'And it came to pass, when Solomon had finished the building of the
house of the Lord, and the king's house, and all Solomon's desire which
he was pleased to do. 2. That the Lord appeared to Solomon the second
time, as He had appeared unto him at Gibeon. 3. And the Lord said unto
him, I have heard thy prayer and thy supplication, that thou hast made
before Me: I have hallowed this house, which thou hast built, to put My
name there for ever; and Mine eyes and Mine heart shall be there
perpetually, 4. And if thou wilt walk before Me, as David thy father
walked, in integrity of heart, and in uprightness, to do according to
all that I have commanded thee, and wilt keep My statutes and My
judgments: 5. Then I will establish the throne of thy kingdom upon
Israel for ever, as I promised to David thy father, saying, There shall
not fail thee a man upon the throne of Israel. 6. But if ye shall at
all turn from following Me, ye or your children, and will not keep My
commandments and My statutes which I have set before you, but go and
serve other gods, and worship them: 7. Then will I cut off Israel out
of the land which I have given them; and this house which I have
hallowed for My name, will I cast out of My sight; and Israel shall be
a proverb and a byword among all people: 8. And at this house, which is
high, every one that passeth by it shall be astonished, and shall hiss;
and they shall say, Why hath the Lord done thus unto this land, and to
this house? 9. And they shall answer, Because they forsook the Lord
their God, who brought forth their fathers out of the land of Egypt,
and have taken hold upon other gods, and have worshipped them, and
served them: therefore hath the Lord brought upon them all this
evil.'-1 KINGS ix. 1-9.
The successful end of a great work is often the beginning of a great
reaction. When the tension is slackened, the whole nature of the worker
is relaxed, and the temptation to slothful self-indulgence is strong.
God knows our frame, and mercifully times His manifestations to the
moments of special need. So, when Solomon had finished his great task,
'the Lord appeared the second time, as He had appeared at Gibeon.'
There had been no manifest token of approval during all the years of
building the Temple, for none was needed; but now there was danger that
the finished work might be followed by languor and indifference, and
therefore once more God spoke words of stimulus, both promises and
warnings.
A solemn alternative is set before the king, both parts of which are
fitted to rouse his energy and inspire him to faithful obedience. The
same alternatives are presented to each of us. In verses 3-5 God
promises blessed results from clinging to Him and keeping His statutes;
in verses 6-9 He mercifully threatens the tragic issues of departure.
In applying these to ourselves we must remember that outward prosperity
was attached to a devout life more closely in Israel than it is now.
But, though the form of the blessings dependent on doing God's will
alters, the reality remains unaltered.
I. The promises to Solomon are preceded by the assurance that his
prayer had been heard. The answer corresponds very beautifully to the
petitions. God has 'put His name' in the Temple, as the descent of the
Glory to rest between the cherubim visibly showed, and thus has
fulfilled Solomon's petition; but the answer surpasses the prayer in
that the presence of 'the Name' is promised 'for ever.' Similarly, in
Psalm cxxxii., the answer to the petition 'Arise into Thy rest'
transcends the petition which it answers, and adds the same promise of
perpetuity, 'This is My rest for _ever_.' Again, Solomon had prayed,
'that Thine eyes may be open towards this house,' and God answers with
the expanded promise that not His eyes only, but His heart shall be
there perpetually. He is 'able to do exceeding abundantly above all
that we ask or think,' and He delights to surprise us with over-answers
to our prayers. We cannot widen our desires so far but that His gifts
will stretch beyond them on every side.
But the promise of perpetual dwelling in the Temple is conditional, as
appears in the latter part of God's answer, though no condition is
stated at first. The promises to Solomon individually are all
contingent. The all-important 'if' at the beginning of verse 4 governs
the whole. The divine eulogium on David, which introduces these
promises, suggests how mercifully God regards the imperfect lives of
His servants. That merciful interpretation of conduct is removed by a
whole universe from palliation of sin. It affords no ground for our
thinking little of our inconsistencies. David's crime was sternly
rebuked and sorely punished, but still his life, in its main drift and
outline, could be presented as a pattern, as being marked by integrity
of heart and uprightness. The moon shines like a disc of silver, though
its surface is pitted with extinct volcanoes.
We may note, too, the pregnant description in outline of the elements
of a devout life, as here enjoined on Solomon. The first requisite is
to walk before God; that is, to nourish a continual consciousness of
His presence, and to regulate all actions and thoughts under the
thrilling and purifying sense of being 'ever in the great Taskmaster's
eye.' Only we are not to think of Him as only a Taskmaster, but as a
loving Friend and Helper. A child is happy in its little work or play
when it knows that its father is looking on with sympathy. The sense of
God's eye being on us should 'make a sunshine in a shady place,' should
lighten labour and sweeten care. It is at the root of practical
obedience, as its place in this sequence shows; for there follow it, in
verse 4, 'integrity of heart and uprightness,' on which again follow
obedience to all God's commandments.
