Day Twenty-Six

WHAT’S AN OPEN DOOR?

He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.

—PSALM 23:3 ESV

How do you know when to make a brave move, even if it isn’t easy? How do you know when to just go for it?

As a sophomore in college (and for most of my college career), I loved spending time in the offices of my campus ministry, the University of Georgia Wesley Foundation—it felt cool and trendy and Christian.

A campus ministry is a church for college students set on a college campus. Many of my youth group friends also attended UGA, so every time I stopped by the Wesley building felt like a homecoming of sorts. And when I walked through the halls, I saw the photos of mission trips from past years.

One day I stood in front of one of those pictures—a group of college students clumped together in a sunflower field. The sun was shining on their heads, almost making the curly blonde girl look like she was glowing. Across the bottom it read, “SCOTLAND.”

I had heard of Scotland. That was about it. During a Wednesday night service at Wesley that fall—just weeks later, really—the mission trips were announced for that school year, and I saw Scotland as an option. Yeah, I thought, I want to stand in that field and take that sunflower picture.

It wasn’t superspiritual. It was an open door.

I knew the Bible said to go into all the nations and share the gospel (Matthew 28:19), so it was more about picking from the list of trips that would be offered for the interested students that semester. I prayed; I remember that. But there was no huge Scotland banner flying outside my bedroom window or any other weird signal from the heavens on this one. I just knew I wanted to go on a mission trip, and that was the one that stood out to me.

I ended up going on that mission trip, and even wound up living there for a time. Going on a trip overseas, and later to live there, took courage. It was different. It was new. And I wasn’t following a path lit with bright arrows. It was an open door that God led me through.

It wasn’t superspiritual. It was an open door.

In today’s passage, the psalmist said that God led him down the path of righteousness. Ask the Lord to lead you to the open doors, then be brave enough to walk through them.

BE BRAVE: Write out a prayer to God, asking Him to show you the open doors in your life right now. If you want Him to open the right doors and close the wrong ones, write that as well.