When God calls us missionaries, we are confused when something stops us from going. Frustration sets in. We feel we have failed or made a mistake. The answer is that God opens and closes doors. I hope you enjoy hearing from a mission expert, J. Herbert Kane.

We have heard much in this postwar period about closing doors, and the assumption is that these doors were closed by the nationalists, or the Communists, or the revolutionists; and behind all these, of course, was the devil. It is true that the devil delights in closing doors. It is also true that human agents are usually employed. The fact remains that when doors are closed they are closed by God and not by man or the devil.

This may sound like heresy but it has the sanction of Holy Scripture. In His letter to the church in Philadelphia Jesus Christ describes Himself as the One who opens and no man shuts and shuts and no man opens (Re 3:7). Most of us prefer open doors. We dont like closed doors. We tend to identify the former with God and His purposes; we associate the second with the devil and his diabolical schemes. This is because, like Peter, we have man’s point of view and not God’s (Mt 16:23).

The greatest reverse ever suffered by the modern missionary movement was the evacuation of mainland China in the 1950s. In the 1840s the Christian Church, like a mighty army, moved into China with its banners flying. On those banners were inscribed the words of Scripture: “I am He that openeth and no man shutteth.” One hundred years later the Church was on the march again; but this time it was coming out of China. Its banners, tattered and torn, were dragging in the dust. But on those banners were inscribed the words of Scripture: “I am He that shutteth and no man openeth.”

By purely human definition the first event was a victory; the second was a tragedy. But both were engineered by God. It was He who opened the door in the 1840s. It was He who closed the door in the 1940s. If it had not been for the permissive will of God, all the armies of Red China could not have chased the missionaries out of that country. One can only conclude that when doors open, they open at His command; and when they close, they close at His behest. Closed doors are just as much a part of His plan as open doors.

 J. Herbert Kane, Understanding Christian Missions