1 Kings 5:1-9:9 - Solomon Builds A Giant House

Well, welcome back to the Bible Babels Podcast.

My name is Bryon and I'm here with my friend and co-host.

It's Carlos. How's it going?

Well, Carlos, how's your week been so far?

It's been pretty good so far and just excited to get back into this episode today.

Yep. We are covering Solomon is building a giant house. Actually, in this particular section we are going over, he builds three houses.

How many houses does the guy need?

Well, to be fair, only one of them is really for him, but he builds houses for two of his friends.

Wow.

Which is, you know, it's pretty cool.

You want to build me a house?

I was just about to ask if you could build a house for any two friends of yours.

I guess either which two friends would it be or where would those two houses be?

I would build a house for me and myself. No, I don't know. It's like I can choose my mom and my and Bryon Self.

Yes. I choose those people.

Sweet.

You get a house in Atlanta and I'll give my house. I'll give my mom my mom a house in Florida.

Oh, I have a lot of questions, but we got to dive right into our passage. So we'll we'll run through some of the other stuff later. So we're going over 1 Kings, Chapter 5, going all the way through the first part of Chapter 9.

We are doing this very briefly. We're going to speed run through all of this because it's all basically on the same general purpose, same general topic. Solomon is building a giant house and 2 smaller houses.

So in Chapter 5, King Solomon receives some servants from King Hiram of Tyre who loved David and they send Hiram's condolences.

King Hiram was a friend of David and so when he heard that he had died, he sends some servants down basically just to tell Solomon, hey, sorry about your dad, but congratulations on becoming the new king.

And while they're there, Solomon asked them for wood from their forests because they were right there near the forests of Lebanon, which had just tons of cedar trees.

So Solomon asked them for wood from their forests and says, hey, there's no tree cutters like your tree cutters. So can you help us out with some of this?

Well, he tells him, hey, my father wasn't able to build a temple for the Lord because of all of the wars and stuff that had been going on throughout his reign, but he was going to do it now. And so he asked Hiram for help.

And Hiram does exactly that and is very, very helpful and gives him just tons of resources. Solomon thanks Hiram by giving him 20,000 measures of wheat and 20 measures of pure oil. And he continued to give him stuff.

It says year by year or every year, he would continue to give him just tons of resources.

Solomon also had tens of thousands of conscripted workers that cut and brought wood from Lebanon and cut and brought stone, smooth stone in particular, from the places wherever those were to Jerusalem. It kind of blew my mind in the story.

One, just how much money Solomon had, that he was able to give just enormous amounts of wheat and oil to Hiram, and then also that he could pay people, tens of thousands of people to work away from their farms, from all of the stuff that they had

been doing and working in that. If you had to choose, Carlos, between being one of the guys that had to cut or bring wood or to cut and bring stone, which one would you prefer?

I'm going to go with cutting wood.

Yeah, I feel like that.

Cutting stone would be very difficult.

Yeah.

Depending on what tools they had to use back then.

Yeah, and I feel like they probably didn't have enough of the resources, you know. And an axe is an axe, and you could probably get, you know, some horses or mules or stuff to to help carry some of the wood or the stone.

But if I had to be the guy that was either chipping out stone or whacking down wood, I feel like I'd get further faster with the with the wood.

Actually, side note, so Solomon conscripting all of these tens of thousands of people to do all of this work for the temple later caused issues for his son, Rehoboam, when he ascends to the throne because the people come to Rehoboam and they're like,

hey, your dad, like, literally forced tens of thousands of us to do jobs that we weren't already doing and we already had our own other jobs. Could you take it easy on us? And we'll learn more about that story here in several weeks.

But that's Chapter 5. Solomon starts working on getting all of this stuff together for the temple.

In Chapter 6, Solomon actually builds the temple and it goes into all sorts of details about all of the intricacies and the people that they brought in to work on it. It took seven years to complete, which is a very, very long time.

We just bought some property as a church so that we can have a little bit better spot in town, more people can see, hopefully a little bit bigger facility with more classrooms and stuff so that we can reach and teach more people.

And if it took seven years from starting the building to completing the building, that would be a very, very long time. Obviously, back in these days, you had not as many great things and inventions and whatever to help.

But seven years is still a very long time to complete stuff. This building was ornate. Solomon had tons of angels carved into it, and it was filled with gold.

