feeling bad about yourself because that opportunity didn't come to pass because what God has for you has your name on it it has your name on it the fourth lesson I feel like this is probably the most important lesson that we learned from David's life is that the gift of rejection draws you nearer to God think about David being in that field by himself over and over day after day week after week year after year nobody coming to check on him nobody coming to defend him nobody coming to protect him but the Lord was faithful when you have nobody in your corner that's when you realize you have the only one that you need because the thing about God is that God is not impressed by your accolades God is not impressed by how many pounds you lose God doesn't care about your degrees or your job title God doesn't care if you're single or married or widowed if you have children or you don't in the eyes of God there is nothing that you could do that could make you more worthy than you were before he forms you in the womb but what so many of us do is when we experience rejection we turn inward and we think something is wrong with us but what God is calling every single one of us to do tonight is instead of turning inward look upward because God is unchanging there is nothing that you have done in your past that hath disqualified the purpose that he has on your life please hear me and internalize what I'm about to say I don't care what it is I don't care how damaged you feel that you are I don't care how bad you may have messed up God knew all of that before the sperm at the egg and he still decided that you were necessary for creation you know I look at second Timothy chapter four a recounts an experience that the Apostle Paul had and every time I read this passage of scripture I read it with a knot in my stomach because I know that I know that as a human being he had to feel the pain of rejection because he turned upward he experienced the peace of God it says beginning at verse 9. he's telling Timothy do your best to come to me quickly for Dimas because he loved this world deserted me he's gone to thessalonica Christians has gone to galatia Titus to Dalmatia only Luke is with me get Mark and bring him with you because he is helpful to me in my Ministry Alexander the metal worker did a great deal of harm to me the Lord will repay him for what he has done you too should be on your guard against him because he strongly opposed our message at my first defense no one came to my support but everyone deserted me May it not be held against them but the Lord stood at my side and gave me strength so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it and I was delivered from the lion's mouth he said he was delivered from the lion's mouth that sounds oddly familiar to what David said David said that he was protected from the Paw of The Lion and the Paw of the bear and I came tonight to tell somebody that you may feel like you've been isolated and you may feel like you've been attacked and you may even feel like you have been damaged Beyond repair but my God is the god that takes rejection and redirects it for his purpose and if this message was for you I need you to stand in the presence of God and receive your healing tonight receive your deliverance tonight receive your peace tonight father we stand under your open Heaven as your daughters knowing that happy enemy would love nothing more than to make us believe the lie that we are not worthy and we are not good enough and we are not relevant but in you God we take our value and you God we take our purpose and in you God we take our healing because whom the son has set free is truly free indeed God we bless you on tonight we lift up our praise tonight and we receive our freedom in Jesus name if you receive it give God praise Hallelujah Hallelujah Hallelujah I feel I just really quickly just really quickly I'm not trying to I'm not trying to belabor this but Aubrey if it's okay I feel like I feel like there are some women in here who you literally believe that you are on your own like you literally believe like everybody who mattered to you seems like they've walked away from you I'm gonna ask you if you would be willing to be honest In This Moment raise your hand if you just feel like you're alone what I want you to do is keep your hand up I want you if you're near any woman with her hand up just to put your hand on her shoulder and begin to pray over her look for the women in your section because there is Deliverance in the room right now there is healing in the room right now keep your hand high this is not the time to be ashamed this is not the time to be afraid this is the time to receive the healing that is in the room right now father God your daughters have believed but they have no one God the pain inside of their heart is so visceral that many times they're crying themselves to sleep since in this room several ladies have considered ending their life because they say if I'm not good enough to live for I cancel the Demonic spirit of suicide right now in the name of Jesus you shall live [Music] father I pray right now for every sister who admitted right now in your presence that she needs the comfort of the spirit I speak Comfort over her right now God I pray that you will connect every sister into a community that will love them back to life in a community that will love them back to Joy in a community that will love them back to Value recognizing God that they are not a mistake Hallelujah Jesus we lift up the power of Jesus tonight in this room you're not free tomorrow you're not free next week you're not free next year you are free right now and if you are going to make that declaration and receive the freedom in the room right now I need you just to say I am free I am free free I am free through Jesus through Jesus through Jesus Holy Spirit have your way in our midst give God your best worship and give God your best praise Hallelujah

Channel: Nona Jones Ministries

Views: 365,922

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Id: mbP3tNiJXC4

Length: 44min 33sec (2673 seconds)

Published: Tue Jun 20 2023