Rejection

Matthew 9:1 So He got into a boat, crossed over, and came to His own city. 2 Then behold, they brought to Him a paralytic lying on a bed. When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, "Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you." 3 And at once some of the scribes said within themselves, "This Man blasphemes!" 4 But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, "Why do you think evil in your hearts? 5 For which is easier, to say, 'Your sins are forgiven you,' or to say, 'Arise and walk'? 6 But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins"--then He said to the paralytic, "Arise, take up your bed, and go to your house." 7 And he arose and departed to his house. 8 Now when the multitudes saw it, they marveled and glorified God, who had given such power to men. 9 As Jesus passed on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax office. And He said to him, "Follow Me." So he arose and followed Him. 10 Now it happened, as Jesus sat at the table in the house, that behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat down with Him and His disciples. 11 And when the Pharisees saw it, they said to His disciples, "Why does your Teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" 12 When Jesus heard that, He said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 13 But go and learn what this means: 'I desire mercy and not sacrifice.' For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance." 14 Then the disciples of John came to Him, saying, "Why do we and the Pharisees fast often, but Your disciples do not fast?" 15 And Jesus said to them, "Can the friends of the bridegroom mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? But the days will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast. 16 No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment; for the patch pulls away from the garment, and the tear is made worse. 17 Nor do they put new wine into old wineskins, or else the wineskins break, the wine is spilled, and the wineskins are ruined. But they put new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved."

Remember the “in crowd?” Were you part of it?

At my high school, the ‘in-crowd’ consisted of the jocks, the cheerleaders, and the sort-of preppies that hung around with them. Unless you were one of them, you could not be part of them.

But there were other ‘in-crowds’ of their own making, designed to deal with the ‘in-crowd’ they couldn’t be part of. These were the greasers - who were the guys in shop class, the hippies, and the geeks.

But what if you were none of these? What if none of the labels applied to you? Did they then? Do they now?

Jesus came to teach us there are no labels in the eyes of God, and that the only “in-crowd” is the crowd going in to heaven. For the crowd going to heaven there are no labels or affiliations other than “saved by grace.” There is no white, or black, or red, or yellow, or cool, or geek, or religious, or cool or even un-cool. None of that matters. It also doesn’t matter if you’ve been rejected as being, “not one of those.”

Our greatest example is Jesus being rejected as, “not one of those.” He was an outsider from the onset of His ministry life. He was rejected by those with commercial interests because He wasn’t commercial. He was rejected by the religious leaders because He wasn’t religious. He was rejected by those who were popular because He didn’t seek popularity. He only sought to do God’s will, and that led Him to be rejected by the whole world.

-Pastor Bill