The Daily Audio Bible

God Appears to Solomon^(A)

1 Solomon, son of David, strengthened his position over the kingdom. The Lord his God was with him and made him very powerful.

² Solomon spoke to all Israel—to the commanders of regiments and battalions, judges, every prince, and the heads of Israel’s families. ³ Then Solomon and the entire assembly went to the place of worship in Gibeon because God’s tent of meeting was there. Moses, the Lord’s servant, had made the tent in the desert. ⁴ (However, David had ⌞already⌟ brought God’s ark from Kiriath Jearim to a place he had prepared for it. He had put up a tent for it in Jerusalem.) ⁵ The bronze altar that Bezalel, son of Uri and grandson of Hur, had made was in front of the Lord’s tent. There Solomon and the assembly worshiped the Lord. ⁶ In the Lord’s presence Solomon went to the bronze altar in front of the tent of meeting and sacrificed 1,000 burnt offerings on it.

⁷ That night God appeared to Solomon. He said, “What can I give you?”

⁸ Solomon responded to God, “You’ve shown great love to my father David, and you’ve made me king in his place. ⁹ Now, Lord God, you’ve kept the promise you made to my father David. You’ve made me king of people who are as numerous as specks of dust on the ground. ¹⁰ Give me wisdom and knowledge so that I may lead these people. After all, who can judge this great people of yours?”

¹¹ God replied to Solomon, “I know this request is from your heart. You didn’t ask for riches, fortunes, honor, or the death of those who hate you. You didn’t even ask for a long life. Instead, you’ve asked for wisdom and knowledge to judge my people, over whom I made you king. ¹² So wisdom and knowledge will be given to you. I will also give you riches, fortunes, and honor like no other king before or after you.”

¹³ Solomon went from the tent of meeting at the place of worship in Gibeon to Jerusalem. And he ruled Israel.

¹⁴ Solomon built up ⌞his army⌟ with chariots and war horses. He had 1,400 chariots and 12,000 war horses. He stationed ⌞some⌟ in chariot cities and ⌞others⌟ with himself in Jerusalem.

¹⁵ The king made silver and gold as common in Jerusalem as stones, and he made cedars as plentiful as fig trees in the foothills.

¹⁶ Solomon’s horses were imported from Egypt and Kue. The king’s traders bought them from Kue for a fixed price. ¹⁷ They imported each chariot from Egypt for 15 pounds of silver and each horse for 6 ounces of silver. For the same price they obtained horses to export to all the Hittite and Aramean kings.

Solomon Assembles the Labor and Materials for the Temple^(B)

2 ^[a]Solomon gave orders to begin building the temple for the Lord’s name and a royal palace for himself.

² Solomon drafted 70,000 men to carry heavy loads, 80,000 to quarry stones in the mountains, and 3,600 foremen. ³ Solomon sent word to King Huram of Tyre by saying, “Do what you did for my father David. You sent him cedar so that he could build a palace to live in. ⁴ I want to build the temple for the name of the Lord my God. I want to dedicate it to him, burn sweet-smelling incense in his presence, and have rows of bread there continually. I want to ⌞sacrifice⌟ burnt offerings every morning and evening, on weekly days of rest—holy days, New Moon Festivals, and during the annual festivals appointed by the Lord our God. (⌞These festivals⌟ are always to be celebrated by Israel.) ⁵ The temple I am building will be great because our God is greater than all other gods. ⁶ But who is able to build him a temple when heaven itself, the highest heaven, cannot hold him? Who am I to build him a temple except as a place to sacrifice in his presence?

⁷ “Send me a man who has the skill to work with gold, silver, bronze, and iron as well as purple, dark red, and violet cloth. He should know how to make engravings with the skilled men whom my father David provided for me in Judah and Jerusalem. ⁸ Send me cedar, cypress, and sandalwood from Lebanon. I know that your servants are skilled Lebanese lumberjacks. My workers will work with your workers. ⁹ They’ll prepare plenty of lumber for me, because the temple I want to build will be large and astonishing. ¹⁰ I will give your lumberjacks 120,000 bushels of ground wheat, 120,000 bushels of barley, 200,000 gallons of wine, and 200,000 gallons of olive oil.”

¹¹ Then King Huram of Tyre responded to Solomon by sending a letter that said, “Because the Lord loves his people, he made you their king.” ¹² Huram added, “May the Lord God of Israel be praised. He made the heavens and the earth and has given King David a wise son who has insight and intelligence and can build the Lord’s temple and a royal palace. ¹³ And now, I’m sending a man with skill and intelligence—Huram Abi. ¹⁴ He was the son of a woman from the tribe of Dan, and his father is a native of Tyre. Huram knows how to work with gold, silver, bronze, iron, stone, wood, purple, violet, and dark red cloth, and linen. He also knows how to make all kinds of engravings and follow any set of plans that will be given to him. ⌞He can work⌟ with your skilled workmen and the skilled workmen of His Majesty David, your father. ¹⁵ Your Majesty may now send the wheat, barley, olive oil, and wine he promised the workers. ¹⁶ We will cut all the lumber you need in Lebanon. Then we will make rafts out of it and send them to you in Joppa by sea. You can take it ⌞from there⌟ to Jerusalem.”

