Revised Common Lectionary (Semicontinuous)

¹² Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem! Praise your God, O Zion! ¹³ For He has made your gates strong. He has made good come to your children within you. ¹⁴ He makes peace within your walls. He fills you with the best grain. ¹⁵ He sends His Word to the earth. And His Word runs fast. ¹⁶ He gives snow like wool. He spreads ice like ashes. ¹⁷ He throws down His ice as hail stones. Who can stand before His cold? ¹⁸ He sends out His Word and melts them. He makes His wind blow and the waters flow. ¹⁹ He speaks His Word to Jacob, and His Law to Israel. ²⁰ He has not done this with any other nation. They do not know His Law. Praise the Lord!

Solomon to Build the House of God

28 David gathered together all the leaders of Israel. There were leaders of the family groups, and leaders of the armies that served the king. There were captains of thousands, and of hundreds. There were leaders who cared for all the things and animals belonging to the king and his sons. There were the leaders and all the powerful soldiers. ² Then King David stood up and said, “Listen to me, my brothers and my people. I had wanted to build a house of rest for the special box with the Law of the Lord, a place for God to rest His feet, so I had made plans to build it. ³ But God said to me, ‘You must not build a house for My name, because you are a man of war and blood.’ ⁴ But the Lord, the God of Israel, chose me from all the house of my father to be the king of Israel forever. For He has chosen Judah to be a leader. And in the house of Judah, my father’s house, and among my father’s sons, He was pleased to make me king of all Israel. ⁵ The Lord has given me many sons. And of all my sons, He has chosen my son Solomon to sit on the throne of the nation of the Lord over Israel. ⁶ He said to me, ‘Your son Solomon is the one who will build My house and My open spaces. For I have chosen him to be My son, and I will be his father. ⁷ I will make him king forever, if he is faithful to obey My Words and My Laws, as he is doing now.’ ⁸ So now I say to you in front of all these people of Israel, and in the hearing of our God: Be careful to do all the Law of the Lord your God. If you obey you will receive the good land and also leave it to your children after you forever.

⁹ “As for you, my son Solomon, know the God of your father. Serve Him with a whole heart and a willing mind. For the Lord looks into all hearts, and understands every plan and thought. If you look to Him, He will let you find Him. But if you turn away from Him, He will turn away from you forever. ¹⁰ Listen now, for the Lord has chosen you to build a place of worship. Be strong, and do it.”

¹⁰ Through God’s loving-favor to me, I laid the stones on which the building was to be built. I did it like one who knew what he was doing. Now another person is building on it. Each person who builds must be careful how he builds on it. ¹¹ Jesus Christ is the Stone on which other stones for the building must be laid. It can be only Christ. ¹² Now if a man builds on the Stone with gold or silver or beautiful stones, or if he builds with wood or grass or straw, ¹³ each man’s work will become known. There will be a day when it will be tested by fire. The fire will show what kind of work it is. ¹⁴ If a man builds on work that lasts, he will receive his reward. ¹⁵ If his work is burned up, he will lose it. Yet he himself will be saved as if he were going through a fire.

¹⁶ Do you not know that you are a house of God and that the Holy Spirit lives in you? ¹⁷ If any man destroys the house of God, God will destroy him. God’s house is holy. You are the place where He lives.