Day 164.  Reading 1 Kings 8, 2 Chronicles 5

Read Today’s Scriptures.

What truth about God stays in your mind?

1 Kings 8 and 2 Chronicles 5.

The Temple that King David had imagined, planned, and provided for, and that King Solomon had built … was finished.  A fantastic monument for the LORD GOD of Heaven, glorious and magnificent, only awaiting the breath of God Himself!

Solomon gathered all of Israel for the dedication. The priests were consecrated and sacrificed so many sheep and oxen that they could not be counted. Then, they brought up the Ark of the Covenant from Zion, the City of David. They placed it in the Most Holy Place in the Temple, under the wings of the cherubim.

And when they came out … a cloud filled the house of the LORD, so that the priests could not minister, for the GLORY of the LORD filled the house of the LORD!

King Solomon then blesses the LORD God of Heaven.

• Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who with His hand has fulfilled what He promised with His mouth to David, my father, saying… ‘Since the day that I brought My people Israel out of Egypt, I chose no city out of all the tribes of Israel in which to build a house, that My Name might be there. But I chose David to be over my people, Israel.’  Now it was in the heart of David, my father, to build a house for the name of the LORD, the God of Israel. (But the LORD said, you shall not build the house, but your son shall build the house for my name.)  NOW, THE LORD HAS FULFILLED HIS PROMISE.”

Then Solomon spread out his hands toward heaven and prayed a lengthy prayer to the LORD, filled with praise, humility, contrition, and confidence in God.

• “O LORD, God of Israel, there is no God like You, in heaven above or on earth beneath, keeping covenant and showing steadfast love to your servants who walk before you with all their heart.”  “Now therefore, O God of Israel, let your word be confirmed, which you have spoken to your servant David, my father (that he would not lack a man to sit before you on the throne of Israel). 

Solomon pleads that God when He hears prayer offered from that place, would hear it and forgive.

• If a person sins against his neighbor and comes before the altar…
• When the people of Israel are defeated because they have sinned…
• When there is no rain because the people have sinned…
• If there is a famine, pestilence, blight, mildew, locus, or enemy at the gates because they have sinned and they come before this place with repentance…
• When a foreigner comes to pray before this place…
• If your people go to battle and pray for help…
• If they sin against You, and you send enemies to take them captive, and they turn to you….
• If your people repent with all their mind and hearts…

“Then, O God, hear in heaven Your dwelling place their prayer and their plea and maintain their cause and forgive your people who have sinned against you, and for all their transgressions that they have committed against You, grant them compassion.”

Then Solomon got up from his prayer and blessed all the assembly of Israel with a loud voice:

• “The LORD our God be with us, as He was with our fathers, may He not leave us or forsake us, that He may incline our hearts to Him to walk in all his ways and to keep His commandments, statutes, and rules he commanded our fathers.  Let your heart, therefore, be wholly true to the LORD our God.”

After that, there were tons more sacrifices and offerings.  After eight days, the people went home to their houses, joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness that the LORD had shown to David, his servant, and to Israel, his people.

(More tomorrow on Solomon’s prayer and dedication and God’s well-known promise of forgiveness and healing. (2 Chronicles 7:14)

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(Oh, the mountain-top experiences! How we all wish we could stay there. Filled with the joy of the LORD, praises, goodwill, and full tummies. 

There will be more good things about Solomon, but eventually, as he goes against the laws for a king, we will see him falter. God is faithful, but sin will show its ugly head in his own son’s reign. 

Message to me?  Stay alert, be on guard, for my heart tends to sin, pride, greed, and wishes for glory.)