The Bible Study Hour

Guest (Male): They were the caretakers of the house of God. They were the sons of Korah, gatekeepers of the temple, and they were blessed by their duties. But did the real blessing come from the temple or from the God who inhabited it?

Welcome to The Bible Study Hour, a radio and internet broadcast with Dr. James Boice, preparing you to think and act biblically. Even the birds of the air found shelter in the eaves of the temple, as did the men who cared for it and the pilgrims who visited. Let’s join Dr. Boice as he examines Psalm 84 and discovers why the sons of Korah could say, "Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere."

Dr. James Boice: I think it would be very difficult to point to any Psalm in the Psalter that is not beautiful and profound and poignant. They all are. It's why these particular poems are chosen rather than others. And yet some stand out above the rest, and Psalm 84 is certainly an outstanding Psalm for its high and uplifting sentiments, the sheer beauty of its images, and its moving aspirations. It’s perhaps unequal.

Charles Haddon Spurgeon, who did so much work on the Psalms, called it one of the choicest of the collection. He compared it with some of the others. He said, if the 23rd Psalm is the most popular, and the 103rd the most joyful, and the 119th the most experimental, and the 51st the most plaintive, well this is one of the most sweet of all the Psalms of peace.

Psalm 84 is a Psalm of longing. It's a Psalm of longing for God's house and it's written according to the title by the sons of Korah. And that's very important. We're going to see why it's so important in a moment, but it's worth pointing out that we have a number of these Psalms of Korah in the Psalter. There are four of them in this third of the five books which we're in now, Psalms 84, 85, 87, and 88, so we're going to be coming to more of them. And then we've already seen a number of them in Book Two, Psalms 42 to 49.

Now let me begin with a story. As I tell it, it's going to seem initially unrelated to our exposition of the Psalm, but it's not as you'll soon see. One of my predecessors here at Tenth Presbyterian Church years ago was Donald Grey Barnhouse, and there are people here who still remember him. He tells a story from his days in seminary.

Now my days in seminary were long ago and he was one of my predecessors, so his days were even longer ago than that. But I can relate to it because the kinds of things he explains are what I saw as well. There was a student in seminary in his day that didn't take anything very seriously. He was always making fun of spiritual things. I knew a lot of them like that. Somewhat unusual, I guess, in his day and this particular student was present with Donald Grey Barnhouse at a prayer meeting on one occasion.

And the leader of the prayer meeting asked everybody who was present to give a Bible verse that had meant a lot to them. And they went around. Different people gave different verses. And this student, who never took anything seriously, said, "First Chronicles 26:18." Nobody knew that verse, so there was a pause while everybody looked it up in their Bibles. And while they were looking it up, just as they were finding it, this student blurted it out.

He quoted it so rapidly the words almost ran together. It went like this: "At Parbar westward, four at the causeway and two at Parbar." Everybody was just a little bit puzzled, and in the pause the student said, "If you believe in the inspiration of the Bible, find some inspiration in that verse." Well, that student fortunately dropped out of seminary and didn't go into the ministry.

Nowadays, unfortunately, they do go into the ministry. But Barnhouse always remembered that. You can well understand how that would stick in your mind. And years later, in the course of his ministry, he was reading in First Chronicles and he came across the verse. It came back to him and he thought, well now, I'll just study this passage and this verse to see what that is all about.

Well, he looked at the context first of all and he discovered that those chapters in First Chronicles have to do with the assigning of the sons of Levi, the priests, to various duties in the temple. Aaron was of this tribe and his sons are divided into 24 groups to maintain the sacrifices at the altar. So that's what's described in the 24th chapter of First Chronicles.

Aaron had cousins whose names were Asaph, Heman, and Jeduthun, and they were divided into similar groups to take care of the music. It particularly says that they accompanied the music that was sung at God's house by harps and lyres and cymbals. So that's what's talked about in the 25th chapter.

Now this next chapter, from which this strange verse had been lifted, was a record of the assignments given to a third branch of the tribe of Levi, and those were the sons of Korah. They were called Korahites, and these men were chosen to be the gatekeepers or the doorkeepers of the temple. You might call them janitors. That was their job.

