The Right Doors

This morning I am thinking about the time my niece had a bit of a mix-up while looking for my sister’s house.  In all fairness, some of the houses on my sister’s street look an awful lot alike.  When she and her husband first moved there, I admit that I got confused a few times.  Quite a few times.  The more I visited them, however, the easier it became.  I learned to look for distinctive features and characteristics of my sister’s house that the other houses didn’t have, such as my brother-in-law’s masterful landscaping.  I also learned to notice subtle differences about the other houses that let me know they weren’t my sister’s house, such as the design of walkways, porches, or windows.  Anyway, on that particular day, my sister called my niece and told her to come over.  She had something special she wanted to give my great-niece for her birthday.  So, my niece packed the kids in the car and headed over.  When they didn’t arrive within an expected time frame, my sister became concerned.  She looked out the window and was surprised to see my niece’s car parked in the driveway of a neighbor.  She was even more surprised to see my great-niece ringing the neighbor’s doorbell.  With a quick call to my niece’s cell phone, she was able to direct them to the right house.  Two things strike me about this.  The first thing is that, although my niece may have gotten mixed up, she was only there because she was seeking something that had been promised.  The second thing is, chances are slim to none that my niece would have received what my sister had promised at any of the neighbor’s houses, no matter how similar they looked.  This makes me reflect on my own experiences of parking in wrong driveways and knocking on wrong doors.  I’m not speaking of literal houses.  Rather, I am speaking of those persons, places and things to which I’ve mistakenly sought to gain access while acting in sincere faith, based on promises in God’s Word.  I have to say that those persons, places, and things really LOOKED right!  So, there I’d be just knocking away.  How thankful I am that, in faithfulness, God is always looking out for me!  He calls to me, in the depths of my spirit, at those times when I get lost.  I am grateful for how He lovingly directs me away from what seems right to what is right, so I can receive the special blessings He has prepared and intended just for me.  A lesson for me today is that, just as I did with my sister’s house, I can learn to discern the qualities and characteristics of God’s leading that are distinctive from everything else.  And the more time I invest in seeking Him, the better I am becoming at recognizing the right doors.