Opening Locked Doors!

By Hazel Holland

I was returning home from a church service one Sunday evening in November 1997, when I decided to stop by the local El Pollo Loco Restaurant to get a spicy black bean burrito. After I entered the restaurant I was curious for a moment as to why there was no sign of food anywhere. Furthermore, all the waitresses had their backs to me busily cleaning up the kitchen. Suddenly one of them became aware of my presence and almost jumped out of her skin as she swung around to face me.

“How did you get in here?” she abruptly asked. It was obvious she had not been expecting any customers.

“I just walked through the door,” I responded calmly, surprised by her question.

“You couldn’t have!” she argued. “I locked that door forty-five minutes ago. The restaurant is closed!”

Immediately she went out the back door of the restaurant, and came around to check the front door, determined to prove her point. Sure enough the door was locked! The manager had to let her in. As they both walked by me they had this incredulous look of surprised confusion mixed with awe on their faces.

“You must have some kind of supernatural powers!” they exclaimed.

“I’m a Christian and I serve a supernatural God!” I responded.

At that moment, the power of the Spirit fell on me and the Lord began to give me a word for the young lady who had locked the door.

“Are you a Christian?” I queried.

“A Lutheran,” she responded.

“God is going to open locked doors in your life I,” I continued. “He’s heard the cry of your heart and He wants you to know how much He loves you!”

Momentarily she was speechless... After shyly thanking me she went about her business of helping the other waitresses clean up the restaurant. As I headed for the door to leave another waitress told me to wait as she hurriedly fixed me a bean burrito. Although I declined her generous offer, she insisted... and then I left.

As I walked out the previously locked door clutching the burrito, I realized that there was no way I could have walked through that door “unaided.” While I looked around to make sure there were no little rocks that could have somehow prevented the door from fully closing, the Spirit fell on me again. This time I sensed God telling me that He was going to “open locked doors” in my life, too. Instantly I began to weep as I experienced the deep love in the Father’s heart for each one of His children...

As I pondered over what God had just done I knew He hadn't opened that locked restaurant door in order to satisfy my need for physical food that night. After all I had plenty of food at home. I could just as easily have gone home and eaten as gone to the quick food restaurant.

But the unseen spiritual feast that He prepared for me made the humble burrito fade into oblivion. So why did God open the locked restaurant door? Was it because He wanted to speak prophetically into a young Lutheran girl’s life? Did He want to give her a taste of His love so that her spirit would be nourished and her soul fed? There’s not a doubt in my mind that was part of His plan.

Then three weeks later as I was praying with a group of people from my church, the Lord suddenly came upon me again to give a word to those who had gathered to pray specifically for God's children in the Inland Empire. "God is going to supernaturally open the "locked doors" of many people's hearts here in the Inland Empire. Hearts that have been closed to the new covenant gospel will be opened as He begins to pour out His Spirit upon them..."

But it wasn’t until five years later on February 22, 2002 that I began to understand the significance of the deeper message God was bringing through this supernatural event. I was in my car on my way to a monthly hospice meeting, when the Lord impressed me that it was significant that He had chosen to use the El Pollo Loco restaurant at that particular time to reveal His supernatural purposes.

“What does “El Pollo Loco” mean?” He asked me.

“Crazy little chicken! So what’s the significance of that?” I curiously responded.

Suddenly I remembered Jesus' words over the city of Jerusalem when He spoke about His beloved children like a mother hen who gathers her chicks under her wings to protect them from harm…“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord’” (Matthew 23:37-39).

Immediately I began to sense the connection God was bringing from the past into our present time. The truth hit me like a sharp arrow piercing my heart and I began to weep as I heard Him say something like this...

Now I began to understand more clearly the prophetic call on my life to intercede for people God placed on my heart in order that generational strongholds of unbelief might be broken… Through this supernatural opening of a “locked door” God revealed that as we chose to “stand in the gap” and intercede for His beloved children in the church, He will supernaturally open the “locked door” of many a hard heart... People who were once offended by the manifestations of the gifts will be freed to embrace the blessings of the new covenant gospel and walk in the fullness of the Spirit.

As I remembered how God had supernaturally opened a locked jail door for Peter, and now a locked restaurant door for me, I wondered... "Was it easier for God to supernaturally open a locked jail door, and a locked restaurant door than it is for Him to supernaturally open the “locked door” of a hard heart?

Nothing is impossible with God! He will supernaturally open the “locked door” of every hard heart in order to reveal His agape love to us. But it is our choice to repent of the hardness of our hearts and welcome Him in...