Will God Reject Me?

Do you feel secure in God’s family? Or do you secretly wonder if he might reject you one day? I used to fear that on the day of judgement God might suddenly produce some reason I hadn’t thought of and would reject me as “not good enough”.

If I think about it rationally, I can see how silly that is. After all, not only is it impossible for me to be perfect, but it’s impossible for anyone else to be perfect too! If God wants only perfect people, then there will only be one man in heaven – and that man is Jesus, the only perfect man. And quite honestly, He didn’t need to come and die on a cross to get into heaven, did he? After all, Jesus was already in heaven!

No, trying to be perfect is not the answer. Of course there are hundreds of imperfect things about all of us. None of us stand any chance of being good enough. It isn’t about being good enough. So why did Jesus choose to come and suffer so much for such imperfect people?

Well, separation from God leads to death, just as cutting a branch off a tree leads to its death. That’s because God is the source of life. Every person on earth is like a branch that has been broken off from a tree – we may not look dead yet, but we have no hope of life unless we can be grafted back into the tree. The tree is God himself (John 15:5-6). He is our only hope of life, but nobody can reconnect themselves to God, however good their life is. It’s impossible because our sin has broken us away from God. That’s why the Bible says that the wages of sin is death. It separates us from the source of life.

So God came to help us. Jesus lived a perfect life, so there was no sin separating Him from God. Jesus was the branch still attached to the tree. He said that if we believe in Him, turn away from sin and choose to obey Him rather than the devil, then we’re like a branch grafted into him. In today’s verse He says that we’re in Him and He’s in us.
It’s as if Jesus is the branch still connected to the tree. We’re branches that were previously broken off, but are now connected to Jesus. So, through Jesus, we become part of the tree again. We receive life through Him, just as sap flows from a tree into the branch. Jesus explains this in John chapter 15.

We don’t have to be perfect when we’re part of Jesus. That’s because we’re part of Him and He’s connected to God the Father. It is just as if we’re His own body (1 Corinthians 12:27). We share His life when we join Him as part of His body. Paul says in Romans that it’s as if we died on the cross too, because we’re joined to Jesus and are actually part of Him (Romans 6:1-8). And of course we share everything He has – including His resurrection from death. Wow, just think about that!

When we invite Him into our lives to save us and direct us, He enters us by His beautiful Holy Spirit. We’re born again and have a new start. The old is gone. We’re never alone or abandoned. We don’t have to be perfect, or to protect ourselves. He’s there with us. God will never reject Jesus. And we’re Jesus’ body, we are part of Him. This is real – let’s accept this wonderful gift, keep our hearts fit for this royal person and enjoy His company.

Prayer: Thank You, Jesus, for coming to rescue me. I’m grateful that You stayed connected to Father God, and that You offer me the chance to be connected to Him through You. I’m sorry for the things I know I’ve done wrong in my life, and I ask You to forgive me and to come into the whole of my life by Your Holy Spirit and to teach me the way to live. Thank You. Amen.