The divisions of the doorkeepers. Of the Korahites Meshelemiah the son of Kore, of the sons of Asaph.
David now turns to the men who would keep the gates of the house of God. The Korahite name in this list carries a history that makes them the last family you would expect at those doors.
The gatekeepers get the same care from the Spirit of God as the high priest:
In 1 Chronicles 26 we have the porters, for it is part of majesty to think of what is least. The Spirit of God condescends to arrange by David for the porters, just as truly as He did for the high priest, or for the different courses of priesthood. All has its place, and whatever has to do with the service of God is great in God's eyes. Indeed, it is only we who make so much of the differences between great and small. To God, the smallest thing has a value.
This list sits inside a long stretch of the book about the house that was still to be built:
From this chapter to 1 Chronicles 26:28-29 all refers to the house which is to be built. We see the provision that David made of everything needed for its construction. We see the order of the Levites' service: those appointed for song, those among them who were porters, and the priests in their classes. David arranged it all.
The name in this verse reaches back to a judgment. Korah himself went down alive into the pit, but his line did not end there:
In verse 25 there is no statement that the sons of Korah went down with their father. But in Numbers 26:11 we read, "the sons of Korah did not die." Yes, the riches of sovereign grace saved them from going down alive into the pit. And this was not all. As part of the family of Kohath they had given to them the cities of refuge, of which Hebron is named first... Oh, how our God delights in mercy!
(The older translation reads "the children of Korah died not.")
Mercy did not stop at rescue. It handed them a trust, and gave them a reason to serve:
Sovereign grace saved the sons of Korah from the awful fate of the father. They were saved from the pit. Mercy was remembered in wrath... They had the cities of refuge, were keepers of the gates of the tabernacle; were over the chambers and treasuries of the house of the LORD... They were mighty men of valour; strong men; they were the royal guards. And more than that, the Holy Spirit inspired them to write some of the beautiful Psalms... They were faithful and devoted in their service, because they knew they had been saved from the pit. And we have the same deliverance, and the same knowledge of it. Should we be less faithful and devoted?
One reference work sums up where this family came from and the two duties it was known for:
Descendants of Korah, the grandson of Kohath. The two principal offices assigned to them were the service of song, and keeping the doors of the sanctuary.
The work had two directions at once — shutting out and letting in:
The doorkeepers had charge of all the gates of the temple. They must be able to push back any attempt against the house of God. They must also watch with constant energy, so that no defiled person could enter the courts of the LORD. And they must keep the doors open, so that no member of the priesthood who had the right to enter the temple was shut out.
These are large families for one task, and the task asked for more than a quiet spirit:
Meshelemiah, the son of Korah, counts eighteen sons and brothers set apart for this office in his family. Hosah, of the family of Merari, counts thirteen. Obed-Edom counts sixty-two in his direct line... We do not think often enough that the service of the doorkeepers needed these qualities, just as the service of the priests did. It is hardly enough to say that this unattractive task needs humility, dependence, zeal, and self-forgetfulness. Strength and valour are needed too.
The gates were not handed out by preference:
These porters need to be strong men... They were placed in their wards by lot, which was how every gate was assigned at that time. Now the Holy Spirit appoints to each porter his own work (1 Corinthians 12)... So now each porter has his appointed place and service.
- Mercy first. The gatekeepers come from Korah's line. Sovereign grace kept them out of the pit, and then trusted them with the doors.
- Mercy assigns. Those spared were not left idle. They were given cities of refuge, the gates, the treasuries — and psalms to write.
- Mercy dignifies. God arranged the porters with the same care as the high priest. Nothing in His house is small to Him.
- Mercy demands strength. Guarding a door needs humility and self-forgetfulness, and strength too. The doorkeeper kept out the defiled, and never shut out those with a right to enter.
- Mercy places you. The lot gave each man his gate then. Now the Holy Spirit appoints each one his own work.
And Meshelemiah had sons Zechariah the firstborn, Jediael the second, Zebadiah the third, Jathniel the fourth,
This verse names Meshelemiah's sons in birth order. They belong to David's list of the men who would keep the doors of the temple — a family with a shocking history, a job most people would call lowly, and a God who writes down names.
Meshelemiah was a Korahite — a descendant of Korah, the man who led a revolt against Moses and lost his life for it. His family ended up with two settled kinds of work in Israel's worship:
Descendants of Korah, the grandson of Kohath. The two main offices assigned to them were the service of song, and keeping the doors of the sanctuary.
How did a family named after a rebel end up serving at God's house? One writer traces the line from the judgment they escaped to the posts they were later given:
These were the family of the man who led the disastrous revolt in the wilderness described in Numbers 16. When he and his company were swallowed up, God in His mercy spared his sons, as we read, "But the sons of Korah did not die" (Num. 26:11). Sovereign mercy snatched them from the very brink of destruction. Afterwards God brought them into His sanctuary and gave them places of honourable service there (1 Chron. 26). How much like our own case this is! We were once standing on the brink of a more dreadful destruction than theirs, but God has saved us in His grace, brought us into His own presence, and given us the privilege and joy of serving before Him.
