1 Kings 8

It makes the soul red with guilt, and black with filth. Sin in Scripture is compared to a menstruous cloth (Isaiah 30:22), to a plague sore (1 Kings 8:38). Joshua's filthy garments, in which he stood before the Angel (Zechariah 3:3), were nothing but a type and hieroglyphic of s…

1. God's Omnipresency; the Greek word for infinite [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉] from [〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉], signifies without bounds or limits: God is not confined to any place, he is infinite, and so is present in all places at once. His center is every-where, Divina essen…

O Lord God of Israel, which dwells between the Cherubims, you are the God, even you alone. Deity is a jewel belongs only to his crown: Yet further, we acknowledge that there is no God like him (1 Kings 8:23). And Solomon stood before the altar of the Lord, and he said, Lord God…

There is nothing true but what is in God, or comes from God. I shall now speak of God's truth as it is taken for his veracity, in making good of his promises: (1 Kings 8:56) There has not failed one word of all his good promise: the promise is God's bond, God's truth is the seal…

He grieves for it, 1. As it is an act of pollution. Sin deflowers the virgin soul; it defaces God's image; it turns beauty into deformity; it is called the plague of the heart (1 Kings 8:38). It is the spirits of evil distilled.

It is the spirits of mischief distilled. (1.) It defiles the soul's glory; it is like a stain to beauty: it is compared to a plague-sore (1 Kings 8:38). Nothing so changes one's glory into shame as sin.

1. See what the Scripture compares it to. Sin has got a bad name, 'tis compared to the vomit of dogs (2 Peter 2:22), to a menstruous cloth (Isaiah 30:22), which as Jerome says, was the most unclean thing under the Law, it is compared to the plague (1 Kings 8:38), to a gangrene (…

But I answer, from God's word; that though heaven be the seat and throne of God's glory, and where he manifesteth, and magnifieth his glory; yet is it not the place of his substance and being, for that is infinite, and incomprehensible: and it is against the Christian faith, to…

Now, the reasons moving him to pray for longer life, were these: First, he had then no issue to succeed him in his Kingdom; and therefore he prayed for life, to beget a child, which might sit upon his throne after him. And the ground of this prayer was this; GOD had made a parti…

Question. How may God be said to be in heaven, seeing he is infinite, and therefore must needs be everywhere? 1 Kings 8:27. The heavens of heavens are not able to contain him. Answer. God is said to be in heaven: first, because his majesty, that is, his power, wisdom, justice, m…

For it is God's will, that we should not cast the care of heavenly things only, but all our care upon him (1 Peter 5:7). And he has elsewhere commanded that earthly things should be asked at his hand (1 Kings 8:35), and the same has been asked in prayer of Jacob (Genesis 28:10),…

2. It includes deep humiliation for heart evils and disorders; thus Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart (2 Chronicles 32:26). Thus the people were ordered to spread forth their hands to God in prayer in a sense of the plague of their own hearts (1 Kings 8:38). Up…

The Scripture is full to this purpose, in asserting, that not only all men are sinners as considered in their natural condition, but that even believers are sinful in part. For the same Apostle John that says (1 John 1:3), "Truly, our fellowship is with the Father, and with his…

3. Observe here, that a believing elect, or an elect believer, will not only be sensible of sin in the general, but of his own particular and peculiar sinful way; or thus, it's a good token when folk look not only on sin in common, but on their own peculiar sinful way; or thus,…

So (Lamentations 3) tears lie in heaven as solicitors with God, until he hear; mine eye trickles down, and ceases not, (Verse 50) till the Lord look down, and behold from heaven. (1 Kings 8:30) Hear you in the heaven, your dwelling place, and when you hear, forgive: says Solomon…

2. To be a token of the extraordinary presence of God, whose voice immediately came out of the cloud, as also to veil the glory thereof, which was best done by a cloud, a thing of a middle nature between terrestrial and celestial bodies. When Solomon built the Temple the Lord sh…