And we're not talking angels like you'd see on, I don't know, like a precious memories ornament where you have little babies with bows and arrows. But you had some of these things.

Because obviously, back in those days, you had relatively more people had seen angels and were able to describe them. And there were even angels that were on the top of the Ark of the Covenant that in a little bit they're bringing to the temple.

But they had, you know, kind of designs and stuff that they had actually seen. Oh, OK, this is what it's supposed to look like. And it did not look like tiny, chubby babies.

Although, tiny, chubby babies are cute. Yes, I can say this as the father of a tiny, chubby baby. All right, so that's chapter six.

Basically, just Solomon builds the temple. It's super, super complicated. Takes seven years, but it's gorgeous.

Then in chapter seven, Solomon builds his own house. And, you know, if you think, oh, you know, seven years is a long time to complete a building. Solomon's house took 13 years to complete.

And he also used some of Tire's cedars from Lebanon. He had a bunch of trees brought in for that. Not only that, but he also built his wife, who was Pharaoh's daughter, a house as well.

She had her own house.

She did.

I know it's crazy. My my wife would not be happy with that. She would be like, hey, why are you trying to get rid of me?

Why don't you want me to be around? But this is, you know, apparently a nice thing that Solomon has done. We'll see later some complications that arise from Solomon's marriages and things of that nature.

But in this moment, it's great. He has built Pharaoh's daughter, her very own house. And so that's great.

But in the latter part of Chapter 7, Solomon brings a man who's not the king of Tyre, but his name is also Hiram, and he's also from Tyre. But he's just a very skilled worker who was great with working with bronze.

And he brings this man in, and he has him do kind of some detail work on the temple, on some of the pillars, on a ton of the stuff. Just basically anything that had to do with bronze, that they needed detail work, Hiram from Tyre did that for them.

In chapter 7, they mentioned specifically that the work they did and some of the materials used, especially the bronze, cost so much that they literally stopped counting at a certain point.

Solomon was like, huh, let me see, how much is this running us? Well, there's just this giant field worth of bronze that Hiram's doing all this detail work on. Eh, we'll just make this a tax write off.

Obviously, he doesn't have to get taxed, he's the king. But, it's just enormously expensive, and he's been doing all of this work, first on God's house, then on his house, then on Pharaoh's daughter's house, who is his wife.

But, the temple finally got completed, and chapter 8 talks about that. And Carlos, why don't you talk a little bit about the temple and the dedication.

So, this was a huge day for the Children of Israel and Solomon as king because this goes all the way back to God promising to David that your son is going to be able to build a temple in my name.

And so, it comes to this point where Solomon is going to dedicate this temple. And Solomon, he in his part intended this to be a big ceremony, something that would be noticed across everywhere.

And it was probably on the scale in today's terms, and it's like an Olympic kind of like ceremony, just something that's huge and just something that's very special.

And he needs the priest to come, you know, because he wants to honor the way that God would have him to have the covenant of the ark brought to, that should be only picked up by priests.

So, the elders came and everyone, he gathered all the leaders of Israel to this. And Solomon was careful. In 2 Samuel, chapter 6, David had made the mistake of not following that order for the covenant to be carried by a priest.

So, Solomon, you know, in his wisdom and in his obedience to the Lord, wanted to make sure that that was not going to be happening again. The Ark of the Covenant was a very important, if not the most important item in the temple.

And they also brought lamb stand and some other stuff. But this was the most important thing that should be in the temple.

And in the next part, there was Solomon went over the top in his effort to honor and praise God on this great day by sacrificing sheep and oxen that was like innumerable and just couldn't even count.

And Solomon just really wanted to make it special and show people that God is worth glorifying and praising. And at an earlier point in Israel's history, there was three items in the Ark of the Covenant, Aaron's rod and the manna.

But in this story, it says that there was only the two tablets that Moses had put there.

And when the Lord made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt, the reminder of the deliverance from Egypt is significant because there is a sense in which this some 500 years after Exodus is accumulation of

that deliverance. And it's just awesome to see how God carries out his promises to the children of Israel.

Time after time, we see the children of Israel messing up in this cyclical lifestyle of sin and turning from God, turning to God, and yet over a course of many years, God kept his promises to that.

