What happens when we can’t worship and serve God the way we used to? Maybe your job has taken you to a new town so you can’t teach your Sunday School class anymore. Maybe you’ve reached retirement, so your job no longer provides an opportunity for evangelism and service. Or maybe your health has prevented you from coming to worship on the Lord’s Day at all. How do we deal with these sorts of changes in our life’s circumstances?

That’s the question that faced the Levites in this chapter. For when King David brought the Ark of the Covenant into Jerusalem, one of their big jobs simply vanished. Ever since the days of Moses, they had been responsible for transporting all the items involved with the worship of God, taking them wherever the Israelites wandered. But with the Ark permanently ensconced in Jerusalem, and especially after King Solomon built a Temple a few years later, there was no need for them to carry those things around anymore. At the same time, their tribe hadn’t been given any land to farm. So what were they supposed to do?

Well, along with continuing their service in the Temple, making all the necessary preparations for the priests to perform all the sacred rituals and sacrifices, they had two new jobs. Verses 41 and 42 explain that they were also to be musicians, providing continual songs of praise and adoration to God. They were also assigned to guard the gates of the Temple, making sure that those who entered were true worshippers. They thus kept on fulfilling their calling of service and stewardship but in different ways.

Of course, the coming of Christ would bring yet more changes in how we worship God. Since Jesus is the One to Whom all the sacrifices and rituals of the Temple pointed, it is thus no longer necessary for those things to be done anymore. Today, all believers are called to participate in the worship of God the way the Old Testament priests and Levites did, offering up our praise and thanksgiving, remembering and relying on the perfect sacrifice of Christ to make us holy and acceptable in the sight of God.

But as the circumstances of our lives change, we may be called to participate in the worship of God in different ways. Instead of just faithfully attending Sunday School, we may be called to teach or drive others to class. Instead of just coming to worship every week, we may be called to serve as Deacons or Elders. And as the end of life approaches, and we are no longer as able to lead and serve in physical ways, we can continue to demonstrate the patient, loving presence of Christ within us. Perhaps most importantly, we can devote ourselves to a ministry of prayer, which those involved in more physically active pursuits often neglect.

So, given the circumstances of your life today, how is God calling you to worship and serve Him? How is God calling you to demonstrate the reality of Christ to others?

I Chronicles 16:37-43 (ESV)

37 So David left Asaph and his brothers there before the ark of the covenant of the LORD to minister regularly before the ark as each day required,
38 and also Obed-edom and his sixty-eight brothers, while Obed-edom, the son of Jeduthun, and Hosah were to be gatekeepers.
39 And he left Zadok the priest and his brothers the priests before the tabernacle of the LORD in the high place that was at Gibeon
40 to offer burnt offerings to the LORD on the altar of burnt offering regularly morning and evening, to do all that is written in the Law of the LORD that he commanded Israel.
41 With them were Heman and Jeduthun and the rest of those chosen and expressly named to give thanks to the LORD, for his steadfast love endures forever.
42 Heman and Jeduthun had trumpets and cymbals for the music and instruments for sacred song. The sons of Jeduthun were appointed to the gate.
43 Then all the people departed each to his house, and David went home to bless his household.