My daughter always prays “that God will open the door if it is intended to be His will, or He will close the door, if it is not His will.” I do not believe this works, primarily because usually people praying that way, want an almost instant answer, and to my experience, God does not act that quickly.
Recently they put a down payment on a home, without selling their other one first. And there appears to be some problems, and she said “But, I prayed God would open doors or close them.” I tried to explain to her, but she said then how are you ever suppose to know? Maybe you can give her a better answer than I can.
I think some people hear that verse that says “God will open the door that no one can close” and take it to mean the above? Thank you so much, you are wonderful, and God is doing great things through you and nothing can be better than that.
The answer to your question depends on the way she’s going about it. In the temptation wilderness, Jesus answered one of the devil’s temptations by saying, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.” (Matt. 4:7) It was a quote from Deut. 6:16.
Praying and then waiting for God to open a door is one thing, and there’s nothing wrong with that because if God doesn’t open the door we know it isn’t His will and we don’t do anything. But moving ahead on our own and waiting for God to close the door to stop us is dangerously close to a violation of God’s word, because in effect it’s putting the Lord to the test.
In the case of buying a new home, if it was the Lord’s will for her to do it, and she can’t afford two mortgages, he would more likely have sent a buyer for her old one first, than to come to the rescue after she’s gone ahead on her own.