Uninvited: Living Loved When You Feel Less Than, Left Out, and Lonely

by Lysa TerKeurst

The exhausting manipulation and control it takes to protect an identity based on circumstances will crush our hearts and hide the best of who we are behind a wall of insecurity. It’s time to stop the lies and devastating hurt stemming from this kind of circumstantial identity. We must tie our identities to our unchanging, unflinching, unyielding, undeniably good, and unquestionably loving God. And the ties that truly bind me to Him and the truth of who I am in Him are given to me in those quiet moments where I say, “I’m Yours, God.

C. S. Lewis said it best: “We are not necessarily doubting that God will do the best for us; we are wondering how painful the best will turn out to be.”

The mind feasts on what it focuses on. What consumes my thinking will be the making or the breaking of my identity.

Which has really gotten me thinking about all the many times I assign thoughts to others that they never actually think. I hold them accountable to harsh judgments they never make. And I own a rejection from them they never gave me.

Live from the abundant place that you are loved, and you won’t find yourself begging others for scraps of love.

We must respect ourselves enough to break the pattern of placing unrealistic expectations on others. After all, people will not respect us more than we respect ourselves. No, it’s not wrong to need people. But some of our biggest disappointments in life are the result of expectations we have of others that they can’t ever possibly meet. That’s when the desire to connect becomes an unrealistic need. Unrealistic neediness is actually greediness in disguise. It’s saying, “My needs and desires deserve to tap into or possibly even deplete yours.” This will never set a relationship up for success.

To love God is to cooperate with His grace. And since I’m so very aware of my own need for grace, I must be willing to freely give it away. Each hole left from rejection must become an opportunity to create more and more space for grace in my heart.