Stand and Knock

I find it strange what we are able to recall from our early childhood. As I age, I find myself remembering fifty-five year old events better than what happened last evening. At the same time, others can recall to me a mutually lived event from years ago and I have absolutely no recollection of the memory so vivid to them. The event doesn’t need to be momentous in any way. It just was and the memory is. The recollection of it is a very individual matter.

I am sure that I was only four or five years of age when I enjoyed one of my first independent walks in our neighbourhood. In those years children were allowed so much more freedom at a younger age due supposedly to living in a safer world. I did learn very early to avoid the local bully. I hiked through the fields behind our house and soon came to the street bordering that field. I started down the sidewalk and soon came to a small church. I can still remember how I felt compelled to approach the door of that chapel. It was as if I was being drawn to the large double door at the end of the walk way. I sincerely believe that we are all spiritual beings and indeed from a very early age we are drawn even to inanimate objects such as a building where the faithful meet. I walked up to the door and knocked. There of course was no response to my knock, but deep down I was hoping for a response. We all need a response to our spiritual quest.

As it turns out, as I learned much later in life, I had the knocking situation reversed. It was not me who should have knocked, but it was me who had a choice to open the door and admit the ultimate answer to my spiritual search. In Revelation 3: 20 we read the words of Jesus.

20 "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.

Jesus is talking to the members of the Church at Laodicea, but there is no doubt in my mind and those of assorted biblical scholars that the invitation is much wider than one offered only to church members. Jesus is the one who is initiating this relationship. We all feel the urge from the earliest of years to open that door for Him. The invitation is made to all of us. Jesus says that He will allow “anyone” to open the door. He does not force Himself on us. We have a choice to make. We can, and many do, refuse to open the door so that He grows tired of knocking and speaking to us and finally leaves. He may return to knock again and then again maybe He will never return to knock another day. In many ways, it all sounds so simple and indeed it is. All we have to do is to acknowledge His knock that we all hear and begin to listen to His voice. When we open the door, a relationship is started. Dining together is associated in virtually every culture on earth and within every historical period with love and friendship. If the door is opened, a religion does not come through the door, but a relationship with the Son of God.

I repeat…we all hear the knock. Have you answered that door?

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