When I was younger, I had a naive outlook of what life would be like. I considered myself a well-liked guy, someone who had no problem meeting new people and found it easy to make friends. I still had that mindset entering high school, thinking to myself everyone would want to be my friend and vice-versa. It didn’t turn out exactly that way.
Wanting to be liked by everyone, I would often gravitate towards different social groups but would never really settle for one of my own. Making lasting friendships was really tough during my first two years of high school, and being a nerd who didn’t excel in academics or athletics didn’t really help either. I longed for acceptance from the people around me; I craved and wasn’t satisfied.
Reality finally set in when I hosted a birthday party and invited several people, but only one person showed up. This opened my eyes to how much my need for being accepted was not being met and how I longed for something greater. On the outside I looked happy, but I wasn’t.
Since I grew up with Christian ideals and morals I had a basic understanding of who God is. To me, God was someone who created us and wanted us to love him and love people, so I was nice to people and followed the golden rule, but never felt a satisfaction from it. It really didn’t matter how good of a person I tried to be and how well I got along with people, I still didn’t feel accepted.
In desperation, I turned to God and attended a church service after years of not going, where I began to investigate who this God of love is. Through that journey God brought people into my life that have been real inspirations for me. Through them I began to see the character of God. This radically changed my perspective of who God is. I used to know God as creator, but since then he’s become my friend. Since accepting His love for me, I feel loved and accepted by Him but I know I am. He is actually the best friend that I can have, because I know that He sent his Son to die on the cross for me. The bible teaches, “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:3)
There are still times in my life when I don’t feel accepted or even respected by some people. But there is no longer that inner struggle within me that tears at my heart. Not only have I have I learned that I don’t need to be friends with everyone, but more importantly I learned that God does love me and is by my side, and in times when I feel alone, he will still be there.
I craved acceptance, and I received so much more.
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