Open Doors
Do not give the devil a foothold.
The polar vortex that swept across the United States recently did not miss Virginia. The cold front announced itself on a Thursday night with strong winds. The winds were so strong that they set off the alarm at our cabin in the country at 4:30 am. The following Sunday, the rain fell all day. Late in the afternoon, the temperature finally dropped below freezing and the wet snow started. Monday morning, we awoke to find everything covered in ice. I had to use ice remover spray to get into the car. The temperatures continued to fall steadily all week after that. Driving to the gym early Thursday morning, the car said it was 2 degrees outside. We decided it would be a good idea to head out to the cabin and check out things, especially the water pipes, after a serious cold spell.
We headed out Saturday morning. About fifteen minutes down the road, the Holy Spirit prompted me to ask my wife if she had one of the new cabin keys in her car. We had replaced the door before winter came and changed the locks. It turns out I had not managed to get a set of the new keys to her, so we turned around. Thirty minutes later, we were back where we had turned around with a set of new keys in hand.
The drive was uneventful. We opened the gate and drove up the driveway to the parking spot in front of the cabin. When I pulled into the spot, I found myself staring at an open front door to the house. It was sitting about one foot ajar, open. As I processed what I was seeing, I realized that the front door alarm from ten days ago had not been from the wind rattling the door—it has been from the wind blowing the door open!
I was nervous about what I would find.
Fortunately, I observed no footprints or tracks in the snow leading up to the door. That suggested I would not find a human or animal intruder waiting for me. As I walked in, I observed that the first casualty was my aloe vera plant. Apparently single-digit cold winds blowing straight on it through the open door was not helpful—it was slumped over. A sweep of the house found nothing amiss except a few white bird droppings. A small bird must have explored the open house, but finding nothing to eat it left.
The next project was to go down to the cellar and start the water running to the bathroom again. We had installed cut off valves and drains to the bathroom last year because the pipes run through a crawl space that lacks insulation. I started the water and came back upstairs. No water pressure in the hot water at the sink. I headed back down. This time, hearing water running outside the cellar wall, I went out and opened the crawl space. There was a growing puddle of water there. I shut the water back off and resigned myself to giving the plumber a call. Fortunately, there was not any significant damage.
A Christian can have an “open door” in the spirit. Open doors give the devil legal rights to enter your life, attack and cause problems. This is why St. Paul tells us: “Give no opportunity to the devil.”1 Another translation reads: “Do not give the devil a foothold.”2 The word translated as “opportunity” or “foothold” is more accurately described as a place. This Greek word tópos means “any portion of space marked off, as it were, from surrounding, space.” In other words, do not open the door to the devil and let him in.
The primary open doors to spiritual bondage are caused by the seven capital sins: envy; greed; pride; gluttony; sloth; anger; lust.3 When we sin, we make a choice to follow the devil and not Jesus. This choice opens a door in the spirit to the enemy. By God’s grace, we may be protected from demonic infestation when we sin. That does not change the fact that the effect of committing a deliberate mortal sin can be demonic infestation or possession. This is similar to the open door at my cabin—by God’s grace the only intruder was a small bird that did not stay. But what if I had shown up and found a bear in my cabin?
In addition to past sins, there are also secondary open doors to bondage. These can include emotional wounds and trauma; unholy soul ties and unholy personal choices; denial of God; occult and new age; generational or ancestral issues. We may also have open doors to bondage due to unconfessed sin or unforgiveness.
Are there any open doors in your life that need to be closed?
This question is not intended to cause fear or anxiety in you. If you suspect you are dealing with an open door in your life, do not be afraid or despair. Take it to prayer. The Lord wants to help you to close the door to the devil.
For many people, open doors can be resolved with prayer, sincere repentance and a good confession. For more challenging open doors, there are resources available to help address these issues. For example, Unbound is a popular Catholic ministry that started with the book “Unbound: A Practical Guide to Deliverance.” There are other books and articles available that discuss the process of discernment and self-deliverance. Your pastor or spiritual director may be able to pray with you for discernment and to guide you through the process of repenting, forgiving yourself and others, renouncing and closing the open door. A spiritual retreat may be the opportunity to immerse yourself in God’s presence and obtain the healing necessary to close the door. The key is to ask the Holy Spirit to lead you to the specific resources or people that can help you.
My prayer for you today is that you would be healed, delivered and set free from any open doors to the devil in the Name of Jesus. I pray that you would open the door of your heart to Jesus Christ and surrender to Him.
Peace be with you!
“Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any one hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.”4
Eric A. Welter is an employment lawyer and trial attorney with a long-time devotion to intercessory prayer. He is a Catholic Christian who has been involved with intercessory and healing prayer ministry for over twenty years.
The Abound in Hope Ministry website is https://www.aboundinhope.org/ministry. The mission of the Abound in Hope Ministry is to show men and women how much God loves them and to increase that love in their hearts.
Eric’s books on prayer are available in paperback or e-book format on amazon.com.
Effective Intercession for Our Loved Ones: Power Tools for Prayer.
(Available on amazon.com in paperback or Kindle.)
Effective Intercession for Ourselves: “Power Tools” for Prayer (Part Two). (Available on amazon.com in paperback or Kindle.)
Ephesians 4:27 (RSV-CE).
Ephesians 4:27 (NIV).
Fr. Christopher Onuoha has written an extensive book on these issues called Healing You and Your Family Tree: A Contemplative Approach to Personal and Generational Healing.
Revelation 3:20.
Great article. Thanks for the words of wisdom. I like the new Substack feature, allowing audio playback.