Open doors and favour with people can be heady things to experience. But we need to remember who opened those doors and whose favour is getting us into places we’d never enter by ourselves.
Psalm 121:8 says:
“The Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.”
When I originally sketched out this thought back in 2018, I was doing a 90-day video challenge. The assignment was simple: look at the day’s Bible verse, take five minutes to collect your thoughts, turn on the camera and go. No editing.
Apparently, my thoughts wandered rather quickly that day, because Psalm 121 sent me straight over to Revelation 3:7–8:
“He who is holy, who is true, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, and who shuts and no one opens… I know your deeds. Behold, I have put before you an open door which no one can shut.”
Just as a refresher, the first few chapters of Revelation contain specific words to real churches functioning at the time John received these revelations from Jesus.
These particular words were spoken to the church in Philadelphia. They didn’t have a lot of power or influence, but they had remained faithful.
And God put an open door in front of them.
That distinction matters.
They weren’t powerful people who managed to pry a door open. The One who held the key opened it for them.
Whose Credentials Are Getting You Through?
I’ve never been on the A-list of anything in my life.
However, because I live with a slowly progressive neurological disease, whenever I book an airline ticket, I let the airline know I’ll need wheelchair assistance. Although I can walk, there’s absolutely no way I could walk across one of today’s enormous airports to reach my gate.
As soon as I reach the ticket counter and they see that my ticket is flagged for assistance, I’m placed in a wheelchair and off we go.
And suddenly, doors start opening.
Queue barriers are moved. We skirt lineups. I’m taken through entrances I couldn’t use by myself.
But here’s the thing.
None of that is happening because I’m important.
If I didn’t have someone behind me pushing that wheelchair who carried the proper credentials and had gone through all the necessary security checks, I wouldn’t be going anywhere.
I’m not getting through on my own favour.
I’m getting through because I’m travelling with someone who has the authority to take me there.
When airport security sees me approaching in a wheelchair, being pushed by someone they know and recognise, those little ribbons across the queue are lifted. I’m ushered through.
The door opens because the person accompanying me has the authority to bring me through it.
I feel safe and well cared for because I’m in the hands of someone authorised to usher me into places I couldn’t go by myself.
The same thing happens when I disembark. Someone meets me and escorts me through all the gates and checkpoints between the plane and my destination.
Don’t Become Impressed With the Access
There’s a lesson in that for us.
When God begins opening doors, bringing favour with people or giving us access to places we’d never imagined entering, it can become pretty heady stuff.
People suddenly know our name.
Invitations arrive.
Someone moves the barrier and waves us through.
And if we’re not careful, we can begin believing we’re getting through those doors because of our own credentials.
We’re not.
The favour isn’t proof that we’re important. The open door isn’t necessarily evidence that we’ve finally arrived.
It’s evidence that the One who holds the key has opened a door.
But there’s another side to this that I’ve come to appreciate more over the years since I orginally wrote this.
Not every door we’re excited about is necessarily the door God is asking us to walk through.
Sometimes we can become so focused on asking God to provide the means to get through a particular door that we forget to ask whether it’s actually the door He’s opening.
After all, Revelation 3 doesn’t only tell us that Jesus opens doors no one can shut. It also reminds us that He shuts doors no one can open.
Perhaps a better prayer isn’t simply, “Lord, open this door for me.”
Perhaps it’s also, “Lord, show me which door You’re opening.”
Back at the airport, the person pushing my wheelchair doesn’t just have the credentials to get me through restricted areas. They also know which route will actually get me to my gate.
That’s important.
So when doors begin opening that you never imagined you’d walk through, don’t become impressed with the access. And don’t assume every attractive door is yours simply because you can see it.
Stay close to the One who knows the route.
Perhaps that’s why my thoughts wandered back to Psalm 121:8 after all:
“The Lord will watch over your coming and going both now and forevermore.”
Whether He’s leading us out, bringing us in, closing a door or opening one nobody else can shut, He’s the One watching over our journey.
And if you’re standing in front of a door right now that you could never open for yourself, don’t assume you have to force it.
Ask Him which way He’s leading.
The One who holds the key knows exactly how to get you where He wants you to go.
Until next time,
Kath
