Better Is One Day In Your Courts

Than a thousand anywhere else

Ed Jarrett
The Dove
2 min readDec 16, 2022

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Cedar Lake in the Olympic Mountains
Photo by Ed Jarrett

There are few places I would rather be than sitting near an alpine lake nestled high in the mountains. Especially the one shown above. The beauty and tranquility are soothing to my soul. It is a place of rest for me.

A Day in God’s Court

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.

Psalm 84:10 NIV

The Sons of Korah, who were temple musicians, wrote this psalm. In it, they expressed how much it meant to them to be in the temple courts. They would rather be there than anywhere else on earth. They had what they considered the best job in the world. I suspect they felt like I do when sitting by that alpine lake.

While the temple of Solomon is long gone, as is its replacement, God’s temple still lives on. As believers in the Lord Jesus, we are being built into a holy temple (Eph. 2:21). We live and dwell within that temple, always in the presence of God.

How wonderful it would be to have the same joy serving within the temple of Christ’s body, as the Sons of Korah did serving in a physical building.

And there is no good reason we cannot have that joy. When our hearts, minds, and eyes are fixed on things above, we can know the great joy that comes from living and serving in the presence of our creator and Lord.

A day at the lake is great. But as the Sons of Korah declared, better is one day serving God and worshipping him than a thousand elsewhere.

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Ed Jarrett
The Dove

Disciple of Jesus. Husband, Father, and Grandfather. And I love sharing what God is teaching me from his Word. Follow me at aclayjar.net.