Doors, Entrances and Opportunities

Introduction

Have you ever noticed just how incredible the Word of God is for us? God’s word is definitely an instrument for us to gain intelligence, insight and promote introspection. The Bible is designed to make us more knowledgeable about our Creator and His plan for us. It is alive and active.

Hebrews 4:12 NIV84

For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

As being living and active, I think it is fair to say that the Word of God is intelligent. Have you ever thought about the intelligence of Scripture?

Proverbs 9:10 NIV84

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.

The intelligence of Scripture gives us great insight as well.

Proverbs 2:1–5 NIV84

My son, if you accept my words and store up my commands within you, turning your ear to wisdom and applying your heart to understanding, and if you call out for insight and cry aloud for understanding, and if you look for it as for silver and search for it as for hidden treasure, then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God.

The intelligence of Scripture and the insight of Scripture help us to introspectively apply its precepts and principles into our daily lives.

Proverbs 22:17 NIV84

Pay attention and listen to the sayings of the wise; apply your heart to what I teach,

This is exactly the case of what has happened for many of you as you have done this month’s scripture writing plan. This month we have written scripture that has been called “Doors, Entrances and Opportunities.” We have looked at various intelligent scriptures that give us insight and introspectively provided for us clear direction in our lives. Today, I want share with you an example of this by looking at Jeremiah 7:1-3.

Jeremiah 7:1–3 NIV84

This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: “Stand at the gate of the Lord’s house and there proclaim this message: “ ‘Hear the word of the Lord, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship the Lord. This is what the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place.

Doors

The word gate used here is synonomous with an entry way or door that gave access to the temple. There were many entry ways and doors in the temple. Our church, for example, has 8 doors in which we can go in or out of our building. All of these doors are useful in going and out, but some are useless to go where the main events of the church take place. Our front door and annex door allow us to come in to the sanctuary where worship takes place. It is the area in which hear the word of God proclaimed and sing His praises. Hopefully, these doors will welcome the rich person as well as the poor person, the hungry person as well as the completely satisfied person, the sad person as well as the happy person, the white person as well as a person of color, and the hopeful person as well as the hopeless person.

People who come through these doors should feel the love and presence of our God. They should feel the warmth of the opportunity for worship. These doors should be useful for those who enter to receive instruction, encouragement and understanding that God, Creator of the universe, loves them and has a plan for them.

Psalm 100:4 NIV84

Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name.

Hopefully, that is why you come through these doors and they indeed are useful in your life.

As a prophet of God, Jeremiah had to make sure that he was in a place to receive the word of God. There had to be some doors in his life that he made use of to gain understanding how and what the word of the Lord was all about and how it was to be received.

However, there are also some useless doors in our church building. Our back basement door is one such door. This entry way is dark and dirty. It is the entry way to a storage area that has all kinds of pieces of junk and relics from the past. It is not conducive to worship or study. It is dismal and not a place in which one would want to linger. We may look at this entry way and think, “Hey we can go in this way and save a few steps,” yet, it is the worst way possible.

Proverbs 16:25 NIV84

There is a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death.

Hopefully you can see the point that is being made. Our church has useful doors and useless doors. Our lives also have useful doors and useless doors. Jesus calls us to go through doors that lead to righteousness.

Matthew 7:13–14 NIV84

“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

Entrances

There are other entrances in which we should look at as we continue this study. Jeremiah’s command from the Lord is to stand at the gate of the Lord’s house and proclaim the need for reform. Specifically, he is enlisting followers of God to heed the command is to reform their ways and actions. Our church doors should provide an entrance to enlistment.

Matthew 11:28 NIV84

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.

Our world is in horrible shape. Do you know anyone that is weary and burdened? Jesus said that those who come to Him will find rest. The entrances of our church should be entrances of enlistment, where we are inviting a weary and burdened world to come to Jesus. How are we doing with that?

Our entrances should also have an entrance of excitement. It is not a path of doom and gloom! It is exciting to be in this place, to worship our God and fellowship with each other. We should be excited to have this opportunity each and every time we are able to gather.

Hosea 13:14 NIV84

“I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death. Where, O death, are your plagues? Where, O grave, is your destruction? “I will have no compassion,

We have overcome so much and our church should be a place of excitement, celebrating what God has done in our lives and how He has given us the gift of salvation!

