Seeds of the Kingdom 17th October 2022 Daily Devotional || By Ellel Ministries International. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.
Read Seeds of the Kingdom 17th October 2022 Daily Devotional for Sunday
Who Is Knocking?
by Denise Cross
Please support 5dailydevotional.com so we can continue publishing impactful and uplifting content daily. GIVE HERE
Behold I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him and he with me. Revelation 3:20, NIV
Seeds of the Kingdom 17th October 2022 MESSAGE
I wonder if you have ever found yourself on the wrong side of a door. Maybe you have been shut out in torrential rain without an umbrella and without the key to get back into the warm dry sanctuary of your home. I’m sure, if this has happened to you, you knocked extra hard, or insistently rang the bell, and perhaps even shouted out, “Let me in”.
Of course, in this scenario, we are knocking to get in for our own benefit, but what if the person trying to get in is wanting to help because of a dire need inside. It could be a paramedic perhaps, who is responding to an emergency call but unable to gain entry to bring essential help until the door is opened. What if no one opens the door? The result of that closed door could be life-threatening for someone.
You might be certain that you wouldn’t shut the door of your house to needed help, but what about the spiritual entrance to your heart? In John’s Revelation we find a sober warning. The message comes from ‘the Amen, the Faithful and True witness, the Beginning of the Creation of God’, and is given to those in the church at Laodicea: “You have a problem with closed doors.” Jesus tells them that He is standing at the door and knocking, and calling out to them, because there is a need for heart-healing help. But the door is shut, and it seems that they might not realise that He can’t get in,
So why do we shut the door, or in other words build up a defence to guard our heart, a defence that keeps out the very One who longs to come in with the life-saving help that we need? Maybe we don’t recognise our need. We haven’t sent out the emergency call, because we think we’re doing OK. We’ve got it all together. But the One who knows us intimately sees needs we might not yet recognise, and He may come knocking at the door of our self-righteousness or self-sufficiency.
READ: October 17, 2022 – Daily Bread Devotional for Today
Or maybe it’s the fear of feeling exposed or vulnerable without our own door of defence. Past experiences with those whom we thought might help us, but who ended up harming us, have made us extra wary. Or maybe we don’t believe that anyone can help us, even God. Perhaps we don’t feel worthy of His help. We feel we are so bad that we are a lost cause.
However you feel today, remember Jesus is knocking at the door of your heart and longs to come in to establish a deeper friendship and share His sustaining, life-giving food. Perhaps you can’t imagine flinging that door to your innermost being wide, just yet, but maybe you could risk starting with just a crack. It may not be easy, but the good news is that even the smallest crack is enough for the light and love of Jesus to start to flood into the darkness, bringing comfort into any wounded places.
Is He standing at your door and knocking today? Is He calling out to you, “Let Me in”? We have a choice to make.
Seeds of the Kingdom 17th October 2022 PRAYER
Jesus, I ask You to forgive me that I so easily build walls of protection around my innermost being. Today I repent of my reliance on my own defences and ask You to reveal to me why, and how, I have effectively shut You out. I choose today to open that door of my heart and to let You in to bring Your Kingdom truth into my life and to fellowship with me. I ask this in Jesus’ name, Amen.
Seeds of the Kingdom 17th October 2022 written by Denise Cross, has been married to David for nearly fifty years and they have three grown-up children and eight wonderful grandchildren. For many years Denise was a Director of Ellel Glyndley Manor but in recent years has been peripatetic across many of the Ellel Ministries Centres, teaching guests and supporting or training teams.
She originally trained as a mathematics teacher but her life and the future of her whole family was radically changed by a “Damascus Road” experience of the Lord Jesus in 1981. For many years previously David and Denise had been attempting to live a self-sufficient life in the Highlands of Scotland but Jesus completely changed their views and focus and showed them how much they needed His sufficiency rather than their own.