This verse names four sons; the family count runs higher. One writer sets that count beside the other doorkeeper families, and notes what the work took:
Meshelemiah, the son of Korah, counts eighteen sons and brothers destined for this office in his family. Hosah, of the family of Merari, counts thirteen. Obed-Edom counts sixty-two among his descendants... Of Obed-Edom's sons it is said that they were rulers in their father's house, that they were mighty men of valour, able men in strength for the service. We do not reflect often enough that the service of the doorkeepers, like that of the priests (1 Chron. 9:13), required these qualities. It is not enough to say that this unattractive task needs humility, dependence, zeal, and self-forgetfulness. Strength and valour are necessary too.
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Standing at a gate sounds passive. The charge had two directions to it — shutting and opening:
The doorkeepers had charge of all the gates of the temple. They had to be able to drive off any attack on the house of God. They had to watch with unbroken energy, so that no defiled person could enter the courts of the Lord. But they also had to keep the doors open, so that no member of the priesthood who had the right to enter the temple might be shut out.
Zechariah, the firstborn named here, turns up later in the chapter with a gate and a character note attached:
The lot chose the doorkeepers of the future temple, and it chose the keeper of each gate as well. Shelemiah had charge of the door to the east. Zechariah, his son, a wise counsellor, had charge of the gate to the north.
The writer treats Shelemiah as the Meshelemiah of this verse. So the firstborn son named here was later given the north gate.
A list like this can look like filler. One writer reads God's pleasure in it:
There is little to say here except that the Lord takes pleasure in recording even the names of His servants... He honours those who honour Him. He records their names in His word now, and in the great day that is coming quickly He will glorify the men themselves.
One writer carries the doorkeeper's job over into the present:
Their first service was to keep the door. Do we not now have to guard the door too — not only trying to stop Satan and men from closing the doors again, but maintaining the gospel of Jesus, the way into the holiest place?... These doorkeepers were placed at their posts by lot, the way appointment was then made for every gate. Now the Holy Spirit appoints to each doorkeeper his own work (1 Cor. 12)... So now each one has his appointed place and service.
- Spared. The gatekeepers descend from Korah, whose sons God spared when judgment fell. Sovereign mercy is why there is a list at all.
- Stationed. Mercy did not stop at survival. God brought the spared sons into His sanctuary and gave them honourable service.
- Strong. The post looks lowly, but it called for humility and dependence and for strength and valour, like the priests' work.
- Two-way. The doorkeeper's charge was to shut out the defiled and to keep the door open for everyone with a right to enter.
- Named. Zechariah the firstborn later held the north gate as a wise counsellor. The Lord takes pleasure in recording even the names of His servants, and He still gives each one his own place and service.
Elam the fifth, Johanan the sixth, Elioenai the seventh.
This verse adds three names to a family list: Elam, Jehohanan, and Eliehoenai. They were sons of Meshelemiah, whose family guarded the doors of the house of the Lord. Why would God keep the names of men who only stood at a gate?
One writer, on a similar list of names in Numbers, shows what such records say about God:
Nothing less would satisfy Him than a full, detailed account of each man's name, the tribe he represented, and the offering he brought to the sanctuary of God... He delights to record every little act of service, every little loving gift. He never forgets the smallest thing. And He does more than remember it Himself: He takes special care that untold millions will read the record.
That is why this verse counts sons one by one: the fifth, the sixth, the seventh. Another writer brings the same truth into everyday service:
These modest jobs are very valuable in the eyes of the Lord... It is the same today. Serving tables, passing the bread and the cup, caring for the "upper room" — the Lord forgets none of it. He writes down the names of those who have kept this service, and they deserve that place as much as anyone else.
Meshelemiah came from the line of Korah. That name carries a hard history:
Divine judgment falls on them. Dathan and Abiram, their wives, their sons and their little ones, along with the ringleader Korah, are swallowed up by the earth and go down alive into the pit... Notice that the sons of Korah did not perish. Sovereign grace saved the sons of Korah from the terrible fate of their father. They were saved from the pit. Mercy was remembered in wrath. They were given the cities of refuge. They kept the gates of the tabernacle. They were over the chambers and treasuries of the house of the Lord.
One writer turns that rescue on the reader:
Have we been saved from the pit? We were children of wrath, just like everyone else. Sovereign grace has brought us to live in the heavenly places — not with Abraham, but in Christ.
