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1 Kings 8 Bible study: Hear in heaven
Solomon calls the house "a place for you to dwell in forever" (8:13), then calls heaven "your dwelling place" (8:39) in the same two Hebrew words. And the verb of "heaven … can’t contain you" (8:27) comes back at the end: the bronze altar was "too little to receive" the offerings (8:64).
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“Blessed be the LORD, who has given rest to his people Israel, according to all that he promised. There has not failed one word of all his good promise, which he promised by Moses his servant.”
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“1 Kings 8 says there was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets.”
Is that in 1 Kings 8, or not? Make your call.
What's really going on
The cloud, as at the tent
The ark goes into "the inner sanctuary of the house, to the most holy place, even under the cherubim’s wings" (8:6), and the Tent of Meeting comes up with it: "They brought up the LORD’s ark, the Tent of Meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the Tent" (8:4). When the priests come out, "the cloud filled the LORD’s house" (8:10), "so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud; for the LORD’s glory filled the LORD’s house" (8:11) (tap cloud and glory). Exodus ended the same way at the tent: "Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the LORD’s glory filled the tabernacle" (Exodus 40:34), and "Moses wasn’t able to enter into the Tent of Meeting, because the cloud stayed on it, and the LORD’s glory filled the tabernacle" (Exodus 40:35). In Hebrew the two passages share their words: cloud (anan), glory (kavod) with the LORD's name, filled (male'), and not able: Moses "wasn’t able" and the priests "could not" are the same verb (yakhol). What differs is who and where: Moses at the tabernacle, the priests in the house.
Where it leads to Jesus
Not in temples made with hands
1 Kings 8:27leads toActs 7:55-56
Solomon asks, "But will God in very deed dwell on the earth? Behold, heaven and the heaven of heavens can’t contain you; how much less this house that I have built!" (8:27), and prays, "hear in heaven, your dwelling place" (8:30). Brought before the council (Acts 6:12), Stephen (Acts 7:59) names this house: "But Solomon built him a house" (Acts 7:47). "However, the Most High doesn’t dwell in temples made with hands, as the prophet says" (Acts 7:48), and the words that follow are from Isaiah (Isaiah 66:1), not from Solomon: "heaven is my throne, and the earth a footstool for my feet. What kind of house will you build me?" (Acts 7:49). At the end of his words Stephen "looked up steadfastly into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God" (Acts 7:55), and said, "Behold, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God!" (Acts 7:56). Acts names Solomon's house but doesn't cite 8:27 or 8:30, so setting them side by side is a reading. Some read them together: the God whom heaven can't contain, and whom Solomon asked to hear in heaven, is the God whose glory Stephen sees when he looks "into heaven" (Acts 7:55), with Jesus standing at his right hand. Others read Acts 7:48-49 as Stephen's answer to the charge about "this holy place" (Acts 6:13), in words from Isaiah, and 7:55-56 as what he saw just before he was stoned (Acts 7:58), and don't draw a line from them to 1 Kings 8.
Honest questions
Questions people ask about 1 Kings 8
That was a taste
The rest of 1 Kings 8 is waiting in Favor
- A promise kept, and a promise asked for
- Seven cases, one request
- The foreigner who comes to pray
- A place for you to dwell in
- Not one word failed
- Back to their heart
- 23 questions as you read
- 13 more Hebrew words
- A short check at the end
- Your notes, saved as you go
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The Hebrew word behind it
שָׁמַעshamasay sha-MA
Brown-Driver-Briggs: "hear". Strong's: "to hear intelligently". It is the word of the prayer: 14 times in 12 verses of 8:28-52. Solomon asks the LORD "to listen to the cry and to the prayer" (8:28), and eight times he asks him to hear from heaven (8:30, 8:32, 8:34, 8:36, 8:39, 8:43, 8:45, 8:49): "hear in heaven, your dwelling place; and when you hear, forgive" (8:30). Once the ones who hear are foreigners: "for they shall hear of your great name" (8:42). In chapter 3 Solomon had asked for "an understanding heart" (3:9), in Hebrew a heart that hears, with this verb. In the next chapter the LORD answers, "I have heard your prayer and your supplication that you have made before me" (9:3).
For your group
1 Kings 8 Bible study questions
- 1Solomon said even heaven "can’t contain" God (8:27), and still asked him to hear prayers made toward one house (8:28-30). What helps you believe that a God that great hears you?
- 2Solomon's prayer expects people to sin, "for there is no man who doesn’t sin" (8:46), and gives them words to come back with: "We have sinned" (8:47). What makes those words hard to say, to God or to someone else, and what helps?
- 3"There has not failed one word of all his good promise" (8:56). Which of God's promises have you seen kept, in your life or in the Bible, and which one are you still waiting on?
Leading a group? In Favor, everyone reads 1 Kings 8 during the week and answers these questions privately. Answers stay sealed until you meet, then appear together, and you can print the week's sheet.
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