Today, we’re in Psalm 84, a psalm entitled “My Soul Longs for the Courts of the Lord."

Just as the title implies, it is a psalm that speaks to the beauty of the place where God dwells, which for the Israelites, of course, was the Temple.

Let's read together:

1 How lovely is your dwelling place,

O Lord of hosts!

2 My soul longs, yes, faints

for the courts of the Lord;

my heart and flesh sing for joy

to the living God.

3 Even the sparrow finds a home,

and the swallow a nest for herself,

where she may lay her young,

at your altars, O Lord of hosts,

my King and my God.

4 Blessed are those who dwell in your house,

ever singing your praise! Selah

5 Blessed are those whose strength is in you,

in whose heart are the highways to Zion.[b]

6 As they go through the Valley of Baca

they make it a place of springs;

the early rain also covers it with pools.

7 They go from strength to strength;

each one appears before God in Zion.

8 O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer;

give ear, O God of Jacob! Selah

9 Behold our shield, O God;

look on the face of your anointed!

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 dwell in the tents of wickedness.

11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield;

the Lord bestows favor and honor.

No good thing does he withhold

from those who walk uprightly.

12 O Lord of hosts,

blessed is the one who trusts in you!

One of the takeaways from this psalm that I got was that we should LONG to be with the Father, and we should LONG to be with our brothers and sisters in Christ — WORSHIPPING together — and, as the writer of Hebrews says, “We should not forsake the meeting together as some are in the habit of doing.”

What did you get out of this Psalm?

Thank you for listening, and may you live deeply into your calling this week.