You Are Wanted

Do you sometimes feel unwanted?

Wives whose husbands are divorcing them, children born out of wedlock, (it’s even called “an unwanted pregnancy”) and those of us rejected by loved ones can have the sense of “I am unwanted.”

This is something I’ve battled with for much of my life. Coming from a large family I often felt like I was not a wanted child. Although my parents did the best they could, I craved more attention—more of a sense of “you are special and deeply loved.”

One day at a healing seminar, the speaker asked us to consider if we were wanted when we were born. It came to my mind that I probably wasn’t. My brother was less than a year old, and my parents were living with my grandmother. This is where my sense of not being wanted started, I decided.

After receiving this revelation, I went to my small group that was meeting after the general session where the leaders of the group prayed over me. Then they asked me what was coming to my mind.

In my mind’s eye I could see Jesus in my mother’s womb with me. He was holding and rocking me saying, “I want you to be born. I want you.”

That was such a breakthrough in dealing with the feeling of being unwanted which contributed to my battle with depression. But along the way I’ve sometimes chosen friends and associates that can plunge me back into that same sense of being unwanted. Usually it’s due to their own problems and issues, but I still need to deal with it.

When I was going through that recently, a song called “Wanted” came on the radio and touched my heart. Every time I hear it, I celebrate again that no matter who on this earth doesn’t want me—doesn’t want to be with me or be true to me, God wants me. I am precious to Him, and He loves me with a perfect love.

When I think of not being wanted, I think of the word “outcast.” God’s Word has wonderful promises to them.

TRUTH: YOU ARE WANTED BY GOD

For I will restore health to you, and I will heal your wounds, says the Lord, because they have called you an outcast…whom no one seeks after and for whom no one cares! Jeremiah 30:17 AMP

Behold…I will deal with all those who afflict you; I will save the limping [ones] and gather the outcasts and will make them a praise and a name in every land of their shame. Zephaniah 3:19 AMP

The truth I know for sure is that Jesus loves outcasts–the unwanted ones. I think of the woman who used her hair and tears to wash his feet while kissing them and rubbing them with perfume.

Luke 7:39 tell us:

Now when the Pharisee who had invited Him saw it, he said to himself, If this Man were a prophet, He would surely know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching Him—for she is a notorious sinner (a social outcast, devoted to sin).  AMP

Did Jesus say, “You are so right” and push her away. No, he reprimanded the Pharisee and said kind words about this woman—loving words which translated to, “You are wanted and loved.”

When someone is in trouble with the law, the term used to describe them is they are “wanted.” There are those who try to search for them and bring them back to receive justice. In a positive sense, we are wanted by God, and He is searching us out to tell us how much He loves us and that we are wanted. 

What a joy it is to be wanted by the God of the universe.

How about you? Do you feel unwanted by certain people in your life? Will you receive the truth that you are wanted by God, and He loves you deeply—no matter what you’ve done or where you’ve been?