God Comes to Solomon Again

¹¹ Solomon finished the house of the Lord and the king’s house. All that Solomon had planned to do in the Lord’s house and in his own house was well done. ¹² Then the Lord came to Solomon during the night and said to him, “I have heard your prayer. And I have chosen this place for Myself as a house of gifts given in worship. ¹³ If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, and if I tell the locust to destroy the land, or send disease upon My people, ¹⁴ if My people who are called by My name put away their pride and pray, and look for My face, and turn from their sinful ways, then I will hear from heaven. I will forgive their sin, and will heal their land. ¹⁵ Now My eyes will be open. And My ears will hear the prayer that is made in this place. ¹⁶ For I have chosen this house and have made it holy, that My name may be there forever. My eyes and My heart will always be there. ¹⁷ As for you, if you walk in My ways as your father David walked and do all that I have told you to do and keep My Laws, ¹⁸ then I will make your throne to last as I promised your father David. I said, ‘You will never be without a man to rule Israel.’

¹⁹ “But if you turn away and leave My Laws and My Word which I have given you, if you go and serve other gods and worship them, ²⁰ then I will take you from the land I have given you. And I will turn My eyes away from this house which I have set apart for My name. I will make it so all people speak of it in shame. ²¹ Everyone will look with wonder at this house that was once honored. They will say, ‘Why has the Lord done this to this land and to this house?’ ²² Then they will say, ‘It is because they turned away from the Lord, the God of their fathers, Who brought them out of the land of Egypt. They have taken other gods, and worshiped them and served them. So the Lord has brought all this trouble on them.’”