Nehemiah 11:19 – Moreover the porters, Akkub, Talmon, and their brethren that kept the gates, were an hundred seventy and two.

Psalms 84:10 – For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand.  I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness.

We often think of the doorkeeper in the Bible as being equivalent to the janitor at the local church. Nehemiah refers to a similar position of porter or gate keeper.  I am sure there was more too the job description than just opening and closing doors (Men, I hope you open doors for your wife, mother or sisters!).  In reality this position was very important in Bible times.  They needed a 172 of them to man the gates of Jerusalem in Nehemiah’s day.  Let’s try and see if we can draw some spiritual analogies to the position of doorkeeper and the Christian walk.

1. A Doorkeeper Needs to Control Admission – A doorkeeper needs to decide who to let in and who to let out.  The Bible makes it clear that we need to control who and what we let in our lives.  The heart is the door to the soul.  It controls who and what we let in our lives.  We are not to be unequally yoked together with unbelievers.  We need to control who our children hang around.  We need to control where we go to church.  We need to make decisions about who we will marry.  We need to also control what kinds of influences and things come in our lives. We need to control what we watch and what we hear.  It is important that our heart is right with God so we can control admission to our soul.
2. A Doorkeeper Needs to Maintain the Door – A strong door keeps the heat and cool in.  It is also important to keep predators out.  It needs to be structurally sound.  If we do not maintain our Christian walk with daily Bible reading, prayer and study of the things of God, it is going be hard to make good decisions when the time comes as to what we let in our lives. In this world we are constantly bombarded with things that will try to cause us to go astray.  We need to make sure everyday we have a walk with God.  One bad decision because we decide not to keep our door maintained and the thief of the world breaks through and destroys us.
3. A Doorkeeper Needs to Be Close By the Door – A door keeper needs to be by the door at all times of the day.  There is no time to let your guard down.  It is a 24 hour a day task.  A Christian needs to stay close to God all day long.  Even when we sleep we need to make sure we ask God to watch over us.  Spending some time with God before bed puts good godly thoughts in your head. Reading the Bible or a good spiritual book helps.  We need to stay close by the door and close by God at all times.