Chapter 16
The Ark placed in a tabernacle. This does not read as if the Tent of Meeting from the Sinai was moved to Jerusalem and used to house the Ark. It reads as if this was a new tent, erected by David for the purpose of housing the Ark.
Priests offering sacrifices, singing, playing music.
2021 - This verse:
7 Then on that day David first appointed that thanksgiving be sung to the LORD by Asaph and his brothers. [1Ch 16:7 ESV]
So this was the very first time anyone sang a hymn. This was the first inclusion of singing, and very likely of instrumental music, as part of the worship of Jehovah. Instituted by David, and we are not told that God asked him to do it. BUT, David was after God's own heart, and David liked the music. Further, it is certainly acceptable to God, letting it begin like this on such an auspicious occasion.
David gives a Psalm to Asaph. Psalm 105 I think.
The covenant which He made with Abraham, And His oath to Isaac, And confirmed it to Jacob for a statute, To Israel for an everlasting covenant,
I Chronicles 16:16-17 NKJV
Covenant, oath, statute, covenant again. Are these poetic names showing continuity or is each a different thing?
After the Psalm, David reinstates priestly and Levitical duties as required in the law. Israel worshiping as it was supposed to.
God made Israel a great nation, as part of the covenant with Abraham. The New Covenant...is with individuals. Can we really expect to pray the US into a blessed nation under the New Covenant? We are citizens of heaven under this covenant, we are adopted sons under this covenant. I don't think NT Christians are ever called a nation. The church is the vehicle of the NT, not any nation, no physical nation at all...
But does the NT ever deal with nations at all??? Should we even vote? Jesus never voted, never addressed politics, only sin and righteousness. Jesus never defended himself, never talk about his inalienable rights. Are we doing all of this wrong?
2021 - These verses:
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. [1Ch 16:39-40 ESV]. So David moved the ark to a tent in Jerusalem. But he seems to have left everything else associated with that original tabernacle - altar, sea, tent and all - back in that high place at Gibeon, and they continued to offer sacrifices there even though the Ark - the seat of God - was not there anymore. Apparently all those things get moved when Solomon builds the temple, and likely replaces many of those furnishings with better versions. Versions too large, ornate, and heavy to have been carried through the desert.
A GOOD STUDY - Follow the Ark, from it's placement as they arrived in Canaan, to its capture and then later return by the Philistines, to various places including ultimately Gibeon where Saul lived, and now to Jerusalem. It would be a good study to see where all the Ark went.