Solomon’s fine building had been built ‘for the Lord’, 1 Kgs. 6. 2, and its very name, ‘the house of the Lord’, implies a divine dwelling-place. Without the presence of God, the temple would have remained a very impressive, empty shell. But once the priests had carefully placed the ‘ark of the covenant of the Lord’ in ‘the most holy place’, the temple became ‘the house of the Lord’ in reality, 8. 6-11. The New Testament teaches us that the local assembly is ‘the house of God’. When the Lord Jesus was here, it was ‘noised that he was in the house’, Mark 2. 1. On another occasion, He ‘entered into an house … but he could not be hid’, Mark 7. 24. We must pray that His glory will still ‘fill the house’.
When Solomon ‘stood before the altar of the Lord in the presence of all the congregation of Israel’, he was more concerned with the God of the house, than he was with the house of God. He was there to worship. We should notice the following. (i) He celebrated the uniqueness of God. ‘Lord God of Israel, there is no God like thee, in heaven above, or on earth beneath’, v. 23. The God of Israel was ‘the Lord of all the earth’, Josh. 3. 11, 13. He is still ‘the God of the earth’, Rev. 11. 4. He is ‘the true God, he is the living God, and an everlasting king’, Jer. 10. 10. We must approach Him with ‘reverence and godly fear’. (ii) He celebrated the faithfulness of God. ‘Who hast kept with thy servant David my father that thou promisedst him: thou spakest also with thy mouth, and hast fulfilled it with thine hand, as it is this day’, v. 24. We are reminded in the New Testament that ‘all the promises of God are yea, and in him, Amen’, 2 Cor. 1. 20. Very soon, we will look back over the pathway of life, and say, ‘there failed not ought of any good thing which the Lord has spoken … all came to pass’, Josh. 21. 45. (iii) He celebrated the greatness of God. ‘But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Behold, the heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain thee; how much less this house that I have builded?’, v. 27. We must never think of Him as ‘one of us.’ We must rather exclaim, ‘How great Thou art!’
The ‘greater than Solomon’ also leads His people in worship: ‘I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee’, Heb. 2. 12.
