Bitter Sweet - 2 - Bitter Taste of Rejection

Today we will be continuing our Easter series, “Bitter Sweet”. Last week we looked at the ups and downs in the life of Jesus, and that in all situations God is with us.

This week we are looking at the “bitter taste of rejection” where we see Jesus facing the ultimate rejection, of his friends, his community and even his father in Heaven.

We are going to play a game with those of you who are brave enough. Here I have some super bitter sweets. We are going to see who can stand the bitterness for the longest.

As you experienced in the game bitterness is not a pleasant taste. It can make you want to spit it out in disgust. However, those of you who stuck with it, who continued sucking despite the bitterness, experienced the sweetness that followed.

As we will discover this morning rejection can sometime be similar to this. This was certainly the case for Jesus as he faced massing rejection near the end of his ministry. The first passage that we are going to look at is Matthew 26 : 47 - 54.

Here we have seen one of Jesus’ closest friends, one of his disciples betray him. Judas plots with the religious leaders to secretly reveal Jesus so that they can arrest him.

But what is interesting is that Jesus does not let this bitterness get the better of him. He doesn’t pick a fight like some of his disciples want to, instead he let the betrayal happen because, despite how hard it was, he knew it was part of God’s plan for him.

Can you think of any times when you have felt let down, rejected or betrayed by your friends or someone close to you?

How did you react to the situation?

Looking back is there anything that you would have done differently?

Following the initial betrayal that we read about earlier there were a number of other key moments on Jesus’ journey that ultimately lead to his death on the cross which we will read about in a moment, can you think of any examples of what these are?

We can see the final moments of Jesus’ life in Mark 15 : 25 - 39.

At this point we see one final rejection where Jesus is crying out “My God, my God why have you forsaken me” This was a point of total rejection for Jesus, rejected by both humankind and God.

What would have been going though Jesus’ mind at this point while he was hanging there on the cross must have been horrendous, feeling like he had been left helpless alone apart from everyone he loved. However he knew that it was part of God’s great plan to restore all of humanity.

Jesus faced unthinkable rejection, cruelty and pain on the lead up to and during his crucifixion. However he did it willing out of love for us because he knew that his suffering would save us from a similar fate.

Quite often what God values and what people value are very different, and what God values highly is often disregarded by humans and what humans value highly is of little value to God. We see an illustration of this in 1 Peter 2 : 4 - 10.

Here we see Jesus being compared to being a stone. We see that for those who believe in him they can see his value and put him at the centre of what they are building.

However other people who do not believe in him, look at him and see his different shape. He is not like the other stones that they have been using, however they can’t see how he would fit into whatever it is that they are building. They cannot see the value of him, and so toss him out onto the scrap heap, never seeing the true value that he can offer them.

We are going to build some arches built out of stones (or things) that are valuable to followers of Jesus, and to other people.

In your arches you will have noticed that the middle stone is far bigger than all of the others. This is known as the “keystone”, it is the final and most important brick to be added and is key to the arch standing up once the supports are removed from underneath it, as it provides the support for the columns of either side of this central stone.

As followers of Jesus he should be the cornerstone in our life, the one thing that everything else in our life rests upon.

In pairs have a chat and decide one thing that you each want to get better at leading on Jesus for, a thing where you find it hard to trust him with entirely.

As followers of Jesus he should be the cornerstone in our life, the one thing that everything else in our life rests upon.

We know that without Jesus coming to Earth to live as a man. Tasting the bitter taste of rejection as a man, dying for us separated from all who loved him and then come back to life again we would not be complete.

Without him we would be missing the keystone in our lives that is designed to hold everything together, and keep us strong . Let’s pray:

Lord Jesus,

We thank you that you came to Earth as a Man for us, you experienced the bitter taste of rejection from everyone, even your father God, so that we don’t have to do the same.

We thank you for the pain, and suffering that you went through for us so that we can have a relationship with you both now and forever.

We ask you to help strengthen us when we feel rejected, and help us to remember that you are always with us and will never reject us.

We thank you that you not only died on the cross but rose again.

Amen