Acceptance

Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. (Ephesians 1:4-5 NLT)

For most of my life I have had acceptance issues stemming from not receiving acceptance from my dad as I was growing up. As I entered into adulthood, I tried to get acceptance from people in destructive ways, such as people pleasing, saying "yes" to everything, co-dependency, etc. All of which never did get me the acceptance I was looking to fill that void. The funny thing is that I was already accepted by God, I just didn't know I was accepted by God. God said in His word, that He DECIDED, past tense (that means He already did this), to adopt me into His own family through Jesus. This means that when I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Saviour, I was adopted or accepted into His family. In verse 4 it also says God loved me and chose me! So for most of my life I was trying to get something I already had! As Judge Judy says..."doesn't make sense!" If you are having acceptance issues, if you feel like you've never fit in with anyone, if you feel like nobody loves you and that you are all alone, don't believe that lie. God accepts you and loves you!