Solomon’s reign as king is taken up in chapters 5-8 of 2 Chronicles and it went way beyond the wisdom of building the temple to the administration of the kingdom and worshiping the Lord as the basis of all national life. Solomon did not just see the Ark placed into the temple and the Glory of the Lord filling the temple, no he made sure that such would continue well beyond the moment.
Listen to his prayer in chapter 6 where he says in verse 14 “Lord God of Israel, there is no God in heaven or on earth like You, who keep Your covenant and mercy with Your servants who walk before You with all their hearts.”
Then looking at this amazing temple Solomon said in verse 18 “will God indeed dwell with men on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens cannot contain You. How much less this temple which I have built!” Then he humbly asks in verse 20, “Your eyes may be open toward this temple day and night, toward the place where You said You would put Your name, that You may hear the prayer which Your servant prays toward this place.”
And God Himself confirms Solomon’s words in chapter 7 verses 14-15 where God says, “If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to prayer made in this place.” The 8th chapter tells us that it took ½ of Solomon’s reign of 20 years to complete this building project of the temple and it is what defined his reign of service both for God and His people.
But story of Solomon doesn’t end there as we are told In 1 Kings 11:1-2, that Solomon’s failure is that, “King Solomon loved many foreign women, as well as the daughter of Pharaoh: women of the Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians, and Hittites — from the nations of whom the Lord had said to the children of Israel, “You shall not intermarry with them, nor they with you. Surely they will turn away your hearts after their gods.”
Solomon clung to these in love. For it was so, when Solomon was old, that his wives turned his heart after other gods; and his heart was not loyal to the Lord his God, as was the heart of his father David.” Though Ezra who wrote 2 Chronicles does not record this we must understand that Solomon’s failure was due to the fact that though he built the temple to worship “he nonetheless clung to these foreign wives in love”.
He chose to be close to God outwardly but failed in the end to do so inwardly and instead chased after his own fleshly desires. The temple for him in the end was nothing more than a reminder of his lost throne.
All would do well to hear this friend; if God ceases to dwell on your throne you will in the end find yourself removed from enjoying the God that you encouraged others to worship.