1 Chronicles 17:1 Now it came to pass, as David sat in his house, that David said to Nathan the prophet, See, I dwell in an house of cedars… This verse shows us the good man's proper anxiety to have his God better housed than himself. We may properly assume that David thought about this matter immediately after his success in bringing the ark of God to Mount Zion, and restoring the ancient service. When David had taken the city of Jerusalem, and proposed to make it the capital of his kingdom, he found a royal palace was as important as safe fortifications. The erection of this palace indicates the new era which dawned in David. The previous king, Saul, did but make a beginning of a kingdom, and was little more than the previous judges had been. David is the proper founder of the Jewish kingdom. It appears, from 2 Samuel 5:11, that David's alliance with Hiram of Tyre enabled him to secure Phoenician artists, workmen, and materials for his palace; and this may have been necessary because the Israelite workpeople had no training for such work, and no experience of such buildings as David required. The one point on which David's thought more especially rests is, that a character of permanency and abiding rest attached to his own house, while God's earthly dwelling-place was still a movable and perishable tent. He very properly felt that there should be a closer harmony between the two, and God's house suggestive of associations suitable to a settled and permanent kingdom. We may never be indifferent to the "sense of fitness" in Divine things. I. THE SENSE IN WHICH GOD MAY HAVE AS EARTHLY DWELLING-PLACE. See the teaching of Isaiah 66:1, 2 There is a proper sense in which the created world may be called "God's dwelling-place." There is a much higher sense in which the heart of man may be so called. But, seeing that an external and ceremonial worship is found to be necessary for man, and earthly things may wisely be made the symbols of Divine truths and relations, place is made for the work of the architect and the builder in expressing religious truth by sacred edifices, churches, or temples. We, however, need to watch lest any building should limit our thought of God, as though he could be wholly contained within it; or as though we could put human limitations to his revelations, or to himself. God permits us to raise temples for him mainly that we may have, carried home to our hearts, the conviction of his permanently dwelling with us. His house is with us; his home is here; he does not come and go; he is with us always. II. THE DUTY DEVOLVING ON MAN TO FIND FOR GOD AN EARTHLY DWELLING-PLACE. This is not a duty directly enjoined, but one recognized and felt by the sincere and pious soul. It is like the duty of worship, and follows of necessity upon it. Explain that man cannot satisfy himself with the conception of God as spiritual, and that he wants material help even to realize this. Also the very sense of appropriating God leads to desire to fix him to a house. Illustrate by Genesis 10:17 Show that in all ages this sense of the duty of "localizing" God has influenced men to plant sacred groves, consecrate hill-tops, raise tabernacles or temples, and build - at cost of amazing labour and sacrifice - magnificent churches and cathedrals. Impress the duty of aiding in the erection and maintenance of Divine sanctuaries. III. THE RELATION BETWEEN SUCH DIVINE EARTHLY DWELLING-PLACES AND THE DWELLINGS OF THE MEN WHO MAKE THEM. This is David's point. He felt that one ought to match the other; and if there was any "best," that should be for God. Tent was fitting enough while the people were tent-dwellers. But a house was needed now the people dwelt in houses; and a palace, a magnificent house, now the king dwelt in a palace. Illustrate the relations which should now be maintained between the architecture and decorations of our houses and of God's house. Show what a help to the conception of our kinship with God, and to what we may call the humanity in God, is found in the erection of a house for him. Lead on to show by Paul's teaching that man may be himself the temple of the Holy Ghost. - R.T. Parallel Verses KJV: Now it came to pass, as David sat in his house, that David said to Nathan the prophet, Lo, I dwell in an house of cedars, but the ark of the covenant of the LORD remaineth under curtains. |
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