By Judith Victoria Hensley

Plain Thoughts

Some say that when an event happens repeatedly and out of the ordinary routine, a person should take note. I’m trying to make sense of why I suddenly can’t keep up with my keys.

I’m a person who does things habitually. Except for reading glasses that I scatter all over the house in every room (the cheap kind), I try to put things back in the same place every time. There’s a pocket on the outside of my purse for my cell phone. There’s a zipper for the little bit of cash I carry. There’s a specific place for breath mints in my purse, ink pens, wallet and miscellaneous things I carry.

My keys always only have two places to go. One is an outer purse pocket and the other is in my jacket or pants pocket. As soon as I’m inside the house, I take them from my garment pocket and put them back in my purse.

How in the world can I have lost them between seven and 10 times in the last couple of weeks? It is very bizarre. I’ve lost them in the car, under the sofa, in the bathroom, on the counter, under the mail. It has been ridiculous. Even though I keep a spare set of keys, losing my usual set does not make me happy.

I decided to do an internet search about the symbolism of keys. Tribly Works says, “Throughout history, the key has been one of humankind’s most universal symbols, representing knowledge, mystery, and initiation. In art, Christian saints, pagan gods, and medieval kings alike are depicted holding keys as symbols of their spiritual or temporal power. Keys have been used to symbolize man’s ability to gain access to those things of either a material or spiritual nature which are of the greatest significance to him. The key is an object symbolic of opening and closing powers, such as the power to open the door between this world and the next. Temporally, it has represented rule over everything, from empires and feudal kingdoms to single households.”

I didn’t gain any personal understanding about losing my keys through this explanation, even though I found it interesting. I went on to look up the Biblical meaning of keys and each example, keys represent power, such as when Jesus was resurrected and had overcome the power of death and the grave.

It was interesting to me that when I searched for losing and finding keys, 128,000,000 sites were available to browse on the topic. Apparently losing and finding keys is a big deal. Since I hadn’t had the problem before very recently, I never gave it that much consideration unless I was trying to help my mom and dad track down their lost keys.

The keys to my house, car, mailbox and half a dozen important things are on my key chain. Each time I’ve lost them, I’ve prayed that God would help me find them, and He has. Each time I am thankful to know that I have entrance to those places I can only enter with a key on my chain.

We live in a world of locks. Closed doors, lock boxes, filing cabinets, cars and almost every other important thing in our life is behind a lock. At a recent women’s conference which I attended the speaker emphasized the spiritual locks in life that keep others out or keep us locked in. Prejudice. Ignorance. Addiction. Poverty. Hatred. Sin.

Jesus is love and love is the universal key that unlocks every single door. Where there is prejudice, He brings acceptance. Where there is ignorance, He brings wisdom. Where there is addiction, He brings deliverance. Where there is poverty, He brings opportunity. Where there is sin, He brings redemption, and where there is hatred, He brings replaces it with God’s love. Every single attribute of God is one form or the other of love.

Reach longtime Enterprise columnist Judith Victoria Hensley at judith99@bellsouth.net or on Facebook. Check out her blog: One Step Beyond the Door.