An Open Door.

We have just had a week of prayer at my church, recently.
One word which came was, “I have placed an open door before you, you just need to step through it.”

It’s always pleasing to hear words of this nature, but do we truly know what a word like this can mean?

I opened a door in my house just recently.
It was the door to my side extension.
There was a mess behind it. I kind of knew that the mess was there. I was the one to close the door on the mess in the first place. But I had conveniently forgotten about it, right up until the moment I opened the door again.

This time, rather than just close the door I did do a bit of clearing up.

As I was clearing up, I was thinking about the word that was brought during our week of prayer.

Are all open doors going to lead to happy blessings, or are they going to lead to a task (work) that needs to be done, in order to see the blessing that will come from doing said task?

You do know that blessings come from being obedient to Father?

The Israelites had an open door offered to them after they left Egypt.
You can read about it in Numbers starting at chapter 13.
They just needed to go and take the land that was being given to them.
But they didn’t take it. Instead they listened to a report that said there are strong people in the land and they became afraid.

They should have listened to God and gone forward. But because the open door meant going up against the strong people, who they were focusing on instead of their God, they didn’t.

Do we treat open doors in the same way?

If we look at it, and don’t like what we see, do we then turn away? Only to miss the growth opportunity and blessings that could have followed?

I sometimes think that we expect things to be easy, and when they turn out to not be so easy, we can then turn away from whatever it is that is not so easy.

One of the scriptures that I’m often drawn to is Matthew 11 28-30

²⁸ “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Even in this scripture which speaks about rest, the rest is found in doing something.
It says, “For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” A yoke implies work that needs to be done, but it is light and easy.

In other words, it is a task that you are able to do.
How many times have we missed a blessing because we didn’t want to engage in a task that was in front of us, that we could do, if we would only chose to?

You might find an enemy behind the open door to you, just like Israelites did. But if the door has been opened by Father, then He will be with you!

If He is with us, then who can be be against us?

If He is with us, then the swords that the enemy hold have the strength of paper swords.
They are able to shout and wave them about, but that is all that they can do. The enemy will do all they can to intimidate us, but that is all they are able to do, if Father is with us.
If Father is for us, then the paper swords will melt away and we will take the ground that Father is giving to us, as we step into what He has for us.

So when you are given an open door, will you step through it, in Father’s strength and face all that is before you, together with Him who is Lord of All?

Father,
Thank you that you do place open doors before us.
Help us to see them through Your eyes.
Help us to see the victories that You will lead us to.
Help us not to be intimidated by the enemy, but to listen, and to trust in You.
Our Lord God Almighty.
King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
Amen.