And they're commended very highly for their work. This chapter says these were very capable men, men who had the strength to do the work. Verses 6 and 8 of that chapter. And then it goes on to tell where each of them is going to serve, and it's in this context that our verse occurs. Some of them were stationed to the north, others to the east, some to the south, some to the west of the temple.

Now, the word Parbar is, of course, just a Hebrew word. It's one of those words that doesn't occur anywhere else, and so when the translators came to translate the King James Bible, which is where that verse came from, they didn't know how to translate it, so they just put it in as Parbar. Well, it turns out that Parbar's actually the name for the colonnade of the temple.

And so that's the way the verse is translated in some of the more modern versions. The New International Version says, for example, "As for the court to the west, that's the colonnade, there were four at the road and two at the court itself." And so what the chapter is teaching is that God took pains to appoint specific men to be the gatekeepers or the janitors at the temple and that he honored them for the service.

Now, here is where this story has bearing on the Psalm because this Psalm is written by the sons of Korah, that is, by the appointed gatekeepers of the temple. This is the Psalm of the janitors. What it tells us is that they delighted in their work. They longed to do that kind of work because they counted it a great privilege to be present at the house of God. Now read the Psalm in that light. You're always going to see this Psalm differently if you approach it this way and remember this.

Here are the janitors writing. "How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord Almighty. My soul yearns, even faints for the courts of the Lord. My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God. Even the sparrow has found a home and the swallow a nest for her young, a place near your altar. O Lord Almighty, my King and my God, blessed are those who dwell in your house. They are ever praising you. Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked."

Well, years later Barnhouse wrote about that. He said, "I have thanked God many times for the cynical twist in the mind of that fellow who tossed a seemingly nonsensical verse into the midst of a prayer meeting. He meant it for confusion, but the Lord meant it to me for good. Because I learned later as I probed into the depths of God's word that God is interested in the simplest tasks of the simplest persons. He's interested in you, whatever your task may be."

Now, as I have read over the Psalm with that in mind, it seems to me that it strips away a lot of the scholarly barnacles that get in the way for understanding it. If you ever do serious study in commentaries, you know that the scholars throw out all sorts of things which, if you follow them, often lead you away from the meaning of the Psalm rather than toward it. It seems to me that that is what has happened with this Psalm.

If you approach it as the Psalm of the janitor, it eliminates a number of things. For one thing, this is not a Psalm of the pilgrims making their way up to Jerusalem, as some of the scholars say. There are other Psalms that do that, the Psalms of ascent. It's not an allegory in which the swallows and the sparrows in verse 3 represent the Psalmist or even less the children of the Psalmist whom he is somehow commending to God. Scholars have said that.

This is not even the Psalm of a person who is separated from the temple and is longing to get back to it as David was on several occasions. Other Psalms say that. It's not that at all. This is a Psalm of people who worked in the temple and who were talking this way because they really did appreciate their work. They are expressing how intensely their very souls yearn and even faint for God. Sometimes people that are associated with Christian work get jaded and sort of cynical about it. But you see, these people didn't. They are serving there because they want to.

Now this also throws light on the most beautiful image of the Psalm, this image of the sparrows and the swallows. As I say, people have read all kinds of meaning into that, but it's probably best taken as a simple observation. Here were these men who worked in the temple. They did it day after day, week after week, and they noticed that the birds nested around the temple courts. And they saw themselves more or less represented in the birds.

They said, "Yes, that's it. Look, the birds have a home, we have a home as well." One of the commentators, Leupold, one of the great Lutheran commentators, says this statement is not to be thought of as a kind of allegory in which the birds represent the writer or any worshiper. The poet simply saw the birds at the temple, and his point is that as the birds made their home at the temple and were secure there with no fear of their enemies, so the child of God can make his home in God and be secure in him.

Now, as I say, I think that's a simple observation on the part of those who wrote this Psalm. But when you look at these birds in the light of all of Scripture, it does have sort of poetic overtones. For example, if you look at the sparrows, sparrows were such tiny little things and there were so many of them they become in the Bible almost a symbol or an image for something that's virtually worthless.