First must come the clear recognition of God's relation to us. That
recognition will influence our relation to Him, bending hearts to love
and wills to submit, and the whole inward being to cleave to Him.
Thence, and only thence, will issue in the life the streams of
practical obedience. It is vain to seek to produce righteous deeds
unless our hearts are right, and it is as vain to labour at making our
hearts right unless thoughts of what God is to us have purified them.
Morality is rooted in religion. On the other hand, no knowledge of the
truth about God is worth anything unless it touches the hidden man of
the heart, and then passes outward to mould conduct. 'Faith without
works is dead.' Correct theology and glowing emotions lack their
consummation if they do not impel to holy and God-pleasing living.
The reward promised in verse 5 is for Solomon alone. His throne is to
be 'established for ever.' The duration intended by that expression is
therefore not absolutely unlimited, but equivalent to 'during thy
lifetime.' Solomon could only affect himself by his obedience. The
continuance of the kingdom after him depended on his successors. His
possession of the throne during his life was the beginning of the
fulfilment of the promise to David referred to in verse 5, but it was
only the beginning, and, like all God's promises, it was contingent on
obedience. We receive no outward kingdom if we are servants of God;
but, in deepest truth, the righteous man is a king, 'lord of himself,
though not of lands.' All creatures serve the soul that serves God, and
all Christ's brethren share in His royalty.
II. The second part of this divine utterance is addressed to the whole
nation, as is marked by the 'ye' there compared with the 'thou' in
verse 4, and it lays down for succeeding generations the conditions on
which the new Temple, that stood glittering in the bright Eastern
sunshine, should retain its pristine beauty. While the address to
Solomon incited to obedience by painting its blessed consequences, that
to the nation reaches the same end by the opposite path of darkly
portraying the ruin that would be caused by departure from God. God
draws by holding out a hand full of good things, and He no less
lovingly drives by stretching out a hand armed with lightnings.
A plain declaration of the evils that dog disobedience is as loving as
a bright vision of the good that attends on submission. The sternest
threatenings of Scripture are spoken that they may never need to be
executed. There is no more foolish misconception of Christianity than
that which calls it harsh because it reveals that 'the wages of sin is
death.' Note that the threatenings come second, not first. God's heart
is averse to smite. To lavish blessing is His delight, and judgment is
'His work, His strange work,' forced on Him by sin.
The special sin against which Israel was warned was that to which it
was specially prone and tempted by its circumstances. When all the
nations 'worshipped stocks and stones,' it was hard to 'keep thy faith
so pure' as to have no share in the universal bewitchment. So the whole
history of the people is one of lapses into idolatry and of
chastisements leading to temporary amendment, until the long, sharp
lesson of the Captivity eradicated the disposition to be as the nations
around. No doubt, idolatry in its crudest forms is outgrown now in
Western lands, but sense still craves material embodiment of the
unseen, and still feels the pressure of the material and palpable.
Hence the earthward direction of so many lives. Asthmatical patients
often breathe more easily in the slums of a city than in pure mountain
air, and sense-bound men find difficulty in respiration on the heights
of a religion which minimises the appeal to sense.
The penalty attached to departure from God was the loss of the land.
Israel kept it on a tenure like that of some of our English nobility,
who hold their estates on condition of doing some service to the
sovereign. Of course, that connection between serving God and national
prosperity involved continual supernatural intervention, and cannot be
applied entirely to national prosperity now; but it still remains true
that moral and religious corruption saps the foundations of a people's
well-being, and, when carried far enough, destroys a people's
existence. The solemn threat of becoming 'a proverb and a byword' among
all peoples is quoted, apparently from Deuteronomy xxviii. 37, and has
been only too terribly fulfilled for weary centuries.
The promise in verse 3, that God's eyes and heart should be perpetually
on the Temple, has now the condition attached that Israel should cleave
to the Lord. Otherwise it will be cast out of His sight, and be a mark
for scorn and wonder. The vivid representation of a dialogue between
passers-by is quoted from Deuteronomy xxix. 24-26, where it is spoken
in reference to the nation. It carries the solemn thought that God's
name is made known among the heathen by the punishment of His
unfaithful people, not less really, and sometimes more strikingly, than
by the blessings bestowed on the obedient. If we will not magnify Him
by joyous service, by rewarding which, with good He can magnify
Himself, He will magnify Himself on us by retribution, the more severe
as our blessings have been the greater. The lightning-scathed tree,
standing white in the forest, witnesses to the power of the flash, as
its leafy sisters in their green beauty proclaim the energy of the
sunshine. Israel has, perhaps, been a more convincing witness for God,
in its homeless centuries, than ever it was when at rest in the good
land. 'If God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest He also
spare not thee.'