"Doors"

While this post isn't about the Bible, I thought it was a timely one to share. This is an extemporaneous essay I wrote shortly before graduating college. These days, a lot of us have faced closed doors. I hope these words remind you that our Father is good.

Behind it breathed rooms full of comfort, the affection of family, and the intangible barrier of security. Beyond it lay a green lawn, climbing trees, and dirty bare feet after long summer days of play, a swimming pool, and an ever-new adventure.

It was the first door in my memory.

For sixteen years, I went in and out of that door to home. Its black coat frazzled and flaked away until my mother painted it a reviving green, and the door remained the mediator between the familiar and the ever-changing abyss of life.

But what I remember most is how, when I clasped the cool gold door handle and pulled, the wind pulled back, countering my effort and resisting my will—as if nature challenged my desire to join in its pleasant world. I pulled harder, because I knew what I wanted.

Doors were easy, back in those days.

They were all that stood between me and rounds of nighttime hide-and-go-seek tag, neighborhood playmates, and brand new adventures. Small, barefoot, and hungry for life, I yanked hard. The wind surrendered.

Back then, I knew what waited on the other side.

The doors I face now have no windows, no peep-holes, and no friendly green paint. I can guess at the landscape beyond. I can hope for flowerbeds and cloudless blue sky. I can imagine that hopeful things wait beyond every door. But ultimately, I don’t really know what waits on the other side of the doors I find myself pulling at. Even those I grasp and yank, sometimes doubt and fear weakens my zest. Because what if I’m wrong, and this door leads to pain? What if desert lies on the other side? What if the journey beyond it is lonely and harsh?

That’s the thing about doors, I suppose. You never quite know where they lead. You can take only one at a time, and perhaps you’ll never be able to backtrack.

Like that first door?

I walked out of it one day, and I never went back. I couldn’t. Life veered, time surged forward, tomorrow came, and that door was gone.

Since then, I have gone in and out of countless doors. Wooden doors. Glass doors. Metal doors. Broken doors. And as time flows, I have learned that it’s all right to not know what waits on the other side of the doors I walk through—because my Father does. The One who loves me, the One who did not spare His Son for me, who walked through the doors of humanity, crucifixion, and sacrifice for me—He sees the doors I pull at. He knows which ones are good.

So I pull a little harder, and I don’t do it because I trust in what’s on the other side. I do it because I know my Father’s heart, and I know He will not let me breach a doorway that is not good. I know Him, and that is enough.