Knock and a Door Will Be Opened

⁷ “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. ⁸ For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

------Matthew 7:7-8, ESV

This passage can be taken out of context; many people will read it and think, 'ok, so God will just give me what I want if I ask.' Although the train of thought runs in the right direction, we must place that train on a direct path towards God in order for these words to be true. But I can speak to the truth of these words from my own life, and I can honestly say that when I have put myself aside, and kept company with Christ as my ultimate destination in my mind and heart, I have always found these words to be true.

It started with the simple lesson taught in training a child in the way that they will go. My mom taught me a night time prayer, 'Now I lay me down to sleep; I pray thee Lord my soul to keep. If I die before I wake, I pray thee Lord, my soul to take. God bless my mom, and dad, and brothers, and Nannie and Granddaddy, and Granny, and our little dog Gretchen...' - and on down the line I went, and prayed every night before bed. First my mom would say my prayers with me, as far back as I can remember. Then I began doing it on my own, especially once my brother Daniel came along. Although I had my first real brush with death when we lost my little dog Gretchen, for the most part, it seemed that God answered that prayer daily, because I kept getting to see all of these people in my life...for awhile.

Although I learned that death is a part of life, I have learned over the years that God has a plan for everyone, and only He knows what that plan is. But that plan can have various people's paths cross, for all sorts of reasons. My mom taught me once again, to turn to God and ask, like the passage above suggests, even in a time of immediate trouble. My brother almost drowned, I witnessed my mom pray fervently while lifeguards revived him, and saw God's answer. My brother surviving that day again helped me see God's provision, even in a time of urgency.

So far, so good up to that point, I thought; it seemed like there really was something to God and His ability to answer prayer. But the examples I had to go by were directly related to asking for something that falls directly into path with God's Will.

Then there are the seemingly unanswered prayers. We see them as unanswered, of course, because we are a selfish lot, forgetting that we have a rather narrow perspective of the timeline of our lives. Then there is the fact that there are a whole lot of other 'timelines' going on. And on top of all of that, there is this course of History that God seems to manage as well. After all, I am still able to sit here and type this out, and you are able to sit in front of another screen somewhere and read this blog post. The world is still going, history keeps moving on, and when one tries to just step back and think of the infinitesimal probabilities related to all of that, it can really boggle the mind how you even clicked on this post and happened to read these words, but I digress.

As I said, paths cross where God wills them to. This brings me to a certain beautiful woman I 'happen' to call my wife. As God's Will may have it, I was yearning for a woman to call my wife one day. No - Jason was never some guy who wanted to play the field, trying this person and that person to see if we 'fit'. I don't know what exactly to attribute it to, other than the steady marriage I witnessed in my parents' marriage, when so many of my friends' parents had divorced. But I made up my mind a long time ago, I was going to be a one-woman man, and I made one of my life goals to be finding that one woman for me. Obviously, God has a sense of humor, and I had my weaknesses and fallen ways to go about 'making this happen.' And that is kind of the point. It's predictable at this point in the post, to know that as long as I was selfish, stopped praying about finding a woman that would complement me not just in personality, but also spiritual growth, that God would just let me fumble along the way. I was on the wrong track for some time.

Leave it to God to use my mother to help me once again. She saw an opportunity as a certain young lady who'd come to know her at the school where she worked happened to be getting over a certain relationship, not long after I had been doing the same. My mom, being Mom, thought she would ask this young woman that if she were to give her phone number to her oldest son, would she be open to going out on a date with him. To accelerate the greater story here, she said yes - and fortunately for both of us, she said yes many more times afterwards, to the point that we are still married today. Now - don't get me wrong. There was still plenty of selfishness to go around for me, but the long and short of this part of the story is, I did pray for God to put a woman in my life that I would call my wife, and He answered. He answered in His Way, in His timing, and in His continued writing of the story.

Fast forward two and a half decades, past plenty of other instances where God showed me His amazing ability to answer when I asked, appeared whenever I looked for Him, and opened plenty of doors for both myself and my wife along the way.

But there are other lessons in life regarding prayer, and asking God for answers. There were the blessings I asked for in childhood, there were those times of urgency where He answered. And then, and I am sure many more times in the future, there are the times of suffering.

Pain. Discomfort. Uncertainty. Misery.

For a guy who tried to live as Christ-like a life that I could, as a Christian husband and father, my life had turned out amazingly well for the most part. So all of these uncomfortable words associated with suffering were far from my mind.