And as we get down to about verse 22, Solomon starts praying, you know, and he prays for about till about verse 50 or 53. And Solomon is just thanking God for this point in history where he gets to have the temple made.

And he's thanking God for keeping his promises. And one of the things that stuck out to me is that he wasn't afraid to, you know, ask God to just keep his promises. And God loves to keep his promises.

And it's one of the ways that we can glorify God because Solomon, he knew God's promises and that he still asked for them, which is a great thing to do as a believer because God wants to keep his promises to his children.

Yeah, definitely.

Yeah, I think one of the other cool things in this chapter is as soon as they bring in the Ark of the Covenant into the temple, then you have God's glory like literally comes in, fills the Holy of Holies, and they can't even like look into the temple

at this point. And such a cool like visual thing that happened right then and there for them that they knew like, hey, God is absolutely in this. I think that's awesome.

I think in Solomon's prayer, he says, you know, he prays to God that there is no other God like you.

And I just love that because in Solomon's wisdom and all that, he knew, he still knew who God was and that God was just like no other God that people bow down to worship to and just so amazing to know that God is still the same today as he was back

then.

Yeah, definitely.

And I think it's cool too. The temple, all of the work that was put in, the dedication, all of this kind of shows me a little bit that God is absolutely for worshiping him in community. That obviously we don't have to go to a church.

We don't have to go to a temple in order to worship God. But God is honored when we come together as the people of God and say, Lord, you're worthy. There's no one like you.

You are, you know, you're important enough for me to take time out of my day, out of my week, whatever, to come and to worship you.

And I think even this Old Testament example of the temple can even show us back then that God does love to be worshiped by a community of believers as well as by individual believers.

One of the cool things that I notice when Solomon starts praying is he stretches his hands out towards heaven. And I think we should keep that. I think we should bring that back into a trend these days.

But one of the things that is interesting is that it says in verse 22 that Solomon is standing in prayer. By the time he's done, it says that he gets up off the ground.

So during this prayer with God, this conversation with God, he just fell on his face and there's a reverence towards him. And I think that praying on your knees is very, you know, symbolic of just like, just a reverence you see towards God.

And I just thought it was interesting that he was standing at the beginning. And then he was on the ground at the end.

Yeah. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, that's super cool.

I also love how extravagant, so you mentioned at the beginning that they have that sacrifice of sheep and oxen. And it says it's innumerable. They can't count it.

And then at the end, after the prayer, they offer another sacrifice and there's 22,000 oxen and 120,000 sheep, which is just so many animals. But I love just the truth that God is worthy of whatever we can give him.

And to that end, like we should give to the Lord whatever he's given to us, sometimes that's, you know, people would think of it only as, okay, well, I need to give, you know, if I give, if I get five bucks, I need to give, you know, 50 cents to the

Lord or whatever. And while there is, you know, maybe a financial aspect of giving to God as he's given to us, there's also, hey, he's given me my house, my car, my energy, my talents, and I need to use those all for the Lord as well.

And Solomon just kind of picturing that with, hey, I'm going to give all of this to the Lord. So, do you want to talk for just a second about the feast that Solomon threw?

Before that, one of the things that in his prayer was saying, God, just hear your children in times of oaths, in times of famines and struggles. And one of the ones I really like is when someone who is not a child or a children of Israel praying.

And Solomon knew that God's temple, God's house wasn't just for the children of Israel. And back in Isaiah 56-7, it says that his house is a house for all nations.

And I just love that fact that in God's plan for, you know, people worshiping him, it wasn't just the children of Israel. It wasn't just Israelites. And the fact that anyone could go to there and worship God is just huge.

Yeah, that's awesome.

Yeah, I love that truth. You know, sometimes the Jews thought, oh, you know, God is our God. The other nations have their own gods.

But all throughout the Old Testament, God brings out the fact that, yes, like I am your God, but I intend to be the God of every nation. And that's awesome that we can see that even in the Old Testament.

So at the end of chapter eight, Solomon holds a feast for 14 days. There's like one seven day stretch and then they wait for a day. And then they do another seven day stretch all the way from Egypt to the northernmost part of Israel.

And they just celebrate everything that God had done. Final part of today's episode is just in chapter nine. And God appears to Solomon after all of this.

