I stopped looking and maybe you should also.
You see, I made a decision YEARS ago to mind my own business and work with my own hands.
The scripture that references this is in 1 Thess 4. It jumped out at me one day while reading the Bible and grabbed MY WHOLE LIFE.
The Rejection Connection
I suffered from rejection so severely in my life that I needed practical ways to overcome it. Prayer, healing sessions, prophecy and laying on of hands wasn’t working at the depth I needed — and my “rejected self” was ruining so many relationships and sabotaging friendships left and right.
So, I began crying out to the Lord for help in dealing with this “my own way” and the Lord sent me straight to scriptures on coveting. That was when I found 1 Thess. 4:11-18. Check out the article, “Stop Measuring Success By The Success of Others”
I found a practical passage that I could put in practice in a “different way” in my life to guard my HEART FROM ME — and the pathways it would make when certain situations arose. You see, I had this profound ability to make everything “about me” and “about how rejected I felt.”
I had two choices: (1) Throw myself into my healing in this area; or (2) continue to blow up the relationships around me by coveting people in my heart.
Can you stop looking?
So, the journey of “minding my own” business began. Just because we understand healing from one perspective does not mean that it is THE ONLY WAY to receive healing. My giant step began with this statement: I STOPPED “LOOKING.”
I stopped:
- Looking at the relationships others had with my pastors or mentors
- Listening to the prophetic words others received (whether folk understood why or not)
- Following prophetic words from lists, books, popular people, etc.
- Following certain ministries
- Listening to testimonies of friends/people about how God blessed them
- Watching how those I loved interacted with other people I knew
- Hanging out with bragging people
- Hanging around people who triggered my rejection the most (had nothing to do with them personally)
- Looking at other people’s relationship with their parents, mentors, mentees, etc. and comparing them to mine
- Following celebrity lives on any media form
- Comparing my gifts, talents, ministry, successes, etc. with others
- Asking questions about other people not directly influencing my life
- Entering into competition with others.
- Worrying about the Smiths, Joneses and what all that people were doing around me
- COMPARING MY LIFE to folks
- Trusting MYSELF to help me do this, and began crying out: HOLY SPIRIT HELP ME STOP LOOKING! I AM MAKING THE EFFORT AND I NEED YOU TO WALK ALONG SIDE ME TO REVEAL WHAT I NEED TO STOP LOOKING AT! I STOPPED LOOKING AND BEGAN FOCUSING ON SEEING THE GOOD IN ME!
Focusing on the Good
Listen, Holy Spirit began teaching me how to do this in a healthy way. So much so… that it literally became a way of life for me. It expanded into something much more as the years have passed.
The gift of LETTING PEOPLE GO became a powerhouse state of being for me.
I realized that my battle with rejection had more to do with what I let in my eye-gate that sent me INTO REJECTION than any “spirit of rejection” ever could. Check out, “Consider What Success Is To You”
I had to break the habit of “LOOKING” and then “COMPARING” and then “CONDEMING MYSELF” and then “COMPETING!” THAT TOOK WORK ON MY PART! I had to train my Spirit…. to keep my focus on what mattered.
There’s a lot more to this, but I want to share it because the rejection that plagued me, regardless of its source, was crippling my ability to be CONTENT, UNIQUE & FOCUSED on my own healing journey.
It was causing me to enter into jealousy… to feel unloved…. and to believe God had forgotten me. It was causing me to be offended and bitter… and to lash out. It was hindering my ability to mature in the Lord.
It was STIFLING MY CREATIVITY because at that time in my life…. I was so desperate to be accepted by people and by God… that I was performing, PERFORMING… performing. And that – in me – needed to be demolished and my heart healed.
Time To Think Differently
Holy Spirit had to teach me to LOOK at something different. So, I began focusing on what made me, my ministry and calling unique.
I stopped looking at what everyone else was doing, saying and believing…. and with every effort, newness began emerging.
Sometimes, we look too much at other people. (I am not speaking of learning, training, having a mentor, pastor, etc.) I am speaking of coveting.
WHEN WE COVET — longing for something we believe others have that we don’t, it digs a pit of rejection inside of us that grows into a vicious, bitter fruit.
That ain’t the devil. That’s you! All kinds of toxic behaviors flow from it. (Check out, “Consistency: The Dirty Word of Progress”
Hebrews 12:2, “Keep YOUR EYES on Jesus, who both began and finished this race we’re in.”
