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DAVE GIPSON
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Loser

I’ve never been particularly good with rejection. Which makes it tough to be a pastor.

In church life, people are always coming and going. Most of the time, it’s because their commitment to God flags depending upon their mood. They come for a while and then suddenly disappear.  They get busy and don’t prioritize their time properly. But as a pastor, you always wonder if it’s something you’ve done…or didn’t do.

To them, it’s rarely personal. For the pastor though, it always seems personal.

The toughest part is when someone walks away because they’re mad at you. In church life, this isn’t always because the pastor has done something awful. Often, it’s just that he didn’t do what they wanted. But we do fail sometimes, and I’ve noticed people tend to expect perfection from a pastor. The minute they find a flaw in him, they shout, “See, I told you he was a fraud”! Because if God is perfect, surely the pastor ought to be too.

I always thought my love for people would overpower any flaws they might find. You know, that they’d say something like, “Gipson really is a goofball, but at least I know he sincerely loves me.” As long as they knew I loved them, they could overlook my imperfections.

But for too many people, being loved just isn’t enough.

More than loved, they want to be seen as “significant”. They want importance and influence. They want to be valued for their talents and wisdom. Love is nice, but it’s often looked down on with a sneer and a roll of the eyes.

“Is that all you’ve got to offer me?”

When someone gets frustrated enough with me, I’ve found they like to tell me off first before leaving the church. Unfortunately, that was the case recently.

A person I’d put a lot of my time counseling and encouraging decided I didn’t quite appreciate his importance. He enumerated all the many ways I’d failed him, first to others in the church and then finally to me. I could innumerate those things and rebut them here, but it would just be my side of the story. Let’s just say I disagreed with his assessment, but told him I was sorry to have made him feel unappreciated. Of course that didn’t help, and he walked away anyhow.

Since then, I’ve stewed over his departure like a little boy picking at a scab. The guy had taken up a lot of my time and attention but now wasn’t my responsibility anymore. So I really couldn’t figure out why it still bothered me…

I was out walking and praying tonight, as is my habit in the evenings. I rounded the big lake in the center of our development, talking to God in the dark. I have to watch myself when people come up on me suddenly. Don’t want them to think I’m a crazy guy mumbling to himself.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m crazy, all right. Just not for that particular reason.

As I walked, I asked God, “I know what he said about me was petty and childish. Yet, it still bothers me – it always does. Rejection is incredibly painful to me, even when the person isn’t that close to me. And now I’d really like to know why.”

Then a funny thing happened. God answered me. No, not audibly. People really would think I’m crazy then. God speaks loudest when He speaks to the heart.

God said this, and I’m paraphrasing…

“Son, what if all the things he said about you were actually true? What if you’re not that great of a pastor? In fact, what if compared to other men you really are a complete and utter failure?”

“That’s what you’re bothered by – that someone looked you up and down and decided you were worthless! It bothers you because you believe your only value comes from how you compare to others and what you’ve accomplished.”

Exactly. In fact, I’ve been worried about that for most of my life.

Do you ever do this? Here’s what I do: I compare my very weakest points to the very best qualities and accomplishments of others. If I find myself lacking in one area, I see myself not measuring up. In my mind, I’m only as good as what my worst critic thinks of me.

At that moment, God reminded me of my newly adopted baby girl. Her name is Ellie and she’s not quite two years old. And I can’t imagine loving anything more in this world than her.Dave & Ellie

“Why do you love her so?” God asked me. “What’s so special about her?”

What do you mean?

“What has she done to earn this overwhelming love you feel for her?”

She hasn’t done anything. I love little things about her. Her smile, her laugh. I love the way she crawls up into our bed at night and snuggles between us. I love listening to the squeaks of her sucking on her pacifier, sleeping peacefully.

Really, I love her just because she’s mine.

“Exactly. Her worth is not based on anything she’s ever done or ever might do in the future. 

Then God gave me a picture in my mind of how He sees me. More than my accomplishments or attributes, mostly He sees me as a child. His child.

“Can’t you see… you are MY child, just as Ellie is yours. If everything your enemies said about you were true, it still wouldn’t matter one bit. The reason you’re worthy is simply because YOU ARE MINE!”

“Let me love you the way you love your child. Because of that love, you can live in freedom knowing that your mistakes will change nothing about your worth. Accomplish what you wish, but do so with the peace of knowing any failure is inconsequential. Nothing about you is on trial, because I love you. And nothing else but my love matters.”

