Are You Afraid of Rejection?

Author: Alice Lee

“Are you afraid of rejection?” This was a revelation God gave me one night last year in the month of November while I was serving at the Rock Cafe.

I was handing out tracts with a foreigner staff named Catt on the busy Ying-Zhuan Road (the busiest night market street in Danshui). Usually we try to attract people to our cafe through these tracts, but that night not many people were around because it was so cold outside. Even so, we were still out there handing out tracts.

This wasn’t the first time I had to do this. I joined YWAM as a DTS student back in 2012, and I’ve been serving in the Rock Cafe ever since! So I know the different emotions and situations I may encounter when I hand out tracts. Sometimes I would feel happy because a lot of people took the tracts I was handing out that day, finishing a whole stack within half an hour! But other times I would be rejected multiple times, which isn’t a good feeling. When that would happen, I had to try to motivate myself, pray to God, and try again and again!

Handing out tracts isn’t something I’m ashamed of or shy about, but it’s something that affects my attitude. And that’s what I want to share about with you today – my attitude.

My Attitude

Back to that night last year. Our “business” was slow that day, and we still had a huge stack of tracts that didn’t get handed out. So, Catt and I were standing on opposite sides of the road, hoping to get everyone walking in the different directions!

Out of nowhere, I had an idea to try to have some fun! The stacks in our hands were still huge and people continued to reject us, but why not try to make it fun for ourselves?  I decided to change my attitude, and I prayed for each tract. I prayed that whoever received a tract that day would see their lives changed as a result!

Then I said to Catt, who was standing across from me, “Let’s try to hand out these tracts in really creative ways!”

Jokingly, I knelt down as if proposing to someone and said, “Please take the tracts from me!”

Catt and I just started having fun. Standing on both sides of the road, we took turns showing each other our creative poses: rolling up the tract as a baseball bat and pretending to play baseball; using the tract as the baton in a relay race and trying to pass it on to the passerby; imitating some of the other staff on base and how they would hand out tracts….

We were having fun! We didn’t care about whether or not people were taking the tracts, nor did we care about the weird looks we were getting.

After a while, we went back to our normal way of handing out tracts, and my watch showed that after all that fun only 30 minutes had gone by. Even though we had fun, a lot of people still rejected us and only a few “lucky” people got our tracts.

I looked at all the faces passing by and I started to wonder what they were thinking about. How was their day? Are they in a hurry to get home? Are they thinking about their unfinished work? Are they facing some relational challenges? Perhaps there are many different things occupying their thoughts and lives.

Suddenly, a thought hit me. My focus was no longer on why they rejected me, but rather I tried to put myself in their shoes and thought about the reasons they reject.

Why did people reject Jesus?

Because they don’t know how great this God is! They don’t want God and they reject God because they don’t know God. So they need people to tell them who God is.

The revelation God gave me in that moment was the urgency of preaching the gospel!

God’s Revelation

After that night, God really changed my attitude towards serving at the Rock and handing out tracts.

Even though I’ll often get rejected when handing out tracts, I can change my own mindset and think, “Who will be the lucky one? The one who will come to the Rock, hear the gospel, and see his or her life radically transformed?” I can hand out tracts with a joyful heart, remembering that they’re not rejecting me because of who I am, but because they haven’t yet experienced the goodness of God!

They reject God because they don’t know Him.

They don’t know God because no one has told them about Him.

“How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, ‘How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!’” Romans 10:14-15

An Encouragement

I hope that this story will encourage those who serve at the Rock and those who work in the mission field. Thank you for your obedience to the Lord and all that you’ve done. As a result, many lives are blessed, and many lives are changed. May God remember your labor, bless you.

And those who don’t know God, don’t be too quick to reject. But seize the opportunity and come to know this God who loves you!