We have several entrances of excitement. We have these sanctuary doors and we have a door that leads to our children’s playground. We will soon see that excitement from our children when we can once again open up that door and give them an opportunity to play outside.

Another entrance we have gives us the opportunity to encounter each other. Our church has had a long standing tradition in fellowshipping together. The door downstairs leads to our fellowship hall and kitchen area where we have had many meals together and tasted and seen that the Lord is good. We will soon be back to doing this again and our fellowship will be sweet. However, we do not have to wait until then to go through that door for us to encounter each other. We are given so much when we say yes to Christ! We are given salvation and we are given each other.

Acts 2:42 NIV84

They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.

I encourage you today to celebrate this rich fellowship God had given you! Utilize the entrance of encountering each other and richly celebrate what God is doing in the lives of your brothers and sisters in Christ.

We also have the entrance of everlasting. You have heard the old gospel song, “this world ain’t my home I am just a passin’ through!” Your life has been changed forever if you allowed this church or another church to be a place where you accepted Jesus as your Savior. As a result, you will spend eternity in heaven, praising God. Every door to this church in an entrance to everlasting. We can come in to this place concerned about the things of this world or we can come into this place excited about the everlasting. There are things that we get worked up about here that just will not matter in eternity. So why do we let them worry us here? We have an entrance to the everlasting!

Jeremiah said that the word of the Lord came to him and told him to tell the people to reform their ways and actions. Do you know we have it much better than the Israelites he was speaking to that day? They had to perform acts and make sacrifices to reform their ways and actions. All we have to do is trust Jesus as our Lord and Savior and He will reform our ways and actions! The more we trust Him the more He reforms!

2 Peter 1:3 NIV84

His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.

Glory to God in the Highest! He has given us doors and entrances and we can see that being carried out figuratively in our lives and we can see it literally if we look carefully at our church. These doors and entrances also give us opportunities.

Opportunities

Every time we enter any one of these doors, we can worship. We can be free to do so without the worry of persecution.

Psalm 132:7 NIV84

“Let us go to his dwelling place; let us worship at his footstool—

We call this place the sanctuary because it is indeed where we worship. However, because what Christ has done in giving us the Holy Spirit, we do not have to be in a building or a temple to worship our God! These doors and entrances of the building not only allow us to come in, but the give us the opportunity to go out! By the way, today is known in the liturgical world as Pentecost Sunday. When we go out, we still have an opportunity to worship! The more we worship and understand the fullness of our God, the more we should want to share His love.

So not only do these doors and entrances give us opportunity to worship, these doors and entrances give us opportunity to work!

Galatians 6:9 NIV84

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

We need to develop more opportunities to gather together. We need more Bible Studies and more discipleship classes. We need to offer ways to invite others into these doors and entrances so that we can share the Good News of Christ and celebrate His goodness, grace, love and mercy! We need to have more opportunities where people can pray together and ask the Lord to clearly give direction. This church has been positioned on this corner now for 95 years and it is obvious that we are here for such a time as this! We can use these doors and entrances as opportunities to work.

We can also use them to for opportunities to widen our ability to reach others. I made mention earlier about the idea of encountering each other through fellowship and sharing meals together. Some might think I am talking about widening our waistline. I do not think we need any help there. However, I do think that you and I were called to go out of these doors and entrances to widen the opportunities for our world to know and experience Jesus Christ.

Matthew 9:37–38 NIV84

Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”

Some of you under the sound of my voice are running from a call to ministry. Some of you need to stop running away and start running towards Him!

Some of you are using age as an excuse. Some of you are using everything else. Listen, if God is calling use the opportunity before you.

One last opportunity that I want to share with you just now. It is the opposite of what I just said. Some of you need to experience the opportunity to just wait.

Psalm 27:14 NIV84

Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

Do not run ahead of God. Be reminded that His timing is perfect! Use the opportunities we have to wait.

Isaiah 40:30–31 NIV84

Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

We have doors, entrances and opportunities.

Are you going to stand at that gate and accept the call to action or are you let someone else do it? I say this in the greatest amount of love I possibly can, utilize the doors, entrances and opportunities before us just now, or get out of the way.