¹⁷ Solomon counted all the men who were foreigners in the land of Israel, as his father David had counted them. Solomon counted 153,600 foreigners. ¹⁸ He made 70,000 of them carry heavy loads, 80,000 of them quarry stone in the mountains, and 3,600 of them supervise the work as foremen.

The Temple Built and Furnished^(C)

3 Solomon began to build the Lord’s temple in Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared to his father David. There David had prepared the site on the threshing floor ^[b] of Ornan the Jebusite. ² He began to build on the second day in the second month of the fourth year of his reign.

³ This is how Solomon laid the foundation to build God’s temple. It was 90 feet long and 30 feet wide. (They used the old standard measurement.) ⁴ The entrance hall in front of ⌞the main room⌟ was 30 feet wide (the same as the width of the temple) and 30 feet high. He covered its inside walls with pure gold. ⁵ He paneled the larger building with cypress, overlaid it with fine gold, and decorated it with ⌞designs in the form of⌟ palm trees and chains. ⁶ He covered the building with gems to beautify it and used gold from Parvaim. ⁷ He also overlaid the building, the rafters, the threshold, the walls, and the doors with gold, and he carved angels ^[c] into the walls.

⁸ He made the most holy place. It was as long as the temple was wide, 30 feet long. It was also 30 feet wide. He overlaid it with 45,000 pounds of fine gold. ⁹ The gold nails weighed 20 ounces. He also overlaid the upper rooms with gold.

¹⁰ In the most holy place he made two sculptured angels and covered them with gold. ¹¹ The combined length of the angels’ wings was 30 feet. A wing of one of the angels was 7½ feet long and touched the wall of the building. Its other wing was 7½ feet long and touched one wing of the other. ¹² The wing of the other one of the angels was 7½ feet long and touched the other wall of the building. Its other wing was 7½ feet long and touched the wing of the first. So the angels’ combined wingspan was 30 feet. ¹³ They stood on their feet and faced the main hall. ¹⁴ Solomon made the canopy of violet, purple, and dark red cloth and of linen and decorated it with angels.

¹⁵ He made two pillars for the front of the temple. They were 53 feet long, and the capital on each pillar was 7½ feet ⌞high⌟. ¹⁶ He made chains for the inner room and ⌞also⌟ put them on the capitals. He made 100 pomegranates and put them on the chains. ¹⁷ He set up the pillars in front of the temple, one on the right and the other on the left. He named the one on the right Jachin [He Establishes] and the one on the left Boaz [In Him Is Strength].

No Longer Slaves to Sin, but God’s Servants

6 What should we say then? Should we continue to sin so that God’s kindness ^[a] will increase? ² That’s unthinkable! As far as sin is concerned, we have died. So how can we still live under sin’s influence?

³ Don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? ⁴ When we were baptized into his death, we were placed into the tomb with him. As Christ was brought back from death to life by the glorious power of the Father, so we, too, should live a new kind of life. ⁵ If we’ve become united with him in a death like his, certainly we will also be united with him when we come back to life as he did. ⁶ We know that the person we used to be was crucified with him to put an end to sin in our bodies. Because of this we are no longer slaves to sin. ⁷ The person who has died has been freed from sin.

⁸ If we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. ⁹ We know that Christ, who was brought back to life, will never die again. Death no longer has any power over him. ¹⁰ When he died, he died once and for all to sin’s power. But now he lives, and he lives for God. ¹¹ So consider yourselves dead to sin’s power but living for God in the power Christ Jesus gives you.

¹² Therefore, never let sin rule your physical body so that you obey its desires. ¹³ Never offer any part of your body to sin’s power. No part of your body should ever be used to do any ungodly thing. Instead, offer yourselves to God as people who have come back from death and are now alive. Offer all the parts of your body to God. Use them to do everything that God approves of. ¹⁴ Certainly, sin shouldn’t have power over you because you’re not controlled by God’s laws, but by God’s favor.^[b]

¹⁵ Then what is the implication? Should we sin because we are not controlled by God’s laws but by God’s favor? That’s unthinkable! ¹⁶ Don’t you know that if you offer to be someone’s slave, you must obey that master? Either your master is sin, or your master is obedience. Letting sin be your master leads to death. Letting obedience be your master leads to God’s approval. ¹⁷ You were slaves to sin. But I thank God that you have become wholeheartedly obedient to the teachings which you were given. ¹⁸ Freed from sin, you were made slaves who do what God approves of.

¹⁹ I’m speaking in a human way because of the weakness of your corrupt nature. Clearly, you once offered all the parts of your body as slaves to sexual perversion and disobedience. This led you to live disobedient lives. Now, in the same way, offer all the parts of your body as slaves that do what God approves of. This leads you to live holy lives. ²⁰ When you were slaves to sin, you were free from doing what God approves of.

²¹ What did you gain by doing those things? You’re ashamed of what you used to do because it ended in death. ²² Now you have been freed from sin and have become God’s slaves. This results in a holy life and, finally, in everlasting life. ²³ The payment for sin is death, but the gift that God freely gives is everlasting life found in Christ Jesus our Lord.

A miktam ^[a] by David.