#473 Eyes and Ears

In the four hundred and eightieth[a] year after the Israelites came out of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv, the second month, he began to build the temple of the Lord.

2 The temple that King Solomon built for the Lord was sixty cubits long, twenty wide and thirty high.[b] 3 The portico at the front of the main hall of the temple extended the width of the temple, that is twenty cubits,[c]and projected ten cubits[d] from the front of the temple. 4 He made narrow windows high up in the temple walls. 5 Against the walls of the main hall and inner sanctuary he built a structure around the building, in which there were side rooms. 6 The lowest floor was five cubits[e] wide, the middle floor six cubits[f] and the third floor seven.[g] He made offset ledges around the outside of the temple so that nothing would be inserted into the temple walls.

7 In building the temple, only blocks dressed at the quarry were used, and no hammer, chisel or any other iron tool was heard at the temple site while it was being built.

8 The entrance to the lowest[h] floor was on the south side of the temple; a stairway led up to the middle level and from there to the third. 9 So he built the temple and completed it, roofing it with beams and cedarplanks. 10 And he built the side rooms all along the temple. The height of each was five cubits, and they were attached to the temple by beams of cedar.

11 The word of the Lord came to Solomon: 12 “As for this temple you are building, if you follow my decrees, observe my laws and keep all my commands and obey them, I will fulfill through you the promise I gave to David your father. 13 And I will live among the Israelites and will not abandon my people Israel.”

14 So Solomon built the temple and completed it. 15 He lined its interior walls with cedar boards, paneling them from the floor of the temple to the ceiling, and covered the floor of the temple with planks of juniper.16 He partitioned off twenty cubits at the rear of the temple with cedar boards from floor to ceiling to form within the temple an inner sanctuary, the Most Holy Place. 17 The main hall in front of this room was forty cubits[i] long. 18 The inside of the temple was cedar, carved with gourds and open flowers. Everything was cedar; no stone was to be seen.

19 He prepared the inner sanctuary within the temple to set the ark of the covenant of the Lord there. 20 The inner sanctuary was twenty cubits long, twenty wide and twenty high. He overlaid the inside with pure gold, and he also overlaid the altar of cedar. 21 Solomon covered the inside of the temple with pure gold, and he extended gold chains across the front of the inner sanctuary, which was overlaid with gold. 22 So he overlaid the whole interior with gold. He also overlaid with gold the altar that belonged to the inner sanctuary.

23 For the inner sanctuary he made a pair of cherubim out of olive wood, each ten cubits high. 24 One wing of the first cherub was five cubits long, and the other wing five cubits—ten cubits from wing tip to wing tip.25 The second cherub also measured ten cubits, for the two cherubim were identical in size and shape. 26 The height of each cherub was ten cubits. 27 He placed the cherubim inside the innermost room of the temple, with their wings spread out. The wing of one cherub touched one wall, while the wing of the other touched the other wall, and their wings touched each other in the middle of the room. 28 He overlaid the cherubim with gold.

29 On the walls all around the temple, in both the inner and outer rooms, he carved cherubim, palm trees and open flowers. 30 He also covered the floors of both the inner and outer rooms of the temple with gold.

31 For the entrance to the inner sanctuary he made doors out of olive wood that were one fifth of the width of the sanctuary. 32 And on the two olive-wood doors he carved cherubim, palm trees and open flowers, and overlaid the cherubim and palm trees with hammered gold. 33 In the same way, for the entrance to the main hall he made doorframes out of olive wood that were one fourth of the width of the hall. 34 He also made two doors out of juniper wood, each having two leaves that turned in sockets. 35 He carved cherubim, palm trees and open flowers on them and overlaid them with gold hammered evenly over the carvings.

36 And he built the inner courtyard of three courses of dressed stone and one course of trimmed cedar beams.

37 The foundation of the temple of the Lord was laid in the fourth year, in the month of Ziv. 38 In the eleventh year in the month of Bul, the eighth month, the temple was finished in all its details according to its specifications. He had spent seven years building it. 1 Kings 6 NIV

In the 480 years since the captivity men can look back into their history and see that they could not but get themselves back to captivity. They could be taught the law, the state of a fallen nature, and the separation. They could come to know the inferiority of human effort and that of the gods of their making. They were taught the need of a substitution, a lamb without spot, an ark to climb inside of in the day of God's wrath. They were now building a house for the presence, twice the size of the tabernacle, and not made to be carried or taken down. It is a quiet build that preparation occurs outside of the holy city, its measurements, its cuts, its chipping and hewing, all outside of the building. The rocks are shaped, the wood is cut  far away, so that their is no disturbing the peace of this place. Everything is brought here that is perfected away from here. Each stone is perfectly fitted, and some take the description here of the windows, bigger looking in and narrow going out, as that which reflects the true temple of the Lord. Your body being the temple of the Holy Spirit, that introspection of the heart always being more important than that narrow minded comparison to your neighbor. I have walked through church buildings here that are meant to look like upside down versions of Noah's ark, with stained glass windows bearing the art of Biblical stories. Solomon's temple is filled with cherubim, not to be worshiped, for no created thing should tempt us, it is a folly and a distortion, but to show that they all point in turn to God. There are such spiritual beings that come into the presence of the Lord to worship, but not to be worshiped. Only those of a strong delusion would ask so much. They remind us that God is even greater, that He is the Creator of all things, and that this is yet only token. He says to Solomon, in all this, in verses 11-13, that if you obey, then I will fulfill. Obedience is greater than sacrifice, more precious than the gold laid over the wood. This place does not exempt you from obedience, it does not cover you from justice, it is a mere reflection, no matter how beautiful, intricate, expensive per square foot, I am still Holy says the Lord. One thing that is not new here is the ark, the presence of God has not changed. Many will come to take a look from the courtyard, but few are those who enter the holy of Holies. It is there that the gold used is so refined as to be pure. They get a glimpse, but God is not a man that He is held to any place or so easily impressed. In heaven, gold is something you step on, and here it will be something that gets torn down. This temple in Jerusalem will not stand, the people will give it up to chase idols. It is a beautiful picture right now, Jews and Gentiles, come together to make the house of God, a house of prayer, a petition, that house to which some of you are now stones, taking up that wood of the cross and being covered and ever refined by that precious blood of the Lamb. Remembering that every tree is known by its fruit, what happened to the fig tree when Christ spoke to it, what did He do when he reached the temple? They had turned His Father's house into a den of thieves. God allows them to build the temple, knowing that they will defile it, and He is not bound to uphold such places, but His righteousness is bound to tear it down. Have you trusted in a building? Do you think that God is held to some name, place or religion? I take the Bible to be His Word for a lot of reasons, but in so doing I cannot have what part of it that suits me or what church that I make. It's not Burger King, I don't get to have it my way. If I am a Christian or so I say, and God says that heaven and earth will pass away, but His word shall remain, then I am a person of the Book, a believer in what God has said, and therefore also in what He has meant. Remember, they build the tabernacle, the temples, yes more than one, but they do that with God's foreknowledge that it will be torn down. I know my opinion doesn't count for much, but I'm starting to think that the church I may feel most comfortable in may not be the best for me. What if the church that is most aesthetically pleasing is not the most God fearing or sound of doctrine? I would say, Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever.

When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. 15 So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. 16 To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” 17 His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.”[c]

18 The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?”

19 Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.”

20 They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” 21 But the temple he had spoken of was his body. 22 After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.

23 Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, many people saw the signs he was performing and believed in his name.[d] 24 But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all people. 25 He did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person. John 2: 13-25