God saw such value in us He would die to save us. And that value comes not from anything we’ve done or even from who we are – it all comes from WHOSE WE ARE!

I walked back to my house tonight, a few tears running down my face and feeling free. Drowning out the self-doubts in my head were the words of that little song I learned in Sunday School:

Yes, Jesus love me…the Bible tells me so.

Just like that baby girl I now adore for no good reason, realize you are the object of God’s immeasurable and unstoppable love.  So you can stop trying to earn your way, or to justify yourself to your critics. God has already rendered the final assessment, and the price tag He hangs around your neck is enormous.

In opposition to the famous affirmations of Stuart Smalley, you don’t have to be “good enough, smart enough”, and it really doesn’t matter if people like you.

You are worthy and immeasurably valuable right now for no other reason than this…

You are His.

1 Comment

  • Julie Smith
    Posted November 29, 2017 at 3:06 pm

    I read the article titled loser. It really enlightened me. I have had such horrible experiences in the church setting that I haven’t gone to church in 25 years. I suppose most people don’t see things from the other person’s perspective. Most people do expect perfection from Christians and pastors. I have also felt that I deal with rejection better if it comes from a lost person. When a Christian rejects me I feel like maybe in reality God won’t accept me. It was nice to read your perspective. God bless you.

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Copyright © 2024 by David Gipson. All rights reserved.

Our dream house was a 120-year old 3-story Victorian home. It was just a few blocks away from one of the loveliest parks in the city and the same distance from the church I pastored. I could literally walk to work, and did so on many mornings. How convenient!

Unlike the other brick houses that lined the streets nearby, this one was painted light yellow and stood apart from the rest. Plaster reliefs of baby angels wrapped around the base of the house. They represented the children of the original owners, making the structure even more unique. It also had a three-car garage at the back of it. Few houses in this older section of town had one as large, and many people resorted to parking on the street. But not us! On just an average salary, we had bought one of the nicest places to live in the area. 

I had always dreamed of owning a Victorian home. I had performed the role of Prof. Henry Higgins from the musical My Fair Lady right before we moved to our new city. So I was primed to live the life of the English gentleman, sipping tea in my beautiful old house. I loved the old wood, the stained glass windows, and our “penthouse suite” for my wife and me on the top floor. We’d be sequestered away from the noise of our little girls playing below us. It all seemed so ideal.

But it turned out to be anything but ideal. Our “Golden House”, as our little girls came to call it, was not so golden. In fact, our dream house almost killed us, quite literally. 

One afternoon I got a call at the church. It was Dawn, my wife, and she was sobbing hysterically. Finally I was able to make out enough of her words to understand what was happening.

“I fell…come home!”

Almost 20 years ago, my wife had been in a bad car accident that crushed her right leg. That ankle couldn’t turn at all. So as I ran the 5 blocks to my home, I knew what had happened.

When I got to the house, I found Dawn in the basement. She was headed to the washer and drier there, and had misjudged a step going down. She hit the concrete floor hard.

After getting her to the hospital, thankfully we learned nothing had been broken. However, that would be just the first of several falls for Dawn down those steps. We eventually moved the washer and drier up to the second floor, which helped a little. But the bottom line was a three-story house with narrow stairways were not meant for a woman who had challenges with mobility.

I also learned having your bedroom on the third-floor is not a good idea for a chubby guy in his mid-50s. There were a few days I wondered if I’d still be alive by the time I reached the top floor. Though I began on the stairway to the bedroom, I might end up on the stairway to heaven…

Then there was the city. Dawn and I always loved culture, restaurants, theater and all the things a great city has to offer. So living there, we felt like kids in a candy store. There was always some new restaurant to explore, always a show playing somewhere, and interesting people living all around us. It seemed ideal.

Except for crime. And taxes. Many cities are big on those, and ours was no exception. We had both in abundance.

One of our regular nightly diversions was watching the notifications on our community’s “Next Door App” alert us to all the recent shootings and hold-ups around us. One of us would hear gunshots, and I’d watch for the posts to pop up. I’d then calculate how close it was to our home. Many were within just a few blocks, some just down the street. 

We would occasionally get notices of some tax we hadn’t paid. Usually, we neglected to pay because the city had neglected to ever send a bill. Then one day, you get a notice you’re being sent to a collections agency, even though you still hadn’t received a bill yourself. 

Once we got a bill for trash pick-up. We were confused because we paid a refuse bill on time every month. But a lady on the phone informed us what we had paid was in fact only the garbage bill. There was completely different bill that was a tax for just having trash pick up available to us in the city. This bill was paying for the “possibility” our trash might be picked up. No kidding.

