2 Chronicles 3:1-17 - Building the Prepared House of God

2 Chronicles 3:1-17

Solomon Builds the Temple (1 Kings 6:1–22)

1 Now Solomon began to build the house of the LORD at Jerusalem on Mount Moriah, where the LORD had appeared to his father David, at the place that David had prepared on the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. 2 And he began to build on the second day of the second month in the fourth year of his reign.

3 This is the foundation which Solomon laid for building the house of God: The length was sixty cubits (by cubits according to the former measure) and the width twenty cubits. 4 And the vestibule that was in front of the sanctuary was twenty cubits long across the width of the house, and the height was one hundred and twenty. He overlaid the inside with pure gold. 5 The larger room he paneled with cypress which he overlaid with fine gold, and he carved palm trees and chainwork on it. 6 And he decorated the house with precious stones for beauty, and the gold was gold from Parvaim. 7 He also overlaid the house—the beams and doorposts, its walls and doors—with gold; and he carved cherubim on the walls.

8 And he made the Most Holy Place. Its length was according to the width of the house, twenty cubits, and its width twenty cubits. He overlaid it with six hundred talents of fine gold. 9 The weight of the nails was fifty shekels of gold; and he overlaid the upper area with gold. 10 In the Most Holy Place he made two cherubim, fashioned by carving, and overlaid them with gold. 11 The wings of the cherubim were twenty cubits in overall length: one wing of the one cherub was five cubits, touching the wall of the room, and the other wing was five cubits, touching the wing of the other cherub; 12 one wing of the other cherub was five cubits, touching the wall of the room, and the other wing also was five cubits, touching the wing of the other cherub. 13 The wings of these cherubim spanned twenty cubits overall. They stood on their feet, and they faced inward. 14 And he made the veil of blue, purple, crimson, and fine linen, and wove cherubim into it.

15 Also he made in front of the temple two pillars thirty-five cubits high, and the capital that was on the top of each of them was five cubits. 16 He made wreaths of chainwork, as in the inner sanctuary, and put them on top of the pillars; and he made one hundred pomegranates, and put them on the wreaths of chainwork. 17 Then he set up the pillars before the temple, one on the right hand and the other on the left; he called the name of the one on the right hand Jachin, and the name of the one on the left Boaz.

Solomon built the house of God as prepared by Him and shown to David his father where and how it should be constructed.  The place was on Mount Moriah at Jerusalem where the Angel of the LORD stopped ed the destruction of the city (1 Chronicles 21:18, 22) at the threshing floor of Ornan after David had sinned by counting the people of God (1 Chronicles 21:1-2, 7-8, 14-15) to prove their strength instead of trusting God as their strength over their enemies and had chosen a plague from God over famine or enemy attacks as the price of pride.  That -lace was where mercy and grace were given and an altar erected as a placeholder until this temple was built to seek atonement through sacrifice and worship that trusted God’s glorious sovereign power instead of man’s strength.  The design patterned in the heavens (Hebrews 8:5, 9:8-9) was carefully followed as given to Moses for the traveling tabernacle until the permanent temple design was delivered to the man of war David and passed to Solomon as the man of peace to complete.  The Most Holy Place to meet with God where the Ark of the Covenant was made with the angelic cherubim standing over the mercy seat to seek atonement through the high priest every year then as a foreshadowing of Christ as our permanent High Priest who would sacrifice Himself as He officiated this saving grace once for all (Hebrews 7:27, 9:12, 26, 28, 10:10) whom He calls to Himself to find eternal atonement in His sacrifice of death and resurrection for we the people of God.  It is this perfect temple of Christ Himself that even Solomon as a man of peace could only imitate by the heavenly pattern of the eternal one we now enter to worship in spirit and truth, at peace with God as we trust His work to battle for our souls and not by our religious rites or reliance of compliance.  Such is the grace founded in this pattern given on the mountain to Moses, to David, and built here by Solomon.  They were merely building the prepared house of the LORD God representing the true in the heavens to come, unseen until Jesus Christ revealed it to us.