A Knock at the Door
"Behold, I stand at the door, and knock:
if any man hear My voice and open the door,
I will come in to him, and will sup with
him, and he with Me."
(Rev. 3.20)
LET us think now for a short time about something that you see and use every day, that sometimes brings safety, and sometimes danger, and that divides one from the other. Can you guess? You have a good many of them in your house, and you are moving them all day long. We are going to talk about a door.
How impossible it is to open a door and walk in, if it is locked and bolted against us! Open doors take us into delightful places, but they can also take us into prison. What important parts of a house they are! How safe you feel in bed at night knowing that all the house doors are shut and fastened inside!
A door is sometimes a man's salvation. Here is a man fleeing for his life! He is unarmed and defenceless, another man is pursuing him sword in hand. He means to kill him. The frightened man comes to his house, he dashes in at his door. He draws the stout bolt and locks it. His enemy is outside. He breathes freely.
We are glad we have a door to shut out our enemies, but do we ever shut out our friends?
There was an old woman who lived in a little cottage in Scotland, not very far from Balmoral, the Castle that belongs to our Kings and Queens.
When Queen Victoria was alive, she was very fond of visiting some of the old people who lived near her. One afternoon this old woman sat in her cottage alone. She was in a very bad temper. She had quarrelled with her nearest neighbour, and because some of her friends had been gossiping about her, she shut her door and locked it, saying viciously to herself:
"Ay, I'll keep myself to myself in future. I won't let 'em in when they come to try and get a dish o' tea out o' me."
Presently she heard a soft knock at her door.