I’m sure they’re still probably working on a way to collect a tax on our taxes. 

All of this added together was a painful lesson on the difference between perception and reality. After we first moved to that city and were still living in an apartment, I walked down those very streets and fantasized about how wonderful living there would be. When we found the Golden House, we rejoiced and basically cried out, “Here, take our money” to the realtor. 

But the view from the outside of a situation is always much different from the inside. Nothing is ever quite what you expect…with houses, or with life.

The problem with so many of the things we want is it’s too often based on an illusion. We think a thing, a person, or a situation will bring happiness. But happiness is never found in those things outside of us.

Real happiness only happens from the inside out.

There’s an old fashioned Bible word for this foolishness: covetousness. The prohibition against coveting is actually the 10th and final commandment. It’s easily skimmed over in favor of the more R-rated commandments against murder or adultery. Simply wanting your neighbors stuff as opposed to stealing it or killing for it seems like no big deal in comparison.

But coveting is like a powerful drug. The addict never gets enough. Once he gets that one thing he’s obsessed over, he’s disappointed to realize it doesn’t fulfill his needs and he moves on to something more. The new car he’d wanted all his life now sits in the garage most days. She can’t even remember why she bought that purse now. That’s how coveting works: whatever you get, it’s never enough. You’re always left wanting something else, and even more addicted to your desires.

Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart rejoiced in all my labor; And this was my reward from all my labor. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 2:10-11

Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. - Luke 12:15

There was nothing wrong with us wanting a house. But it was very wrong of me to think that it would bring us so much happiness on its own. The ideal life and fulfillment I was expecting from a house was unreasonable. 

That kind of happiness only comes from God’s address, not mine.

Inevitably, we become like kids on the day after Christmas. We’ve opened every package, played with every toy, and we’re already bored with them. The newness wore off in a day, all because we were expecting too much from them to begin with.

Most homes stop being dream houses the minute we walk into them. Reality inevitably sets in, and the “house porn” on the realtor’s website is now just a bunch of plaster and dry wall. 

We finally made it out of our dream house before it killed us. No, we didn't run screaming from it in the middle of the night like in the Shining or the Amityville Horror. When we left, it did take quite a bite out of our finances, and we had to sell for quite a bit less than we'd paid. But the wound was worth it for the lesson we learned.

We’re in a new place now, in a much smaller city. We’re renting a little one-story house we’re hoping to buy soon. We're in a little neighborhood where we hardly ever lock our front door. It's pretty boring compared to city life, but that’s just fine with me.

I’ve discovered what really makes a “dream house”. The dream is not the house, it’s the people you put in it. Regardless of the size or location, those people are what makes life worthwhile. 

Everything else is just a dream. And all that glitters is not a golden house.

Our dream house was a 120-year old 3-story Victorian home. It was just a few blocks away from one of the loveliest parks in the city and the same distance from the church I pastored. I could literally walk to work, and did so on many mornings. How convenient!

Unlike the other brick houses that lined the streets nearby, this one was painted light yellow and stood apart from the rest. Plaster reliefs of baby angels wrapped around the base of the house. They represented the children of the original owners, making the structure even more unique. It also had a three-car garage at the back of it. Few houses in this older section of town had one as large, and many people resorted to parking on the street. But not us! On just an average salary, we had bought one of the nicest places to live in the area. 

I had always dreamed of owning a Victorian home. I had performed the role of Prof. Henry Higgins from the musical My Fair Lady right before we moved to our new city. So I was primed to live the life of the English gentleman, sipping tea in my beautiful old house. I loved the old wood, the stained glass windows, and our “penthouse suite” for my wife and me on the top floor. We’d be sequestered away from the noise of our little girls playing below us. It all seemed so ideal.

But it turned out to be anything but ideal. Our “Golden House”, as our little girls came to call it, was not so golden. In fact, our dream house almost killed us, quite literally. 

One afternoon I got a call at the church. It was Dawn, my wife, and she was sobbing hysterically. Finally I was able to make out enough of her words to understand what was happening.

“I fell…come home!”

Almost 20 years ago, my wife had been in a bad car accident that crushed her right leg. That ankle couldn’t turn at all. So as I ran the 5 blocks to my home, I knew what had happened.

When I got to the house, I found Dawn in the basement. She was headed to the washer and drier there, and had misjudged a step going down. She hit the concrete floor hard.

