We are earthside, as we know, to be tested. God’s already proven Himself, so this mortal experience is not about His faithfulness nor righteousness but rather about ours. Part of our test can involve delays and denials and sometimes just flat out not getting what we hope for in this life, even when our wants are nothing but righteous.
I, myself, am facing a window closure on something for which I have righteously desired all my mortal life, a dream of over thirty years – one as a child and teenager, I never even considered would be denied me during my mortal experience.
But alas, on this, my window is closing.
If you have a shutting window, I want to especially write to you today.
As your window closes.
First, I express my deepest and most heart-felt sorrow for what you surely feel is a significant loss. We humans currently reside in the place of sometimes unexplainable happenings, ones that heaven often gives no reason for and earth cannot adequately elucidate.
Our God gives, our God takes, and our God withholds. In His perfection, He determines which course and when.
Truly, I am sorry.
Some realities of earth life totally stink.
Having so said, I would be amiss if I did not immediately follow that with an admonition. Look to Jesus. In your pain, seek His comfort and aiding grace. Like Father Lehi with God, get wrapped up in the arms of gentle Jesus. (1 Nephi 1:15) He is the One who bore the pain of your closing window.
I have had so many sweet moments with Jesus and God as I look out my closing window. Some have come on the heels of very passionate earth to heaven communions where it wasn’t all pretty and proper on my end.
Your closing window may not make good sense now, but now is not forever. Remember that. For the faithful, now is not forever. Hope in a different reality will come to pass in the timeframe the Lord declares.
Do you remember the video the church put out in 2021 at Easter time? It played a catchy little tune and featured simple sentences with Biblical scenes mixed with modern pictures and was entitled “Because Of Him?”
Those words are powerful. Though they were largely focused on life after death, they have meaningful application for closing windows, too.
“It was unthinkable
Impossible
Unfathomable
Unprecedented
A single act that changed history
Possibility
Destiny
He was a carpenter
A teacher
An outcast
A leader
Yet He did what no carpenter, teacher, outcast, leader had ever done
Like all who preceded Him
He lived
And He died
But unlike all who preceded Him
He rose from the dead
He lived again
He lives
And because He lives
You, you, and you and she and he and they and we
All will live again
Because of Him
Death has no sting
The grave no victory
We can start again and again and again
Because of Him
Guilt becomes peace
Regret becomes relief
Despair becomes hope
Because of Him
We have second chances
Clean slates
New beginnings
There is no such thing as the end
Because of Him.”
(https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/media/video/2020-02-4100-because-of-him-easter-video?lang=eng)
Oh gosh, aren’t those lovely words? Hope in place of hopelessness. Peace smack in the middle of the trial. Knowing that there is more than just the end of this mortal life. The reality of more opportunities for yet to come wide open windows. No permanent sting.
“Because of Him.”
So look to Jesus. You will find Him not far from Father’s embrace, too. He can help you see beyond your window’s closure into a faith filled and hopeful future.
Next, like me, I know you desire the celestial kingdom. In that pursuit, I like to remember the words of President John Taylor who quoted the Prophet, Joseph Smith. He said,
“I heard the Prophet Joseph say, in speaking to the Twelve on one occasion: ‘You will have all kinds of trials to pass through. And it is quite as necessary for you to be tried as it was for Abraham and other men of God, and (said he) God will feel after you, and He will take hold of you and wrench your very heart strings, and if you cannot stand it, you will not be fit for an inheritance in the Celestial Kingdom of God.’ “ (Desert News Weekly, 29 Aug, 498)
Closing windows most often “wrench [those] very heart strings.” However, the glorious truth is: If we “stand it,” we will “be fit for an inheritance in the Celestial kingdom of God!” I love this reality. Let this sink deep within you! So keep fighting for the celestial kingdom, one day at a time. Soldier on even as you see your window falling ever downward.
Finally, Alexander Graham Bell is credited as having said: “When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” While I have been guilty of fixing my gaze too achingly long on my closing window, I have recently started to notice the upward shifting of another one – a possibility not considered previously.
So as your window closes, perhaps it’s time to fix your gaze elsewhere.
On another window that with a little effort and the blessing of God, can probably be propped open.
Unto all the world: As your window closes, please know I feel our shared sorrow in the loss and disappointment. Please let your gaze through that window settle on gentle Jesus, and throw yourself into His love. He will receive you. Keep fighting for the heaven that wants you there, and consider readjusting your gaze towards another slightly dusty window that with a slight wipe and nudge, will likely open to your vision a new treasure.