It would be easy to picture a doorkeeper with nothing much to do. One writer compares two of these households — Meshelemiah's and Obed-Edom's — and says otherwise:
Meshelemiah, the son of Korah, had eighteen sons and brothers in his family marked out for this office... Obed-Edom had sixty-two in his own line. It is said of Obed-Edom's sons that they were rulers in their father's house, that they were mighty men of valour, able men with the strength for the service. We do not think often enough that the doorkeepers' service, like that of the priests, needed these qualities. It is not enough to say that this unimpressive task needs humility, dependence, zeal, and self-forgetfulness. Strength and courage are needed as well.
The doorkeeper's job had two halves, and both mattered:
They had to drive back any attempt against the house of God. They had to watch with constant energy, so that no defiled person could enter the courts of the Lord. They also had to keep the doors open, so that no priest with the right to enter the temple was shut out.
Careless doorkeeping reaches past the door. It touches the singing inside:
Only the redeemed can sing the songs of Zion. So the doorkeepers had to carry out their duty faithfully, if the Lord was to have His portion. To let in those without divine qualifications is to admit people who cannot sing. Careless doorkeepers will mean loss to the singers.
One writer weighs the choice a psalm puts into words:
"I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness." It is easy to see the force of that. The doorkeeper is first to let others in, and he stays till the last; he is there longest of all. The margin reads, "I would choose rather to sit at the threshold." That gives us a different thought: he is content with the threshold, the lowest place, as long as he is in God's presence. Was God there? He would be there too.
- Mercy first. These doorkeepers came from Korah's line. God spared them when judgment fell. Their place at the door began as grace, not merit.
- Mercy gives a name. God did more than spare them. He wrote their names down — even the fifth, sixth and seventh son of one household.
- A name gives a post. God gave these men real work. It needed humility and courage together, not one without the other.
- The post guards the house. They shut the door on what defiles and opened it to every rightful worshipper. Neither half was optional.
- The guard keeps the song. Careless doorkeepers cost the singers their song. And the man content at the threshold stands nearest to God.
-- And the sons of Obed-Edom Shemaiah the firstborn, Jehozabad the second, Joah the third, and Sacar the fourth, and Nethaneel the fifth,
The list of temple doorkeepers opens with Obed-edom, and verse 4 begins naming his sons one by one. That plain list hides a story. This is the man whose house once sheltered the ark of God, and his large family is the visible result.
The ark was the chest that held God's covenant, the sign of His presence with Israel. One writer sets Obed-edom's family line against what his name and his home town mean:
Obed-edom, as we see from the reference to the blessing on him elsewhere (1 Chr. 26:4-5), was a Korahite Levite, and so his house was not unsuited to receive the ark. Yet his name means "servant of Edom" (a picture of the flesh). And Gath, where he had lived before — or more likely where he was born — means "winepress", a type, as we know, of divine wrath. It is no strange thing to say of any of God's Levites that we were indeed "by nature children of wrath". The apostle adds (Eph. 2:3) that we were carrying out the desires of the flesh — we were Obed-edoms. And now we are Korahites too. God has saved us, just as He saved the children of Korah in the wilderness from their father's penalty.
One writer counts his line against the other doorkeeper families:
Obed-Edom is here, as always, the object of special blessing. Meshelemiah, the son of Korah, has eighteen sons and brothers in his family set apart for this office. Hosah of the family of Merari has thirteen sons and brothers. But Obed-Edom counts sixty-two in his direct descendants. He had eight sons, for it is said that God had blessed him (v. 5). Had he not, along with his family, kept the ark in his house for three months? It was at that time that the Lord had blessed his house (1 Chron. 13:14; 1 Chron. 16:38). He had become a doorkeeper of the ark when David brought it up to Jerusalem (1 Chron. 15:18). We see him and his large family with him here as doorkeepers of Solomon's future temple. Of his sons it is said that they were rulers in their father's house, mighty men of valour, able men with strength for the service.
The blessing fell on a whole house, not on one man. One writer draws a rule from that for every home:
The ark, or mercy seat, was in "the house of Obed-edom the Gittite three months, and the Lord blessed Obed-edom and all his household." The blessing was too remarkable to go unnoticed or untalked of... No Christian should expect the Lord's blessing in his household unless the mercy seat is consciously known and honoured there! God's word is, "those who honour me I will honour." So if we call on, honour, and serve the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ in our homes, we may be sure of blessing — not only our own, but blessing for all the household.
Keeping a door meant deciding who came in and who stayed out:
The doorkeepers had charge of all the gates of the temple. They had to be able to turn back any move against the house of God. They had to watch with constant energy, so that no defiled person could enter the courts of the Lord. But they also had to keep the doors open, so that they shut out no priest who had the right to enter the temple.
