Discover the New Door!Sample

IF IT ISN’T GOD’S PLAN, WOULD WE WANT THE DOOR TO REMAIN OPEN? The more I aged, the more this diagnosis was becoming real to me.  I guess I first realized in my heart that others were noticing when I wasn’t the one being asked to speak at an annual work presentation.  I had done the presentations for years prior, but this particular year, everything I normally did was assigned to others. I felt a myriad of emotions that night.  I could understand why I had been replaced, yet I was disappointed, hurt, and inside I was angry.  I began to dread going to meetings, especially the board meetings where I would have to speak because when under stress my head shook more, and my voice trembled.  I can remember crying all the way home after the meetings and my neck being so tense and my chest tight that I just couldn’t wait to get home and put a heated neck wrap on to get some relief. My husband heard every reason under the sun why I wanted to just quit, but deep inside I loved the people; I loved my job, and it made me feel like I was contributing to the community.  Yet I could feel the way I contributed was changing, and I didn’t like that at all. I loved speaking at Mother’s Day banquets and women’s conferences, and slowly that all ebbed away.  Within my head were lots of plans.  I had always thought I would write a book or devotional book.  At one point I wanted to write a children’s book.  If I couldn’t speak any longer, I could still write a book! Plans, plans, and more plans!  The problem was they were my plans. > “These are the words of him who is holy and true, who holds the key of David. What he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open.”  Revelation. 3:7 I didn’t plan for cancer to take my husband’s life although he battled it for years. In 2017 he was diagnosed terminal, and I resigned from my job to spend his remaining days together.  I put all plans on the back burner.  He died in August of that year, and in October I got an offer to co-author a book on heaven.  My self-esteem began to come back, yet due to an outright attack on my co-author and his family, our plan to write a book ended. > “Changes in our life often change the course of our plans!” Oh, how true are the words of Revelation 3:7!  If a plan is truly God’s plan, no one or thing can shut the door to the plan, and if He shuts the door, no one can open it. CAN YOU RELATE? It is so important to be open to change in plans.  After all, if they aren’t God’s plan, would we want the door to remain open? WHAT WE LEARNED IN TODAY'S STUDY: * Health issues cause stress. * Change in plans often causes emotional trauma. * It is okay to have plans, but we need to be sure God is in the plan! * Changes in our life often change the course of plans! * If God shuts a door, no one can open it! * If God opens a door, no one can shut it!