Now whatever invisible power this worship is tendered to, must be omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent. Omniscient who knows the thoughts, cogitations, secret purposes of our heart, which God alone does (1 Kings 8:39). Give to every one according to his ways, whose heart you know…

Oh plead and improve this relation. 10. God is omnipresent: Your Father which is in secret: the heaven of heavens cannot contain him (1 Kings 8:27). He fills all places with his immense and infinite essence: Heaven is his throne, the earth is his footstool; he is excluded from n…

This is demonstrated two ways: 1. A child of God banished out of all human society may pray still. Suppose a man were rejected by men, and ejected out of all companies of men, and were shut up in the closest prison, or shut out in the remotest wilderness; suppose a man were in t…

Some say, that the saints in heaven are with God, and that in him they see the desires of our hearts: but it is false which they say. For the Scripture says, that God alone searches the heart (1 Kings 8:39). None knows what is in man but God, and the spirit of man (1 Corinthians…

And yet no question but this Temple thus consecrated for the service of God, was truly and really his house: for he had told by Moses, that he would be present in every place where he should put the remembrance of his name (Exodus 20:24). And Solomon in dedicating the Temple sai…

He also means to attribute a more excellent and glorious form to God, than to any human creature whatever. And that he thus appeared in the Temple, it does yet add greater authority to the vision, because he had promised his presence to his people there, and there the people wai…

For it is not fit that God should dwell upon earth, or be shut up as within a prison. The Temple also was built upon a little hill, which little space was unable to comprehend God's glory (1 Kings 8:27). That place of my rest.] And yet the Lord had said of the Temple, in Psalm 1…

Here the temple is put for the outer court, as in other passages. Near it was the altar of burnt offerings, (1 Kings 8:64; 18:30,) so that the priest offered the sacrifices in presence of the people. It is evident, therefore, that there must have been furious rage, when the sigh…

Surely they were more than men, that the father is but at a question, whether his sons have sinned or no? Solomon after an If concerning sin, resolves it into a conclusion (1 Kings 8:46): If (says he) they sin against you (here he makes a supposition, but you see he goes not one…

And though some wicked men have prophesied, as Balaam did, yet are they never accounted Prophets of the Lord, as Solomon was, but false Prophets and enchanters; neither were they Penmen of Holy Writ; who were, as Peter calls them (2 Peter 1:21), holy men of God, speaking as they…

In a word, when the Lord shall come forth upon his white horse with his armies, and shall destroy the Beast, and all the powers of the earth that take part with him: as (Revelation 19, from verse 11 to the end): Then God will speak terribly indeed against his enemies by the swor…

If a man come presumptuously upon his neighbor to slay him with guile, you shall take him from my [reconstructed: altar] that he may die. Joab being a man of blood, King Solomon sought to slay him, though he caught hold on the horns of the altar (1 Kings 8:29). In Bohemia former…

"He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth." See also 1 Kings 8:56. 9. God by David perfected the Jewish worship, and added to it several new institutions.

These seem to have been preserved in the ark till the captivity. These were in the ark when Solomon placed the ark in the temple, 1 Kings 8:9. There was nothing in the ark, save the two tables of stone, which Moses put there at Horeb. And we have no reason to suppose any other,…

'Tis said, Elijah built an Altar in the Name of the Lord; Beshem. Here the Prefix Beth is manifestly of the same Force with Lamed in 1 Kings 8:44. The House I have built for thy Name or to thy Name, Leshem.

