I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked. (Ps. 84:10)
Expanded Passage: Psalm 84:10-12
A young musician, fresh from college, sat at the piano in his parents’ home and wrestled with a decision that would shape his future. The son of a Wesleyan Methodist pastor, he felt a call to the ministry of music, but that would mean turning down a promising offer in the entertainment industry in New York City. Understanding his struggle, his mother had placed a clipping of a poem by Rhea F. Miller on the piano, and her son began to put it to music. That night, long before he became soloist for Billy Graham’s evangelistic campaigns, George Beverly Shea gave us the beautiful tune to “I’d Rather Have Jesus.” The song became his personal testimony: “I’d rather have Jesus and let Him lead than to be the king of a vast domain and be held in sin’s dread sway.”
Another musician, the temple worship leader who composed Psalm 84, had expressed his love for God in very similar words three thousand years earlier. His people, the Levites, assisted Israel’s priests in a hundred ways on the vast temple complex, being responsible for everything from directing worship to . . . well, serving as doorkeeper.
The psalmist understood what Bev Shea would one day discover: service to God, no matter how humble, is too good a job to turn down.
Be the most faithful doorkeeper in the kingdom.
Bob Black is an emeritus professor of religion at Southern Wesleyan University. Along with Keith Drury, he co-authored the denominational history, The Story of The Wesleyan Church.
© 2025 Wesleyan Publishing House. Reprinted from Light from the Word. Used by permission. Scriptures taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.
