Open Doors, Closed Doors

This was not an easy week. It was not a week of ease and refreshment. But it was a turning point for us. For some reason I kept singing a line from that old hymn, '...Let all bondage go and let deliverance flow...". I sang that over and over, trying to absorb what the song was advising. "Let" it flow, or "let" it go means I had to be involved with the process. Some of us have a lot to let go of.

My husband,Bill, and I are praying about our specific career paths and financial issues and also for our son, Alex, in his college search. We are praying that we hear God clearly because we want to perceive the "new thing" God is doing. A lot changes when your first child goes off to college at the same time that you feel you too need to venture out into greater exploration, service, and commitment to your dreams.

Bill and Alex went to visit a college this week. There's three schools my son is interested in, and depending on scholarships, grants, and the strength of their academic programs, my son hopes to wind up where the most doors open for him. This week we got news of a closed financial door at one place, and decided to head towards an open door Alex had. So Bill and Alex headed down to Pennsylvania on Thursday. They got to stop by and visit my oldest brother and his family. They enjoyed 48 hours of traveling, visiting, surveying the land down there, and coming home - all the while concluding that maybe that college really wasn't the right place for Alex. It had some good factors in the equation but it did not all add up to a sense of "YES, this is it."

Just because you know where you don't want to be, or where you should not go, doesn't mean you know where your Answer is. But that's okay. Closed doors are all part of the path to progress. Lately I've been thanking God for the closed doors that previously I had been frustrated with. Now I'm adding up all these closed doors and instead of feeling like God has had a grudge against me, I am thinking that God has gone to a lot of trouble to keep me out of certain things, certain places, for a reason. What that reason is, I don't know. But that doesn't perturb me as much now.

When Jesus was at the wedding of Cana and His mother requested that He get involved in solving the problem of the wedding wine being all gone, Jesus told her it wasn't yet His ideal time for ministry. But still she knew He was willing to get involved, because she proceeded to tell the servants nearby, "Whatever He says to you, do it." (John 2:5) She knew He would do something.

Maybe He would make it so that the joy and festivity could continue without them having wine. Or maybe He'd get up and preach an eloquent sermon of love and hope that would make the wedding party weep as their hearts were touched with the power of His love. I really don't think she knew exactly how or what Jesus would do because it all depended on what HE thought was the real problem and what the best solution would be. In this story, we find out He did do a simple miraculous act of turning water into wine....really good wine. But whether that happened or another miracle happened, what mattered was that Jesus intervened in the situation.

So that's what I'm asking of Him in this season of life I'm in. "Whatever you want to do Jesus, do it. I'm standing by ready to cooperate with what you will do." That's what I'm telling Him. So who knows what miracle I get to be involved with next? The miracle may have already started with a closed door.

And I'm not going to tell Jesus it can't happen that way.