You may recall that Jesus referred to them on one occasion. He said that you can buy two for a penny. That's what he's recorded as saying in Matthew. And then in Luke he says you can get five for two pennies. They were such worthless things that the boys in the city of Jerusalem would catch them and then would sell them and very, very poor people maybe would buy them, offer them up at the altar and so forth. Just a symbol for something that is hardly worth anything at all.

Here are these janitors looking at the sparrows and saying the courts of God have room even for those who in the eyes of the world are considered almost worthless. Christians as a whole are thought of that way by the world. The world doesn't pay any attention to Christians, where they stand, what they do, who they are, what they contribute. The world would be glad to get rid of them if they could, get on with all the important things. But God sees them.

You know, when the television stations carry the news and when the newspapers report it, they don't report what's going on in some little church somewhere. They report what's happening in Washington or Moscow, some great national disaster, something like that, airplane crash. That's the sort of thing that makes the news, but not what's happening in little churches. And yet as God looks down and he sees these little sparrows, his people, gathering together to worship him and praise his name, well the Bible says he's present in the midst of them.

He rejoices in what they're doing. And if these people say, as the author of the 84th Psalm says, "My soul yearns for God," God says, "That's wonderful. I'm going to meet people like that. I'm going to be with them and I'm going to satisfy that yearning of their heart."

Just this week I was out in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. I drove out there on Friday and back. They had a Reformed Theology conference out there. I was unable to get there the last time I was invited, when I had hepatitis and didn't make it. So this was the return visit. I got there, this little town up in the mountains. All it mostly is known for is that it had a great flood there in 1889, and they've had a number of floods since.

And here's this little church tucked away. You can't even see it from the road. There's a sign out there you have to kind of go back in to find the church. But there it is, little church, just one story, seats about 200 people. 200 people were there Friday night, all day Saturday, meeting today as well, to learn about God. God's there. You see, the sparrows are gathered. God cares about the sparrows. You know what Jesus said? He said they're not worth anything, but not one of them falls to the ground without the knowledge of the Heavenly Father. Are not you worth more than many sparrows?

And then you've got the swallows. The swallows are a symbol for restlessness. They flit back and forth in the air from point to point. They never seem to rest. But then at the time of the year when it is right for them to mate, they settle down. They build a nest and they rest peacefully in that little nest. You have a symbol there of the hearts of men and women flitting around from place to place, restless in this age, trying to find satisfaction here and trying to find it there and not finding it anywhere.

Some people make a whole life pursuit of that, trying to find peace and rest somewhere. And then the Psalm tells us that these swallows who flit around in the sky restlessly from point to point have found a nest near the altar of God. That's what it's like today.

You know, Alexander MacLaren said there's only one being in this whole world that doesn't fit into the world that he is in, and that is man, the chief and the foremost of all. All others perfectly correspond to what we now call their environment. But we don't. Why? Because we're not resting in God. Saint Augustine said it in words far better known than those of Alexander MacLaren. He said, "You have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee."

Saint Augustine was a very wise man. He looked out on life. He knew what people were like. He knew what you were like, although he lived so long ago. Restless, you see, until you actually rest in God. So that's the question of the Psalm, you see, are you at rest in God? There's a place for you. You say, "I'm not important enough." Oh no, there's a place even for the sparrows. If there's a place for the sparrows, there's a place for you.

Now there's a number of ways of outlining this Psalm or parts of it. It can be done by the Selahs. You notice there are a couple of those. That probably means you're to pause at that point, so you can break it up that way. You can break it up according to the stanzas of the New International Version. If you do that, you'd have six parts. I've avoided that because I think the way I've handled it is a far better way of getting into this particular Psalm.

But at this point there really is an outline that emerges and you notice it by noticing the three blessings or beatitudes that are found in verses 4, 5, and 12. They make a progression. You see, verse 4 pronounces a blessing on those who live and work in the temple, that is, the priests. The second, verse 5, is for those who don't live in the temple but are on their way to it, that is, the pilgrims. And then finally at the very end of the Psalm, there's a blessing for those who can't get to the temple but nevertheless place their faith in God.