After getting her to the hospital, thankfully we learned nothing had been broken. However, that would be just the first of several falls for Dawn down those steps. We eventually moved the washer and drier up to the second floor, which helped a little. But the bottom line was a three-story house with narrow stairways were not meant for a woman who had challenges with mobility.

I also learned having your bedroom on the third-floor is not a good idea for a chubby guy in his mid-50s. There were a few days I wondered if I’d still be alive by the time I reached the top floor. Though I began on the stairway to the bedroom, I might end up on the stairway to heaven…

Then there was the city. Dawn and I always loved culture, restaurants, theater and all the things a great city has to offer. So living there, we felt like kids in a candy store. There was always some new restaurant to explore, always a show playing somewhere, and interesting people living all around us. It seemed ideal.

Except for crime. And taxes. Many cities are big on those, and ours was no exception. We had both in abundance.

One of our regular nightly diversions was watching the notifications on our community’s “Next Door App” alert us to all the recent shootings and hold-ups around us. One of us would hear gunshots, and I’d watch for the posts to pop up. I’d then calculate how close it was to our home. Many were within just a few blocks, some just down the street. 

We would occasionally get notices of some tax we hadn’t paid. Usually, we neglected to pay because the city had neglected to ever send a bill. Then one day, you get a notice you’re being sent to a collections agency, even though you still hadn’t received a bill yourself. 

Once we got a bill for trash pick-up. We were confused because we paid a refuse bill on time every month. But a lady on the phone informed us what we had paid was in fact only the garbage bill. There was completely different bill that was a tax for just having trash pick up available to us in the city. This bill was paying for the “possibility” our trash might be picked up. No kidding.

I’m sure they’re still probably working on a way to collect a tax on our taxes. 

All of this added together was a painful lesson on the difference between perception and reality. After we first moved to that city and were still living in an apartment, I walked down those very streets and fantasized about how wonderful living there would be. When we found the Golden House, we rejoiced and basically cried out, “Here, take our money” to the realtor. 

But the view from the outside of a situation is always much different from the inside. Nothing is ever quite what you expect…with houses, or with life.

The problem with so many of the things we want is it’s too often based on an illusion. We think a thing, a person, or a situation will bring happiness. But happiness is never found in those things outside of us.

Real happiness only happens from the inside out.

There’s an old fashioned Bible word for this foolishness: covetousness. The prohibition against coveting is actually the 10th and final commandment. It’s easily skimmed over in favor of the more R-rated commandments against murder or adultery. Simply wanting your neighbors stuff as opposed to stealing it or killing for it seems like no big deal in comparison.

But coveting is like a powerful drug. The addict never gets enough. Once he gets that one thing he’s obsessed over, he’s disappointed to realize it doesn’t fulfill his needs and he moves on to something more. The new car he’d wanted all his life now sits in the garage most days. She can’t even remember why she bought that purse now. That’s how coveting works: whatever you get, it’s never enough. You’re always left wanting something else, and even more addicted to your desires.

Whatever my eyes desired I did not keep from them. I did not withhold my heart from any pleasure, for my heart rejoiced in all my labor; And this was my reward from all my labor. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; And indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind. There was no profit under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 2:10-11

Take care, and be on your guard against all covetousness, for one's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. - Luke 12:15

There was nothing wrong with us wanting a house. But it was very wrong of me to think that it would bring us so much happiness on its own. The ideal life and fulfillment I was expecting from a house was unreasonable. 

That kind of happiness only comes from God’s address, not mine.

Inevitably, we become like kids on the day after Christmas. We’ve opened every package, played with every toy, and we’re already bored with them. The newness wore off in a day, all because we were expecting too much from them to begin with.

Most homes stop being dream houses the minute we walk into them. Reality inevitably sets in, and the “house porn” on the realtor’s website is now just a bunch of plaster and dry wall. 

We finally made it out of our dream house before it killed us. No, we didn't run screaming from it in the middle of the night like in the Shining or the Amityville Horror. When we left, it did take quite a bite out of our finances, and we had to sell for quite a bit less than we'd paid. But the wound was worth it for the lesson we learned.

We’re in a new place now, in a much smaller city. We’re renting a little one-story house we’re hoping to buy soon. We're in a little neighborhood where we hardly ever lock our front door. It's pretty boring compared to city life, but that’s just fine with me.

I’ve discovered what really makes a “dream house”. The dream is not the house, it’s the people you put in it. Regardless of the size or location, those people are what makes life worthwhile. 

Everything else is just a dream. And all that glitters is not a golden house.