And he says, you know, I promised to put my name in this temple forever, in this place forever. Even though Solomon's temple would be destroyed, there would be another temple that would be constructed.

That temple would be kind of taken down a little bit. Herod's temple would be put up where Jesus would have attended several times a year during the feasts.

And then even though that temple was destroyed one day, the lasting temple will be put up and Jesus will be worshiped there. And I'm looking forward to that day. I think it's going to be awesome.

God also promises Solomon, hey, as long as your descendants follow me and seek after me, I'm going to have your royal lineage last forever.

Obviously, we know, because there's not a king of Israel sitting on the throne right now, we would know that Solomon's descendants didn't do that. But because of the promises that God made to David, we know that Jesus will reign forever and ever.

God also kind of in a first shadow of what we'll see in several, several, several weeks, promises that Israel will be cast out of the land temporarily if they reject the Lord.

And even in all of this greatness, God makes Solomon realize, hey, just because Israel has done all of this work, just because they have put all of this money and this effort into the temple, doesn't mean that then they can forget about relationship.

It's not just, okay, if I give enough money to God, then I don't have to worry about anything else. It's okay. God says, no, I want them to actually be my people.

And I will be their God. And in all of this, you have God just re-emphasizing to Solomon, hey, thank you so much for doing this. But remember, it's not about how much you give to God.

It's what your actual relationship is with God.

And I love in the beginning of chapter 9, he specifically mentions, hey, as long as they follow me and don't follow other gods and seek after other gods, it can be so easy for us to chase after everything else except for God.

But what God wants is for us to follow him and to seek him with all of our heart. Well, any closing thoughts?

Yeah, imagine them spending years on this temple and then they think that would be sufficient enough for their relationship with God.

Like, God, I spent so much time of my own strength building this temple for you, so I think that's sufficient enough for me to have a relationship with you.

But in fact, they're supposed to be there all the time worshipping God and having that relationship with him.

And I think that translates over to nowadays where people who give to God or do extra service in the church think that that suffices for their relationship with God. But it just goes so much deeper than what you're physically doing for the Lord.

Yeah. It's not like, you know, maybe other religions where you can, you know, give whatever money to the priests or to that temple, and then you can do whatever you want for the rest of the week, the rest of the month.

And it doesn't matter because you've already given everything that that God demands. Our God doesn't demand like, hey, you know, you have to give me $300 every Tuesday.

Instead, he says that he wants all of our heart, all of our soul, all of our mind and all of our strength. And so to follow in that, we have to realize, hey, you know, I should be all gods. I'm not just gods on a Sunday.

I'm not just gods on a Sunday and a Thursday. I'm not just gods when I'm at church. Instead, every day, whenever I wake up, I need to realize, hey, Lord, I'm all yours.

What do you want me to do today?

Yeah, I love the simple thought of going to church is not what you should be filling up on, you know, from God's word. It's just another side to what you've been doing the entire week is just soaking up God's word. So I just love that simple thought.

Don't come to church to be to be to become fool, but you should that's what you should be doing throughout the week.

Yeah, I think that's great. And and even the other part of it, like we mentioned earlier, that we're worshiping God throughout the week.

And then when it comes to, you know, maybe a Sunday or a Thursday or something, then you're worshiping together with other believers. That's just a cherry on the top. That's just the icing on the cake.

Like, that's not where you're. That's not where the centrality of your worship is. The centrality of your worship is every day just walking with God, loving him, following him.

And then on Sundays and on Thursdays, just getting to rejoice in the fact that you get to be with other people who have also been worshiping God all week. And now we all get to do it together in community. And I think that's awesome.

Yeah, that's good.

Well, anything else for today?

No, I don't think so.

All right.

Well, thank you so much for listening to the Bible Babels Podcast. Please let us know if you have any thoughts you have, any comments, concerns.

If you have any episodes that you'd like us to talk about, anything like that, we would love to hear from you.

You can email Bible Babels Podcast at gmail.com, or you can find us on Facebook or Instagram with the at Bible Babels or at Bible Babels Podcast handle. I can only say it so many times before I start to lose all semblance of it.

But looking forward to hearing from you and looking forward to next week. Be sure to be in God's Word every day, and we would love to hear from you. Thank you so much for listening.

I'm Bryon.

This is Carlos. Thanks for joining us.