First, regarding my own health, came the bad right hip. I came to discover that I was born with hip dysplasia, and just exacerbated the condition with my days of carrying the extra weight from law enforcement gear through some years, and years of lifting heavy weights for half my life. Turns out, that beautiful woman, who'd learned over the years to somehow tolerate the bear of a man she lived with, had a heart of gold for her husband. She showed me gentleness and kindness in the most vulnerable time in my life up to that point. When I faced the day of surgery for a hip replacement, there my sweetheart was, holding my hand as I lay in a hospital bed, ugly gown and all, assuring me that I would wake up from my surgery (my biggest fear at the time was not waking back up, as irrational as that seems now). I realized as she squeezed my hand while our son was over in Syria, there was nobody else in the world I wanted by my side in that moment - not even my mom and dad.

She was my peace in the storm. She prayed with me and for me. My wife was there for me like nobody else could be, and the Lord humbled me. It made me appreciate her all the more - and then, for me to wake up and be wheeled back near the room where she was waiting, somewhat regaining awareness of where I was, I heard her voice. It was yet another answer, from God.

But then, for whatever reason, although our son was still safe in Syria up to that point, our timelines went for a real sharp turn, even though it was my wife that would suffer the most. It is suffering like hers, not mine, that makes me still ask God, 'why' - despite my faith in His forever plan for both of us and the rest of His children. My wife already had a rough year with her only son deployed to a dangerous part of the world; it messed with her mental state and every-day life, and then her husband had to become an invalid for a couple of weeks. She battled depression; she picked up an exotic virus while attempting to have a vacation away from it all.

And then - 'the fall.'

For whatever reason, practical and logical thoughts of ways of doing things aside - while helping a friend pack up to move from Florida to South Carolina, my wife fell through an attic floor and onto a concrete floor in the garage below. Where was her husband? Why, I was back home just getting used to life again, going back to work and getting used to wearing the uniform again after a six-week hiatus. I was helpless to help her.

She had to have surgery. She broke bones in several places. This fall, for reasons still unknown to this steady believer in Christ, changed her whole world. On top of all of this, this same year, she discovered that she has a disease called Crohn's. Without going into detail, this means yet even more discomfort. Although it is almost a running joke between us now, being able to look back at all of this misery that she especially endured, we both unanimously agree, 2025 was the worst year ever. But needless to say, my sweetheart still suffers, from the ongoing pains and recovery process of follow-up surgeries from that dreaded fall.

So why do I write about knocking and a door opening, in this post that led to the description of misery and discomfort?

It's simple, when I reveal this last part of the story to you. Not only did I pray for God to give me a wife to partner with me until death separates us - but I made a promise. I made a promise before God and witnesses that I would have and hold that beautiful woman, and I think promises mean something to the Lord - especially if you can somehow keep them. Sure, we have had our rocky moments in marriage. But the Lord did something through all of this; He revealed something to me, that I never would have put together, had my wife not suffered the way she has. Perhaps it isn't even her suffering that revealed it, but just magnified it. But ever since the discomfort really started, I have seen something happen. Although I always saw my wife as beautiful inside and out, it is the beauty of her heart that has shined forth, more than anything else in the world for me. Her suffering, yet continually SEEKING to know the Lord better, has truly revealed the heart of Christ.

In our Tuesday night Bible study, we have been looking deeply at the heart of Christ. Gentle and lowly are the words that title the study lessons, and my wife's gentle heart, in the lowest times in her physical life thus far, has shined ever so bright! I have seen her pour herself into students, even when times were the hardest for her. I have seen her love for our son, and how she aches so much just from the 'baby bird' pushing his way out of the nest, trying to create distance for independence. I have seen how much she gives of herself just to continue to help provide for our home, despite her pain. I have seen her heart show when she scratches my head until I fall to sleep, because I might be the one tired from a long day at work after extra duty.

Yes, although she is my bride, she shows me the amazing love of Christ every day. I am reminded of the day when I got saved...how an angry little 12 year old adolescent could turn into a mean, ugly little monster and beat up some other kid out of anger, and feel so bad about it later, hating myself in the process, but then - the love of Christ, loves me anyway. My wife hears me moan and complain about the insanity of this fallen world, and political nonsense, and incurable corruption that will only be cured by Jesus Christ, and yet, she accepts this mean ugly monster, this grumpy bear of a man when he gets caught up into his own cynicism... and she loves me.

It is her heart; the only other thing that I've ever seen that is just as pretty, is her loving smile. This is not some sappy attempt to just say something sweet about my wife. This is a serious story about experience and revelation, written by a simple man who observes things for a living. May this revelation of the power of the beauty of the heart of Christ, be poignant enough to show the impact of such beauty, even in something as simple as the love between a husband and wife. And I truly believe that this revelation only came to me, because I knocked on God's door a long time ago, and merely saught to have a Godly woman to be my wife. He opened that door to me, and He answered my prayer.

In Christ,

JEF