January 25

Guidance through hindrance

“So he shall open, and none shall shut: and he shall shut, and none shall open” (Isa 22:22).
“He that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth” (Rev. 3:7).

“I always thought that if we prayed for guidance we would get it, but here I have prayed earnestly for the way to be opened up, and it seems as if every door so far has been closed,” said the girl petulantly.
“Perhaps the closed doors are the very guidance you are seeking for,” answered her mother.


“What do you mean?” was the surprised question.
“Just this, when the way is blocked, it may mean that at present that is not the door God wishes you to enter; if you still continue praying and doing His will, you may rest assured that the right door will open in due time. Do you not remember how Paul, when he was starting on his second missionary journey, found barriers set up by the Holy Spirit, which prevented him from going where he had intended, and how it was a clear leading of Providence, though at the time neither he nor his companions may have recognized it as such? Many a door is closed in order to force one out along the line of God’s wise choice. If the doors Paul wanted to enter had not been closed, the Gospel would not have had a chance to enter Europe, and who knows but we should have been the heathen today instead of the foreign nations to whom we are sending missionaries?”

I wondered why God closed the door,
On what I fondly planned;
I tried in vain to open it,
And could not understand;
Was it through error of my own,
This disappointment sore,
Or something I had failed to do?
¬—But God had shut the door
Because He’d planned some better thing,
Some blessing on before,
Far richer than I ever dreamed,
That’s why God shut the door.
—Clara Simpson.

“The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord” (Psa. 37:23).

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