I sat myself down this afternoon after church to preview our small group lesson for the evening, session two of Uninvited.  I have read the book cover to cover twice now, but we are just now getting through the study and video downloads.

Tonight our lesson touched on Peter denying Jesus three times, and specifically how Jesus asked Peter to feed his sheep, and take care of them.  Now, Jesus didn’t have any cute little lambs (I am dying to own some actual sheep 🐑 they seem so huggable) he meant people, his fellow man.  The theme of the entire book is rejection, and how your individual path of pain in your own life may make you perceive certain things as rejection that simply are not.

I had to read that paragraph a couple of times because it’s good stuff. I work with teenagers and sometimes frazzled teachers and parents, on the daily. Teenagers get a bad rap for seeming kind of entitled. I blame our culture for a lot of it. They want everything fast and now, my own child is the same.  It’s rare for a child to walk into my office to see how I am doing, because again, the nature of my job is to fix things, or to nudge kids in the direction to help them figure out the solution (and make them make actual phone calls where they talk to humans on the phone…it’s a pity you can’t simply text the Department of Higher Education 😉 ), so I don’t take that personally at all.

My calling in life is to encourage others, to guide kids and to raise my little person. But I am GUILTY (earlier in my life, not so much now) of walking into an unknown situation and having my own self doubt take over.  I have allowed that critical voice in my head to make me not return to churches, to classes at the gym (again, not now, I am a Chatty Cathy at my church and my gym, sorry if you happen to be near me, I might hug you) or lunches in the lounge because others did not make me feel welcome or wanted. If you wake up wondering and praying about how you can possibly bless someone else, instead of hoping for someone else to bless you, your life perspective is totally changed.

Imagine how sad your life would be if you were constantly mad that no one did nice things for you, and no one talked to you at church or at the gym, or at the PTO meeting, or no one prayed for you. Stop waiting for other people to bless you, and being mad at them for not helping you, and BE THE BLESSING TO SOMEONE ELSE. That’s all.  I posted something a few weeks ago about how if you want kindness, be kind.  Chances are that girl next to you in your boot camp class staring at her phone is lonely and wishing someone would talk to her about her day.  That single mama at church with her three babies is probably exhausted and hoping no one asks her where her husband is, because she doesn’t have one, and finally got up the courage to come to church alone (it takes guts, people).

I cannot wait to see where God takes my small group with session three, since two made us all want to stand up and shout.  We have been trying to get through this fantastic study for awhile, rejection is a topic that so many people can relate to, on so many levels.

I hope you all have a fantastic week!

*do NOT go hugging people at work tomorrow who are not huggers, start with just asking them about their weekends first…you’ve got to build up to that hug 😉