Touched Archive: Sometimes God says 'No.'

I was thinking yet again about God's plans for us and remembered this article I wrote in 2004. Even though I wrote it seven years ago, it's just as relevant today as it was then. Hope you find it encouraging :)

‘Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails’ Proverbs 19:21

At the end of grade 11 at my high school, the teachers would choose prefects for the following year. They would draw up a shortlist of girls who would go on a leadership camp, then after that camp the list would get narrowed down further. Eventually that list of girls would go for an interview and 30 or so girls would become prefects. When I was in grade 11 I secretly hoped that I’d be chosen to be a prefect. I could picture myself with the big shiny silver badge and the scroll on my blazer. But, that’s not what God wanted for me. He said “no.” I didn’t even make the first round.

I don’t know about you guys, but God’s said “no” to me many times. Perhaps He’s said “no” to the plans you’ve made or to that award you were hoping to win. Perhaps He’s even answered “no” to the person you thought was ‘the one’. In Revelation 3:7b it says ‘What he opens, no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open.’ God opens doors for us, but sometimes He closes them.

It can be hard when God shuts doors in our lives, but God has a bigger plan for our lives than what we can comprehend. Sometimes God closes one door so that another one can be opened to us. God shut the door to me being a prefect, but that’s not where the story ends. A few weeks later the teacher in charge of our S.C.A (Students Christian Association) came up to me and asked me to be S.C.A vice chairlady. If I’d been chosen to be a prefect I wouldn’t have been able to be involved in S.C.A. God shut the prefectship door so that He could open up the door to serving Him by telling others about Him as a leader of S.C.A. And, I’m so glad that He did!

I used to get pretty upset when God closed doors in my life. That was until He helped me realise something. We go to Him with a question, then get upset when He answers it because it’s not the answer that we hoped for. He’s still answered the question; He's done what we asked Him to do. So, why do we complain? God’s revealed His will to us. He knows that if we walked through the wrong door it would only end up hurting us, taking us far away from Him and from His Will for our life. He’s sparing us from great trouble! But, even when we do feel upset about God’s “no” we should be honest with Him about how we feel (He knows all our thoughts anyway - Psalm 139:4) and go to Him for comfort.

So next time God says no to something you ask Him for, rejoice! Don’t be disheartened. ‘ “For I know the plans I have for you.” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”’ (Jeremiah 29:11) God has an awesome plan for your life and He knows just when to send the right opportunity or to place the right person in your life. Focus not on the disappointment of hearing Him say ‘no,’ but on the day when He says “See I have placed before you an open door that no one can shut.’(Revelation 3:8)