Have You Opened The Door?
Many times throughout my prayers and revelations I have written about how I believe Jesus sanctifies, transforms and resurrects us. It begins with the spirit, then the soul (heart) and lastly the physical body. I believe all three parts need to be sanctified and born-again (resurrected in wholeness and life). And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Thessalonians 5:23, KJV). I have also been shown that sometimes when something is healed in the soul it can be reflected within the physical body also, as wounds in the soul can cause infirmity in the physical body. The resurrection of the physical body I believe is when Jesus returns and we receive our glorified body.
My salvation experience was somewhat unorthodox. In 2008 I asked my mother in law how you find God and she told me to ask Jesus into my heart. I did this every day for a year but had no understanding of who Jesus was whatsoever. One morning in 2009 whilst on my toilet I was baptised in the Holy Spirit and my entire life changed. The Holy Spirit had entered my spirit and my life from that point was never the same again. The Holy Spirit pointed me to Jesus and told me to read the Holy Bible. I immediately operated in amazing gifting’s and spent hours getting to know and understand Jesus as the day I was born-again I clearly recognised His voice. Everything unfolded from there.
Seven years after I was born-again and baptised in the Holy Spirit I saw Jesus in a vision standing at my heart and knocking. He told me that He hadn’t yet entered my heart and couldn’t until He saw I was ready. He confirmed at that point that I was ready and if I was willing to open the door to Him then He would enter my heart and do a deeper work in me. I accepted this and when He entered I got delivered from a spirit of self-hatred. The encounter was very powerful. At the time I accepted what happened and never thought to scripturally back up my experience of what happened. Recently a friend of mine had read about this experience and questioned me on it. My friend believed that Jesus comes into our heart the moment we believe and then straight away works in our heart to clear it of sin. I believed when we make a commitment to Jesus, His Holy Spirit enters our spirit (which was previously lying dormant), are born-again (in our human spirit) and then we start a walk with Him of trust and allow Him to work on those other areas. In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:12-14, NKJV). My belief is that our soul (heart) and physical body are not born-again at this point and need to go through a sanctification process before they too are transformed at the end of the sanctification process. Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water (Hebrews 10:22, NKJV). I believed that Jesus does not automatically come into our heart the moment we receive Him as our Lord and Saviour as there may be some work needed before our heart can receive Him. I believed this because of my own personal experience and the things He spoke to me about this. Pondering her understanding and my own experience I then decided to do a Bible study. The last thing I wanted was to be teaching deceptive experiences that were not based on Scripture. After researching it appears we were both correct. How can we both be correct? I learned that Jesus does enter our heart which is also known as our soul (mind, will, emotions, and conscience) when we believe (just like she thought), but the key to this is the belief. Our belief has to first come from our heart. But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation (Romans 10:8-10, NKJV). The Greek word for believe is Pisteuō which conveys a much deeper meaning than mere intellectual agreement. It implies a profound trust in, reliance upon, and commitment to Jesus, encompassing both faith and obedience—a wholehearted dedication to follow Him. Some can take years before that belief comes from their heart. God will even test the heart to see how much you actually believe in His Son as your Lord and Saviour. Once you believe from your heart He can then enter your heart and begin to do an even deeper work in you. For some the work in the heart may begin straight away but for others it may require (like myself) a work of preparation before our heart is truly ready to receive Him. The reason it took so long for me (after my spirit was filled with the Holy Spirit) was because I did not understand fully the role of Jesus in my life and I had major trust issues. I believed Jesus was real, and that He was who the Bible said He was but I did not trust in Him as my own personal Lord and Saviour (because of fear) and I did not understand a thing about how the Kingdom of Heaven worked. I had so much to learn. I wanted to trust Him but couldn’t. To help me to do this He has been showing me His heart since the moment I met Him so I can learn to trust Him completely. I can honestly say because of the amount of time I have spent getting to know Him (which also includes all three members of the God-head - Father, Son and Holy Spirit), I have absolutely fallen in love with them.
I then looked up the Bible to see if there were any examples of people who were followers of Jesus but did not yet have Him in their hearts. This is what I found - I sleep, but my heart is awake; It is the voice of my beloved! He knocks, saying, “Open for me, my sister, my love, My dove, my perfect one; For my head is covered with dew, My locks with the drops of the night” (Song of Solomon 5:2, NKJV).