A list of five sons can look like filler. One writer reads the whole chapter the other way:
In 1 Chronicles 26 we have the doorkeepers, for it is part of majesty to think of what is least. Through David, the Spirit of God stoops to arrange for the doorkeepers. He does this just as truly as He did for the high priest or for the different courses of priesthood. All has its place, and whatever has to do with the service of God is great in God's eyes. Indeed, it is only we who make so much of the difference between great and small. To God, the smallest thing has value.
The same holds for unnoticed service today:
Today, whether it is a matter of serving tables, of passing the bread and the cup, or of taking care of the "upper room", none of this is forgotten by the Lord. He records the names of those who have kept the charge of this service just as deservedly as others.
- Cause — Obed-edom housed the ark for three months. That is where this list of sons comes from.
- Gift — He had eight sons because God had blessed him, and sixty-two descendants in all. No other doorkeeper family came close.
- Reach — The blessing covered the household, not the man alone. Where a home honours the mercy seat, the Lord promises blessing to all in it.
- Grace — His name means "servant of Edom", and Gath means winepress of wrath. He is a Korahite, spared his father's penalty. Every servant of God starts there.
- Record — Doorkeeping needed strength and valour. God wrote down the names of the men who did it, because to Him the smallest service has value.
Ammiel the sixth, Issachar the seventh, Peulthai the eighth for God had blessed him.
A bare list of names ends with a reason: this man had eight sons, for God blessed him. Commentators trace that blessing back to three months when the ark of God stayed under his roof, and forward to the doors his whole family later guarded.
This list counts several families of doorkeepers. One family runs far longer than the rest, and one writer explains why.
Obed-Edom is here, as always, the object of special blessing. Meshelemiah, the son of Korah, counts eighteen sons and brothers marked out for this office in his family. Hosah, of the family of Merari, counts thirteen sons and brothers. Obed-Edom counts sixty-two among his direct descendants. He had eight sons, for the text says that God had blessed him (v. 5). Had he not, together with his family, been the keeper of the ark in his house for three months? It was at that time that the Lord had blessed his house.
The blessing did more than enrich his house. It showed something about the man.
Those three months when the ark was in the house of Obed-edom had shown one thing. Here was a man who knew how to care for the ark of God, and who had the Lord's approval in doing it. It was therefore fitting that he should have a special place in caring for the ark when it came to the city of David.
David stopped short of bringing the ark home, and it went to this house instead. What the king drew back from, another man received.
This was David's loss. By stopping short he gave up much blessing and privilege. The ark of God could do nothing but bless all who were rightly connected with it. To be connected with it in any other way brought judgment, as with the men of Bethshemesh, and Uzza. It was a happy time for Obed-edom while the ark was in his house, for "the LORD blessed the household of Obed-edom and all that he had." The whole time David was "afraid" and without the ark, Obed-edom had the ark and its blessing.
His family line makes him a Levite, from the house of Korah. His name and his hometown point the other way.
Obed-edom, as we see by the reference to the blessing on him elsewhere (1 Chr. 26:4-5), was a Korahite Levite, and so his house was not unsuited to receive the ark. Yet his name means "servant of Edom" (a picture of the flesh). And the place where he once lived, or more likely was born, is Gath, the "winepress" — a type, as we know, of divine wrath. It is nothing strange to tell any of God's Levites that we were indeed "by nature children of wrath"; and the apostle adds (Eph. 2:3), "carrying out the desires of the body and the mind" — we were Obed-edoms. So also we are now Korahites, saved as the children of Korah were in the wilderness, from their father's penalty.
The sons God gave him served at the doors. The record calls them capable men, strong for the work.
Of his sons it is said that they were rulers in their father's house, that they were mighty men of valour, able men in strength for the service. We do not reflect often enough that the service of the doorkeepers, like that of the priests (1 Chron. 9:13), required these qualities. It is not enough to say that this unattractive task needs humility, dependence, zeal, and self-forgetfulness. Strength and valour are needed too.
Guarding a door looks like the lowest job in the house of God.
In 1 Chronicles 26 we have the gatekeepers, for it is part of majesty to think of what is least. The Spirit of God stoops to arrange the gatekeepers through David, just as truly as He did the high priest, or the different courses of priesthood. All has its place, and whatever has to do with the service of God is great in God's eyes. Indeed, it is only we who make so much of the differences between great and small. To God, the smallest thing has a value.
- House opened. David was afraid to take the ark home, so it turned aside into this house. The man who welcomed what the king shrank from became the man God blessed.
- House blessed. Three months with the ark under his roof settled his family's future. The record still points back to it here: first the sons, then the reason.
- House filled. Other families supply eighteen or thirteen men. His line supplies sixty-two. The blessing showed up as children, not just comfort.
- House qualified. His sons are called capable and strong. Guarding a door looks like a small task; it still calls for humility and valour together.
- House honoured. God arranged for the gatekeepers just as truly as for the high priest. Only we rank service as great or small. To God the smallest thing has value.