It is plain that that Sort of Judging is forbidden, that God claims as his Prerogative, whatever that be. We know that there is a certain Judging of the Hearts of the Children of Men, that is often spoken of as the great Prerogative of God, and which belongs only to him; as in 1…

When therefore men have slight and transient thoughts of their lusts, it is no great sign that they are mortified, or that they are in a way for their mortification. This is every man's knowing the plague of his own heart (1 Kings 8:38). Without which no other work can be done;…

5. Our private necessities show that it is a necessary duty, which cannot be so feelingly spoken to and expressed by others, as by ourselves; and (it may be) are not so fit to be divulged and communicated to others; we cannot so well lay forth our hearts with such largeness and…

Secondly; How is God there, since he is everywhere? 1. Negatively; It is not to be understood so, as if he were included in heaven, or locally circumscribed within the compass of it; For the heaven of heavens cannot contain him (1 Kings 8:27). In regard of his essence, he is in…

By the way of truth, is meant true religion, as 2 Peter 2:2: By whom the way of truth is evil spoken of. It is elsewhere called the good way wherein we should walk (1 Kings 8:36), and the way of God (Psalm 27:11), and the way of understanding (Proverbs 9:6), and the way of holin…

Before we can fly we must get wings, we must have grace before we can run the way of God's commandments; and then the quickening of the habits, the exciting of the soul to action; the deed as well as the will (Philippians 2:13) is from God; the first inclination, and actual acco…

David says here, Lord incline my heart. And (1 Kings 8:58), The Lord be with us, that he may incline our hearts to him, to walk in all his ways, and keep his commandment. It is God's work alone to bend the crooked stick the other way.

(Joshua 23:14) Not one thing has failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spoke concerning you. (1 Kings 8:56) There has not failed one word of all his good promises, which he has promised by the hand of Moses his servant. You will often find the very letter of the…

2. Partly by afflictions; as the prodigal when he was reduced to husks and rags, then he came to himself, and was brought to his right mind. Again, (1 Kings 8:47), If in the land of their affliction they shall bethink themselves, and repent, the Hebrew is, bring it back to their…

So do the servants of God observe his accomplishing promises, (Joshua 23:14) And behold, this day I am going the way of all the earth, and you know in all your hearts, and in all your souls that not one thing has failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spoke concer…

1. The time of affliction is a serious thinking time (Ecclesiastes 7:14): In the day of adversity consider. (1 Kings 8:47): Yet if they bethink themselves in the land where they are carried captive. We have more liberty to retire into ourselves, being freed from the attractive a…

Now with such persons as are under these diseases, others are loath to eat or drink: 'tis likened to the rot, to the filth and corruption of the foulest disease, which is so foul and rotten, as (according to the proverb) one would not touch it with a pair of tongs. The Apostle t…

Indeed, God is marvelously ready to meet the sinner halfway in his mercy and compassions, when he perceives that with a serious purpose of heart he sets himself [illegible] this work (Psalm 32:5): I said (says the prophet) I will confess my sin, and you forgave [illegible] iniqu…

We are not worthy (as the Centurion said) that the Lord should come under our [illegible]. In (1 Kings 8:27) Solomon says, Will the Lord indeed dwell on earth? Will he dwell in a house made with hands?

We are a lump of clay and sin mingled together. Sin does not only blind us but defile us; it is called 'filthiness' (James 1:21), and is compared to a plague-sore (1 Kings 8:38), to spots (Deuteronomy 32:5), to vomit (2 Peter 2:22), to an infant tumbling in blood (Ezekiel 16:6),…

What David's enemies said reproachfully of him is true of every natural person (Psalm 41:8): an evil disease clings to him. He has the plague of the heart (1 Kings 8). Even those who have been renewed are cured only in part; they have some lingering of the disease, some stirring…

In fact, God will not only take notice of what we have done for him, but what we would have done. David had an intention to build God a house, and the Lord did interpret it as if he had done it (1 Kings 8:18). Whereas it was in your heart to build a house to my name, you did wel…

And the fault were the less, if our works were only called the way to the kingdom, not the cause of reigning, but they are called perfect, both in their nature, and conform to the rule, and also in order to the end, to justify us before God, and to save us. And if so, all in Chr…

And so the stability and certainty of the decree and oath is not to make the children of David secure, but watchful in their duty: But this is not a condition without which the Messiah should not reign, but without this he should not reign to their comfort and everlasting good.…