Although I love writing fiction, I also love teaching Bible studies. So far I don’t feel the call to write them, a la Beth Moore or Lysa TerKeurst, I’d rather purchase their materials and teach on them all day long.

Case in point: Lysa TerKeurst’s latest, UNINVITED.

I am passionate about seeing women living free through surrender. As I mentor and encourage women of all ages it is clear rejection is a place we’ve all lived. I believe God’s ready to show us some change of address cards.

Last week I started the series with my home church Sunday School class and with a friend in a one-on-one setting. I also plan to go online with a closed Facebook group and chat about the book, too. As I shared with the Sunday School class, a memory dropped that I believe was heaven sent.

It drove the point home that Lysa shares that we’re doing to “deal with our rejection, but not dwell on them. We are going to dwell on the declarations of God’s love for us. We’re going to live loved.” But how many times have you been offended and you stayed up all night thinking about what you were going to say to that person in the morning?

I have.

And that’s dwelling.

The memory was from sixteen years ago or so. My son was a toddler at the top of the play place at a local McDonald’s. I heard a cry and knew it was him. All the kids scattered. I climbed up and asked what was wrong.

“He called me a name.” The tears kept falling.

I tried to find out who, and what was said, my own experiences giving me plenty of words to wonder. Later that day he told me.

The Rejection Lesson by Julie Arduini. Image from Pixabay and not Julie’s kid.

“He called me coconut head.”

I kid you not, my son stayed offended for two years. When I’d walk in to check on him in his room, he had action figures, Legos, whatever, and he was rehearsing what he’d say to that kid if he had the chance. One reply I remember was he was going to counter coconut head with “lemon head.” And “stupid head,” a word he knew we weren’t saying in our house without consequences.

But that’s what we do when wounded. We rehearse the hurt. We dwell on it. And that memory was so vivid and such a good example of what we do that I thought I’d share it.

It’s time to deal with the rejections from childhood. School. Work. Family. Marriage. Friends. Enemies. Ministry. Anything else. Stop rehearsing it. Stop dwelling on it.

Instead, let the Bible do the talking. Do you know God is talking to YOU there? He has some very romantic and beautiful things to say. Try out Zephaniah 3, for example. The Psalms. Song of Solomon, weird as it is, is a love letter to the bride of Christ. His church. You. Me.

No more coconut head come backs. It’s time to find healing from rejection.

To purchase Lysa TerKeurst’s Uninvited, click here.

To learn more about my Praise and Coffee Online Fall 2016 Uninvited Study, click here.