Every closed door doesn’t always mean we are doing something wrong and every delay doesn’t mean we aren’t where we are supposed to be.   Sometimes, to advance the kingdom of God, our plans need to be interrupted, delayed or inconvenienced and these interruptions may not always be for our good; they may be for someone else’s.  We must realize that there is a reason for every closed door, there is a reason a promise has not come to pass, and that God uses these examples to remind us that we may be thinking too small.  We may have been standing on a promise for such a long time that in our minds we may be thinking it will never come to pass, but while we are thinking about healing, God is thinking about resurrection. 

When our dreams die, that is a sure sign that God is up to something big.  Our expectations are not what we predict will happen; they are what we want to happen.  Often times, we don’t even realize we have expectations until they are not met.  Sometimes for God to open another door, we have to be willing to shut the very one He opened.  Trusting God is a daily thing, because He provides exactly what we need to make it through each day.  Recently, in my own life, I felt in my spirit that I had completed the task that God had called me to do.  The only way I can describe it is that I believe God anoints us for what He calls us to do and that my anointing and covering had lifted in my current season.  I felt as though for a new chapter to begin, I had to trust God to provide, by closing the current one.  This was very hard to do with the state of our economy and with the oil spill, but I could not find peace until I moved forward.  This step of faith was one of the biggest I have had to take, but the same day I turned in my two-week notice, upon arriving home, I had received an email regarding a job I had been trying to get for over a year and it had now come to fruition.  God’s ways are so much higher than ours and once again He had amazed me in a way I cannot even begin to express.

I don’t want to toot my horn, because I had my own doubts.  What I want you to know is that it is ok to wonder why things happen and how God can allow them to.  The presence of faith does not mean the absence of doubt.  Our doubts don’t drive God away; in fact, because He is so merciful, they can actually draw Him closer to us.  God is more pleased when we are open and honest with Him and He is not in the business of giving us what we deserve; He is in the business of restoring our faith.  The next time you feel alone, or abandoned, allow God to show up and remind you of who you are.  As children of the Most High God, we are the redeemed, saints, priests, called out ones, beloved, wearer of white robes, and we are born from above.  God has adopted us and He has invited us into the Godhead and the Shepherd knows his sheep. He knows each one of us by name. The Shepherd knows you; He knows your name and he will never forget it. “I have written your name on my hand” (Isa. 49:16)