Now let's just look at those. First of all, those who dwell in God's house, verse 4. We ought to be prepared for this particular blessing now because the whole Psalm has been about it up to this point. The Old Testament people knew that the Lord of heaven and earth doesn't dwell in a building made with hands, the way Paul explained to the Athenians as he looked around at all their temples there in Athens. They understood that perfectly well.

But nevertheless they realized that there was a special blessing associated with the temple in Jerusalem. For one thing, it was arranged to teach spiritual things. All of the apportionments of the temple were meant to teach spiritual truth, and they were arranged in such a way that they led the heart and the mind of the worshiper toward the most holy place in which was located the ark of the covenant, where God in a symbolic way was understood to dwell. And so to be there was a great blessing to them to be reminded of these things.

And as it were, to place themselves into a position where God could make himself particularly close to them. David wrote about it in the 27th Psalm. He wasn't a priest, but he did write about how wonderful it was to go up to the temple. He said, "One thing I ask of the Lord, this is what I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to seek him in his temple." Now it's with that same feeling you understand that these sons of Korah write about yearning and even fainting for the courts of the Lord.

The second blessing is pronounced on those who are making their way up to God's house. Not everybody was able to live in Jerusalem, of course. It was never a great city, as we think of the size of cities, but most of the people were scattered throughout the countryside in small villages, many of them on family farms. It was an agrarian economy. These people couldn't live in Jerusalem as the priests were privileged to do.

But they did have the opportunity and indeed the responsibility of making their way up to Jerusalem three times a year for each of the annual feasts. Now the Psalmist doesn't forget them either. So having said how blessed it is to actually live in Jerusalem and work in the temple, he turns to those who are pilgrims and he says in verse 5, "Blessed are those whose strength is in you, who have set their hearts on pilgrimage."

Now it's because of that stanza that so many of the commentators on this Psalm think of it as a pilgrim Psalm. It's not that, as I've pointed out, but nevertheless it does talk about these pilgrims and it pronounces two great blessings upon them. Do you see them as you look at it? First of all, that they bless every area they pass through. Their blessing is that they are a blessing to other people.

And it spells it out: they turn the Valley of Baka—that means the Valley of Weeping, it's the meaning of the word—into a place of springs. And secondly, that they go on from strength to strength until each appears before God in Zion. Now that is a wonderful picture of the Christian life. You see, we don't make our way up to an earthly city of Jerusalem. Things have changed now in the Christian era since the coming of Jesus Christ.

But there is a temple not made with hands in heaven and we're headed toward that. We're like Abraham so long ago, who didn't look for an earthly city but rather a city with foundations built by God. That's what we're looking for, and as we make our way toward that heavenly city, we pass through many Valleys of Baka, many places of weeping. Tragedies come into our lives. Sad things happen. People die. We lose jobs. There are all kinds of disappointments.

But the one who is blessed by God and traveling in God and with God can actually by the grace of God turn those places of weeping into a place of springs, that is, a place of refreshing. And as far as going on from strength to strength, Christians do that. That's the way we go on. That's the way the faith is passed on from one to the other and from strength to strength. And we help each other along the way.

Don't you know people who do that? I know lots of people like that. Lots of Christians who have been that to me. Who just to be near are a blessing and with whom to associate is a source of strength. You see, what the Psalmist is saying is that we should have that blessing each one of us if we're Christians and be that to other people. So that when we're around them they say it's good that Christian was here. Some great ideas they have. But you know, good to have them around.

And when I'm discouraged, I'd much rather have them than my secular boss or the person who works next to me in the office as a source of strength there, you see, that I don't have. That's what each of us should be. And then verse 12 at the end, this third blessing is simply for those who trust God. "O Lord Almighty, blessed is the man who trusts in you."

I suppose that the greatest mistake we can make in looking at this Psalm or other Psalms like it is to suppose that when the writers express their passionate longing for the temple of God, that all they're really thinking about is the building or possibly the festivals that occurred there. Now they were thinking about the building. The temple in Jerusalem did mean a lot to Jews in this period and the festivals really were splendid times for them. It's like Easter for us. That's an important time.