“And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, ‘These things says the Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God: “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth. Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked— I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined in the fire, that you may be rich; and white garments, that you may be clothed, that the shame of your nakedness may not be revealed; and anoint your eyes with eye salve, that you may see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me. To him who overcomes I will grant to sit with Me on My throne, as I also overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne.” (Revelation 3:14-21, NKJV). These Scriptures show us that Jesus is knocking on the door of our heart. Many believe that Revelation 3:20 is talking to unbelievers but upon further reading we see that John is having a vision of Jesus talking to a Church of believers who are lukewarm. Revelation 3:20 is not about Jesus wanting to come into the heart of an unbeliever, it is about Him wanting to come into the heart of believers. It is about how we as believers can become lukewarm and end up pushing Jesus out, and leave Him standing on the outside of the door of our lives. In this scenario the belief of the people was that He was not needed. This shows us that these lukewarm believers had accepted Him as their Lord and Saviour but because their hearts were lukewarm He had not been able to enter their hearts because they had not opened the door to Him. Their lukewarmness was a blockage. Jesus is standing at the door of our heart waiting to enter. The problem is that we may have blockages on our end that prevents us from opening the door to Him. We may have taken the first step and confessed Him as our Lord and Saviour but He also sees our heart and what it truly believes. This certainly backed up my experience of why He hadn’t been able to enter my heart until 7 years after I accepted Him as my Lord and Saviour.
As I was researching and writing these things I sensed that Jesus had something to add. I sat down before Him and this is what I heard: - : “Are you lukewarm? Do you say that you are rich, have become wealthy and have need of nothing? What about priorities? Do you know about things that are wrong and do them anyway? Do you put your purpose ahead of God and His purposes? Do you preach good works and not enter into them yourself? Do you put the things of God on the back-burner and attend to your things first? Priorities are what are important now. You need to understand the importance of the hour. Put Me first. Put Me ahead of all the other things and all the other things will fall into place. Seek Me and ask Me to show you all the things you put first, ahead of Me. Lukewarm, neither hot nor cold. The word of God says to love the Lord Your God will all of your heart. When I am not first these things can prevent Me from entering into your heart because you hold it back from Me. Although you have made a commitment with your mouth, your works say otherwise. Faith is an action word. Your actions show your faith. When I enter your heart I start to invade those deep places that you hold most dear. I know when you are ready to give them to Me. The heart needs to be washed clean. A deeper cleansing. Those whose hearts are not washed clean remain in that place of having an uncircumcised heart – eyes that cannot see, ears that cannot hear. These cannot enter My rest. “You stiff-necked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you” (Acts 7:51, NKJV).
For we which have believed do enter into rest, as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, if they shall enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world (Hebrews 4:3, NKJV). I enter the heart of man when I see that He is serious toward Me. I require a heart commitment that goes greater than lip service. I cannot sanctify the heart until you are ready and I see your roots go deep otherwise it would be difficult for you to stand. The sanctification of the heart is a much deeper work. Even after I have entered the heart there still may be parts that You have not opened to Me. I need all of Your heart so I can fill every part with Me. That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height— to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God (Ephesians 3:17-19, NKJV). Preach the Gospel! An understanding of Me and My ways is first and foremost what those who do not know Me need. This is the milk. Then they need the meat – the deeper things of God that only those with ears to hear and eyes to see can understand. They do not know nor understand; For He has shut their eyes, so that they cannot see, And their hearts, so that they cannot understand (Isaiah 44:18, NKJV).
But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him (1 Corinthians 2:9, NKJV).
That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe” (Ephesians 1:17-19, NKJV). I then asked Him, “If your heart has to be prepared and made ready to receive You, what gets sanctified when we first accept You before the deeper sanctification of the heart, as it took me seven years of knowing You before You entered my heart?” He answered, “Your understanding. Your born-again spirit needs to be fed with the things of God to bring understanding to the soul.”
(PRAYER) – “Dear Jesus if you are standing at the door of my heart and I have not let you in I repent. I repent and renounce unbelief, lack of trust, wrong priorities and works of lukewarmness. Please show me if there are any other reasons why my heart may be closed to You. I would also ask that You would show me any way I have not put You first in my life. I repent also if I have not fed my born-again spirit with the things of God to bring greater understanding to my soul. Please show me how to feed my spirit and show me the things I need to do this. I unlock the door of my heart and open it to You Lord Jesus and ask you to enter in and dine with me. I give every part of my heart to You Lord Jesus and I open every area that I may have guarded and kept from You. Open the eyes of my understanding Lord Jesus that I would know what is the hope of Your calling, the riches of the glory of Your inheritance in me, and that I would see the exceeding greatness of Your power toward me as I believe. In Jesus name, Amen.”
By Tania Francis