Testimony – Jesus is the Door
Amazing. God, you are truly amazing. Here is another blessed testimony from above. Praise God, Jesus is the Door.
Earlier today while sharing a testimony on a brother’s blog, I wrote: “I had to seek, knock and ask … I asked for help, and He opened the door. You can see what the Door revealed to me…” While writing this, I stopped to dwell on Jesus opening the door after a knock. So I checked out the scripture (knocking and it will be opened):
Matthew 7:7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.
After reading this, the thought of Jesus is the Door popped into my head, thus that’s why I wrote: “You can see what the Door revealed..”. The topic that was discussed on the brother’s blog was about sin and sinning no more in-Christ. While at a bible study this evening, the Lord did something amazing.. truly amazing. First, another piece of scripture –
John 10:7 Then Jesus said to them again, “Most assuredly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. 8 All who ever came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. 9 I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture.
The study tonight was about Philosophical influences in early Church history. The discussion was about man’s ability to obey God. We looked at 3 examples:
- Augustine: denied man’s ability to obey God. Salvation was all of God by sheer force of a new birth. (Man does not have the inability to obey)
- Pelaguis: Stressed the ability of free will – A life of sinful choices has established a bondage of habit, which makes virtuous choice difficult, but not impossible. (Man has the ability to obey with free-will)
- Semi-Pelagianism: A split between the 2 above – affirms that man is able to deny himself and obey God, but difficult and needing Divine help. (Man has impaired ability to obey)
As we studied, this topic was really speaking to me. It’s been on my mind for many years (the ability to obey God all the time). Also, this was similar to the topic that was discussed this morning on that brother’s blog. Can we stop sinning? Can I get rid of this stiff neck? As I’m dwelling on this and reading the points mentioned above about it being difficult to obey God, I heard the Lord speak in that quiet-still-small-voice: “My yoke is easy..” I knew it was Him so I quieted myself.
I put my elbows on the table, my head into my hands, closed my eyes, and started to dwell. I was dwelling on the need to take a step and walk through the Door. While thinking this, I open my eyes. My eyes were immediately focused on 2 words in my bible. There was not any scanning for words, and I did not look around the page. I opened my eyes and they were immediately focused on 2 words: doors open. It was a completely unrelated verse and was not part of our study:
Acts 16:27 And the keeper of the prison, awaking from sleep and seeing the prison doors open, supposing the prisoners had fled, drew his sword and was about to kill himself.
I need to go pray.. Thank you Lord for this testimony. You are the Door, the Way, the Truth, the Life, the True Vine, the Light, the Bread of Life, the Shepherd, the Son of God.. and no one comes to the Father except through You. Lord, I pray for continued ministering to me on this. Help me Helper, teach me Teacher. Thank you Teacher, thank you Helper, thank you Father. In Jesus name I pray, Amen. (Update: The Lord answers this prayer, praise God. See the 2 updates: Jesus is the Door Pt2 and Jesus is the Door Pt3)
joseph
That was a very interesting verse to end with. It left me thinking about how the guard was ready to kill himself instead of having to ask for forgiveness. Why is it so hard to ask for forgiveness?
:) Hiya matt, thanks for jumping in.
When I examine my own walk, I see 2 things going on inside me with confession/forgiveness. 1: I know I disobeyed God..and that’s hard to swallow, out of love and reverence for Him. I hate it. A pricked heart. (agreement with God). 2: The wicked one plays off of my emotions and tempts me with thoughts of being unworthy, ashamed, condemned, etc. It’s the 2nd choice I make that causes me to stay away from asking for forgiveness, reading the word, etc. When #2 is contemplated further, I see it is actually underdeveloped faith in Jesus Christ as my Savior.
As a Pastor once said to me… “You get up immediately, dust yourself off, get the confession out, and march onward. The evil one wants nothing more than to have you say ‘I’ll be forgiven in a few days… it’ll just take a week to get back. I can’t quite face Him yet.’ No! That is very dangerous and your walls of protection are down. Confess! You are forgiven! Pray! Read the word! Don’t stop marching.”
I think this soldier fell into #2.. Underdeveloped faith.
[…] is a follow-up to the blessed revelation from yesterday: Jesus is the Door. He continued to speak to me last night after the confirmation – doors open. Here is His […]
Wow another great blog. More confirmation from the Lord. My key words from God this week have been truth, bondage and authority. When I read Acts 16:27 above my Spirit jumped. He is the Door, the Way, the Truth and the Life, He is ALL things, the great I AM. Thanks for sharing your testimonies Joseph. God bless you and bless your ministry abundantly.
praise God.. He is good!
[…] over the past 2 days – Jesus is the Door. You can see the previous 2 discussions here: Jesus is the Door and Jesus is the Door […]
Great post. I’ll need to look more into the philosophical influences on man’s ability to obey God. Obedience is something God’s downloading to me right now – we need it to:
1. Fear God
2. Seek God
3. Do what’s right
Which happen to be the three conditions for us to receive all the good God has for us.
[…] If you haven’t followed, I recommend checking out Unity and Oneness with God and the testimony about Jesus being the Doorway, starting off with this one: Testimony – Jesus is the Door […]
[…] and a few weeks ago, I had that vision in Testimony – Jesus is the Door whereas Jesus was standing at the Door saying “Come”, but I didn’t go through the […]