THE CLOSED DOOR

THE CLOSED DOOR

There are few things that seem as final as a closed door. If you are on the inside, it can signal security, but if you are on the outside, it can represent rejection.  When someone dies, we stand before a door that has been effectively slammed in our faces.  There is only one way to open that door, but that is not up to us. 

Besides doors, we can also close our hearts. Arguments turn into unresolvable feuds when hearts close.  There was a woman, recently, who left a suicide note, which said she was leaving earth because her husband of twenty years had closed his heart to her.  

It’s startling how easy it is to close our hearts over the most petty things. We refuse to listen, to acknowledge apologies or accept anything that could change our minds.  This, then, becomes who we are for the foreseeable future.  We don’t see it as imprisoning ourselves?  We don’t see ourselves as hypocrites, as we treat everyone else with kindness believing we are following Jesus’ command to love one another?  

When we are reminded that Jesus forgave, we are tempted to think, “Well, it was easy for him.” That is so wrong. Case in Point:  Jesus goes to the temple to pray on the Sabbath.  It soon becomes obvious that his enemies have set a trap.  A man is in the crowd with a withered hand.  The enemies wait and watch knowing Jesus will help him and that will condemn Jesus.  But Jesus knowing what they’re thinking, asks them whether it was lawful to do good on the Sabbath and to save life rather than destroy it? Because they stood silent, he called the man over and healed him. The Gospel writer says, “He looked at them with anger and grieved at the hardness of their hearts.”  (Mark 3:1-6)

The Pharisees left then and joined the forces of Herod to think up ways to do away with him.  Yet after all that, he prayed for them from the cross!  Still think it was easy for Jesus?  Whenever the subject comes up ,and someone says it was easier for Jesus because he was God, I am reminded of the words of Phillip Yancy, 

“Jesus did not come to show us how to be God. He came to show us how to be human.”

Opening our hearts means setting ourselves free, not necessarily patching up the relationships. That will come or not, but at least we will have let the burden go.  It’s a start.

Carol Lemelin OPA