Oblate Program at Belmont Abbey, NC

Doorways of the Soul

Doorway-soul-enter-webEver stop to contemplate the importance of doors?

Yes, entranceways: there are so many kinds of doors in life. There are doors that lead to stairs that go up and doors that lead to a basement and doors that open entire new vistas on a patio or that we open to enter a church. There are the all-important little doors on the tabernacle!

Doors can open great things and they can also open to very bad things.

Did you ever see a picture of an open door to leads to nowhere — just a sheer drop?

We must have an idea, through the Holy Spirit, which ones to open and which to leave alone — despite our curiosity. It’s wise not to step blindly!

There are doors that God opens and doors that are opened — or offered — by the devil. Quite a doorman, he! A grotesque creature that looks like a combination of an oval reptile with the head of a snake may be invisibly standing next to a door with darkness behind.

Really, in each case, we’re the ones who choose to open doors; it’s a part of free will. There are vault doors. There are sealed doors in submarines that keep the ocean out, or that in a space station keep deadly forces away. There are steel doors but also glass ones, cracked by sin.

It takes little for smoke to enter.

Doors can lead us to great opportunities.

They can open into a life of God’s purpose for us.

They can be the start of something new that God wants for us.

Usually, we can tell something is powerful ordained for us when every door leading to it is readily opens for us after we have earned it. After effort. After pure intention. Perhaps after testing.

Opportunities. Offers.

“He commanded the skies from above; He set open the doors of the heavens” (Psalm 78:23).

We must be open — open our door — to the Holy Spirit. “Ask, and it shall be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you” (Matthew 7:7).

The discernment comes with whether there has been enough prayer and a sense of real peace with the urge to walk through a threshold.

Doorway-soul-enter02-webGod opens doors for us, to repeat, as does the devil, though his are usually opened through wrong purpose. We open the doors to darkness when we are seeking our own urges, our own will, our titillation, our lust, instead of the higher inclinations toward the Lord.

“I have chosen to stand at the door in the house of my God, rather than dwell in the tents of wickedness” (Psalms 84:10).

Often, we barge through doors — out of our own ambitions — and this leads to a series of unfortunate events, misfortunes that may not be immediately apparent.

The devil takes us down a hall and shows us all kinds of doors. He opens one and there is luxury. He opens another and there is something to do with carnality. He opens another and there is magic: the promise of something for nothing. Many are the lottery winners whose lives become nightmares because they were based on the wrong wants!

Sin opens doors into us, and through them come spirits that contaminate, that cling to us, that may root and draw other spirits that cause a bevy of problems. Through the Precious Blood of Christ raised in the chalice can we ask Jesus to purge us of wrong inclinations — to help us avoid doors that open the way for foul spirits.

Want to open a door to dark vapors?

Play the Ouija board. Go to to a fortuneteller. Read astrology.

You will find yourself inn darkness before you realize it.

Holy Doors in Rome

Holy Doors in Rome

Many are the kinds of doors. There are revolving doors: we can get caught in them. Around and around, getting nowhere. There glass doors. There are doors that are hard to open — really a strain — and those that swing open for us. There are heavy bronze doors that seal august buildings. There are trap doors. There are secret ones. “Go, My people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy door after thee; hide thyself as for a little moment, until the anger be overpast” (Isaiah 26:20).

Some doors slam in our face. We must think twice about why we opened them! Maybe it’s from God — a door — and the devil is harassing us. But if doors continue to close, if it’s too uphill, with bad fruits, we may need to reorient; we may need to pray our way into a new perspective, a new way of thinking and desiring; we may have to release an ambition.

His Will unlocks where we are to go.

When we constantly have to pry doors open, something must be wrong.

When motivated by the right thing, the doors that easily swing open, that have been earned through right intentions, are the ones to take, for they indicate a good future — the doors opened for us by God, not our worldly desires. We can tell when something has been given by Him — when “doors have been opened” for us. Yes, it may take effort, but you can feel yourself flowing with Him when you don’t feel you are doing it all by yourself.

Beware false blessings.

False blessings are often over-attachments.

When you are not overly attached to something or someone, the path opens and widens to your freedom; attachment to Christ and Christ only is the way of wisdom and the door that leads to Heaven — the stairs that go up.

Michael Brown

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