What's that sound?

Slamming Doors

“As often happens on the spiritual journey, we have arrived at the heart of a paradox: each time a door closes, the rest of the world opens up. All we need to do is stop pounding on the door that just closed, turn around—which puts the door behind us—and welcome the largeness of life that now lies open to our souls.”
Parker Palmer (Let Your Life Speak)

When I read the quote above, I am reminded of the story from Ezekiel 37, about the valley of the dry bones. In that story, the prophet is called by spirit into the wilderness to a valley filled with the bones of a once great army. Ezekiel is instructed to prophesy to the bones about God’s power to call them back to life. They respond by rejoining and re-fleshing. He calls to the wind to fill them and they breathe and stand on their feet. This is the story of all of us who’ve heard a door slam and had no idea that another would open up.

Whether the circumstance is being laid off from a job we love, or having our spouse leave, or losing a loved one to death, or receiving a life-threatening diagnosis, the noise of that slamming is deafening and for a moment we aren’t able to turn around and see what the future holds. Sometimes, we’re even afraid that there is no future for us; that life as we know it is truly over. And it is. That life is over.

Often, when we’re lying wasted in the valley of dry bones some singing Ezekiel comes along and prophesies to us about a new future, a different way—a new job, a new partner, a new life that we could not have envisioned for ourselves. That revelation enlivens us; we feel our breath return and once again are on our feet and moving forward.

Over the course of a lifetime, we will find ourselves in the valley of dry bones many times. After a while, we begin to recognize it as fertile ground, a place of transformation and renewal. We will listen excitedly for the call of the prophet. What’s in store for me now? What’s God calling me to this time? Kind of gets the juices flowing just thinking about it, doesn’t it?

In the flow,
Jane