As I read Psalm 84 this morning I was struck by its great and important call for us to long for and live for our hope of heaven every day. Listen to it!
1 How lovely is Your tabernacle, O LORD of hosts!
2 My soul longs, yes, even faints for the courts of the LORD; My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
(The beatitude in Matthew 5:6 says, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. We are to long for God’s justice to rule and reign. We are to long for His courts and temple above until we even feel weak for want of His presence and throne of grace. We are to wait with yearning and pray with zeal and cry out for justice to be done in our world.)
3 Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young—Even Your altars , O LORD of hosts, my King and my God.
4 Blessed are those who dwell in Your house; They will still be praising You.
(In Matthew 10:31 Jesus said, “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground outside of your Father’s care. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So do not fear, you are worth more than many sparrows.” The verse about sparrows in Psalm 84 shows us that just like the sparrows on earth, so much more does our home down here become an altar to the Lord when we live for Him. He values us so much that indeed He makes our very hearts and bodies His tabernacle and altar where we make sacrifices for Him in our affections, dying to ourself in worship and love for Him and Jesus’ sacrifice daily. We make our bodies instruments of righteousness, extending the hands and feet of Jesus to the world around us in need of His touch.)
4 Blessed are those who dwell in Your house; they will still be praising You.
(We were made to praise and worship our Maker and bring Him glory just as all His creation does. I heard a testimony of a man who had an encounter with Jesus that led to his conversion from New Age religion to Christianity. He said he could hear and understand the wind blowing through the trees around him was praising God. Psalm 19:1-4 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; And the firmament shows His handiwork. Day unto day utters speech, and night unto night reveals knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is heard. Their line has gone out through all the earth, And their words to the end of the world.” Just as creation does, so too are we made to praise, to be blessed to live in God’s house. Jesus died to make a way for us, fallen sinners, to be united with holy God in heaven.)
5 Blessed is the man whose strength is in You, whose heart is set on pilgrimage.
6 As they pass through the valley of Baca, they make it a spring; the rain also covers it with pools.
7 They go from strength to strength; Each one appears before God in Zion.
(As we are strengthened by the Spirit of God to endure any trial in our lives, we set our hearts on this journey through life to make it to Zion, home to heaven, where we will meet God before His very throne and hope to hear the precious words, “Well done, my good and faithful servant.” A pilgrimage can be long and arduous, but we don’t give up the faith until we make it to our final hope and destination. Let us set our hearts on this pilgrimage to Zion, come what may.)
8 O LORD God of hosts, hear my prayer; Give ear, O God of Jacob!
9 O God, behold our shield, and look upon the face of Your anointed.
(This is the prayer and cry of God’s child as He anoints them with His Spirit. God’s ear and heaven is never something we take for granted or treat casually and lightly. Always we cry out in our great need for Him and dependence on Him in trust of who He is.)
10 For a day in Your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.
(Even the most humble position in God’s house is a gift and nobility compared to any gain by wicked means. No glory in this world compares to God’s love and purposes. We are to live for that one day in God’s just and gracious court than a thousand good days in this world. Being near to Him and His righteousness and Love far exceeds any gain from this world in all its beauty and glory. We are to take note of this Truth and never grow so attached to this life that we forget the true value and our true home.)
11 For the LORD God is a sun and shield; The LORD will give grace and glory; No good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly.
(This the amazing promise of God. He is the Light of this world, the Light of our lives. Though we live in darkness and evil in this world, He lights our way in the dark with Hope and Faith, with redemption and rest one day. He guards us from the evil one and delivers us from death and sin and the grave. He crowns us with the crown of eternal life for simply believing Him and honoring Him. He shares His very own glory with us as we live to bring Him glory and praise in this world. Psalm 8 says, “When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars, which You have ordained, What is man that You are mindful of him, and the son of man that You visit him? For You have made him a little lower than the angels, and You have crowned him with glory and honor.” We are grateful to our God’s gracious generosity and grateful to place faith in His promise to share of His good with us as we walk uprightly and follow Jesus in His example and wisdom and truth. What an amazing promise! Eph 3:20 says, “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” That is God—that is the measure of Good He works in us if by no means but to gift us with His heaven when we die and to please Him in a life well lived, a life driven by our Love and devotion to Him.)
12 O LORD of hosts, Blessed is the man who trusts in You!
(We honor God with our trust—trust that He is True and Just, Faithful to His Word, living for and by His grace, reaching always for His promises in faith, come rain or shine. Praising Him along this way, this pilgrimage to be with Him in heaven, to stand before the throne that chose mercy to triumph over judgment by shedding His own precious blood. Let us set our hearts on this pilgrimage to that “one day” in His courts, better than a thousand anywhere else! Praise God! Thank You Lord for Your goodness and faithfulness and for Your generosity to share Yourself with us. Amen.)