What is a door?  A door opens and lets someone in or serves as an exit to let someone out.  Doors can be fancy or plain.  Doors can be hollow or thick. Doors can be tightly locked or easily broken. Doors are for security.  Doors can have peep holes so the insider can look outside.

God shuts doors sometimes.  Genesis 7 tells us the story of the flood that destroyed the world.  God told Noah, his family and the animals to enter the ark and verse 16 says, “and the Lord shut him in.”  A door God closed that stayed closed for one year and seventeen days (Dake’s Annotated Reference Bible, page 7,k).

Genesis 19 gives us the story of God’s judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah. Two angels went to Sodom and Lot greeted them and invited them to spend the night in his home.  The angels at first refused and said they would sleep in the open square but Lot urged them and they relented and went into his house.  Before they retired for the night the men of Sodom surrounded the house and demanded that the men (as they called the angels, v5) “Bring them out to us that we may know them carnally” (NKJV).  Lot went out to them “through the doorway, shut the door behind him …” But the men of the city were insistent for the men (angels) to be brought out and tried to break down the door.  Verses 10 & 11, “But the men (angels) reached out their hands and pulled Lot into the house with them, and shut the door.  And they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they became weary trying to find the door.”  In this story Lot opened and shut a door, it was subject to being broken but the angels pulled Lot back into the house and shut the door.

Joseph of Arimathea who had become a disciple of Jesus laid the body of Jesus in his personal tomb “and rolled a large stone against the door of the tomb” (Matthew 27:57-61).  However, the next part of the story is what brings joy and hope to us all … Jesus didn’t stay in the tomb! Hallelujah! Chapter 28:1 & 2 tells us that when the two Marys came to the tomb after the Sabbath there was a great earthquake because an angel of the Lord descended and “rolled back the stone from the door, and sat on it”!  Man rolled the stone to keep Jesus in but an angel rolled the stone away to show Jesus was no longer there!

Matthew 25 gives us the parable of the Ten Virgins.  All ten had been invited to meet the Bridegroom.  The Bible tells us five were foolish and five were wise.  The five foolish virgins asked the five wise for some of their oil because they lamps were going out.  But the wise answered, v9, “no lest there be not enough for us and you; but go you rather to them who sell, and buy for yourselves” which they did but while they were gone the Bridegroom came, welcomed the five wise virgins and shut the door.  When the five foolish virgins returned and asked to be let in … the Bridegroom said, “I know you not” and the door was not opened to them.  Verse 13 ends the parable, “Watch therefore for you know neither the day or the hour when the Son of Man cometh.”  Our lives are to be lived as if Jesus would come today.

Revelation 3:8 Jesus says, “I have set before you an open door, and no one can shut it …”  There is deeper truth to be studied here but I want to concentrate on the “open door that no one can shut”.  What is your open door?  Who can shut it?  If we don’t take advantage of the open doors before us that God has opened, who is responsible.  If we don’t walk through, who does?  Who then can shut it? God?

There are doors that we are responsible for.  Psalm 141:3, “Keep watch over the door of my lips.”  How do we talk?  What thoughts come out of our mouth?  Are they uplifting and noble, pure, virtuous, degrading, snarly?

There is one door that only we are totally responsible for.  There is a classic picture that shows Jesus standing at a door and knocking … obviously wanting in.  Interestingly there is NO door knob.  For Jesus to enter, the person inside MUST open the door to let Him in.  Revelation 3:20, “Behold, I stand at the door and knock.  If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”  WOW!  What an invitation!  That’s what salvation is all about … inviting Jesus Christ into the door of our heart and dining with Him.  Dining?  Yes, partaking of all that He offers to us … fellowship with Him, knowing God and being infused with the Holy Spirit … but I, you … MUST OPEN THE DOOR!

One more door I want to mention and that concerns the doorposts of our house (our family).  The last plague that God sent to Egypt concerned the protection of His people.  His command was that a lamb without blemish was to be killed and the blood of that lamb put on the doorposts of the house.  When the death angel passed over the land any door WITHOUT the blood experienced death of the firstborn.  Exodus 12:13, “Now the blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you are.  And when I see the blood, I will pass over you; and the plague shall not be on you to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.”

How does that apply to us?  The Lamb of God (Jesus) was slain for you and me.  His blood covers us but we must apply it!  We must teach it to our children.  It’s not hokus pokus … His blood is real!  Do Christians still suffer and die?  Are Christians martyred?  Yes.  Does that mean the blood covering doesn’t work?  The blood is not just something we claim in an emergency but we must submit to the efficacy of His blood.  When we are covered by the blood God provides that supernatural protection.  If we are not submitted to the blood through the repentance and confession of our sins we do not have this protection.

John, the beloved disciple, near the end of his life lived in a time of impending persecution for the Christians.  John was exiled to the island of Patmos, a prison island that may have been used to quarry rock.  While exiled there he wrote the book that now ends our New Testament, Revelation.  This imprisonment did not keep him from writing nor did it stop him from enjoying God’s presence … chapter 1:10, “I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s Day …”.  Chapter 4:1, “After these things I looked, and behold, a door standing open in heaven.  And the first voice which I heard was like a trumpet speaking with me, saying, “Come up here, and I will show you things which must take place after this.”  Question for us … if in prison (lockdowns and shut-ins) what should you or I be doing?  Would we be complaining and griping or would we be in the Spirit enjoying His presence and perhaps seeing that open door to heaven?

If you are as “old” (smile) as I am you may remember the old television show, “Let’s Make a Deal”.  The contestant had to choose door number 1, 2 or 3.  It may be the winner take all or the prize behind the chosen door may be the “dud”. We face the same challenge today … which door will you choose … opening your hearts door to Jesus or keeping your door closed?  Jesus said, “I am the door.  If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved” (John 10:9).  He is the ONLY way to salvation and eternal life.

Don’t leave the door to your heart, house or mouth unprotected!