⁵ For I have not lived in a house since the day I brought out Israel to this very day, but I have lived in a tent and a tabernacle.^[a](A)

⁶ I have not lived in a house since the day I brought up the people of Israel from Egypt to this day, but I have been moving about in a tent and a tabernacle.

The Worship God Demands

¹⁶ ‘Since the day that I brought my people Israel out of Egypt, I have not chosen a city from any of the tribes of Israel in which to build a house, that my name might be there, nor did I choose anyone to be a ruler over my people Israel. But I have chosen Jerusalem in order that my name may be there,^[a] and I have chosen David to be over my people Israel.’^(A)

² “On the first day of the first month you shall set up the tabernacle of the tent of meeting.^{(A) 3} You shall put in it the ark of the covenant, and you shall screen the ark with the curtain.^(B)

⁴⁴ “Our ancestors had the tent of testimony in the wilderness, as God^[a] directed when he spoke to Moses, ordering him to make it according to the pattern he had seen.^{(A) 45} Our ancestors in turn brought it in with Joshua when they dispossessed the peoples whom God drove out before our ancestors. And it was there until the time of David,^{(B) 46} who found favor with God and asked that he might find a dwelling place for the house of Jacob.^{[b](C) 47} But it was Solomon who built a house for him. ⁴⁸ Yet the Most High does not dwell in houses made with human hands;^[c] as the prophet says,^(D)

¹⁸ “But will God indeed dwell with mortals on earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!^(A)

⁶ But who is able to build him a house, since heaven, even highest heaven, cannot contain him? Who am I to build a house for him except as a place to make offerings before him?^(A)

²⁷ “But will God indeed dwell on the earth? Even heaven and the highest heaven cannot contain you, much less this house that I have built!^(A)