The rejection is one of silencing the prayer. It makes us believe that we are dismissed, we are unworthy, or invisible. However, Scripture and the heart-wrenching thoughts contained in IntercessHER: The Power, Posture, and Purpose of a Praying Woman by Lydasia Rayanna Harris show a truth otherwise: God is nearest to women in the locations where they are attempting to be defined by rejection.

The scene of Hagar is not only one of abandonment, it is one of meeting with God. This is what her life teaches us, not to neglect the fact that God still speaks, even when people are abusing, mistreating, and dismissing us.

Hagar: Seen in the Wilderness

Hagar was a servant that came into the biblical story not due to choice but by circumstances. As a power upon behalf of someone else impatience, she bore a promise upon her which it was not her lot to prudence to arrange. She was abused and sent home pregnant alone and rejected when there was conflict.

Gen 16 informs us that Hagar ran away to the wilderness. She did not run away because she was a faithless person, but because it was unbearable to live rejected. But there she was in the desert where God saw her.

And this is where IntercessHER kindly reminds us that wildness seasons are not times of abandonment, but of invitation. God was not waiting till Hagar was safe. He sought her out in the abode of pain. He addressed her by name before he put her back on the right path.

Rejection is usually attempting to reduce a woman of her value but God will heal first, and then he will redirect.

El Roi: The God Who Sees Me

During one of the most personal experiences in Scripture, Hagar refers to God El Roi, the God who sees me. This was not the theology acquired in ease; it was the revelation of agony. Hagar was the first to address God in Scripture, and she did so, out of rejection.

Lydasia Rayanna Harris in the book IntercessHER focuses on the fact that prayer is most effective when it is sincere. Hagar did not go to God with smooth talk. She arrived tired, scared, and insecure. But God did not react by condemnation, but with assurance.

This experience teaches us that it is usually more therapeutic to be witnessed by God than to be rescued now. God never erased the situation of Hagar but transformed her look. He told her that her story was important even when she was being abandoned by other people.

Praying Through Rejection Instead of Running From It

The story of Hagar encourages women to quit running away in the face of rejection and begin to pray in the face of rejection. The rejection may either be a hardening or softening to God. The wilderness is a place of encounter that redefined Hagar on the presence of God.

According to IntercessHER, an intercessor does not pray because he cannot, but because he is weak. When we are hurt by rejection, the prayer does not aim at correcting the outcome; rather, it helps us recover the identity. God perceives the tears which are not noticed, the prayers said in solitude, the faith not lost because of abandonment.

To be rejected never qualifies a woman out of purpose but usually makes her ready to get closer to God.

You Are Seen, Even Here

The story of Hagar promises that God sees what others do not see. He perceives the woman behind the refusal, the agony behind the silence, and the belief behind the terror. In case you are walking through rejection today, know that God is not distant He is near. This is the same God that encountered Hagar in the wilderness. He is El Roi. And when He sees all this it changes everything.