[MUSIC PLAYING]

Lysa TerKerust has written bestselling books,

she's made dozens of TV appearances,

and she's been a featured speaker at countless events.

Even though she's had a successful career,

Lysa has been haunted by something

else-- a stain of rejection.

NARRATOR: Lysa TerKerust was a little girl

when her father drove away in his car and never came back.

That rejection was something she would deal with for many years.

Rejection.

It isn't just a complicated emotion.

It's an utter devastation of what we thought

was real, and safe, and secure.

NARRATOR: In her book, "Uninvited",

Lysa shares how she dealt with the devastation,

and offers advice on moving past the setbacks in our lives.

Lysa joins us now with the rest of that story.

Lysa, welcome back to "The 700 Club".

Thank you.

It's always so fun to be with you, Terry.

It's great to have you.

And your books are always so soul searching.

You really invite us to go to a deeper place with the Lord.

And this one, I think, maybe more than anything

that you've done before, really speaks

into a place of unhealed scenarios in our lives.

So we can't receive everything God wants to give us

as long as we live that way.

Let's talk about your dad leaving, if you will.

Because you say in the book that really even

before he made that exit, you were already crying

in your heart-- Daddy don't go.

Why?

I think because so much of my fear,

and I think a lot of what feeds this fear of rejection,

is the loss of our identity and abandonment.

Those are two core things that I think

my dad leaving tapped into both of those at the same time.

Fear of him abandoning me, but then also

fear of losing my identity.

I wanted to be his treasured little girl.

And when I wasn't, it opened up a world of insecurity for me

that was very, very hard to deal with.

I wrote in the book, "rejection steals

the best of who I am by reminding me the worst that's

been said to me."

And I think I've lived in that place for a long time.

Haunted by lies.

And maybe they were some things that my dad said,

but then also the enemy takes those lies and does

such a number with us.

It's his specialty.

Really.

I mean he waits for us to have those wounded

places on our hearts, and then he

comes in and starts digging deeper and deeper with lies

about things.

Sometimes the rejection is a perceived thing,

not even necessarily a reality.

That's right.

In "Uninvited," there's a whole chapter I wrote called,

"There's a woman at the gym who hates me."

[LAUGHTER]

I think I know her.

[LAUGHTER]

My husband snapped a picture of her the other day the gym

and sent it to me and said, does she

have any idea she's in your book?

And I'm like, no, don't tell her!

[LAUGHTER]

But the reality is, I dealt with this

like this whole long season.

I had all these dialogues in my head of how much she hated me.

And then one day she came out of the bathroom at the gym,

and she smiled.

And it wasn't like, I'm about to whip your tail on the gym floor

smile.

It wasn't that.

It was totally genuinely like, hey I've you here before.

And all of a sudden I realized I've

been assigning thoughts to her.

I've been assigning a rejection to her.

That she never ever had toward me.

And so here's what I think that Satan does.

Whether it's real rejection, like the deep hurts

from our past-- because we're all either dealing

with a past rejection, trying to heal from the present day

rejection, or fearing an unexpected rejection

is right around the corner.

And this is what Satan does.

He takes the line of rejection that maybe somebody spoke

or that we perceived, and that line, or that statement,

turns into a lie.

And that lie Satan loves to scheme

and let it turn into a label.

Where it's no longer like, they didn't want me.

It's suddenly the lie that we believe, I'm not worthy.

Exactly.

And then that lie turns into a liability

in all future relationships.

You say that rejection is actually

more painful than death.

Why?

Well, I say that if you lose a loved one to death,

it is excruciatingly painful.

But part of what makes it so painful is that neither of you

wanted that separation, right?

But with rejection, if someone rejects me

that I deeply love-- they just walk out of my life--

I do believe in that case it's more painful than them dying

because I want them in my life.

But they have freely chosen to walk away.

And worse yet, they may even be happy

that that separation exists.

And that's excruciatingly painful.

You say that there are some things

that we need to remember when we're feeling rejected,

or embracing the concept that we have been.

Well, there's three things that I have had to wrestle well.

And again, Terry, I wrote this book

because I desperately needed it.

And I write about what I struggle with.

And as I was wrestling with this topic, even saying to God,

I don't want to write about rejection,

this is no fun at all.

And so these were the three things I had to wrestle with.

One, is God good?

Because sometimes when you're in a season of feeling

rejected, whether it's a big rejection or even an every day

rejection-- hop on social media and three of your best friends

went out to dinner last night and they didn't invite you.

So then it's like I feel left out, I feel less than,

I feel lonely, right?

So, whether we're dealing with a big rejection or an every day

rejection, I have to wrestle, well is God good?

Even when my circumstances are not good.

Is God good?

So I had to answer that yes, God is good.

And then the next one.

Is God good to me?

And I have to trace God's hand of faithfulness

of all the many times he's been faithful

so that I can remind myself people can reject me,

but God never does.

So is God good to me?

And the last question is the most important I think.

Is God good at being God?

Because if he is, then I can trust him.

[INAUDIBLE]

That's right.

You know, I think we skim over scripture

so often when we read it, but as I'm listening to you give

these three areas that we need to examine,

I think of the scripture that says,

take every thought captive.

Because my mind is often my worst enemy.

Because I buy the lie.

I let the lie fester.

I live out of that place that it's in there.

But I have to choose the things that you're talking about.

I have to consciously say-- I have

to consciously ponder an answer, and then say, now what?

So what's the now what?

Okay so here's the reality about me.

I mean I am an introvert forced to live

the life of an extrovert.

So, it's painful sometimes for me to walk into a situation,

especially where there's a whole bunch of people

that I don't know.

I think people assume that the spotlight fixes

your insecurities, and it does not.

The spotlight exposes your insecurities.

And so what I thought would fix me, never has fixed me.

It's only exacerbated my issues, for sure, and exposed them.

So I have to make the choice.

I have to walk into a room and decide, OK God is good.

God is good to me.

God is good at being God.

Therefore I can live loved, and live deeply assured.

But I have the choice when I walk into a room,

I can either let my insecurities and my fear of rejection

be the first thing that walks in that room,

or I can let the reality that I am a treasured, dearly loved

child of God, walk in the room.

And here's how that changes everything.

If I walk in with the fullness of God's love, which

is a complete choice for me-- it's not a feeling,

it's a choice that I'm making.

Then my neediness will not become greediness.

Because when I walk in needy, I'm so focused on myself.

I can't even think about the needs of other people.

But if I walk in carrying the abundant love of God,

I'm freed up to see the needs of other people.

And then I can live loved because I'm

more eager to give love than expecting and hoping

others to give me love.

One of the great underlying messages of everything

that Lysa has just shared with us

and that she shares in the book, is

none of that's dependent on the other person, or persons,

responding the way you'd like them to.

It all happens in here between you and Jesus.

You can hear more from Lysa by going to facebook.com/700club.

Earlier she sat down with a few of our producers

for a Facebook Live interview.

We don't want you to miss that.

And don't forget, Lysa's book is called

"Uninvited," which is available in stores nationwide.

Great to have you here again.

Thank you, Terry.

You always bring a great word.