seekeroftruth
Well-Known Member
2 Chronicles 5:1 When all the work Solomon had done for the temple of the Lord was finished,he brought in the things his father David had dedicated—the silver and gold and all the furnishings—and he placed them in the treasuries of God’s temple.
2 Then Solomon summoned to Jerusalem the elders of Israel, all the heads of the tribes and the chiefs of the Israelite families, to bring up the ark of the Lord’s covenant from Zion, the City of David. 3 And all the Israelites came together to the king at the time of the festival in the seventh month.
4 When all the elders of Israel had arrived, the Levites took up the ark, 5 and they brought up the ark and the tent of meeting and all the sacred furnishings in it. The Levitical priests carried them up; 6 and King Solomon and the entire assembly of Israel that had gathered about him were before the ark, sacrificing so many sheep and cattle that they could not be recorded or counted.
7 The priests then brought the ark of the Lord’s covenant to its place in the inner sanctuary of the temple, the Most Holy Place, and put it beneath the wings of the cherubim. 8 The cherubim spread their wings over the place of the ark and covered the ark and its carrying poles. 9 These poles were so long that their ends, extending from the ark, could be seen from in front of the inner sanctuary, but not from outside the Holy Place; and they are still there today. 10 There was nothing in the ark except the two tablets that Moses had placed in it at Horeb, where the Lord made a covenant with the Israelites after they came out of Egypt.
11 The priests then withdrew from the Holy Place. All the priests who were there had consecrated themselves, regardless of their divisions. 12 All the Levites who were musicians—Asaph, Heman, Jeduthun and their sons and relatives—stood on the east side of the altar, dressed in fine linen and playing cymbals, harps and lyres. They were accompanied by 120 priests sounding trumpets. 13 The trumpeters and musicians joined in unison to give praise and thanks to the Lord. Accompanied by trumpets, cymbals and other instruments, the singers raised their voices in praise to the Lord and sang:
“He is good;
his love endures forever.”
his love endures forever.”
Then the temple of the Lord was filled with the cloud, 14 and the priests could not perform their service because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the temple of God.
The commentary this morning was excerpted from the easy English commentary.
Solomon had completed the temple. He finished the work in the 8th month of his 11th year as king. That was in September or October 960 BC. The dedication of the temple was in the autumn of the next year. That was in the 7th month of the year 959 BC. At that time, there was a special week when the Jews lived in shelters. They did this to remember the time when God led them through the desert. Solomon dedicated the temple to God on the 8th day during this special time.
Then the priests took the ark into the holy place. Only priests could go into that place. They put the ark beneath the cherubim at the end of the room. There were curtains between the holy place and the most holy place. But the priests could see the poles from the holy place.
In the ark, there were the two stones that God’s 10 commands were on. But the other original contents of the ark were not there. These objects were the gold pot of manna and Aaron’s stick (Exodus 16:32-34; Numbers 17:10-11).
After the priests had put the ark in the most holy place, they came out to the people. These priests were not just the group who should have been on duty at that time. They came from all the groups for this special event.
The Levite musicians stood on the east side of the altar. They sang to the LORD and they played their musical instruments. 120 priests with trumpets stood in their place. These priests sounded their trumpets to join in the music of the Levites. All this music was in perfect harmony. The priests and the Levites praised the LORD and they gave thanks to the LORD. They sang that God is good. They sang about his love that is always the same. The words of this song appear often in the Psalms, for example, Psalm 136.
Then the LORD’s glory filled the temple area like a cloud. The LORD was there among his people.
There were a couple of notable moments to capture in today's post.
- They used the Sukkot [Feast of Tabernacles] to dedicate the Temple. What an excellent idea. People would be coming to Jerusalem for Sukkot anyway..... double duty is always efficient.
- The poles could be seen from outside the tent. I found a site that has some really interesting information about the construction of those poles. Apparently, based on math, the poles that were made to carry the Ark in David's time were longer than the ones Moses had made. Of course, Moses' crew didn't have a death on his resume like David's crew did. Moses' crew had the original instructions, and they knew better than to try to carry the Ark on cart.
- Finally.... Psalm 136 is good to use to get the members involved in the service. I remember reading that when I was at the church in Charlotte, NC., when I was a teenager.