When God closes a door, does he unlock, open, or bust out a window?

When the door of opportunity has been slammed shut in your face (or on your foot as you were trying to stick it through just in time), friends and loved ones are quick to remind you that “God will open a window.” And it sounds simple enough. When one opportunity doesn’t work out, something else will, right? But how do you know if a window is really open, or if it’s just so clean that it looks open, only to leave you with a smashed face and bruised ego.

I’ve found myself in this position lately, doors unopened, or closed at the last minute, and I’ve been left wondering where I should go next. Is this window cracked open only for fresh air, or am I to go through? Is it okay to go through a window that is unlocked and easily opened? How much effort are we to put in on our part? While I feel certain I need to move on to other sources for water (as Elijah’s brook seems to be drying up at home), my desire hasn’t been for a specific source. Rather, it’s been to see clearly the path. I’ve started down a few, only to have them dead end, or lead me in a loop right back to where I started.

Is this a message to stay right where I am, and wait for rain? I do know one thing for certain. Although the shriveling resources gave me cause to seek elsewhere, he keeps providing. Little by little, drop by drop, he keeps providing. Not much, but just enough to keep us hydrated. And for this I’m grateful. Perhaps it’s biding me more time. Or maybe it’s been a lesson in patience, and submitting to his will. I know I’ve changed. Opportunities I would have once leapt at, I now casually review. Those doors I would have once done anything to open, tried to pick the lock, disguised myself as someone I’m not, I now no longer knock on. While I may not know what I should do at this season in my life, at least I know what I shouldn’t do, what I won’t do.

Lord, help me to know your will. Sharpen my discernment, silence the voice of false opportunity, make clear the path. Lead me with willing feet toward the open window. Not the unlocked one, not the one busted out with jagged edges, but the one flung wide open. I’m not asking for the easy way out Lord, just the one most in line with your will. And if I’m to stay right where I am, help me to understand. Show me the trickles in the stream, the spring-fed place with a steady source of water, if not a heavy volume. You’ve led me this far, and I know you’re not abandoning me. You will come through. You always do. You  always do.