But you see we make a mistake if we think that all they were thinking about is the building. What they really were thinking about was God, and the reason they loved the temple is that they met with God in the temple. And that's why they loved the festivals and why they speak the way they do. This is why the Psalm ends with a blessing on those who simply trust God.

You see, the Psalmists as they write, these sons of Korah, recognize the great blessing it is that they themselves shared to be there in Jerusalem at the temple. They recognize the corresponding blessing of the pilgrims who can't live there but who make their way up to the temple regularly. But they say to themselves, I know there are people who can't do that. Whether because of old age or distance, just aren't able to get up to Jerusalem.

But you mustn't think because they're unable to get up to the temple that there's no blessing for them. The blessing is for them and it's as real as for the others if they really trust God. Because in the final analysis, you see, the blessing comes from knowing God, not from where you are but from knowing God. And that's why the verse immediately before this last blessing doesn't speak about the temple. You would expect it to, wouldn't you?

The Psalm begins by saying it's wonderful to be in the temple. Expect it to end with saying how wonderful it is to be in the temple, but it doesn't do that. It ends by talking about God and his attributes. It says, "For the Lord God is a sun and a shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless." This is the only place in the Bible where God is explicitly called a sun. It's a great image. It's a way of saying that his light shines upon us and he brightens our days and he illuminates our path and he provides warmth and nourishment in life and all of that.

The last sense—"no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless"—is a very close equivalent to a verse most of us know and appreciate, Romans 8:28: "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him." He's also our shield from our foes and, as it says, he's the only possible source of real favor and true honor.

Well we get to the end of the Psalm and the bottom line is simply this: that we should learn to seek God, to desire God. And we should learn to do that in the company of his people, that is, in the church, and also by looking to heaven. I say in the company of his people in the church, not because you can't see God in nature—you can see certain things about God in nature, many people talk about that—but what you find out about God in nature is very limited. And there's no real promise in the Bible that you're going to find out about God in nature.

But there is in the company of the people of God. "Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them" is what the Scripture says. And so we come together for that. We come together for a number of things. We come together because we enjoy one another's fellowship. But you know we're sinful people, we don't always enjoy that a whole lot. And sometimes it's difficult to continue meeting together and even more difficult to continue working together for a common end.

So ultimately that's not why we come. The reason we come together is because God is here. And if you don't know God, if you're saying, well I think maybe I'd like to know something about God, try the company of the people of God. Where people are meeting together and praying and saying, Lord meet with us. Well you know when you begin a service, that's the way we begin it. We pray that God will be here to bless us, to teach us about himself.

Come join the company of people like that. You've got a far better chance of finding out about God and coming to know God in a personal way, learning to trust him and love him there than anywhere else. But I also say: seek him not only in the company of his people, that is in the church, but seek him in heaven. Because ultimately that's where he's to be found. It's a way of saying we don't look to other people but rather we look up. We look up.

And when we pray, we don't pray to one another. And when we make our requests, it's not to the saints, but we make our requests to God in the name of Jesus Christ, who has opened the way into his presence. And we say, Lord make yourself known to us. You are teaching us something of yourself, and because you're teaching us our hearts, even our souls, yearn to know you.

Alexander MacLaren said, "If we want rest, let us clasp God as ours. If we desire a home, warm, safe, sheltered from every wind that blows and inaccessible to enemies, let us like the swallows nestle under the eaves of the temple. Let us take God for our hope." Let's pray. Our Father, we're thankful for this great Psalm, one that has meant so much to your people down through the ages and which in its own way has been a gate to paradise for many in whose hearts and minds you have awakened a yearning for yourself.

We thank you that we have the privilege of learning about you here. We thank you for the company of your people that have been an encouragement to us in our pilgrimage, and we thank you for those that you are bringing that you would have come to know yourself. Father, we ask that together we might be strengthened in Jesus Christ and in the knowledge of yourself and your ways, and then like pilgrims go on from strength to strength, being a blessing to those about until the day when we settle down for good around the throne of your grace in the presence of Jesus Christ our Savior. We pray in his name. Amen.

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